Make Soap the Old-Fashioned way

Learn how to make your own lye from ashes, and then 

use it to cook up a mild, soft soap perfect for personal use.

By Susan Verberg

Soap-makers love to tell the story of how ancient Romans first “discovered” soap by burning animal sacrifices on Mount Sapo, and how the creeks at the bottom of that mythological mountain were the best places to do laundry. They’ll tell you that the water, ash and animal fat on those sites accidentally created the soap that filled the creeks. The reality is that the Romans didn’t actually make soap. They traded for it with the Celts, who dominated the market because of their access to abundant limestone and seashells [writer's note: this would be access to marine plants for soda ash as opposed to potash, not limestone which is calcium oxide], from which they produced slaked lime [soda ash] to make a caustic soda lye (sodium hydroxide).

After years of professionally making all-natural goat’s milk soaps to sell at our local farmers market, I decided to develop a self-sufficient soap-making process based on ancient techniques. My goals were to make my own lye and to turn kitchen-waste fats into soap. I finally took the plunge… and what an interesting adventure it became! I dug through old articles and manuscripts, learned to decipher medieval English, and filled my kitchen with weird, bubbling concoctions. And I wondered how something that seemed so simple could be so challenging.

Don’t let me discourage you. If you’re an outdoor enthusiast, you may have made soap already. Scrubbing a greasy frying pan with campfire ashes doesn’t just scour the dirt away: when rinsed with a little water, the hydroxide salts in the ashes combine with the cooking grease to form a primitive cleanser.

Understanding Soap-Making Basic

To undertake the process of soap making, known as “saponification” (from sapo, the Latin word for soap), let’s first review what soap is and why it works the way it does. Because soap is made from water-soluble bases known as alkalis, it neutralizes acids while retaining its ability to be dissolved in water. More specifically, soap is a surfactant with the unusual ability to diffuse fats and oils into water, which is why it can rinse away oily stains.

Soap is made by mixing dissolved hydroxide salts, generally called “lye”, with fatty acids. To make your own lye that you can use to produce a soft soap, you leach (or drip) water through ashes to dissolve the hydroxide salts. Ashes are highly concentrated minerals of hydroxides, nitrates, carbonates, sulfites, and more. The quality of the lye produced depends on how well the plant material was burned. I’ve found that the more complete the burn (all organic material combusted), the more hydroxides will be dissolved, and the more basic (that is, higher pH) the resulting lye will be. In the case of incomplete burns, such as you’d find in fire pits and fireplaces, you can add lime to help change the carbonates (charcoal) into hydroxides.

My drip lye made from ashes has a pH of about 11, while commercial lye has a pH of 14 – making it 1,000 times more basic than ash lye. This is a big reason why making drip-lye soap is so different from conventional soap making. Because of the lower pH, drip lye is a lot less dangerous to handle than modern commercial lye. As a precaution, though, you should always keep some vinegar handy during soap making because its acid will help neutralize the lye’s base.

Making soap using drip lye can be challenging because the purity, density, and consistency of home made lye is uneven. For home soapmakers, I recommend preparing hot-process soap (which I describe below) rather than cold-process because an exact amount or specific purity of lye isn’t required for successful saponification. In hot-process soaps, saponification – the chemical reaction between lye and fat – is controlled by added heat, not by the pH.

During my research, I uncovered a historic trick for checking the density of drip-ash lye using a fresh egg. Because an egg has about the same density as lye that’s the correct strength, the egg will float. Many colonial recipes for drip-ash lye recommend using homemade lye if it can float an egg with ¼ of its shell showing about the liquid. This lye will produce “Black Soap”, a strong laundry soap that historical re-enactors complain is too harsh. On the other hand, I uncovered a 16^th century shampoo recipe that recommends using lye dense enough to suspend an egg in the middle of the liquid. Suspended-egg lye makes near-neutral soap, perfect for personal use because it does not “bite”. This same historic recipe also confirms the 3-to-1 ratio of lye to fat that consistently works for me: “thre pottels of lye to one pot of oyl”. It’s nice to find confirmation that’s five centuries old!

Based on experience and historical research, I’ve developed these instructions for making a soft, creamy, hot-process soap from scratch – including homemade lye.

Soft Soap in 8 Steps

1 - To make a leaching barrel, drill a small hole at the bottom of a 5-gallon bucket and stuff it with a piece of dishcloth as a filter. Fill the bucket with sieved ashes, tamping down intermittently. Level the top, leaving about 2 inches of headroom. Slowly pour in about an inch of rainwater. When the water has absorbed, add about an inch more. Continue to slowly add water until liquid starts to drip out the hole in the bottom of the bucket – it should take about a day. Prop the ash bucket on top of a second bucket to collect this drip lye. (Or build a setup like in the illustration at the left.) You’re ready to test the strength when you’ve collected about 1 gallon.
                                                                                

2 – If you’ve used regular ashes from a woodstove or fireplace in Step 1, the drip lye will be dark brown and probably won’t suspend an egg. Slowly heat the the drip lye and allow it to evaporate until it has the desired strength, which is likely to about a quarter of its original volume. Use stainless steel vessels for heating lye, never aluminum (which creates noxious gases in combination with lye) or enamel (which lye will etch). Cool down the lye before soap making. Contaminants will settle to the bottom. The next day, pour the purer lye solution off the top (that is, decant it). If you’ve used white ashes from a high-efficiency stove in Step 1, the lye may be light yellow and will float an egg from the get-go. Use this lye as is to make a strong, sharp laundry soap. To make neutral hand soap, slowly add water in small amounts until the egg is suspended in the solution.

 3 – Measure out (by liquid volume) 3 parts lye to 1 part oil. Fats that are solid at room temperature, such as tallow and lard, should be heated until they liquefy, and then cooled. If you’re a soap-maker beginner, use olive oil because the process will be easier. Add the lye to the oil and mix well – a stick blender works great – and let sit overnight.

 4 – After 12 hours rest, the solution will have separated. Mix it very well. Heat the solution for an hour or two in a slow cooker on the high setting with the lid in place. Stir only occasionally, as the soap should not be allowed to cool down. When the soap starts to rise, you’ll see foam forming under the lid. Remove the lid, and stir the soap well to settle the foam. Replace the lid, but prop a toothpick under the lid to create a little gap for hot air to escape.

5 – As the soap cooks in the slow cooker (still on the high setting), you’ll see bubbles form at the edge of the ceramic insert. This is the soap “turning itself”. It should only bubble at the edges – never boil in the center. You’ll observe finished soap starting to form on top. Stir occasionally to ensure that no areas dry out at the edges of the insert. Be sure to stir gently, because the mixture can foam up suddenly at this stage.

6 – The soap will get thicker and thicker until it incorporates, or finishes. Remove the slow cooker’s lid so excess moisture can evaporate. This soap will look like custard (soap-makers call this “trace”), leave droplet marks (“trace marks”) on the surface when scooped and drip off the spoon in globs. You’re nearly finished!

7 – Cook until it starts to have a glazed, sleek look, like petroleum jelly, and leaves little wavy points when stirred. If you part the soap at the bottom of the cooker, it should not come back together. Stop cooking at this point for a thin, soft soap. Or, keep evaporating the moisture until the soap is your desired density – it will never get hard. I prefer a whipped cream consistency.

8 – Your finished product will vary by color and consistency. I’ve made successful batches of soap using “old-fashioned” techniques and each one takes about six to seven hours. If you decide to try this process over open heat, be aware that a more erratic heat sources will make the soap behave erratically as well, and your mixture may not come to trace.

Making soap from homemade drip lye is a fun and rewarding project, and one that doesn’t require specialized or expensive equipment. I hope you’ll give it a try!

Susan Verberg is the founder of Far Mountain Soap in Ithaca, New York. Find her handmade soaps at www.FarMountainFarm.Blogspot.com

From the December 2016/January 2017 Mother Earth News issue, page 40-42.

Backyard Dye Fun!

Having laid my hands on half a dozen skeins of plain white wool yarn, and having the resources of a homestead, I decided to combine the two and under guidance of my friend Angelika try my hand at all natural plant dyeing this summer.

But where to start? And what to buy? Isn't dyeing quite an intricate and expensive challenge better left to the experienced and initiated? In part that is true, it is quite handy learning to dye from someone who has done it before. But it does not have to be difficult or expensive at all - it can be as intricate as you decide to make it. If you're looking for a specific shade, and want to be able to duplicate, mine is not the way for you. But if you're happy to get color, and even happier if it is mostly the color you intended - you can get a surprising amount of dyeing fun out of an ordinary back yard.

We both prefer natural fibers so we used a selection of linen, cotton and wool fabrics and fibers. I quickly learned that plant based fibers and animal based fibers do not take color the same way; plant based fibers are made from cellulose which is fairly resistant to taking dye. Animal fibers are made from protein and are relatively easy to dye. Both need a little help to create a good connection between fibers and dye and this process is called mordanting.

From looking over Angelika's shoulders and listening to her explanations the past few years - she loves dyeing with natural materials - I did pick up some dyes need mordanting, some fibers need it too, but not always or in the same amounts... but why? As it turns out most fibers and dyes are not all that compatible, there isn't a lot for the dye to adhere to. So to give the dye a place to stick, something is added that bridges, or sticks both to the fabric and to the dye. In the case of cellulose fibers a tannin mordant is needed, followed by a metal mordant and in the case of protein fibers a metal mordant is enough. It is possible to dye wool without mordants but it won’t be as vibrant; onion and tea are high in tannin and will dye, but mordanting as well influences the intensity of color. Black walnut is a bit of an odd one, it does not need mordanting because it is high in natural mordants but because the chemical structure of the pigment allows it to directly adhere to the protein fiber!

 

 Processing sumac leaves to make a tannin mordant.

Two good sources for tannin mordants are sumac and rhubarb leaves. As rhubarb is easily available in spring, and sumac easy to find in summer and fall these two make a good three season source of natural tannin mordant. With both sumac and rhubarb the leaves are used, not the wood; for each pound of dry yarn use four pounds of greens. Put leaves in a big pot, cover with water, bring to a boil, and boil for an hour. After an hour remove the greens, add the cellulose yarn and let sit for another hour, or two. Another source for tannins would be black tea, but as that is highly concentrated it would also act as a dye and darken the yarn significantly. Sumac does too, but not as significant and therefore does not interfere with the dyeing process as much, making it a better tannin mordant for brighter colors (and it's free).

A good metal mordant is alum, or aluminum sulfate, which is fairly inexpensive and sold over the internet at stores specializing in dyes. Use 10% for wool or up to 20 % for fine yarn like silk, cotton or linen, of the dry weight of the yarn. Add enough water to submerge the yarn, bring to a boil, turn off, add the damp yarn and let steep for an hour, or so. Do not boil fibers, especially wool roving and tips, as the roiling bubble action of boiling can naturally felt it!

Mordanting the fibers in sumac ‘tea’ overnight.

Mordant the evening before and let the yarn sit in the mordant overnight - that way the yarn is cooled down enough it can easily be squeezed or wrung dry for the next step, the dye bath. Keep in mind that each mordant results in slightly different color dyes, so choose accordingly. For instance chromium really brightens colors (but is poisonous), alum gives clear colors, tin brightens colors and can also be used as an afterbath (adding it to the dye late to darken), copper gives the best greens and iron darkens, and is often used as an afterbath. Both copper and iron can be made at home: copper can be added by dyeing in a copper pot, and an iron solution can easily be made by adding vinegar to iron scraps (like nails and pieces of cheap fencing) in a glass jar - but be careful not to screw down the lid as the exothermic reaction might respond unexpectantly!

Harvesting stinging nettles is quite a prickly business!

Using plant materials it is not all that difficult to dye yellows; pale yellow, lime yellow, greenish yellow, brownish yellow - most plants give some sort of yellow dye. Like ragweed dyes a greenish yellow, birch & poplar dyes yellow, any of the rosacea leaves dye yellow, peach & apple leaves dye yellow and bindweed dyes a light green yellow. It's the other colors that are harder to find. Onion skins can dye a bright orange and reportedly, bindweed roots dye a slight pink, as do rhubarb roots (but I'm not digging up my patch!). Willow leaves and bark dye a cinnamon brown, black walnut a deep brown at first draw and a cinnamon brown at the second. We also tried some odd ones like daffodil heads (yellow) and tageta flowers (also yellow) and honestly, if there is any indication of dye (it stains your fingers while weeding) get a bunch, boil it down, and see what happens!

Harvesting goldenrod flowers to make a bright yellow dye.

Except for a few dyestuffs, like goldenrod, most dye baths benefit from prolonged exposure. A good rule of thumb is to make your bath in the afternoon, add the yarn, put the colander with greens on top of it (keeps the yarn submerged and keeps steeping more dye) and let it sit overnight. You'll benefit from the cooler evening temperatures to cool down your kitchen again and as an added bonus the yarn is nicely cooled down by the next day to easily be rinsed in cold water without starting a felting reaction. Let it dry, or set, completely - out of the sun - before washing with soap.

Goldenrod dye with unmordanted wool yarn (top L) and alum mordanted wool (top R).

In the case of goldenrod, the flowers give the bright yellow color and are a potent dye. The longer it sits, though, the deeper the color gets and at some point the green stems and small leaves, which dye brown, will add, making it even darker. So for a bright yellow 15 minutes tends to be the optimum time. Similar with onion peels; sitting overnight can darken the orange towards brown. Black walnut is also a powerful dye and needs no mordanting at all for wool fibers, making it a good beginner’s dye. It also has antifungal properties and was used for wool underclothing throughout history to help prevent skin conditions!

Onion skin dye with alum mordanted wool fiber and unmordanted wool yarn.

For my first project we used well known dye plants like black walnut leaves, goldenrod flowers, stinging nettle and onion peels. We could have weighed the greens, but as our limitation was space in the pots, not the amount of greens, we picked as much as we could fit into each stockpot. As I could fit three stockpots on my stovetop we made three dye baths at the same time, in a similar fashion as the mordant solution: cover the greens with water, bring to a boil and boil for an hour, or so. Remove the greens, turn off the heat, add the yarn - and see the color change...

We dyed plant fibers and protein fibers and got wildly different results - both between the two types of fibers and from what we expected and what actually happened. Unless every variable, including temperature, pH & weights, are carefully controlled, natural dyeing is quite the spontaneous undertaking! For instance; a linen dress I was hoping to dye a deep brown with black walnut turned into a beautiful yellow copper instead - linen really does not take dye very well. A cotton dress I was hoping to dye yellow with logwood turned blue instead! The wool was mordanted in an acidic environment (an alkaline can damage wool fibers) but not rinsed real well, acidifying the dye to a pretty yellow brown. But when we made a new batch and added the cotton dress it was naturally alkaline and dyed a deep blue!

LTR: undyed, goldenrod, nettle, onion, onion (longer), iron – all unmordanted wool.

We sure saw chemistry in action: what a difference the nature of fibers makes, how some dyes react to changes in the pH but others not at all, the color difference a bit of metal mordant makes, how some strike enthusiastically quick but others need soaking overnight… to get a taste of all the intricate variables possible while still being such a surprisingly easy and rather satisfying project... I totally see how natural dyeing quickly can become quite the passion!

Mediaeval Secretes!

To separate my homesteading from my medieval studies I started a new blog called:
http://bookeofsecretes.blogspot.com/

It will have tons of soap making, brewing, cooking and other tidbits on there - please come and check it out! I'll cross post some applicable posts, it looks like I'll be spending most of my time over there - it sure is fun going medieval!