Manufactured soaps and other cleaning products contain many chemicals that often wind up in the environment with harmful consequences. Making your own bath soap is easy, and you wind up with a lovely product without having to use animal products, synthetic ingredients, crude oil derivatives or anti-bacterial chemicals. Although making your own soap does involve the use of lye, at the end of the process, called saponification, there is no lye left in the soap.
Step 1
Weigh all of the oils and put them in the stainless steel pot. Warm the oils over very low heat to 120 degrees F.
Step 2
Put on the safety glasses and disposable gloves. Weigh the water and put it in the glass measuring cup. Weigh the lye (sodium hydroxide) and pour it into the water while stirring with the stainless steel spoon. Stir until the lye crystals completely dissolve. The lye will be very hot; allow it to cool to 120 degrees F. Use vinegar and the damp towel to wipe up any splashes of lye.
Step 3
Pour the lye into the oil when they are at approximately 120 degrees F, stirring constantly with the stainless steel spoon. Once the lye and oil are combined, use the immersion blender to stir until you reach "trace," when a spoonful of soap drizzled over the surface remains for a few seconds. At this point the soap is beginning to set.
Step 4
Add the essential oil and stir to combine. Pour the soap into molds. This recipe will make approximately seven 4-oz. bars. Put the soap in the molds into the freezer overnight.
Step 5
Remove the soap bars from the freezer and pop them out of the molds. Allow to air dry for at least two weeks, when the lye and oil will have completely changed into glycerin soap.
Tips and Warnings
- Use any essential oil you like to make your soap, but don't use synthetic fragrances or fragrance oils. Add texture by including 1/4 cup ground oatmeal or ground herbs at trace. Use herbal tea instead of water to make the soap.
- Always add lye to other liquids, but never add liquids to lye. Use the damp towel and vinegar to neutralize any lye that splashes on your work surface or your skin. Use a mixture of vinegar and water to neutralize the lye remaining in your measuring cup after pouring the lye into the oil. Use vinegar to clean your soap molds.
Things You'll Need
- Damp hand towel
- Vinegar
- Safety glasses
- Vinyl or latex disposable gloves
- Large stainless steel pot
- Stainless steel spoon
- Kitchen scale
- 1 qt. glass measuring cup
- 3 oz. avocado oil
- 4 oz. coconut oil
- 8 oz. olive oil
- 4 oz. palm oil
- 3 oz. sesame oil
- 6 oz. water
- 3 oz. sodium hydroxide
- Kitchen thermometer
- Immersion blender
- 2 tsp. grapefruit essential oil
- Soap molds (7 4-oz. bars)
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