I just get my lye from the local grocery store. I live in a very diverse community so I have found that I can get things that people outside my area may not be able to. Language is some times an issue.

You can use veggie oil, olive oil although olive trees in this area are a pain to grow. May I suggest you plant more nut trees and just stock up on the soaps. I still have some of the "garden" soap that I made 10 years ago. No change to the quality. I did wrap each bar in plastic wrap to keep out moisture but that was before I found out about mylar bags.

this is one of my fav books for soap making

http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Soapmaker-Techniques-Luxurious-Handmade/dp/0806948698

My Newest just out of the molds Sheep Milk Soap..

That soap should come with a warning. It looks like peanutbutter fudge to me.

I've been making a living by making soap (and shampoo, deodorant, lip balm, candles, etc.) for the past 5 years. I have never made my own lye, but it is one of the things on my extensive "things I need to do" list!

I don't measure my pH anymore because I superfat all my soaps, so no chance of lye burns. You can just buy pH test strips if you want or use a liquid called phenopthalene - just put a drop on the cured soap and the colour change will indicate the pH. Phenopthalene and test strips both have around the same shelf life I think - about 2 years. Another low-tech way is to just touch your tongue to the bar of soap (when it's finished curing). If you get a zap, better use it for laundry detergent! 😀

I have not had a problem getting lye. Home Hardware always has it, but I use large quantities, so I order it 200 kg at a time from the lower mainland. It comes to me on the Greyhound, but I think this is not really allowed, so I don't want to mention my supplier in public 🙄 I used to have to drive to Calgary to pick it up which is 6 hours round trip, so I was really happy when I found someone who would ship!

I think my most useful SHTF soap-making skill is having all the equipment and supplies (not really a skill and only useful in a bug-in situation), and knowing how to calculate a batch soap based on the saponification values of the varoious oils on hand (will need to carry a chart of SAP values for reference). And sheer experience I guess...

In regards to figuring soap-making supplies into my prep, I always have hundreds of bars of soap on hand, so if I have to bug out I will just take a bunch with me (vegetable soap doesn't really expire, so it will store well), plus my SAP value chart and maybe basic equipment so I can make some soap in the future if necessary with whatever supplies I can get my hands on. If I'm bugging in, I will have those hundreds of already-made soaps, plus, more than likely, the supplies to make hundreds more, with me at home. For you, it might be good to make up a SHTF soap recipe out of vegetable oils you can easily buy and store. Some really good soap-making oils have a 2 year shelf life unrefrigerated. For my recipe, 2.7 kg of oils + 400 g lye and some water makes 32 large bars of soap, so you don't really need a whole lot of oil to make yourself a pretty good stash of soap, and if you use oils that create a very hard soap, it will last you a long time.

As for planting more nut trees, you would need to press soooo many nuts and/or seeds that your idea of doing a big batch on butchering day would probably be best. Also, I understand that glycerin is a byproduct of the biodiesel-making process, so there may be lots of spare glycerin floating around to make soap with as more and more people will be making biodiesel. I have access to some come to think of it.....I'll try to find some time to experiment and get back to you about it 🙂 I hope this helps.

This has been such an interesting and inspiring post that I'm seriously going to try to make soap. Thanks everyone! Keep posting!

thanks for the info, I have a feeling that most of my soaps are plant based and I agree, lots in storage, very good thing but having said that, I still really like the idea of keeping the skill set of making lard based soap after I do a pig butcher out.. I would be very interested in seeing if it would work with lamb fat, but I expect that would be a one time thing, the lamb/mutton fat works so well for home candle making, were the pig lard does not, that it just seems like a waste to me to use it for soap making.

I am always looking at planting more nut tree's but I hear you on the work involved in regards to processing them..

What kinds of nut trees do you have?

Hazelnut and heartnut so far.. but there is local wild black walnut, so I can access them as well.

Beautiful.......I'm jealous! 😉

Skyvoxx

Would you be wiling to share with me your favorite most basic recipe that uses milk, I am still working on and tweeking goat milk soaps into a rock solid sheep milk soap..

I am looking for no colors, no scent other then the natural and no real extra's, just the most basic possable.

Hi Farmgal. I've never made soap with milk, partly because of the expense, partly because of all the hormones and antibiotiocs in store-bought milk, partly because there are a lot of vegans and vegetarians around here so I don't think I could sell soaps made with animal products. If I could get my hands on some farm milk, I'd definitely make some for me though. I'm assuming you just substitute milk for the water? Does it get really hot? Do you have to cool it a lot while adding the lye? Is it difficult to keep the milk from going sour? Sorry for all the questions - I'm a soap geek!:) How big are your batches and what oils are you using already? Are you just trying to make the soap harder or are there other things like lather quality, conditioning that you'd like to tweak?

well because i have my own fresh sheep milk at the moment and within a month my cow will freshen as well, I don't have to worry about the hormones or antibioctics, my current milking sheep was born on the farm and i know what she is eating 🙂

Correct you are using the milk in place of the water, yes it can get really hot if not treated correctly, the lye will burn the fat in the milk, if you see sheep or goat milk soap and its a dark brown/orange color, unless it says they added color or spices, they brunt the milk, if you look at the picture above that is pretty close to be as perfect of a color for a sheep milk soap as you can get, in order to get it whiter, you have to color it to do so..

Typically you start out with a slighlty frozen milk (think slushy)and you put your jug in a ice water bath and you add really slow for the mix..

If you add to fast or let it get to hot, the milk will cuddle, on the other hand even done right the milk will turn color..

Here is the basic recipe I am working with.. this is the current version

28 oz olive oil
10 oz lard
6 oz coconut oil
14 oz sheep milk
5.8 oz lye

I need to make the soap harder, its got a small but nice lather to it, its just that its taking forver to set up (my cold house is not helping on this but I am double wrapping and putting it in as good spoat as I can get at this time. I want to dry up the sheep when the cow freshens so I need to get all my sheep milk soap making for the year done in the next month ideally.

Your soap looks good enough to eat!! It's the olive oil that is causing the softness and the extended set-up time. I still love to have olive oil in mine because it's good for your skin, but I balance it off by using more saturated fats. If you use:

17 oz olive oil (pomace is best)
10 oz lard
17 oz coconut oil
17 oz sheep milk
6.5 oz lye

you should get a nice hard bar with a good lather. Are you using olive pomace (the lowest grade you can get)? If not, you might want to switch, it makes a better, harder bar of soap and it's cheaper. Increasing the coconut oil makes the soap harder and makes a better lather - it will even lather in hard water and salt water. I would do a test batch first, if possible, just to make sure you're happy with it. You should be able to tell the difference as soon as you take it out of the molds and cut it.