Sunday, October 13, 2013

Saponification Sunday






Same gripe. Different day.

I really don't mind so much how you raise your beef, feed your pig, tend your garden or MAKE YOUR SOAP, please just be honest. (and humane!) If you believe your product is good enough to sell, you should be proud of the feed, lodging, ingredients that are involved.

What I really hate is when someone insinuates or outright lies about what their product ingredients. I recently visited a small farm sort of like ours, a couple hours away, where they give demonstrations about life in times past. I enjoyed the horse drawn plow event and the blackberry pie made in a wood oven (yummy) but I was deeply disappointed when I spoke with the woman making soap "Like the pioneers did"

I always wanted to try making soap with real wood ash lye over a wood stove, just for a better understanding of the history of soap if no other reason. But we arrived just after the soap making  demo, still the pioneer dressed woman, explained it all to me when I asked a few questions.

She told me her soap is made with lye crystals instead of real wood ash  ash , which I understood knowing the amount of time it would take to create your own ash lye from a hard wood fire, but then she admitted she doesn't even make soap indoors because it stinks so bad.

Stinks?

Soap?

I love the way my house smells when I make soap even unscented soap. When I asked about the oils she used she leaned in close to me and said "I use leftover Crisco from a restaurant"

Ewwww.

No wonder her kitchen smells bad. Plain new Crisco is bad enough, I tried it once in the early days as I was doing my own research on making soap, but can you imagine using Crisco that had already been used to fry steaks, saute onions, fry potatoes etc...Yuck

I asked why she did not use lard as the pioneers did, and her answer? Lard was too hard to find and too expensive. Now, she sells these rock hard, bad smelling soap bars in big 6 oz chunks for just $1.00. So why does she not just up her price while upping the quality of her base oils?

I did not want to embarrass her in front of some other farm visitors and because it's likely she volunteers her time for this farm event, I felt a letter to the organization she works for might be a better choice. Some of you might wonder why so worked up about a piece of soap so I'll tell you.

Poorly made handmade soap, even if done by volunteers at a small community event who are selling it very cheap, reflects on all handmade soap. Folks who buy this soap will automatically associate lye soap with bad soap. They will likely pass by the next handmade soap vendor thy see at the farmers market or outdoor craft fair convinced that soap made with lye is harsh, barely lathers and smells bad.

In addition, making and selling this kind of soap can be dangerous. Not knowing the exact oil makeup of Crisco (the oil blends are not consistent, sometimes it has lots of coconut oil, other times more Palm oil) makes it impossible to calculate an accurate lye to oil ratio. Not to mention the other "additives" like French Fry pieces or burned up hunks of deep fried Cod.
 
My own lye soap made with Olive Oil, water and nothing else
Too little lye just makes mushy soap but too much lye or Lye heavy soap can leave lye that has not been able to bind to the oil molecules and thus could cause burns to the user. So, who else has run into situations about this and what have you done about it? Would love to know.



 

15 comments:

  1. Leftover Crisco?!?! Eee gads. I'm trying to imagine how that smells--maybe like driving past McDonalds? Every once in awhile I'll run across chunks of poorly cut, DOS "Grandma's Lye Soap" in ziplock baggies at an antique mall for ridiculously cheap prices. It's obvious to see that it doesn't fly off the shelves.

    I'm often asked (quite suspiciously and by older people) who come to my market stand, "Is this lye soap?"....And then I launch into my soapmaking explanation. I understand why they ask, though, and I reassure them that it won't rub off a layer of skin like their Grandma's did. :)

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    1. Amy, the soaper her self said it made her kitchen "stink" and yet thought it OK to use and sell. I really think no bad intentions intended she just had not taken the time to educate herself. Ah well, the horse plowing part of the farm was excellent!

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  2. Crisco soap, the thought of that is enough to prevent me from ever buying handmade soap from an unknown vendor again.

    I like sweet smelling, silky feeling, lots of lather and skin softening soap - just like yours Donna! Bring on the lavender - double up the scent and I am a very happy girl (I know you are bored with lavender, but I do love it so).

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    1. Funny thing Martha, another gal was selling home loomed kitchen towels and the quality was nothing like yours! And the lavender boars me as a single soap scent (but Lots of folks love so I still make) yet I slather myself with a lavender EO and almond oil creation every night because I swear it helps me sleep!

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  3. My grandmother made lye soap...the most wonderful soap I ever used! She made her own wood ash lye, used ONLY rainwater (there's a tip for you!) and rendered down her own lard until it was pure white with no odor. She scented it with rose petals from her own garden or cedar wood chips from the cedar trees on her farm (Granddaddy didn't want to smell like roses). The soap suds were lavish, the soap was gentle and not caustic at all.

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    1. YEAH !! That's the way it should be done. I think it always boils down to being proud of what you make be it an apple pie, a kitchen towel, or real lye soap. Three cheers for your grandmother!

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  4. I hate getting gifts of 'homemade' soap from stores that have shelves lined with day-glow soaps and boast of their pure ancestry. The smell disappears once wet, and the bar turns mushy.

    Your soaps have spoiled me! I will never look at a bar of Irish Spring the same.

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    1. "Blushing" Goes to show just because a product has the word Irish in it, doesn't mean it's the real McCoy...or OShaughnessy for that matter.

      "Day Glow Soaps" That's funny. Get out your black lights for that shower.

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  5. Not specifically with soap, but the term organic. I no longer buy products from a vendor who uses the term of organic when the product/produce doesn't follow NOP...which it may now. Some products do some don't from what I understand and I have wrestled back and forth on confronting them publicly because it diminishes all the hard work you do. In the end, I just chose not to buy anything from them.

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  6. I think you handled that very tactfully and agree that a letter to the head honcho in charge informing them of the misinformation and mislabeling or misleading advertisment of their soaps as "old fashioned" is in order, not only to keep them from spreading false statements, but to educate the ones trying to educate the "uneducated" folks that come there for, well, education on the subject. (Made my head spin there for a second)

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    1. Carolyn, please tell me you were never an educator?!? :)

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  7. We love your soap and appreciate how it is made. Thanks for what you and Keith do. Thanks for continuing to educate the rest of us.

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  8. C, well thanks very much. I just put lots more soap in the farm store today. I hope you like

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