Make soap at home because it is what your ancestors did. Understanding the ways of your ancient ancestors can you make feel better at home because you’ll feel more connected to the past and your ancestors.
Soap making is also healthier, cleaner, and safer than buying commercial soaps.
Making soap at home has never been easier with all the information that abounds on the Internet.
There are four primary methods of making soap, and they include the tried and true melt and pour method, the cold process method, the hot process method, and the rebatching method.
There are pros, cons, hot spots, cold spots, advantages, and disadvantages of each method, and it is up to you to discover each one and which method works best for you.
Let’s start with a review of melt and pour, including its pros and cons, and then you can see if it’s right for you. Making soap with the melt and pour method is most akin to making a cake with a cake mix. While you might not have much control over the ingredients or the personalization of the recipe, you make up for it in the safety, guarantee, and convenience of the recipe itself. You basically buy pre-made blocks of uncolored, unscented, and simple soap from a soap supplier, crafts store, or hobby store. You then melt up the soap base in a microwave, or you can use a double boiler if you have the utensil. After the soap is completely done melting, you add in your own fragrance, coloring, or additives to make it just perfect. Here is where you can really get personal. It is important to follow basic proportions of ingredients, but you can experiment wildly with the types of fragrances, oils, and essential oils you use to create the soap you want.
You basically need a counter top, clean workspace, microwave, double boiler, bowl that can withstand the heat in the microwave, spoons, whisks, mel and pour soap base, measuring spoons, and your own mixture of fragrances, colors, or additives. You also need something to mold the soap in.
Some of the pros to using the melt and pour method include an easy and cheap way to begin making soap, absolutely no need to deal with dangerous lye, a minimization of ingredients to get started, and the soap is ready to use right away – as soon as it hardens.
The downsides are that you have minimal control over your ingredients, the melt and pour method is not nearly as natural as other methods, and the soap is only as good as the base you purchase to make it with.
The melt and pour method is good for beginners. That is a good conclusion to make for readers of this article.
