Soap The Olde Fashioned Way

Soap The Olde Fashioned Way

For a couple of years now I started to dabble in handcrafted soap making using the melt and pour technique. The old fashioned way that you once heard of involving "grandma's lye soap" is the original way of making soap. Actually the original way was accidentally discovered when the fats from animal sacrificing were washed away with the ashes from the wood and ran downstream into the river where some people were beating their clothes and washing them in the river  discovered that the mixture of wood ash and animal fat mixed with the water and created suds. Voila, SOAP!



Nowadays there are 3 ways to make soap: melt and pour (in which someone else handles the caustic lye aka sodium hydroxide), cold process and hot process.  Being deathly afraid of dealing with the corrosive lye (a base) I opted to play with melt and pour and make hand crafted soaps that way.  But, melt and pour soap  does not lend itself to making intricate swirling designs inside the soap , nor does it pipe a soap topping that remains firm when you shower or bathe with it.  It is great for making embedded shapes inside and on top and layers though.  It also does not involve a curing time and can be used pretty much immediately. It takes less fragrance oil to scent and less colorant too.  And you can get various brands and types to have different additives etc in the base you use. But, you don't get to control what is inside your soap. You cannot make it less or more moisturizing on your own. And, you cannot control if there are detergents or surfactants in it to make it more bubbly.  You can opt to buy a detergent free base but it may not be as sudsy. 



 Cold process allows you to make swirl patterns with ease both inside and on top of the soap loaf and if made into a pipeable top frosting it will harden and be like the rest of the soap. And, not to mention that there is  now something called soap dough which has opened up even more doors to creativity for soap toppers and inside embedding of shapes that no longer requires a pre-made melt and pour embed, which you  worry about accidentally  melting inside your cold process soap. 

Hot process also requires handling of lye. I am not at that point yet so cannot describe it but it does involve a slow cooker to cook it and it does result in less cure time so that the bar can be used sooner and results in  a harder bar.

Today I made my first batch of cold process soap and survived! Without any negative casualties like a lye burn in the eye, on your skin, or any splatter that went somewhere it shouldn’t. No volcanic eruptions ..and I remembered to “burp” the stick blender, though trying to figure out how to do that was a head scratcher.  I did not scent or color the batch, figuring the learning curve was already steep enough between not getting a lye burn or splatter everywhere and figuring out when I could stop the forever blending and stirring when I could actually identify the stop point called “trace”.  I tell you my arm and back were hurting (next time I get a chair to sit on while stirring) before the mass ever hit trace and I was wondering if I was going to have to find a safe way to throw out a potential failed batch of oils with lye.  The back of my neck is hurting as I even think about this.

But then finally the intimidating mass started to thicken and lighten in color and I reached…a false trace. Or at least it seemed that way, because then it looked like nothing had happened when I kept stirring. Rats…more stick blending and hand stirring. Then my stick blender got really HOT! Is it supposed to get hot like that? I measured the temp of the mass in the bowl and the temperature was creeping up. I guess that is supposed to happen. But why is the stick blender getting overheated? I see on the bottom of the stick blender “recertified” and a date. What?! You mean I didn’t buy a brand new stick blender? It was refurbished?!…Maybe that was why it was hot. Decided to turn it off and hand blended for a while until the appliance had cooled down some.  I eventually did get what looked like a “light trace”, and it was the color of  an egg custard. I decided that I would stop there before the mass seized up and the stick blender was encased in the soap like concrete.  Though I had just read yesterday online in the soapers forums that the solution to seized soap was to put a towel over it and let it gel.  At that stage it would be like a hot applesauce stage found in hot process that could be then manipulated into a mold. But then it would be lumpy, and not the texture that I like. I think of Hot Process as a process that creates a rustic looking soap and I am not really a fan of that at this time.

Thank God no seizing today. So I’d say a great success for a first batch. Now I just need to see what it looks like tomorrow and if it is lye heavy or not. Wish my PH Strips had come in…but they are coming in from probably China per Amazon as its gonna take a month to get here. I really do not feel like doing the “zap” test either. Being electrocuted is not my idea of fun.

I guess if it is too lye heavy when I finally get to test it I could always rebatch it.  I think there is something about that on SoapQueenTV or Brambleberry as a tutorial. Cross that bridge when it comes.

So today I took my first step into the journey of cold process soap making. I was scared out of my mind...worrying about accidental lye splashes in my eyes or skin, volcanic eruptions spewing soap batter with lye all over the place, birds or squirrels that might think my lye water sitting outside to cool was water (don't even get me started on that one...I am a worry wart).  Sweating bullets I thought my cold process soap would never trace and my arm and back muscles were already starting to hurt. Finally, success! It traced, was pourable and I did not make a mess. I even managed to sculpt a medium high top so that it wasn't flat. Not bad for first go around :) I posted a picture onto one of the many Facebook soap groups that I subscribe to and got overwhelming support and feedback. The soaping community is truly great. I will have to start using colorants and fragrance oils with the recipe as the next step.


 Wish me Luck!