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Yooper

Ale's What Cures You!
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I had one or two people ask me a bit more about soapmaking, and requested I start a thread.

First, the definition of soap is the salt of a fatty acid. If you remember your high school chemistry, the process of saponification takes fats and alkalai (lye) and makes a new substance, which is soap.

So, in order to make soap you need lye. The pioneers would use wood ash, but we have lye (sodium hydroxide). Remember that it is a strong base, and is caustic! I buy my lye from a soap making source, but it's available at Ace in my state as Rooto 100% lye and it works just fine.

For fats, there are many choices. Most people like coconut oil and lard, but there are many other choices as well. Things like palm oil, tallow, and various other oils make great soaps.

I tend to use olive oil (pomace grade), coconut oil, palm oil, and shea butter, along with smaller amounts of castor oil and other oils.

Homemade soap is not nearly as drying to your skin (no detergents!) and there are no weird added ingredients. Soap is, well, just soap. You can add more oils than can be saponified, and that is called "superfatting" so that the soap has a bit more oil, for a less drying effect.

Soaping is easy, and the process is easy. The thing to remember is that lye is caustic, and the lye/water and oil mixtures get HOT. Not only caustic, but hot as well. So googles, gloves, and long sleeves are strongly recommended along with an area with good ventilation.

I will continue this tomorrow, with photos, and recipes, and helpful hints so that anybody can make a batch of soap. Please let me know of any questions in the meantime!
 
My wife make her own bath and laundry soap. I know she use olive oils as a base for bath soap. If i remember correctly the laundry soap is 1.5 bars grated peppermint Castillo 1 cup borax 1 cup washing soda and 1/2 cup baking soda
 
Im already voting for a sticky. I am so desperate to make hop soap after ordering some DFH 90 min pale soap and it made me and everything else so hoppy.
 
I'd definitely like to see a soap making discussion!
Do you make any liquid hand soaps? Eczema and washing my hands a hundred times a day makes me want some nice soap.
 
I can't believe I've never considered making my own soap, but as someone with pretty sensitive skin, it sounds really appealing. Looking forward to learning more. Thanks Yooper! :mug:
 
can you just add some aloe vera gel into your bar of soap? i love that stuff. and what kinds of things should you use for scent
 
I have to head off to work, so I'll put some more things down later.

But one of the great things about making your own soap is you can use ANY liquid you want- aloe vera gel, coconut milk, coffee, goat's milk. These liquids do sometimes need special treatment as the oil/lye mixture gets hot and things like milk can scorch. But there are some work-arounds, and I will definitely explain them.

I only do cold process soaping, and have limited knowledge of hot process or oven processing, but I can describe a bit about them.

You can do lots of "specialty" soaps- pine tar for ezcema, certain soaps for acne, etc. You can make laundry soap by not superfatting, and then grating the bars for example! And the "detergent" by mixing washing soda, those soap flakes, and borax is awesome!

Liquid soaps are a bit different, and I have limited experience with them. I can provide some links for them, though. They use a different chemical, potassium hydroxide, for a softer result.

Which reminds me! For a regular bar of soap, you'll need to read the container of lye and make sure it's 100% sodium hydroxide.

As far as fragrance, you can choose essential oils and or fragrance oils, or go fragrance-free. The heating of the soap sometimes "blows off" much of the fragrance so typically quite a bit is added, like .5 ounce (or more) per pound of oils. Fragrance oils can cause some problems, like seizing of the soap, but many people like those "smelly" soaps and so find it worth it. I do use some essential oils, but in fairly small quantities as I don't like heavily scented soap.

As far as additional ingredients, things like spices and hops turn brown in cold process soap so they aren't really very pretty but they still are kind of neat. Exfoliating things are nice for hand soap by the sink- like a gardeners soap with coffee grounds or poppy seeds. I use some ground oatmeal in several of my soaps and it's really nice in the shower.

If you think about what you love, you can probably incorporate it into soap!

As far as soap molds, you can buy the fancy ones. Or you can use just about any container you have lying around. I'm not neat with freezer paper lined boxes, and found my soap was all crinkly, so I bought silicone loaf pans and just use that. To cut the soap, I use my hand slicer for carrots (the crinkle cut one from Pampered Chef) or the straight handled cutter. I'll cut some soap this afternoon and take a picture of that.

For equipment- you need some non-reactive bowls and pans. That means no aluminum! Stainless is great, and so is pyrex or glass or plastic. A thing to note is that pyrex and glass are not great for mixing lye. It seems like a few people have had even Pryex break because it gets really hot, really fast. So a tall Tupperware pitcher seems to be best.

You always, but always, add the lye to water and never the other way around. A boiling lye volcano is dangerous! So, you make sure the pitcher is way taller than you think you need, weigh the water (everything is by weight, not volume) and add the weighed lye slowly and stir well. Let it sit to cool while you prepare your oils. Again, wear goggles, long sleeves, shoes (don't ask!), plastic gloves while you mix the lye, and make sure you're in a well-ventilated area and do NOT breathe the lye fumes. This is great to do outside, but be careful when you carry it back into the house and make sure no kids or animals are underfoot or can touch this mixture!
 
Ingredients

There are many different kinds of oils you can use- grapeseed oil, olive oil, coconut oil, lard, even Crisco. There are sources on the internet that can give you the qualities of each oil, and what they bring to the soap, so I won't go into that much. Castile soap is traditionally 100% olive oil, and is well liked by most people for its gentleness, but can get slimy (some say "snotty") in the soap dish in the shower. Animal fats tend to produce a nice firm soap, but some people have objections to animal products, and use all vegetable oils with good results. You can also use "butters"- like cocoa butter or shea butter. I've used a bit of castor oil for nicer lather. There are lots and lots of recipes on the internet, and a good basic bar is pretty easy to formulate.

Now, comes the important part! Lye. In order to make soap, you need to have the lye (as was discussed earlier). The important thing to remember is that you need to have the proper amounts of fats/oils and lye. If you have too much lye, you will have a lye-heavy bar that will be caustic on your skin. If you have too little lye, the soap will be a mushy sodden mess. You need to calculate the amount of lye you need for a certain amount of oils. The tricky part is that each type of fat has a different saponification level. The work around on this is to use a free internet calculator that includes the probable levels of each oil. I use soapcalc.net. http://www.soapcalc.net/calc/SoapCalcWP.asp The other important thing is to err a bit on the side of too much oil, instead of too much lye. Most people will always do a "lye discount", or "superfat" of about 5% to ensure they don't have a lye heavy bar even if they aren't 100% accurate with the calculation. You can go much heavier with superfatting if you'd like. I like a nice bath bar with about 7-8% superfat. For laundry soap, I would not discount the lye but that is the only case.

Water amount isn't critical, but you need to have enough to mix up the soap. If you use a bit too much, the worst thing that will happen is the bars take longer to dry and cure. Most people will use a set amount of water (or other liquid), as a percentage of the amount of oils. That is generally around 38% as a default. I'd suggest sticking with that until you know exactly how to use more or less, and are experienced.

So, what does all this mean? Ok, let's put it into practice.

Say, you want to make a "general" body bar using olive oil, coconut oil, and palm oil. You have one loaf pan, so you want about 25 ounces of oils. Coconut oil makes a nice hard bar, with fluffy lather and is very cleansing. But it can be drying. Palm oil also makes a hard bar, with stable lather. Olive oil is very conditioning, and mild, but without much lather. So mixing those three can give you a wonderful bar of soap. So, let's use 40% olive oil, 30% palm oil, and 30% coconut oil, with 7% superfat (lye discount).

Using soapcalc for the lye, we get: lye 3.528 ounces (it's most accurate in grams, so I'd use grams for lye- 100 grams).

The water, at 38% of the oils, is 9.5 ounces.

That makes our recipe:

That gives us:
10 ounces olive oil
7.5 ounces palm oil
7.5 ounces coconut oil
100 grams lye
9.5 ounces cold water

Now, if that seems too difficult I understand! So feel free to pick a recipe from a good internet source or book. But always still run it though a lye calculator!!!!!!! You do not want to have a lye heavy soap, or a big pile of goop, and oils are expensive.
 
Technique

Now, the key is to combine these ingredients and make soap!

Gather your ingredients.

DSCN0642.jpg

First, any oils that are solid at room temperature need to be melted. So, weigh them and put them on low heat to melt.

DSCN0647.jpg
 
Then, mix up your lye by putting into the water slowly. Make sure you are wearing your safety gear! And this will get really hot, really fast. My lye mixture is brown, because I used some beer as half of the water.

Set that aside to cool, to under 130 degrees.
DSCN0646.jpg

While the lye cools, finish measuring any liquid oils and add that to your melted hard oils.
DSCN0648.jpg

Let the oil cool as well, until both the lye mixture and the oils are about 110-118 degrees. That's when it's time to combine them. Pour the lye liquid slowly into the oils as you stir well. You can do this by hand, but recipe with lots of oil olive can take hours to be ready to pour this way! You don't want to whip air into your soap, either, so I mixer isn't great. The best equipment I've found is an immersion blender. Go slow, though, as you don't want to either have the soap set up too fast, or burn up your blender! Give it a burst of 10 seconds, then stir with the motor off for 20 seconds.
DSCN0649.jpg

You're looking for "trace"- when you drag a spoon through the soap and drop some back onto the surface, it should leave a trail (or a "trace") of soap on the surface. That's when it's ready to pour. It should thicken up, look like a runny pudding, and be more opaque. When you're at thin trace, add your essential oils or fragrance or color, pour into your mold:
DSCN0650.jpg

This is a bit different than that orange soap! I made two batches yesterday, and it's hard to take pictures once you start mixing as trace can happen in a few minutes. The second batch was a white soap with a chocolate swirl on top so it's different colors but you get the idea!
 
Next, insulate the soap. I put mine in a box, with a towel over it. You don't want it to overheat, but you want it to finish saponifying, and to reach "gel stage":
DSCN0651.jpg

You can peak, to see if it's getting too hot, but it should take about a day or longer to get hard enough to cut (depending on ingredients). Olive oil soaps may take longer, while palm and coconut oil soaps will be ready as soon as they cool. You can let it sit overnight, and then check by gently pressing with your finger. If it's firm, it's ready to come out of the mold.

It's easy to break soap trying to dig it out of the mold, so line the mold with freezer paper or use a silicone mold you can "pop" out like an ice cube tray:
DSCN0652.jpg

Put your soap on a cutting board (it's still fairly soft at this point). You want to cut it when it's firm enough to hold together but not rock hard because it'll crumble. This today felt like cheddar cheese. Firm, but easy to cut.

DSCN0653.jpg

I use those cutters that I had on hand for other use. I made a variety of different sized bars, and thickness, as Bob likes small bars in the shower while I like longer ones and I give some as gifts. You can also use potato peelers to bevel the edges, and trim up the soaps to look nice, but mine are 100% "handmade looking":
DSCN0654.jpg
DSCN0655.jpg

Set them aside in a dry place on a rack to cure for at least 4 weeks. Longer is better, as the soap will get harder and milder as it cures. Most olive oil soaps need 8 weeks to get nice and hard. The lathering improves as it cures as well.
 
Once the soaps are fully cured, you can store them in a drawer or closet or box- but not wrapped in plastic. They will "sweat" if wrapped in plastic.

I've made shampoo bars, body bars, facial bars, laundry soap, etc, and the technique is all the same. You can vary the oils based on what you have on hand, and what you'd like to accomplish with your soaps. Some oils are really expensive (like shea butter and jojoba) so they are "special" occasion gift bars.

Milk soaps feel really nice on the skin, and they are worth doing. A couple of tips about milk, beer, honey- those have high sugar contents and will BURN easily when added to the lye. So, if using milk for your liquid, freeze it first and add the lye to it when it's frozen. It'll still get really warm, but not turn quite as brown as if it got up to the 170s if you didn't freeze the milk first. Honey is nice in small quantities, but not too much because the sugar in honey will burn plus make it sticky. Beer must be boiled to remove the alcohol (alcohol causes soap to seize) plus it must be flat before adding. Coffee can be added as is (cold of course, to keep the lye mixture from getting boiling hot), and you can use steeped tea as the liquid if you'd like.

There are some things to note about adding herbs and stuff- they turn brown and can get hard. I tried it with hops, and it was just "ok" because they turned brown and lost their fragrance. I"m not sure how to get hop aroma in the finished soap, as even the essential oils fade a lot. A friend made a lavender soap with chopped fresh lavender. It sounds lovely, but the herb got hard and scratchy. So, think about that when adding herbs and flowers. Steeping herbs in the oils and/or water is a nice way to add them, but they don't keep the fragrance after saponification. I use some herbal infusions, and then add a little essential oil when pouring the soap into the mold, to keep a bit of the fragrance.

That's all I can think of right now. I'll provide more information if I forgot anything, or if someone has questions!
 
Oh, another thing I just thought of!

Commercial soaps have their glycerine removed during manufacture. The glycerine is then sold as a skin softener.

Well, when you make your own soap, you have the glycerine in there naturally. So, even though soap is NOT moisturizing, it can be conditioning. It can clean very well, but still not have that "squeeky clean" feeling due to the glycerine being removed. Bob has oily skin, while mine is dry. But we both can use the same soap in the bath with the same good results, because the homemade soap cleans without overstripping.

I make the shampoo bars with different ingredients, with more castor oil and jojoba oils, but my face and body bars are pretty much traditional soap.

My all time favorite recipe so far for bath/body soap is: Olive oil pomace grade- 30%; Coconut oil- 30%; shea butter- 20%; palm oil- 20%. That made a nice rich soap that cleans well and had nice smooth creamy and bubbly lather. The bar was nice and hard and didn't turn to goop in the shower.

For homemade soap, you need a soap dish that drains (or put the soap on a sponge on the little soap shelves in your shower) because the soap will melt if left in standing water. Probably due to the glycerine still in it.
 
Just so I understand, no actual heating is required unless you need to melt additives? Lye added to cold water just creates heat chemically, correct?
 
These fancy soaps are great and everything, but I want to hear about the soap you make from wood ashes and tallow from the rendered fat of game you've harvested!
 
These fancy soaps are great and everything, but I want to hear about the soap you make from wood ashes and tallow from the rendered fat of game you've harvested!

Ha! The tallow, yes. Those deer have lots of nice chunks of fat to use.

But wood ash? Nope not me. I should do it sometime for fun, just to do it. We sure have a lot of hard wood ash in the fall from the fireplace, so I could give it a try sometime.

My friend told me she used her old brewpot (turkey fryer) for rendering the beef tallow she gave me. I think I may do the same but I can use my turkey fryer pot ontop of my gas range indoors.
 
I love this thread!

Totally into the idea of making soap now. Chemical reactions using basic ingredients, resulting in a highly customizable artisanal version of an everyday product -- sounds a lot like home brewing.

What's your opinion on "crock pot" soapmaking, such as described in this here link?

I'm asking mainly out of idle curiosity, as someone who has never made soap and doesn't have an opinion one way or another.

Also, do you recommend any particular forums? Is there an alternate universe of HomeSoapTalk.com somewhere? (motto: RDWTABWHS*)


* Relax, don't worry, take a bath with homemade soap
 
Ha! The tallow, yes. Those deer have lots of nice chunks of fat to use.

But wood ash? Nope not me. I should do it sometime for fun, just to do it. We sure have a lot of hard wood ash in the fall from the fireplace, so I could give it a try sometime.

My friend told me she used her old brewpot (turkey fryer) for rendering the beef tallow she gave me. I think I may do the same but I can use my turkey fryer pot ontop of my gas range indoors.

If you try it, please document it and post up. I don't know what's going to happen when the mayan calendar runs out, but I'm pretty sure being able to make soap from ashes and fat will come in handy. If you teach us how, at least those of us who survive will be well stocked with alcohol and smell nice.
 
ok one question, what are the essential oils? as they seemed to be added near the end.

Essential oils distilled pure oils from plants. I use some of them for fragrance in soaps and lotions and bath salts, but they are most common for aromatherapy applications.

You don't want to use food coloring or flavoring for soaps, say, like vanilla extract. It will cause the soap to seize up and ruin it. You can't use any flavor extracts with alcohol, either, due to seizing and burning.

As far as the crockpot method, I think it would be great but I've never tried it. I don't have an appropriate crockpot with a removable liner so clean up would be bad for me.

I've been on the soapmaking.com forum, but it's not a very busy forum. I got most of my first recipes and tips from Kathy Miller's soap pages, called millersoap.com. There are some pretty good resources out there that give indepth pointers and help. There are many youtube videos, too, so you can "see" the process.
 
Just so I understand, no actual heating is required unless you need to melt additives? Lye added to cold water just creates heat chemically, correct?

Yes, that is correct. This particular technique is "cold process" soapmaking. The heat generated is strictly chemical in nature. First, the lye and water mixture will get HOT (like boiling hot), and even volcano on you and should be in a very tall pitcher. Then, it will cool. If you mix your oils and lye solution at 110 degrees (recommended until you're proficient and then you can experiment with colder or warmer temps depending on ingredients), it will heat up as it saponifies. It will reach a gel stage in the mold, and then cool off. You don't have to gel the soap, but it cures faster if you allow this process to happen.

There are other soapmaking techniques, like hot process, that uses gentle heat to make the soap using things like crockpots or even the oven but I haven't done that so I can't speak from experience with those techniques.
 
had a friend make me sum patchouli soap and love it!! yeah, i know, dirty hippie smell but i love it.. i keep a bar in my undies drawer and makes everything smell great.. homemade bars of soap works perfect as a drawer fragrance :mug:
 
FYI, I was having a hard time finding NaOH at local retailers. You remember those drain-cleaning lye crystals they used to sell? Yeah, they stopped doing that. Meth: ruiner of everything.

But online retailers of soapmaking supplies seem to abound. I haven't ordered from any of these, so links are purely for research/informational purposes: Sweet Cakes - Texas Natural Supply - Biodiesel Barn (ha ha, biodiesel AND soap making supplies!) - other various sources listed at About.com: Where to buy lye - and of course, Essential Depot (cleverly deduced from the label in Yooper's pics)
 
If it is hard to cut like cheese, try using a cheese wire. I use an old piece of fishing wire for my cheese cutter that works great.
 
FYI, I was having a hard time finding NaOH at local retailers. You remember those drain-cleaning lye crystals they used to sell?

I found some 100% lye drain cleaner at Ace hardware. They didn't have it in stock, but they were happy to order some for me. Also found it at Wilco for about $5.
http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2845800

My hard to find item is palm oil. Went to every nonstandard grocery store in town this week and couldn't locate any. I ended up ordering some online, and I'm impatiently waiting for it to show up on my doorstep. This weekend, I may try out some castille soap, which (as I recall) is just olive oil, lye, water, coloring, and a scent.
 
I found some 100% lye drain cleaner at Ace hardware. They didn't have it in stock, but they were happy to order some for me. Also found it at Wilco for about $5.
http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2845800

My hard to find item is palm oil. Went to every nonstandard grocery store in town this week and couldn't locate any. I ended up ordering some online, and I'm impatiently waiting for it to show up on my doorstep. This weekend, I may try out some castille soap, which (as I recall) is just olive oil, lye, water, coloring, and a scent.

Castille is great- but it can get "slimy" in the shower (I've heard it described as "snot-like" for what it's worth!). But if you use, say 80% olive oil and 20% coconut oil, you could get a very nice bar with grocery store ingredients.
 
... (alcohol causes soap to seize)

Yooper, so would that rule out using cologne for fragrance in the soap? ... Do you know of a way to use cologne, perfume ?

Also, does that submersion blender have to be dedicated for non-food use after using it for soap? or does it clean-up enough to be used in cooking after that. Thanx!
 
Castille is great- but it can get "slimy" in the shower (I've heard it described as "snot-like" for what it's worth!). But if you use, say 80% olive oil and 20% coconut oil, you could get a very nice bar with grocery store ingredients.

Hehe, gross. :)
I have some coconut oil at home and will add some to the recipe. Thanks!
 
Hehe, gross. :)
I have some coconut oil at home and will add some to the recipe. Thanks!

I love castille- it's very mild, but the slime is kinda gross.

Castille takes a longer time to cure, so make sure to leave it in the mold until nice and firm and then let it sit for 4 months to cure in a cool dry place (if you can). It will get harder and nicer over the curing time, but it will be safe to use much sooner than that.
 
I recall a passage in one of Laura Ingalls Wilder's books describing a jar of slimy grey soap. Not in a gross way. That's just what soap was to them. It did the job!
 
okay yooper, now I want to make soap.

a question: I really like shaving with soaps - i used dr bronners for a while and am now onto something from Mama Bear or something like that - how would I go about making a soap ideal for shaving with?

Go on, Learn me!
 
okay yooper, now I want to make soap.

a question: I really like shaving with soaps - i used dr bronners for a while and am now onto something from Mama Bear or something like that - how would I go about making a soap ideal for shaving with?

Go on, Learn me!

You know what's funny? I didn't know it, but Mama Bear is in my neck of the woods and I've never noticed. Someone else mentioned it to me.

Anyway, there are some shaving soap recipes I've seen in various places, and they seem really straight forward but I've never done it. They tend to use clay (for "slip") but otherwise seem pretty much the same as other cold process soaps.

If I was going to make shaving soap (and I never have, so take that FWIW), I'd do this to start: http://www.soap-making-resource.com/shaving-soap-recipe.html
 
Yooper, so would that rule out using cologne for fragrance in the soap? ... Do you know of a way to use cologne, perfume ?

Also, does that submersion blender have to be dedicated for non-food use after using it for soap? or does it clean-up enough to be used in cooking after that. Thanx!

You can't use cologne or perfume- the alcohol in it would cause the soap to seize up.

I use my immersion blender for other things, too. I clean it well, and I have one that can go in the dishwasher, so it goes in there as well.

You only want to do short bursts with the blender, as it'll burn up if you keep it on more than about 30 seconds at a time. Do a few seconds at a time at first, and then a few more, up to maybe 30 seconds at a time. It'll trace pretty quickly, so you don't want to go hog wild on the soap with that blender!

Some fragrances cause the soap to go to a trace super fast, too, so watch it after you add the fragrance. I don't use fragrance oils anymore (it's anti "pure" to me) but I have used it once or twice before knowing it wasn't a pure and natural oil.
 
what are some good natural fragrances to use for soap? like ive seen candles and such with actual orange peel and different things like that in them, is that possible with soap?
 
what are some good natural fragrances to use for soap? like ive seen candles and such with actual orange peel and different things like that in them, is that possible with soap?

Not really. I mean, you can add those things but the heat from the cold processing "blows off" any fragrance left behind. But that's true of candles, also. You can add the orange peel (which may be abrasive when the soap dries) but also some orange essential oil for the fragrance.

I've seen flower petals and herbs in the soaps around, but fragrance comes from a fragrance additions. I have a lavender soap that I like but the the person who made it used some real chopped lavender and those little bits got hard as the soap cured so it's rough and not soft like the actual herb. If you want to use herbs, grind them finely in the blender before adding. Things like oatmeal are really nice- but use a blender on them too before stirring into the soap.
 
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