Teach Soap

Hello everyone, so glad I found this forum! I could spend days just reading each post without ever attempting to make soap!

But... I want to make soap! Why? I have wanted to for decades, but let everyone's claim of how "explosive" lye is and how bad homemade soap is, scare me off. Fast forward about 25 years - years spent with allergies and sensitivities to many commercial body products and laundry stuff and I find myself literally itching from head to toe.
Realizing I had recently change shampoo, soap and laundry detergent all in the same month I had my "Aha!" moment.

Now after doing lots of reading, I see that lye is not the horrific danger my grandmother claimed (capable of blowing up a kitchen???) and that education and preparation make it manageable.

I'd like to make my own laundry, and plain, simple, gentle bath soap. I've seen many examples on Etsy and the fancy colored bars are works of art I'd display, but the lovely rustic, beige bars made in someone's kitchen are the ones I'd buy.

However, I've stuffed all this reading into my head and I'm having trouble getting started.

Can someone tell me the best place to buy economic but preferably organic supplies?

Since I'm not selling soap, I need small recipes. I definitely want to try a castile, but want to try others too.

I'd like to try cold and hot process. What size of stainless steel pot do you suggest?

I see a lot of YouTube vids have people using plastic spoons and pitchers; is there a special reason for that? Normally I hate plastic, and would use wood and glass.

Thanks!

Welcome
Lye can be dangerous, but if you know what you're doing and are careful, it's not so dangerous. Mixed with many other chemicals & heat it can blow up a kitchen, but so can a lot of things.

You may be able to find organic oils in grocery stores/Sams Club/Costco closer to you. If you're going to start with small recipes it's usually more economic to shop local so you save on shipping. Also, you can check out http://www.suppliersbystate.com to see if there's any soaping supplier near you.

I don't use stainless steel for mixing because a lot of them are some other metal covered in a stainless steel coating Then after a while the coating breaks down and the lye reacts with the metal. I use thick plastic bowls or thick plastic buckets (like the ones that maple syrup tappers use). Around here you can go to the grocery store and ask for some of their empty buckets from the bakery section and they'll either give you one or charge you a dollar.

Wood and glass should not be used to mix or hold anything that has active lye in it. Lye breaks them down and you'll end up with wood splinters in your soap. With glass, even heavy pyrex, the lye can etch it and it can shatter.

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Genny

Welcome!
I would start simple. Run 16 oz. of organic olive oil through a soap calculator and superfat at 7-8%
Here is a sticky to get you started. > viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3800

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

Thank you both for your input. I'm writing a shopping list with the intent of making soap for the first time next
week! This weekend I hope to watch many tutorials, and write out a very detailed set of instructions.

Thanks again!