Soap Making Party?

[grundygreen]

I rescued 5 gallons of fryer grease. Thinking of experimenting with making soap.
anyone else interested?

[Kat]

Could be interesting - I would love to learn to make soap. Is the end product gonna smell like Long John Silvers? :-)

Do you know whether fryer grease is still veggie oils or are they predominantly using animal fat again? I heard MickyD's made a big to-do about switching to veg and then after a time covertly went back to animal without equal press coverage.

But yes, i'd be game for a soap-making party.

[Pam]

I would like to try it too. Now that the Christmas craziness is over with.

[grundygreen]

Found this online soap calculator.
Turns out the fryer grease is corn oil. A 75% corn oil with 25% coconut oil should make a decent soap.
I have no idea what the end product will smell like.

[Kat]

I'm still game. The smell question was a joke :) but I can bring some essential oils if you'd like. I don't know anything about soap-making and would love to visit your experiment. Let us know when?

[Wendy Farley]

I am interested to know how this all worked out? Do you have recipes or any other directions ? I have looked a lot for the most "uncommercial" way to do this, and have access to all the free fryer grease I could ever want, we burn wood, so I can make my own lye solution, but coming up with information, that seems to be the tricky part, esp. if one does not want to purchase little cans of lye . Any help? I would love to be able to resurrect this old forgotten self reliant craft!
Thanks,
Wendy

[Kat]

Hi Wendy,

We haven't had our soap party yet, but skills like this are definitely on the agenda! In the coming days perhaps we can round up some resources for you.

Kat

[Christine Chapin]

best way for lye (which is very very caustic) is clean hardwood ash that you have let water slowly (overnight slowly) let water seep thru into a container that can hold acid and will not react with acid- if I remember correctly equal part water and ash but do it in small batches- it does not take a lot of lye to make soap. And remember once it is lye it will burn you faster than anything. best to make it the night prior to soap makeing and with lye soap outdoors is better than in..... and Welding gloves are good. Sorry the homemade stuff can't be controlled in strength so best to take lots of the precautions and be safe than halfway measures only to find that what you made is highly caustic ... I have a solid recipe around somewhere that a docent from Williamsburg shared with me- I'll post it as soon as I find it.

[grundygreen]

Just recently met someone at the market who might do a teach in.
She can also get the lye. I'll spring for the cost. Just need to find a site.