Have you ever made soap from scratch?

Question

I was telling my freind who works in a meat plant about us wanting to try making soap after I read about it in a homesteading book, and He Got 25 pounds of beef fat for me to try it with, It looks easy enough, if you have all the stuff, How did it go for you? My Honey wants to use some herbal teas to fortify it. we have all that stuff in the garden. I need to get the lye still, Hardware store? We are kinda freaky this way...

I thought about making the lye from wood ashes, too, but... well, maybe next time.

Answer 1

I've never made soap with Tallow before (tallow ends up clogging your pours in time)...

but here is a recipe for vegetable soap and help to make it:

This is the basic recipe we use when we test out the fragrance oil samples our labs send to us. This will make a nice 4 pound batch of long lasting, hard, bubbly soap.

Palm Oil 520 grams
Olive Oil 440 grams
Coconut Oil 400 grams
Lye 210 grams
Distilled Water 500 grams

Add Lye to Water (never water to lye) very slowly - wear protective eye ware and plastic gloves, set aside to cool.

Best place to add lye to water is outside. Make sure you don't breathe the air in right over top of your bowl - it'll blow your lungs out.

Heat Oils together & set aside to cool.

When both Oils and Lye/water have cooled to approx. 100 to 120 deg. F., slowly pour lye water in to the oils.
Stir with either a wooden spoon or use a braun handblender.
When the soap looks like pudding and leaves a TRACE (dribble the soap and if it stays on top like a little mound where you just poured - this is called Trace) then you're ready to add in some herbs, botanicals, ground REGULAR oatmeal (NOT the quick rising) and/or colourants.
Once you add these in, stir and stir (at this point you need to work a little fast 'cause the soap is starting to harden).

Once you've stirred these in, add in your fragrance oil (or you can keep unscented, your choice).

Pour into molds.
Tap molds on the floor or counters to get rid of any air pockets in the molds.

Set soap aside for 24 to 48 hrs.
Unmold.

Cure/dry this soap for 3 to 4 weeks.
The longer you cure your soaps, the harder the bars will get, and the longer the bars will last.

Good luck.

Answer 2

Making hand-crafted cleaning soap isn't intricate. You need to use care whilst handling the lye and the uncooked cleaning soap. The saponification procedure will occur over a interval of days or even weeks, relying at the procedure you employ. Before you start, you have to learn as so much information as you'll. You need to appreciate the procedure of blending the lye, what hint approach, determine what oils you wish to make use of and discover a supply for lye. I love making cleaning soap however it is not for everybody.

Answer 3

Oh man--you're really wanting to soap from scratch. If you've received the tallow from your friend, you will need to render it first. Here is a great tutorial on that (I've never rendered--I'm not THAT ambitious):

http://www.the-whisk.us/forum/tutorial.render.php

a great place to start your soaping research is: www.millersoap.com

although the whisk is an AWESOME forum for soapers

research and always use caution--but it's an awesome hobby!

Answer 4

Yes I have made it before but never from scratch.