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Soapmaking is fun, creative and makes great gifts. This article will tell how all natural fragrant, beautiful soaps are made at home the old fashioned way. It will also tell you how you can “cheat” and make soaps at home the fast and easy way, yet still be able to add your own fragrances and colors.
Soaps are made by a process called saponification. It can be made through a cold process, hot process or through a continuous process. Commercial soaps are made by a continuous process in a large vat.
The hot process to make soap was used by pioneers in the nineteenth century in a large kettle over an open fire. Soapmaking was an unwelcome chore to the women who had to stir kitchen drippings, lye and ashes over an open fire. It was a hot smelly job and the soaps created were often so harsh they would burn the skin. Sometimes the women could make the soap a little more fragrant by adding flower and scents.
The soaps that you can make at home with today's process, the cold process, will be all natural, gentler and kinder to your skin.
To begin making soap you need to have a large stainless steel or unchipped enamel pot at least 8 quarts in size. You will need two plastic pitchers for mixing and pouring and a long handled spoon. A kitchen scale, two kitchen thermometers and safety glasses or goggles. It is a good idea to wear rubber gloves. And finally, soap molds.
You can purchase soap molds at most craft stores. Soapmaking is becoming a popular craft and finding good molds is getting easier. If you are unable to find molds made specifially for soap, then you can use ones for candy or candle making. Or you can make your own molds out of empty micro-wave food conatiners, ice cream containers or cheese containers. Other things that make good molds are gelatin molds, plastic eggs, tart pans, sardine cans, and small plastic drawer organizers. Anything you use as a mold must be extra thick plastic or stainless steel. They need to hold up to high heat. A flexible mold is preferable so you can pop out the finished soap easier.
All natural home made soaps are made with a fat such as, beef fat, lard, tallow, palm oil, olive oil, coconut oil, cocoa butter or shortenings. You will also use store bought lye as a hardner. You can purchase lye at a hardware store or some grocery stores near the drain cleaners. It is a caustic substance so be careful while handling it.
Adding color and fragrance to your soap with additives makes them more personalized and luxuriuos. You can add honey, oatmeal, almond oil, aloe vera gel, avocados, bran, buttermilk, flowers, cinnamon, cloves, cornmeal, kelp, lemons, milk, myrrh, nutmeg, pectin, vitamin E oil, and to name a few. Coloring your soaps will be done with liquid fabric dyes or candle dye. Food colorings can be used but they do not hold up well in storage.
The first step to making soap is called rendering, unless you purchase ready made tallow.
The fat that you have chosen is melted down to get the impurities out of it. You strain the finished product to get the tallow. This part of the soap making process is smelly, hot and messy.
The next step to making your own soap is measuring the ingredients and weighing the lye. You mix the ingredients and boil in your pot at a temperature of 100 degrees. Pour into your molds and allow it to cool.
With soap making at home becoming a popular craft, there is an easier way to make soap. Most craft stores now carry large blocks of premade glycerin soap that can be melted in the microwave. You choose your own fragrance, colors and additives to put in the soap once it is melted and then pour it into soap molds. You can add small toy figures into the center of the translucent glycerin soaps to personalize them for friends and family.
Now that you know both options for soap making, choose which one suits your style, time and temperament!
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