So here’s the next installment of our deep dive into the nitty gritty of shampoo bars:

What do you find are the pros and cons of different oils when making a shampoo bar? What about olive vs. coconut oil? Also, do you think it likely that castor oil would cause build-up?

I have ditched the vinegar and started using lime juice. That might partially account for the rave-y quality of my last few reviews. This lime juice stuff is amazing! My hair is so soft and shiny. Wow! I’m using about the same amount as I did with the vinegar: 1 few teaspoons to a tablespoon in a bottle of water, to be poured on after the shampoo-ing and rinsing.

You have to try it!

I’m also considering checking out citric acid (aka sour salt) and maybe even ascorbic acid (vitamin C powder), both of which I’ve heard work well too.

The other good thing, of course, is that there’s no vinegar smell. Speaking of smells, the rest of my reviews will focus on fragranced shampoo bars and soaps. It turns out the hubster really prefer for my hair to smell like something other than soap. You know, something lightly fruity or flowery like most salon shampoos. So I need to find something that he likes, but also something that won’t bother me. I’ve mostly gravitated towards the citrus-y fruity side: orange, bergamot, yuzu. I’ll let you know how it goes.

And the experiment continues…

I’m on a roll — another shampoo bar that you can actually go and buy right now. And believe me, you’ll want to! This one is called Wild Mane and is offered by Dreamseeds Organics.

Ingredients: Extra virgin organic olive oil, infused with nettle leaf, usnea and horsetail, castor, sweet almond, avocado, coconut, palm oils, fair trade shea butter and eco friendly silk, saponified with nettle infusion; Essential oils of rosemary, peppermint, cedarwood, sage, lemon, ylang ylang and Italian lavender

Doesn’t this read like a list of all the best good-for-your-hair ingredients there are?

Smell: This shampoo bar has a stronger smell than most of the ones I’ve tested. It’s an earthy, herbal smell that I find very soothing. After washing, the smell doesn’t really linger in my hair.

Texture: This bar glides really easily over my hair and oh my, the bubbles! There are lots and lots of bubbles. It’s wonderful!

Did it clean my hair and scalp? Absolutely — it finds that balance between leaving me feeling perfectly fresh and clean, yet not too squeaky or stripped.

How does my hair look and feel? So wonderful. Ever since I started using shampoo bars, pretty much every day is a good hair day. But this bar takes it a step further and my hair is so, shiny, soft and drapey. I love it!

Price plus shipping: $6.00 plus $3.25 for a 4 ounce bar

Verdict: Double double thumbs up. I love this bar!

I was really curious about a few specific shampoo-bar related questions and fielded them with some of my new favorite soap makers. What’s interesting is how different their answers are, leading me to the conclusion that there really are no cut and dry answers here. I guess this means we’re all going to have to just do our own ‘great shampoo bar experiments’ to find out what works best for our particular hair. So let’s dive into this one first:

What do you see as the main difference between regular soap and shampoo bars?

You’re in for a treat — an awesome shampoo bar that is actually in-stock! Today we have a wonderful shampoo bar from Sweet Creek Herbs.

Ingredients: coconut oil, castor oil, extra virgin olive oil, jojoba, added emu oil, avocado oil, essential oils of tea tree, rosemary, and basil

If you ever get into a convo with Kathleen, you’ll find that she takes her soapmaking extremely seriously and has done a ton of research. So you can be sure that every ingredient on this list is there for a reason.

Smell: This shampoo bar has a very soft, herbal smell. I think it’s mostly tea tree and rosemary that I detect, but it is not overpowering at all. Once my hair is washed, the only thing that lingers is a comforting, soapy smell.

Texture: This is a nice, hard bar that glides really easily over my hair. It lathers up really well, with nice, long-lasting bubbles.

Did it clean my hair and scalp? You betcha — this bar does a great job and rinses away very cleanly.

How does my hair look and feel? Fantastic! I love how soft and silky my hair feels. And I think it looks even shinier than usual when using this bar.

Price plus shipping: $5.00 plus $4.80 for a 4+ ounce bar

Verdict: Absolute thumbs up, this one’s definitely a keeper. I tried the Green Herbal bar, but Kathleen also has Chamomile Ylang Ylang, Marshamallow Root, Rosemary Honey and Lavendar Shea shampoo bars listed. Yummy!

First off, you should read the ‘About me’ page for this store — what a great story. I love how entire businesses can grow off of chance occurrences. Your child takes piano lessons at a goat farm and next thing you know, bam!, you’re running your own soap-making business

So our next shampoo bar is the beer shampoo bar from Country Soaps by Marlene . Let me start off by apologizing for reviewing another sold-out shampoo, but the good news is that Marlene does have a few other shampoo bars listed.

Ingredients : Olive, Castor, Almond, Jojoba, coconut, almond butter, palm, wheat & silk proteins, beer & NaOH

This bar has some of the ingredients I’ve learned to love in shampoo bars, including jojoba oil, wheat and silk proteins, and, of course, beer.

Smell: This soap is basically unscented, but the almost oil/butter gives it that almond-y smell I tend to associate with maraschino cherries. It’s very soft and subtle.

Texture : This is a slightly softer bar than some, rubs on easily and lathers up really well.

Did it clean my hair and scalp? Yes, it did. It seems to have a slight bit of waxiness right up against my scalp, but nothing that affected the look and feel of my hair.

How does my hair look and feel? Very nice — this one leaves my hair slightly on the squeaky side so I think it would work best for fine hair.

Verdict: Thumbs up

A Scentsible World (BJRussell) offers several yummy sounding shampoo bars (the Herbal Silk bar I’m reviewing today is shown on top in the picture, the Peppermint Tea Tree I’ll save for another day, but that’s the one sitting below).

Ingredients: coconut oil, babassu oil, palm oil, castor oil, rice bran oil infused with marshmallow root, chickweed, nettle leaf, Horsetail and Chamomile, shea butter, cocoa butter, hydrolyzed silk proteins

I’ve heard lots of good things about marshmallow root in shampoo bars, horsetail is one of the ingredients in the Giovanni leave-in conditioner I like so much, so I’m happy to see that in here, and the silk proteins I’m finding are great for giving me that silky, glide-y feeling.

Smell: This bar has a surprisingly earthy smell (surprising to me, based on the ingredients — I’m not sure what is imparting the most fragrance). I find it quite pleasant, but it is on the stronger side compared to most of the other bars I am reviewing.

Texture: This is, again, a nice, hard bar of soap which glides very easily over my hair, forming a nice, long-lasting lather.

Did it clean my hair and scalp? Yes, very well indeed.

How does my hair look and feel? Really nice — soft and silky, and not weighed-down at all. I’m really happy with the results of this one.

Price plus shipping: $6.95 + $2.95 for a 4-5 oz bar

Verdict: Big thumbs up! Barbara also offers herbal hair rinses in her store, which might interest those of you looking for something a bit more special than plain old vinegar.

I debated on whether to delay my review on this soap, as it seems that Dragon’s Den is temporarily shut down due to a family emergency (hope everything’s okay, Amanda!). But I’ve decided to go ahead and write my review now, while the experience is still fresh in my mind.

Ingredients: Olive, palm kernel, and castor oils, water, lye, cocoa butter and hemp oil, honey, grapefruit seed extract, essential oil blend (Lemon, Lavender, Bitter Almond, and Ginger)

Smell: This soap has a light, slightly earthy smell which is really only detectable if you hold the soap right up to your nose. Afterwards, the only smell I noticed on my hair was the comforting smell of soap.

Texture: This is a nice, hard shampoo bar that glides well over my hair and lathers up really nicely. The bubbles are really slippery and long lasting (as opposed to some soaps which seem to break down faster and don’t give that slippery / lather-y feel).

Did it clean my hair and scalp? Yes, in a wonderful way. Both hair and scalp were left feeling light and clean.

How does my hair look and feel? I loved the way this bar made my hair feel — it was really light, yet silky, so I’m thinking it left something behind to condition my hair, but in a very non-greasy, non-heavy way. I had thought the only way to get this effect was with silk proteins, but maybe it’s the honey or something, working its magic here.

Price plus shipping: $6.00 + $2.50 for a 5 oz bar

Verdict: Two big thumbs up! I’ll be visiting again in January when Amanda opens back up.

Here’s another lovely beer shampoo bar, this one from CCrafters. In addition to this one, there is also a Botanical shampoo bar that sounds yummy as well.

Ingredients: Saponified oils of olive, coconut, palm avocado, hemp-seed, castor and shea butter, beer, purified water infusion of rosemary, burdock, nettle and chamomile, essential oils of pink grapefruit, lemongrass, rosemary

There’s that beer again, and rosemary and nettle, both of which are supposed to be excellent for promoting healthy hair.

Smell: This shampoo bar has a delightful citrusy note to it, but it’s very light, not overpowering in the least. I think it’s probably the grapefruit and the lemongrass I smell. When lathering up, I also detected a little bit of hoppiness.

Texture: This is another slightly grabby soap, but it lathers up very well. The bubbles to break down a little sooner than other soaps I’ve tried, but they are definitely sufficient to get a nice head full of clean hair.

Did it clean my hair and scalp? Yes, definitely!

How does my hair look and feel? Wonderful! This is another bar that leaves a little something behind to condition my hair and help it feel soft and silky. I haven’t tried it, but I would definitely experiment with skipping the vinegar and / or leave-in conditioner with this one.

Price plus shipping: $5.00 + $3.00 for a 4.5 oz bar

Verdict: Definite thumbs up. I can see this one becoming one of my regulars.

Shampoo bar number four is Hot Summer Nights by Baby Bird Bath Works. This was actually the first shampoo bar I ever tried. I’ve been holding off on reviewing it because I’ve been waiting for Merna, the shop owner, to make some unscented soap. Although I really like the fragrance, I’ve found that I’m more sensitive to smells these days and anything that has a fragrance tends to distract me. However, I was in the mood for fragrance this morning, so I decided to use my Hot Summer Nights and see if it’s as good as I remembered, after having sampled all these other shampoo bars… It is!

Ingredients: Beer, saponified oils of (olive, coconut, palm, cocoa butter, castor) fragrance

This is one of the simplest soaps I’ll be reviewing, ingredients-wise. But I think this soap demonstrates that you don’t actually need a lot of additives to make an exceptional product. Must be in the technique of how it’s made. I’m starting to realize that soapmaking is a lot like baking. Two bars can have the same exact ingredients, just like two cookies can, but the end result is just as dependent on the proportions of the ingredients and skills of the soapmaker / baker.

Smell: This will be the only bar I review that has fragrance oils added. As I mentioned, I prefer light or no scents. As fragrances go though, this is a really pleasant one — fresh and fruity. Here’s a quote from Merna’s listing, since I’m not that great at describing fragrances: “Then we fragranced it with a wonderful blend of summery scents including melon, kiwi, citrus fruits and lime. It smells like a sweet breeze on a hot night without being overwhelmingly fruity.” I know Merna’s working on some specially formulated shampoo bars that will be unscented, and I am really looking forward to picking some up.

Texture: This has been the yardstick that I’ve measured my shampoo bar testing against. This bar glides over my hair like butter on hot corn on the cob. Then it lathers up beautifully with rich, long lasting bubbles.

Did it clean my hair and scalp? Yes, absolutely. Both hair and scalp come out squeaky clean.

How does my hair look and feel? This bar somehow manages to find that rare balance between cleaning well and leaving my hair conditioned at the same time. I think I could easily skip the leave-in conditioner. The comb glides effortlessly through my hair, and even when soaking wet, my hair has that glide-y feeling I was talking about earlier. Once it’s dry, it feels super soft and glossy. I should probably mention that this might be a soap that is too heavy for those with really fine hair.

Price plus shipping: $4.50 + $2.80 for a 4 oz bar. She’s sold out now, but I happen to know there’s an unscented batch on the way.

Verdict: Total thumbs up. This is one of my absolute favorites!