Top Information & Concepts to Get Started Making Soap

No matter what you may hear, there is no way to make real soap without some sort of lye. Whether it's made in a chemical company, or made from water and wood ashes, it's as much a required ingredient as the oils. All types of soap, liquid and bar, cold process and melt and pour, are made with lye.

• How to Safely Make a Lye Solution
• How to Make a Lye Solution Video
• Where to Buy Lye for Soap Making
• How to Make Lye from Wood Ashes
• Using a Liquid (pre-made) Lye Solution

Each oil you use in your soap is made up of a combination of fatty acids. The fatty acids react with the lye to make soap - each in their own individual way - giving your soap unique qualities. Palm oil, which is full of palmitic and stearic acids, makes a different soap than olive oil, which is full of oleic acid. Changing the oils, changes your soap.

• Qualities of Soap Making Oils
• Creating Your Own Soap Recipes
• Basic Soap Recipes

Most soap makers use recipes that are "superfatted" to a certain percentage.

Superfatting, which is sometimes also referred to as a lye discount, is either adding an extra amount of oil into your soap recipe but keeping the lye amount the same, or using the same amount of oil and less lye. For example, using 9.5 ounces of lye instead of 10 ounces would amount to 5% superfatting. (5% extra oil). Superfatting accomplishes two things:

1. It leaves a bit of unreacted oil in ths soap, which makes the soap a bit milder and more moisturizing.
2. It gives you a bit of a fudge factor in your measurements.

• Lye Calculators to Calculate Superfat/Lye Discount
• Superfatting Illustrated with Bunnies and Wolves
• Lye, Saponification and What Really Happens



Most soap making instructions will include the phrase "mix until trace" - but what is this thing called trace? Trace is really synonymous with "emulsion" where the oils and lye-water solution are mixed together. If you remember nothing else about it, remember that it's a "point of no return" where you no longer risk having your oils and lye solution separate once you stop mixing.

• Trace in Soap Making Video

Once you've poured cold process soap into its mold(s), you need to let the soap "cure" - but when soap makers talk about cure, they're really talking about two things:

1. Letting the saponification process complete
2. Letting the water evaporate out of it

The first part of cure takes 24-48 hours. The next part takes longer. 2-4 weeks is the standard cure or drying time for soap. A longer cure makes for a harder, (and some feel) milder soap.

• Mailbag Monday - How Long Does My Soap Really Need to Cure

Once the oils and lye are mixed together, they begin to saponify - the chemical reaction that makes soap. The chemical reaction gives off heat (exothermic). If the soap is able to retain some heat, it will go through what's called a "gel stage." The soap mixture will get so hot that it almost liquifies and turns translucent. It really does look like a gel. This is perfectly normal. Once the chemical reaction is done, it will cool back down and harden. Gel stage is not required for your soap to fully saponify. The only difference is an aesthetic one - soap that has gone through a gel stage is a bit more translucent looking than soap that hasn't.

It happens to all of us at one time or another - suddenly your lovely smooth lightly traced soap becomes a thick mass of mashed potatoes or cookie dough-like glop. You can hardly stir it, let alone blend it smoothly. What happened?

Seize.

It's basically a sudden super-thickening of the soap - usually caused by a fragrance or essential oil. There are a few things to do to salvage your batch if it happens to you...and a few things to do to prevent it from happening in the first place.

One significant difference from cooking is that everything in soap making is weighed...even the water. This ensures that you're using the right amounts of every ingredient. Another difference is that recipes are often expressed in percentages rather than measurements. 

Instead of:

• 6 oz. of olive oil
• 6 oz. of palm oil
• 6 oz of coconut oil

You have:

• 33% olive oil
• 33% palm oil
• 33% coconut oil

What this gives you is an understanding of the ratios of the oils to each other. If you want to scale the recipe up using a lye calculator, or you want to modify the recipe, using a percentage will help you do it more easily.

While lye may be the one ingredient and safety consideration that beginning soap makers fear, you also have to be careful with heat, concentrated ingredients, and stain potential. Soap making can be done completely safely, though, with some thoughtful, careful preparations.