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Lye is made from wood ashes seeped in water, and it was first called potash or pot ash, being ashes soaked in a pot. This is actually the origin of the word “potassium!” Lye is used in many soap recipes and cleansers, usually mixed in with oils and animal fats like beef fat to produce soap.
What’s the ingredients in lye soap?
GRANDMA’S Lye Soap is made with only three ingredients: food grade lard, lye and water. There are no detergents, fragrances, dyes or other additives to irritate sensitive skin, and it retains 100% of the natural glycerin created during the soap making process.
How was lye made in the old days?
Lye is made from wood ashes. In the pioneer days, the women would make lye by gathering the wood ashes from their fireplace and putting them into a wooden hopper. Next, they would pour water over it to soak the ashes. The water that seeped out of the hopper and into the wooden bucket was lye water.
Is lye soap still made?
There is no lye present in the finished bars of soap or shampoo. While all real soap must be made with lye, no lye remains in our finished product after saponification (described below).
Where does lye come from?
Whatever meat scraps and drippings you have on hand will supply the fat and the lye comes from wood ashes and water. To make lye in the kitchen, boil the ashes from a hardwood fire (soft woods are too resinous to mix with fat) in a little soft water, rainwater is best, for about half an hour.
Is lye good for your skin?
Lye is a caustic substance that can certainly damage your skin if you’re exposed to it. It can cause a number of problems, such as burns, blindness, and even death when consumed. The lye gets entirely used up during the process, which means it’s no longer present and can do no harm to your skin.
How did the settlers make soap?
In order to make soap, the colonists would combine the lye and rendered fat in a kettle and heat the mixture to a boil. After 6 to 8 hours, a soapy mass formed at the top of kettle which was liquid soap.
How did people in the 1800s make soap?
They made it from animal fat, wood ashes, and water. The fat had to be boiled (refined) and the hardwood ashes leached for a weak lye solution. Sounds like a whole lot of messy, smelly, hot work.
How did people make soap 100 years ago?
They made soap from fats boiled with ashes. Soap was used in cleaning wool and cotton used in textile manufacture and was used medicinally for at least 5000 years. The Ebers papyrus (Egypt, 1550 BC) reveals that the ancient Egyptians mixed animal and vegetable oils with alkaline salts to produce a soap-like substance.
Is lye natural or synthetic?
Lye has been on the USDA approved list for organic products from day one, The FDA specifically exempts soap from it’s labeling requirements, and The Natural Ingredient Resource Center exempts soap and allows it to be listed as 100% natural if all the ingredients (which they require to be listed) are all natural.
Does lye dissolve plastic?
Plastic. The right kind of plastic container is the best choice for mixing and storing lye solution. Some plastics are resistant to alkali, others are not, so it is important to KNOW, not guess, what a plastic container is made of. The important line to look at for our purposes is the “Bases/Alkali” line.
What can replace lye in soap?
Here are some good choices: Goat’s Milk Soap Base. Shea Butter Soap Base. Glycerin Soap Base. Cocoa Butter Soap Base.
How was soap made before lye?
Thousands of years ago before soap was available, people made their lye the old fashioned way by leaching water through wood ashes layered in a barrel or other container. If you’re in a far corner of the globe and can’t get lye locally, or are just curious how it’s made, you can make potassium hardwood lye yourself.
Why do they put lye in soap?
Without lye, the oils in your recipe would stay oils. Nothing would happen to them. A chemical change involving lye must happen in order to create soap.
What does lye soap smell like?
Lye soap is made from potassium hydroxide (from wood ashes or sodium hydroxide) and animal fat. So it is a “smelly” process that leaves the end product with a slight “basic” or biting odor a little like ammonia.
Is lye soap antibacterial?
Lye is both a disinfectant and a cleanser. Lye is particularly suitable to kill germs and bacteria as well as cleaning the surface of food containers, room vessels, the surface of wash bowls, etc.
Who invented lye soap?
The history of lye is actually rather short, even though soap has been in existence since 2800 B.C. Lye, as we know it, was not created until sometime in the early 1800’s by a chemist named Nicholas LeBlanc. He synthesized a solution of sodium hydroxide, which is what we refer to as lye.
What does lye heavy soap look like?
If the soap is lye heavy, the soap will turn green or yellow. If it’s balanced, it will turn blue.
How did they make soap in the 1700s?
In the 18th century soap came in two forms: hard soap and soft soap. In colonial times, soap was made by leeching lye out of hardwood ashes. The lye was then mixed with a fatty acid, typically tallow, lard or oil. It was difficult to gauge the strength of lye.
How was lye discovered?
Lye’s discovery and first uses revolved around soap. Toward the end of B.C., Romans discovered a lye solution when rain, volcanic ash, and animal fat from sacrifices mixed in a river, which became a place of cleaning. Nicolas LeBlanc, a French chemist, synthesized the first sodium hydroxide solution in 1780.
