I thought I had the perfecy recipe to use the woodashes from my stove and turn them into soap? Is not LYE nothing more than woodashes and water? I did something wrong and I don't know what? Can anyone help? I have to use the library and have searched for help there, but have come up with little to nothing. I know there are those of you who sell soap and supplies, but I was hoping to learn to make my own like they did "way back when." Can anyone recommend a book? Does anyone know if there is a good recipe in the Foxfire series? Look forward to all that answer and thank-you in advance for any help that you can give me.

-- Danette Rebai (drebai@yahoo.com), March 19, 2001

Answers

Yes lye is made from wood ashes, but my first question to you is what did happen, was you trying to make cold soap, or was you boiling it, if you were making cold soap did it seperate while you was making it, if so you pured your lye solution into the lard to fast, it must be poured into the lard very slowly and you must have someone stirring it while you are puring the lye, and your lard should only be milk warm and your lye solution should be cold. Try this and let me know what happens, I am really interrested to know what did happen with your soap making. Please email me at the email address above and let me know.

-- Paul Allen Funk (arrticfox@yahoo.com), March 19, 2001.

do get lye from woodash,, you need to leach it out. pour water into a container that has the ash,, let it drip out,, that will be lye water. There was a posting not long ago on this.

-- Stan (sopal@net-port.com), March 19, 2001.

Try this link: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/paul_norman_3/soapmake.htm

-- Steve - TX (steve.beckman@compaq.com), March 20, 2001.

When I used wood ash for making soap, I used a trough system. The ashes in the bottom, with a spout at one (lower) end. Poured the water through and caught the lye solution in an old enamel kettle.

I always use fat and lye that are relatively the same temp no matter what type of soap I am making. I heat the fat first, and let it start to cool. When I can lightly touch the bottoms of the containers, I start adding the lye to the fat. Stir constantly, and pour slowly.

I have to make soap by myself, so sometimes I use a gallon glass jar with a wide mouth for the lye. Seems family got scared off when hubby decided he needed a glass of water.... Jar was cooling in sink and he let the cool water touch it with the hot lye inside.... Exploded. So, now I have to work by myself. Go figure......

-- Sue Diederich (willow666@rocketmail.com), March 20, 2001.

The wood ash method works best with hard wood ash. I used pine ash and couln't EVER get trace.

-- Lauren Rowland (mommymagic@pon.net), February 08, 2002.