Soap can be made from various products around the home, this soap however is very basic and used more for cleaning or hand soap. It is not recommended to use for bathing, as it may be harsh on skin, and avoid contact with eyes. It contains white ash from hardwoods burned and fat. You can use tallow, lard or grease you have been saving. Boil the ash in a large pot, not aluminum, and let ash settle, skim lye off the top. In separate pot, gentle boil lye and add rendered fat, it will be like soft paste.
Key Takeaways:
- Pioneer households generally produced their own soaps with hardwood ash and surplus grease or fat from animals and cooking.
- Throwing white ashes into a hot cooking pan which is already coated with oil and fat from preparing a meal will produce at least a small quantity of crude soap.
- Boil hardwood ashes in water to make lye float to the top, then skim it and save it up over time until you have enough to combine with waste oil to make a more generous quantity of soap.
“Have you ever wondered what the best way is to make soap if you are living off the land?”
Read more: https://www.offthegridnews.com/lost-ways-found/make-old-fashioned-soap-pioneer-way/