Did you know?

Every oil has its own character. A few curiosities to get you started.

Coconut oil There is a soap that lathers in sea water. "Sailor's soap" is made with 100% coconut oil. Its secret: lauric acid, which lathers even in cold or salt water. Read the profile → Castor oil An oil made of 90% of a fatty acid found almost nowhere else. Ricinoleic acid makes the lather dense and long-lasting. A few percent is enough: beyond that, the soap turns sticky. Read the profile → Olive oil A single oil, and one of the most famous soaps in the world. Castile soap uses nothing but olive oil. Very mild, but patient: it needs months of curing. Read the profile → Sunflower oil Orange spots on your soap? Look in your kitchen. Regular sunflower oil goes rancid quickly in soap. Its "high oleic" version keeps very well. Read the profile → Calculator Why you never swap one oil for another "weight for weight". For 1 kg of oil, you need 122 g of lye with shea butter… and 174 g with coconut oil. The calculator does the maths for you. Do the maths → Cocoa butter Chocolate has its place in soap making too. Cocoa butter makes a hard soap with a creamy lather… and, unrefined, a faint chocolate scent. Read the profile →

How soap is made

A chemical reaction thousands of years old, that you can repeat in your own kitchen.

The reaction

Oil + lye → soap + glycerin. That is saponification. You always keep a little extra oil, the superfat (5 to 8%), for a mild soap with no leftover lye.

The methods

Cold process: the most common, it preserves the oils but needs 4 weeks of curing. Hot process: the batter is cooked, so the soap is ready sooner. Melt and pour starts from an already saponified base: no lye to handle.

Safety first

Gloves and goggles are a must: lye is highly corrosive. Always pour the lye into the water, never the reverse. And weigh everything, to the gram.

The calculator

Lye (NaOH or KOH) and water worked out to the gram.
Hardness, lather, conditioning, cleansing: your soap's qualities before you make it.
Full fatty acid profile, updated in real time.

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Soap making oils

SAP value, INS, fatty acid profile and amount of lye for every oil, butter, fat and wax used in soap making.

Olive Coconut Shea Castor Sweet almond Cocoa butter

Browse the 139 oils

Ready to formulate your first soap?

Add your oils, set the superfat: the recipe appears instantly.

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