Bath Bombs are the Bomb!

By: Kathy Sadowski, MS in Aromatherapy, RA, LMT, RYT

4/9/18

Many people I speak with think it would be way to hard to make their own bath bombs.  In fact, it is really not that difficult to make your own fabulous bath bombs at home with your own customized healthy ingredients!  The key is a combination of citric acid and baking soda that makes the bombs fizz when you drop them in the tub.

First, here are a few pointers on choosing the best ingredients for your bath bomb:

• Buy citric acid from bulk suppliers like New Directions Aromatics or Bulk Apothecary.
• Choose natural clay powders to color your bomb instead of chemical colorants.  Options include rose clay, sea clay, and Moroccan red clay.  These can also be purchased by bulk natural ingredients suppliers as listed above.  Another fun way to add color is with unusual sea salts such as pink Himalayan or black Hawaiian.  I have also used charcoal powder for a gray color, but it requires some clean up of the bathtub after the bath!
• Why choose essential oils over fragrance oils?  Essential oils are extracted from an actual plant as apposed to fragrance oils, which are synthetically made and lack the therapeutic properties of plants.  With children, pregnant ladies, sensitive skin, and health conditions, review which essential oils are safe, and reduce the recipe amount of essential oils used by one half.  Great choices for essential oils include: lavender, cedarwood, chamomile, clary sage, geranium, grapefruit, juniper berry, patchouli, petitgrain, pine, and spearmint.   Blending single notes together can make for a nice aroma.
• Bath bomb molds can be stainless steel or plastic, round, or a fun shape.  Some people will cut a tennis ball in half and use it as a mold.  I have also seen people use cookie cutters, silicone ice cube trays, and even empty plastic yogurt containers.  My personal favorite is a three inch stainless steel ball mold that is cut in half because it is easy to quickly shape and remove the bath bomb from this mold.

Bath Bomb Ingredients:

• 16 oz of baking soda
• 8 oz of sea salt
• 8 oz of citric acid
• 8 oz of corn starch
• 1 oz sea clay or rose powder
• 2 Tbsp of water
• 6 Tbsp of oil such as sweet almond
• 60 drops of essential oil
• Bath bomb mold
• blow dryer shrink wrap

This recipe will make 6 of the three inch ball sized bath bombs.  Do not double the recipe, instead make a second batch.  Whenever I have tried doubling the recipe, the second half of the bath bombs have not turned out as well.

Now that you have all your bath bomb ingredients ready, it is all about the technique!

• First, mix the dry ingredients together in a large bowl.
• In a separate bowl, mix all the wet ingredients. ***If it is a wet or humid day outside, use less or no water in the recipe.  If you live in the desert, maybe add a little more water to the recipe.
• Pour the wet ingredients into the bowl with the dry ingredients.  It may start to get fizzy!  Stir quickly and act fast.  Try to get 6 bath bombs packed and laid to dry in 6 minutes.  If you dilly dally, it seems the bombs do not form as well.
• Pack the ingredients quickly into your mold, tap the mold, and quickly remove from the mold.  For a circle mold, overfill each half of the circle, squash together to make a tightly packed bath bomb, tap each side of the mold a few times, and then immediately remove one half of the mold, then the other.
• Set the bath bombs on parchment paper to dry for at least 24 hours.
• Shrink wrapping adds a nice touch.  You can buy blow dryer shrink wrap in pouch shapes the size of a sandwich bag.

YouTube Video on making bath bombs

Pictured:  Three inch round bath bombs, shrink wrapped, and in an organza bag with a special wide bottom.  Plus, Avery scallop round tag labels: number 80511.