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Making your own liquid soap from scratch is a rewarding and (mostly) simple process. Once you learn how to make it, you can customize it with ingredients that you and your family like. If you are going to change up a recipe, or if you are using a recipe from the internet, be sure to run it through a soap calculator first. If you get the wrong ratio of fats to lye, it can burn your skin.
Prefer to Watch Me Make Soap First? (This makes your first time much more simple)
Ingredients You Will Need to Make Your Own Liquid Soap
Castor Oil (50 g, 1.76 oz)
Coconut Oil (125 g, 4.4 oz)
Olive Oil (325 g, 11.46 oz)
Vegetable Glycerin (114 g. 4.4 oz)
Potassium Hydroxide (not to be confused with sodium hydroxide) (113.16, 3.99 oz)
Distilled Water (112.8 g, 3.98 oz)
Materials You Will Need to Make Your Own Liquid Soap
Crockpot (mine is incredibly old but if I were to purchase one, I would buy this basic model):
PH Testing Strips (optional but handy!)
How to Make Your Own Liquid Soap
- Start by adding the coconut oil, olive oil and castor oil to your crockpot. Turn the heat to low.
- While the oils are melting, make your lye solution. When you are making liquid soap, it is important to use potassium hydroxide (caustic potash) not sodium hydroxide.(Lye)
- If you have not worked with lye before, check out my cold process soap post to learn step by step how to keep yourself safe. When you work with any caustic substance, make sure you are wearing eye protection, gloves, long clothes and are in a well ventilated area. If you get any on your skin, rinse well with cool water. This is according to MSDS. It is NOT recommended to use any acid (such as vinegar) as this will cause a chemical reaction and may make things worse.
After your oils are melted and the lye is made...
Carefully pour the lye into your crockpot and use an immersion blender to blend it together. When it is combined, add in the glycerin and continue to mix. This will go through various stages. Make sure when you use your immersion blender, you take breaks or you will burn out your motor.
- It will look like applesauce. Thin and textured.
- It will become more firm.
- Finally, the blender will no longer blend very well as the mix will be very sticky and thick. This is where you will stop blending.
How to ensure your liquid soap is ready to be reconstituted
There are 2 different methods that you can use to ensure your soap is safe to use.
The first is by using a PH testing strip. You want your soap to be at a PH of 6-10 for safe use. Rub your testing strip on the paste and ensure it in the safe range.
The second option is by the clarity test. Use warm distilled water (tap water will cause a cloudy product even if it is safe) and add a small amount of paste to it. Let the paste dissolve. When it is dissolved, make sure it is clear with no cloudy bits. If both steps are completed, it is time to move on to reconstitution.
How to reconstitute liquid soap
Before you reconstitute the soap, add your vegetable glycerine to the mix. This is what makes your soap extra creamy and nourishing on your skin!
There is some debate over the proper ratios or water to soap paste. I have found a lot of it comes down to personal preference. For me, I like to start with a 1 part soap paste to 1 part distilled water. I find this makes a good thickness for my preferences but you can use more or less water. Please note that you can thicken soap in a later step.
For my soap dispenser, I use 200 grams of soap paste with 300 grams of distilled water.
When you are making the soap, you should use boiling hot water (ensuring you are using a heat proof container and being very careful not to get a burn.)
Use your scale to weigh out your ingredients, combine and cover. Let it sit overnight. Whenever you think about it, you can give it a gentle shake but this is not necessary.
Adding essential oils to your soap
For the essential oils, we add them (and they are optional) at this stage after we have reconstituted. We add them at a 2% ratio. After your soap is weighed with water and paste, take that number and multiply it by 2% on your calculator. This will give you the number of grams of essential oils that you can safely add.
For instance:
Your soap paste is 100 grams. You add 150 grams of distilled water, so now you have a total of 250 grams.
100g +150g = 250g
250g x 2%= 5 grams
Gently stir to combine and you are good to go! A few of the scents I have enjoyed are: Orange mint, vanilla spice, and peppermint.
How to thicken your soap
To thicken your soap paste, all you need to do is combine 42 grams of distilled water and 14 grams of salt.
Mix well and when they are combined, start by adding a small spoonful to your soap. This will make it chunky for a second and you might be caught off guard but the chunkies do go away.
Keep adding this salt water until you are happy with the consistency and you are ready to use!!
