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The cream got “dew” on the lid!
I made a small batch of eye cream, and filled in small plastic jars when the cream was cooled down - both room and cream was aprox. 21Celsius. After a few days the small jars got a kind of dew on the lid - it was not to hot or cold in the room - and the temp. is “constant”. What could be wrong here? I have never experienced this problem before. Here is picture:
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16 Replies
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Do you have anything to monitor humidity?
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I presumed just capped off a little too quick, as in let settle a bit longer
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You capped it when the cream in the pot was too hot.
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I waited 5 days before I filled the small jars - temp. was 21 degrees and I filled from a small plastic bag with no air or dew, This happened after a few days. Is there any other suggestions what I did wrong - maybe with the recipe?
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I don’t think you “did anything wrong” … where are you located? In a hot, humid climate that cools down at night?
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In Norway - and the temperature is aprox. 21 degrees both day and night. Maybe there is no good answer of what happened with these jars. Could it be the plastic jar? Is that possibe?
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Did the product get any sun-exposure? that could increase evaporation in the packaging.
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That happens all the time depending on where you are in the world like mark said, what your Diurnal Range is? Like in a desert it will be super hot in the day & freezing at night. So you need better equipment & vacuums! Such is life…
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You might want to post your Formula as there are factors which could be causing this unrelated to fill temperatures.
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It’s not just fill temperature but temperature difference between cream and lid/exterior in general. Because the lid is often the thinnest part it cools down faster than the pot/cream base and cause water vapour to condense. This can even happen in a fridge just because of temperature variations between of less than 1°C. It can also go the other way round and the condense droplets may disappear again should temp rise or you find yourself with water droplets on the cream.This effect is what we call sweating and happens more often with creams containing high water activity such as cold creams (those without emulsifier or just small amounts thereof), emulsions of a “swollen oil phase type” (high lanolin), and other types which are basically stabilised by a high melting point oil phase (high wax or hydrogenated oils) rather than emulsifiers and contain few to no water soluble ingredients/humectants. Hence, this phenomenon can also be an indication of poor preservation in case one uses a hurdle approach (especially with o/w emulsions) or that your emulsion is not perfect and contains “water pockets” (obviously only the case with w/o emulsions and borderline lamellar/mixed types).I’ve seen it (today actually too
) mostly with simple pharmaceutical base creams which are stored in the fridge and are either taken out regularly or the fridge is used regularly = a lot of temperature fluctuations, no humectants or water gelling agents in there, and low amount of emulsifier but thoroughly gelled oil phases. -
Now that u mentioned it, I just had a look at some jars I’d previously made and there is some sweat it condemnation in lid where I’m sure I gave it ample time to cool down. As Pharma kind of states above they are based on a high melting point wax, with no gelling agents.
Not supposing it will solve anything as opposed to hide it but am buying some airless tubes as heard it has many benefits. -
Thank you all for your comments!! The cream has low melting point and it is O/W and aprox. 80% juice (waterphrase) and I now believe it is a mix of reasons that you have pointed out for me! I only made a small batch of 500 grams - using a stick blender since the batch was so small. - thank you!
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@Pharma, would it help to fill the jars whilst the product is still a bit warm, then put them in the fridge for a while before putting the lids on?
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We have fixed the problem in Commercial applications by simply increasing the glycols.
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Excellent good to know!
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Another strategy, apart from glycols and other humectants, is gelling water phase (think gummy bears which are actually gelled glycerol/sugar rich water and they rarely “sweat”). A different option is using insulated lids such as those with “styrofoam” or plasticised “cardboard” inserts, thick ones which contain air in between, jars with a second smaller “cream cover”, airless dispensers, or tubes. Although, tubes will still form condensation and extra care has to be taken in order to preserve head space since condensation drops are the first place where microbes grow.
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