Basic Soap Making

Safety:
The very first chapter in every soap making book I have read, and I've read many, always talk about safety.  I will be no different.  The very first thing any person needs to understand about soap making is that it is a chemical reaction taking place that generates a great amount of heat.  The name of the process is called saponification, wherein an acid (oils) and a base (NaOH... the lye) chemically combine to form a salt (soap).  No person intending to undertake the making of soap should ever do so without the proper equipment and tools.  The main ones that cannot go without are rubber gloves and chemical safety glasses.  Lye (NaOH in water) is highly caustic, it WILL burn if you get it on your skin or in your eyes.  Most also recommend closed toe shoes, long sleeve shirt and pants.

Remember two things when planning to make soap; the lye water is caustic... and so is the raw soap.  In fact, the soap has the ability to burn until it has been fully cured, though is less likely to do so as time wears along.  It's a good idea to use only steel, glass, or plastic tools when making soap as wood will eventually deteriorate and aluminum can react.

Tools:
The basic tools needed for soap making, aside from safety gear of goggles and gloves, include the following:

• steel or glass bowls for weighing and mixing
• plastic or steel spoons for stirring
• two glass thermometers for measuring temps if you are going to be precise, candy thermometers work very well for these
• an electric hand mixer, or be prepared to stir for a really long time!
• rubber scaper
• steel measuring spoons
• large (4C) glass measuring cups
• soap molds (can be as simple as an old ice bin or as complex as you wish)
• freezer paper if your soap molds are wooden (to line it), Vaseline for plastic molds (it helps the raw soap to release from the mold
• steel blade knife or wire to cut the soap bars (I use a wire cake leveler and a miter box)
• an accurate scale, I prefer a digital one
• a soap calculator to aid in determining the best weight of the ingredients so as to avoid putting in too much lye.  You can find these online or purchase one
• oils (tallow or lard, vegetable oil, specialty oils, or any combination.  It's best to choose single oils to add, no combo oils like Crisco, avoid corn oil as it tends to go rancid quickly (known as DOS), also avoid peanut oil as it tends to not fully solidify and comes out with a fairly nasty result)
• Sodium Hydroxide (NaOH)

I also like to use the following, but these are all optional:

• Additives (coffee grounds, seeds, or salt for a scrub bar
• clays
• butters
• herbal or mineral colorants
• even silk (makes a very smooth bar, this is dissolved into the lye water