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This DIY liquid castile soap recipe is easy and inexpensive to make. It’s a great multipurpose cleaner, perfect for both your body and around the house!
A couple of years ago, I showed you how easy it was to make a basic beginner soap, even if you’ve never done it before. I understand why making soap can sound intimidating, but once you give it a try, it can become very addicting. Seriously, not only is it a pretty thrifty hobby because you can make large batches that will last you a long time, but it’s fun to be able to customize the soap to be exactly the way you want it and not depend upon what’s on the market.
Even if you’re just a beginner, it’s easy enough to change up your soap by only using different essential oils, or exfoliants like poppy seeds, or other fun ingredients without having to do a lot of research into making a new viable recipe. As you get more experienced, you’ll probably want to take things a step forward and make new recipes of your own and add in milk or pumpkin or spices and colorants. Once you learn how to use a soap calculator, that isn’t really that difficult either.
But maybe, you’d just prefer something a little different?
A liquid soap perhaps?
I’ll have to admit that I was making soap for a very long time before I started making liquid soaps and coming up with a DIY liquid castile soap recipe for you to try. There aren’t as many resources available for making liquid soaps, so it’s a bit of trial and error at first, but once you find a recipe that works out well, it’s pretty simple to make. While it does take a little more time and effort than whipping up a batch of bars of soap, I think you’ll find that it’s well worth it, especially when you take a look at the price of a store bought liquid castile soap.
I want to call special attention to something. When making liquid soaps, you use KOH, potassium hydroxide, rather than NaOH, sodium hydroxide, the lye used in bar soaps like my easy, beginner soap.
What is castile soap?
Technically, Castile soap is a type of soap made with only olive oil, whose name originates here in Spain. (You can read more about the origin of Castile soap and other other soaps in my recipe for pure Castile bar soap.) Over the years, the definition of Castile soap has broadened to include other types of vegetable oils such as coconut oil. Dr. Bronner’s Soap, which has probably become the most famous commercial liquid castile soap, even has a greater percentage of coconut oil than olive oil.
When it comes to making a homemade castile soap, though, I was a bit of a purist, and wanted it to be the real deal and made with only olive oil.
Why did I decide to make a pure, liquid castile soap?
The great thing about liquid soaps over bars of soap, is that it is very versatile and you can make several different types and then mix them to the perfect combination for you after having made them!
Soaps made with different oils have different properties.
Soaps made with olive oil, for example, tend to be more hydrating for your skin than soaps made with coconut oil. On the other hand, they don’t lather up as much as a coconut oil soap, nor do they leave you feeling squeaky clean in the same way (partly because they are more hydrating). Pure coconut oil soaps tend to be great for cleaning around the house and for laundry. Pure olive oil soaps tend to be gentle on the skin and great for gentle body cleansing.
The ideal solution would really be to combine different oils when making your soap to get the qualities you want from the various oils you use. That’s exactly what they did when they formulated Dr. Bronner’s soap, and what I did when I showed you how to make a basic beginner soap using a combination of olive oil and coconut oil.
When you’re making a bar of soap, you have to decide what combination you want to use from the very beginning, and your entire batch will have that very same combination.
With liquid soaps, though, you have the advantage of being able to combine your various soaps after the fact, making it easier to experiment with smaller combinations until you find the perfect soap for your need.
That’s why I made a pure liquid castile soap, using only olive oil, and then later made a pure liquid coconut oil soap (recipe here) and I mix them together in differing quantities depending on how I want to use each soap.
The other great thing about making liquid soap is that, unlike with bar soap, you can also add in your additives like essential oils after the fact. This means that you don’t have to divide your batch at trace and work quickly to mix in your different essential oils to each part before the soap sets up. I, instead, make a concentrated liquid soap base, and as I dilute it and mix it using soaps made with various oils, I also decide what essential oils I want to add. This gives me the freedom even months after having made my soap base, to play with fun combinations.
So have I convinced you to give it a shot?
I hope so!
Easy, beginner, DIY liquid castile soap from scratch!
Easy DIY Liquid Castile Soap Recipe
Makes 1-2 gallons of liquid soap. (See notes below)
Materials
Instructions
- Measure out the olive oil and begin to heat it over low heat. I warmed mine on the low setting of my slow cooker. A slow cooker is perfect for this sort of job because it will gently warm without burning, and keeping things at a steady temperature. (In the picture you can see that I first thought to try using a glass bowl in my slow cooker as a sort of double boiler, but I later found it too difficult and just poured the ingredients directly in the slow cooker itself.
- Mix together the glycerine and water, and measure out the potassium hydroxide (KOH).
- Carefully add the KOH to the water (and not the other way around!) in a well ventilated area. I usually do this outside. Stir the KOH into the water until it dissolves. It will be cloudy at first, but then it will clear up.
- Slowly add in the the KOH mixture to the warm olive oil, and slowly stir them together in the slow cooker over low heat to incorporate the lye mixture into the oils.
- Using a hand held blender, begin to blend the ingredients together in the slow cooker. In a few minutes the mixture will begin to thicken and look like mayonnaise, and then just moments later will look like a creamy pudding.
- A couple of minutes later, the mixture will begin to look grainy. A lot of people call this the mashed potatoes stage because that's sort of what the mixture resembles. Continue to blend. (If at any point the mixture becomes too thick to blend with the hand held blender, switch to mixing with a wooden spoon, but when working with only olive oil I found the mixture to be pretty workable throughout the process.)
- As you continue to blend, it will start to get creamy again, and you will notice that you will start to see translucent streaks in your mixture. Once you reach this point, you can stop blending with the hand held blender, and begin to stir occasionally with a wooden spoon.
- The mixture will begin to thicken up and become more translucent. We are now working on making a soap base paste which will be dissolved into a clear liquid soap. The process will take 3-4 hours, and you will want to check on it and stir it up every half an hour or so. (See, I told you this takes a bit longer than making bar soap, but the results are worth it!!)
- To check for "doneness," we will look to see if our paste is dissolving into a completely clear liquid soap. To do this, take a small amount of the soap paste and dissolve it in water, and look to see if the water is clear once the soap paste is dissolved. If the liquid is cloudy, you will want to continue to cook the soap in the slow cooker. You can let it cook another half an hour before checking on it again. If it dissolves clear like the soap in my picture, you are finished making the soap paste.
- Your liquid castile soap paste is now ready to be stored or dissolved into liquid soap as needed.
Notes
- This recipe makes 4.5-5 lbs. soap paste which can be diluted to 10-20 lbs. soap or more. That ends up being 1-2 gallons, or more, depending upon desired concentration.
- Keep in mind that liquid soap is not as thick as commercial gels and surfactants. Liquid soap is of a thinner consistency, and doesn't need to be thick to be concentrated and work well.
Diluting your soap paste
Once you have made your soap paste, you’ll need to dilute it as needed to get your liquid soap. For that, you’ll need to take some of the paste and let it dissolve into water over the course of several hours or over the stove. I used distilled water for my liquid soap to help make sure it will last as long as possible, but for small batches that are going to be used relatively quickly, you can probably get away with tap water without any issues. You can read more about how to dilute a soap paste here.
When I made my first batches last fall, I diluted my various soaps into thick, clear liquid soaps, but was disappointed to find that a week or two later, they started to turn opaque and much thicker.
Why did my DIY liquid soap turn opaque?
It turns out that as the weather got colder, my soaps turned more opaque and thicker just like coconut oil solidifies when in a cold environment!
I wouldn’t have been surprised that the coconut oil soap did that, but my beginner liquid castile soap did the exact same thing!!
I had my suspicions that that was the issue, but wasn’t able to confirm it until this spring when some of my thicker liquid soaps, left as is as an experiment, turned perfectly clear and beautiful again. (update: this winter, my soap has become very thick, opaque and a bit gloopy again. Keep this in mind if you are making this soap in winter!)
So, does that mean you can’t use homemade liquid soap in the winter/cold environments?
No.
You can still use your soap, you’ll just need to dilute it a little more. I haven’t provided an exact amount of water to use for dilution because I’ve found that it depends upon the temperature outside, and what I’m looking for in consistency for each particular use of the soap.
I was curious to compare, so I recently bought some of Dr. Bronner’s soap to compare with mine, and I have noticed that the soap I bought was also quite a thin, diluted consistency. After some reading, I’ve learned that most commercial liquid soaps are later thickened with added ingredients. I prefer to keep mine as natural as possible, so I leave it as is… diluted until transparent and usable in a soap pump.
In the winter, then, my soap is a little bit thinner than it is in the summer, but that isn’t a problem for me.
Why did I add glycerin to the recipe?
This question has come up several times, so I thought it was best to update this post with an answer.
When I first wrote the post, I had studied several methods of making liquid soaps. One is called the glycerin method, and replaces part of the water with glycerin. In theory, that is done to help move the process along and make the liquid soap paste process more quickly. Because this was meant to be a beginner liquid soap recipe, I wanted things to be as quick and fool proof as possible, so I chose the glycerin method.
In the end, I don’t know if it really makes the process quicker and easier or not, but I have found several benefits to adding glycerin to the recipe:
- The resulting soap paste dissolves very easily in water. I don’t need to heat the water nor do I need to leave it for days at a time. I can cover my soap paste with distilled water and in a couple of hours I have a beautiful, clear liquid soap effortlessly.
- I find that even my liquid coconut oil soap is hydrating enough to use on the body despite the fact that it hasn’t been superfatted at all. I think the extra glycerin helps to make a really great, hydrating soap that is clear and doesn’t need extra oils. (I think that’s also why my homemade glycerin bar soap is hydrating even without superfatting at all.)
My DIY liquid body soap recipe:
60-70% liquid castile soap (made with olive oil)
30-40% liquid coconut oil soap (for lather, link goes to the recipe post)
Essential oils of choice.
I mix all of the ingredients together, and keep a bottle in the shower to use instead of shower gel.
I like to switch up the essential oils used in each batch, and have so far tried adding lavender essential oil with a bit of tea tree oil in one batch, and a citrus blend using lemon and bergamot in another.
I’d love to hear what blends are your favorites.
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Hi Tracy,
I just made my first batch of liquid olive oil soap using the recipe above. I misunderstood the directions. I measured out 32 oz of olive oil (4 cups) and 8 oz of glycerin (1 cup) and 11.55 oz of distilled water (about (1 1/2 cups) thenI weighed out 6.52 oz of KOH.
I followed the directions and achieved each stage that you listed. I used a crockpot and it took about 4 hours.
I cooked it to a putty like paste and when added to distilled water it is pretty clear. I have tried it as a hand cleaner and it doesn’t appear to be irritating.
My concern is that I don’t know if it is safe overall? I do not know enough about KOH and worry that I used too much since I weighed the KOH and used liquid measures for the other ingredients. . I would like to share some of my paste with family if it is safe to use.
Could you please advise?. Thank-you I have enjoyed following your blog and I am excited that my soap looks like yours.
Hi Kathy,
Well, I have to admit that I generally think that if it doesn’t irritate the skin (when it comes to soap recipes), then it probably is generally safe.
That said, I started to look up what the differences may be. For olive oil, I found that 32 US liquid ounces of extra virgin olive oil would weight 30.56 ounces at 76ºF. (Interestingly, it goes slightly up if you change the temp to 72ºF.)
8 fluid ounces of glycerine weighs 10.5 ounces. The water doesn’t matter.
Anyway, I guess you used a bit more glycerin- not a big deal either way, but slightly less olive oil than you should. So, the final pH maybe higher than normal and, yes, you probably have more lye than needed. It’s not uncommon to make liquid soaps with a lye excess, though- to ensure they are clear.
I’d suggest reading my post on neutralizing a liquid soap. That should help you determine how and if you should try to slightly lower the pH.
If you’re going to use it for cleaning, don’t worry at all about it! If you’re using for skin, then, well, it’s up to you. 😉
I’d like to add that the extra glycerin doesn’t really matter either- but it may make your soap less irritating. (Some people make without glycerine and some people only use glycerin and no water.)
Hi Tracy,
I have been making Castille soap and my skin does feel clean and soft.
However, a white residue seems to be left on my skin.
I can literally scrape residue off my skin after using.
Please can you advise me how to get round this? Do I need to dilute with more water?
Many thanks in advance and have a good evening
Hi Sara,
That’s interesting. I don’t have that issue.
Did you use this recipe?
Hi Tracy,
Thanks for your advice. I am much more comfortable using my soap. I have added a lemon essential oil as a fragrance and it is very pleasant. I will soon be trying it as a cleaner.
You make it fun and easy to try new recipes. I look forward to trying another very soon and will follow directions:)
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and expertise.
Kathy
I’m happy to hear it! Thank you! 😊
Just curious whether the ounces are volume or weight? They all convert to grams using the button on the website, but that seems odd, and would make a huge difference for the KOH, a modest difference for the oil, and no difference for the water. Just want to make sure I get the KOH right, as that could go very wrong.
Hi Ann,
All of the soap recipes are by weight. I normally post them by grams, but the lye calculator that I use for liquid soap recipes works with ounces. That’s why those happen to go the other way around.
But, yes, go by either the grams or use the ounces by weight.
Hi, how much essential oil do you add for it to be diluted enough? Do you use a calculation like so many drops per so much ml? Thanks so much for sharing this!
Hi Nikki,
Usually, the percentage limits for essential oils in rinse off products is pretty high. I use a conservative estimate- that it can go up to 2% (by weight).
That said, I usually go by scent now as I normally never add anywhere near that when I dilute the soap. I usually just add a few drops to my dispenser when I fill it with soap. For me, that’s enough.
If you want a stronger scent, it would be wise to weigh it when adding it.
Hi,
I was wondering, do we still need to wash our hands after lathering this liquid soap on our hands or we don’t have to. Thanks!
Hi Sarah,
I’m not understanding the question. You should lather and rinse, just as you would with any other soap.
Hi, sorry, but what is koh? In the UK it is a brand of all purpose cleaner, but I’m interested in not buying products in plastic, so that would cancel out my ambition. Is there another ingredient that I can use to make my own?
Hi Tracy (great name!),
KOH stands for potassium hydroxide. It’s the type of lye that is used to make liquid soap. (You can read more about lye and why it’s a necessary ingredient in my post about lye.) Without lye, one can’t make soap.
I’m not sure about buying it in glass or something similar. When I’ve bought it, it has been packaged in plastic bags. That said, the amount that comes in a small plastic bag is enough to make several large batches of soap (enough to last my family years), so I think it is still very sustainable.
Hi! I just made some today and it’s cooked for 4 hours the paste is clear but still very cloudy in water. Looks like diluted milk when I add the paste to the water. I’ll keep cooking it and hope it works
Hello!
So I realized I was attempting to dissolve the soap in really cold water and that was causing it to be cloudy. Once I heated the water and dissolved the paste it is perfectly clear! Although it’s not as foamy as the store bought kind. I’m ok with that i think. Anyway thanks for the recipe this is so cool! I love it.
Hi Grace,
Yes, the temperature will affect it a lot! Mine gets cloudy in the winter sometimes!
I’m glad it worked out well for you, in the end.
Thank you for the recipe, nice and simple to use. I am still cooking it right now and have been all day so far and it’s still cloudy.
Hi Marie,
Don’t worry too much about cloudiness. It can be caused by a number of factors. I’d rest and try to dilute some of it and see how it performs as a soap. You may find that once you dilute it and let it rest, that it clears up on its own. That’s very common.
I’m working on a general post about liquid soaps to add some of this troubleshooting information as it seems to be a common problem that often resolves itself!
In any case, you can always cook the soap paste later on if you think it needs further cooking. I’ve found that once you’ve started cooking it (even if it was done for a very, very short time and it completely opaque still) that it eventually becomes transparent on its own.
I hope that helps and that you are able to enjoy your soap!
well looks like it aint gonna happen! KOH is a controlled substance here in Ecuador. Even for simple home use I would need to get a licence and for one year make a monthly report on amounts used.
However i can buy one litre of a 10% solution, no problems (go figure). is it possible to adapt the liquid recipe for this?
Seriously? That’s crazy!
I’ve never worked with a solution before, so I’m not completely sure how it would work. It seems a bit silly that they allow the solution but not the flakes!
I guess it could be calculated out- rather than mix the KOH in water- use the solution. Let me see if I can figure it out when I get back home.
I’ve looked for someone with a similar comment but I didn’t see one. Sorry if this has been posted!
I’m making this for the first time and I think I added too much olive oil. It isn’t getting clumpy when I mix it. I dont have a mixer like you’ve shown- just a hand held beater. But whatever the deal, it is remaining a liquid in my crockpot. Any way I can save this batch? It was a big trip to get these ingredients and I dont want to start over! 😬
Thank you!
Hi Bryn,
Did it ever get to trace and solidify more?
If not, it’s really hard for me to try to troubleshoot without seeing it.
When you say that you may have used too much olive oil, does that mean that you weren’t weighing the amounts out?
These recipes are very precise, so it can make a big difference.
The beater should be fine for making the soap, and the heat of the crockpot should help move things along. That said, olive oil soaps do take a bit longer to reach trace. If you’re using a beater, it may take longer, and that may be the real problem.
I’d also want to know more about the ingredients used if you blended for a long time and it didn’t reach trace.
Hi Tracy. Nice to meet you 🙂 I have gathered all the needed ingredients to “attempt” making this soap. I have never “made” soap, i’ve only recently started making melt and pour. So I’m a real beginner. My question is, and Im so happy to see you’re still responding to this page!, is… to be absolutely sure, the ingredients are all “weighed” correct? Including the olive oil? Im not just going to dump a 32 liquid ounce (1quart) bottle of olive in the cooker right? Im going to weigh out 32 ounces (2 pounds)? This may be some of what the confusion is. Also, at what temperature should the olive oil be when you mix in the other ingredients? Im excited to try this and the coconut castile soap as it is pretty pricey to buy castile soap. Im on a fixed income so I don’t want to mess it up =/ I hope it comes out like yours so I can impress my 4 daughters and teach my grands a new trick. lol. Thank you for sharing your knowledge. I’ll be patiently waiting with materials at the ready… 😁
Hi Karen,
Yes! You are completely correct about the weight. I normally write my bar soap recipes in grams to avoid confusion, but I use a different lye calculator for my liquid soap recipes. It calculates in ounces, so I’ve left it that way. If you click on “convert units” under the ingredients, though, it will show you in grams. I calculated it both ways and added that to help people who prefer working in grams (like me)! 😉
If you’re on a fixed income, I’d almost just go with the coconut oil soap. If you can find a cheap, refined coconut oil, it’s the cheapest way to make the soap. I’ve been meaning to make a new post about liquid soaps in general and explaining my new thoughts on this. (I actually started writing it, but never finished it and got distracted with other posts.)
Anyway, I’ll say now that I don’t notice a huge difference in the different liquid soaps. It was very surprising to me as the difference in a bar soap made with olive oil and one made with coconut oil is HUGE! They’re completely different. Here, though, there isn’t much more difference than that the coconut oil one is lighter in color and smells a bit different. (IT smells like Dr. Bronner’s unscented as theirs is mostly coconut oil.)
For me, living in Spain, it’s pretty cheap to make soap with either. Lately, though, I pretty much only make the coconut oil one anymore. I found an inexpensive source for coconut oil meant for soap making and it’s perfect for this sort of recipe. (I used to have to use the only coconut oil I could find here, organic virgin coconut oil, which was very expensive.)
The temperature isn’t a big deal. I just add the oils to the low temperature of my slow cooker. In reality, you could melt the coconut oil and do most of the process in cold, but you’d end up with an opaque soap that may not be fully saponified, meaning you may have some leftover lye.
That’s why it’s best to cook the paste.
I actually did some experimentation with “cold processing” liquid soap. It’s something I want to write about too. I had some fascinating findings. I don’t suggest doing that, though. 😉
Good luck with it. If you have any other questions along the way, let me know. I love that you are introducing new skills to your grandchildren. I wish I could have done this sort of thing with my grandmother.
Hi again Tracy. Thank you so much for your timely reply! I didn’t even know castile soap came in bars! Ha! Yes, extremely new to this soap making business. Ok, so I went to fetch my bottle of olive oil I thought I had in the pantry but of course I couldn’t find it 😑 so I must have already used it. I use olive oil alot with my cooking. So this recipe is on hold until I get to the store. Im going to try it though and will let you know how it turns out. I do have some coconut oil though and hopefully its enough. Im going to click on that recipe next. And, since I now know you can make bars of castile soap I may try my hand at that as well. One of my 4 daughters really likes castile soap. Im wondering if she even knows it comes in bars 🤔 But thats another project, I’ll have to get the correct lye for solid soap as I only ordered the one you have in this recipe. Until next time… Happy National Womans Day!
Hello again Tracy. Well I finally got my big bottle of olive oil and my big jar of coconut oil (the one I had wasn’t even enough for 1/2 recipe). I was too busy trying to get some toilet paper =/ I hope you are well during this crisis. So, I clicked on the coconut oil recipe then clicked on a diluting page and “Roger” had me dizzy lol! Then clicked on the PH page and now im so totally intimidated. Talk about Chem class 101 😖 so, my new question is (before I even get started) are these liquid soap recipes ok to use as is or do I now have to get some sort of ph tester? We have basically been told to stay home until further notice here in RI so I’ve got plenty of time for my projects now, esp. since I’ve scored some tp 🤣
Hi Karen,
No need to buy a pH meter. The recipes on my blog are all calculated exactly. I don’t make them lye heavy and so there is no need to “neutralize” them later. I just give that information so that people who have heard about that sort of thing can understand what it is.
Soap is always going to be on the alkaline side. That’s just the way soap is.
The only reason you might want to check the pH is if you found your soap to be irritating to the skin for some reason. You could check the pH as one of the ways to troubleshoot what went wrong.
We’re fine here. We’re in mandatory confinement in our homes. Luckily, I live on the mountain and have a yard. Most people here live in small apartments, some without balconies. Unfortunately, the rain and bad weather is keeping us indoors anyway.
Stay safe! I think now is a great time to work on skills like soap making! Let me know if you need help along the way!
Tracy… Im backkk… lol! I made the olive oil paste today and wanted to share my experience. I followed all the instructions and weighed everything as you said. I opened my brand new crock pot/slow cooker and my brand new hand blender. I already wear glasses, I wore a sweat shirt with rubber bands at the wrists and nitrile gloves. I was a little afraid of the lye. First I would like to mention that when I added the lye to the water mixture I was either too scared or maybe got a whiff of scentless gas? So I moved away and calmed down/breathed then put on a face mask! Ha! serious stuff. It was raining outside so I mixed it near an exhaust fan in the window on high. Take away: if you can’t mix it outside wear a mask. Next, I didn’t know the lye, water, glycerin mix was going to get hot. I think you should mention that above, I don’t see it? I did just see it on your beginner bar soap page but I hadn’t read that page yet. Ok, so, my new cooker has high-low-warm settings. My older one which is too small for this purpose only has high or low. I put the heat on low per instructions. Well, I could not get the mixture to do anything, as in thicken, so I turned the heat down to warm and thats when it started to thicken. Obviously the low setting is too hot on this cooker so I thought I’de mention it as some may also have this same issue. I got through all the phases, let it cook 30 min. more and tried the “cooked” test with the water and it was clear. I turned it off, let it cool and put most away in a container. I added maybe a little more then equal parts distilled water to the remaining paste in the cooker and turned it back on to “low” to make a concentrate to go with tomorrows coconut paste trial. I stirred it while making dinner and after dinner and noticed maybe after 3 hours? or so it was finally all melting and getting clear. I turned it off. So long story short 😆 now I’ve got clear “gel”, not what I was expecting. Tomorrow I will add more water and reheat it. (didn’t want to crack the crock 😉) Over on the coconut paste page you have a picture that shows a translucent gel on a spoon. This is what my “concentrate” looks like. My paste looks more like fudge? I did go through all the stages and stopped mixing after the potato stage when it got smooth again, cooked it an additional 1/2 hour and did the disolve test. Any ideas? I am happy with the end results, both the “fudge” and the gel work up a decent lather. Even the little “disolve test” water lathers with a handful and thats “well” water. I also think my hands feel softer after testing it all evening. One of my daughters has terrible eczema on her hands and Im hoping this will help, along with the coconut soap. I was reading through your beginner bar soap page and got a chuckle over the used oil experiment. I think it’s wonderful of you to be here sharing your knowledge and trials and tribulations and want to say Thank You! Im looking forward to making the next recipe 😊
Hi Karen,
Thank you so much for all of the great feedback. I’m going to be updating these posts soon as I also want to make a starting page for how to make liquid soap and add to it (and these individual recipes) my more recent observations. Comments like yours are very helpful to me when I update posts like this one!
So, let me try to understand what happened…
You diluted it somewhat and it was too thick.
When you say your concentrate looks like fudge- does that mean it is opaque? or quite solid?
I end up with more of a pliable putty. It feels kind of like silly putty. Ha!
It should be fine either way. I’ve found that making the same recipe can give slightly different results depending on the current weather and temperature, the crockpot used, etc.
In the end, though, they all seem to work out.
Now that we have more time at home, it’s the perfect time to experiment with these sorts of adventures. 😉
Hi Tracy, Sending prayers your way for your wellbeing! So, I made the coconut liquid soap paste yesterday. It was a success! This is awesome! YOU are Awesome! Im like a kid at Christmas with a new toy 😁 I did a sink full of dishes with just the remnants of the olive soap that was on my cooker and utensils! I was so excited I even considered cleaning out the fridge just to have more dishes to wash. But no, lets not get carried away 🤣 Anywho, I found it to be really good for washing dishes. They weren’t greasy and my plastics had that squeak of cleanliness. However, today I did the same when washing the cooker and utensils and dishes with the coconut soap and I didn’t think it did the plastics as well so I had to use the olive soap for those. But!!! I have been a Dawn user forever and thats all I will use so for me to be happy with this soap for doing my dishes is really, really, REALLY saying something! You’re awesome, did I mention that already? As for the olive soap paste, I think I just didn’t cook it long enough. I misinterpretted 3-4 hours as “up to” 3-4 hours because like I said it melted in the water clear after only 1/2 hour of cooking (after all the phases). The coconut paste didn’t do that and I cooked it about 3.5 hours before it finally did and it looked like your picture. The olive paste doesn’t look like maple fudge any longer either. The next day it had the green tinge to it and has since gotten a little darker and very slightly more translucent. As far as the olive concentrate “gel” I just think its super concentrated? I measured 1 cup of it into a mason jar and added 1 cup of almost boiling water to it and it liquified immediately. I put a little into a foam soap dispenser and it works awesome! Now Im like the mad scientist over here writing out formulas of how much paste and how much water, what do I want the ratios to be if I mix them, how much essential oil, how much do I think i’ve got total to spread between 5 houses etc. Good, no, I mean “Awesome” stuff here! My 4 daughters are all waiting to try it and want the recipe and the cost etc. You will have some new followers for sure 😊. Im going to get some regular lye next so I can try the castile bar soap. That wont be for a while though because I already have a ton of melt and pour to use. If only I had found you sooner I could have saved some money on that. I figured out my cost (give or take a cpl pennies) at 6 cents per fluid ounce for the olive soap if it makes 2 gallons, less if it makes more. The coconut was even cheaper. Awesome 😉
I cooked it but I think I didnt cook the paste enough, the diluted soap is very milky. Is it okay ??
Hi Huzaifa,
Yes, it can remain cloudy (with an opaque paste) when it isn’t cooked for long enough.
Most of the time, it will eventually convert to become more transparent on its own.
One time I purposely took some paste out to show the difference in appearance of the fully cooked vs. not fully cooked soap paste. I took too long to take the pictures, though, and several weeks later they looked and behaved exactly the same. I think that if it’s warm where you have it stored, it will finish up even faster.
It shouldn’t be a problem to use the soap. It may be slightly more alkaline and irritating to the skin if it hasn’t fully saponified. That would be the only issue I can think of.
It should still behave like soap and you should be able to use it for general cleaning. With time (if not immediately), you should be able to use it for skin too, and it should eventually be like a fully cooked soap.
Of course, if you find it isn’t behaving as you like, you can always cook it a bit longer too- either in a crockpot or a low-temperature oven. 😉