Soap Making Process + Ingredients

Process

Soap is the result of a controlled chemical reaction called saponification between a fat combination and a basic called Lye. The process I use is called Cold Process, where the soap can be fully controlled and the chemical action can be complete, leaving neither fat nor lye, but a new chemical by-product called SOAP. I make my batches of 150 bars in my humble farm kitchen. I heat the fats over a wood stove, cool the lye out on the front porch, and combine these ingredients, slowly stirring the soap for 1 hour by hand. After this the soap is poured into 2 stainless steel molds. The chemical reaction heats up to a remarkable temperature and the soap passed through a gel phase, then slowly cools over 24 hours. After cooling to a pleasant temperature, the soap is unmolded, and cut into 4 oz bar with my butcher knife. As I weigh and cut, all of the scraps I mold into round 4 oz bars. The soap is then stacked in fragrant towers to cure.

Ingredients

Fat Base- I use a combination of Tallow, Olive oil, and Coconut oil. Unlike many soap makers who prefer using vegetable based oil only, I used beef tallow, one of the earliest traditional ingredients in soap. I get the tallow from my local butcher, a by-product that he normally would discard as trash. We render (melt) the tallow outside over a propane burner, and strain and use right away. Our tallow is never rancid, unlike what is used in modern soap making corporations. Tallow is used in my recipe for its superior qualities in making the soap hard, fine textured and long lasting. Extra Virgin olive is also used in my recipes for its property of leaving a moisturizing layer on the skin that is no longer oily or heavy. Coconut oil creates the lather that we crave so much in modern soap. It also moisturizes the skin.

Lye (Sodium Hydroxide) Base – Once created by slowly straining water through oak ashes, I use a chemically precise form of this basic, which when mixed with water, react to temperatures near boiling. Lye is always necessary for the creation of all soap as it what reacts with the fat. All soap is made with it, always has been and always will be.

All Natural Essential Oils – All of the scents used in my soap are all natural essential oils, most of which are imported. I formulate my combinations for their aromatherapy proposes, healing properties and balancing elements.

Botanicals and Minerals – I use many different botanicals for color, medicinal proposes, and exfoliation. I also add various clays for absorbing oil in the skin and for the lovely rainbow of colors they impart.

Nothing artificial or synthetic is ever used in any of my soaps