Mother Earth News_December_2016_2017

40 MOTHER EARTH NEWS December 2016/January 2017

S

oap-makers love to tell the sto-

ry 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, from which they produced

slacked lime to make a caustic soda lye

(sodium hydroxide).

After years of professionally mak-

ing 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 an-

cient techniques. My goals were to

make my own lye and to turn kitch-

en-waste fats into soap. I finally took

the plunge — and what an interesting

adventure it’s been! I dug through old

articles and manuscripts, learned to

decipher medieval English, and filled

my kitchen with weird, bubbling con-

coctions. And I wondered how some-

thing 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 Basics

To undertake the process of making

soap, 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,

By Susan Verberg

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

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

MAKE SOAPMAKE SOAPMAKE SOAP

the Old-Fashioned Waythe Old-Fashioned Waythe Old-Fashioned Way

SUSAN VERBERG (7); TOP: AMANDA NAGENGAST; PAGE 40: MATTHEW T. STALLBAUMER

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