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5 from 13 votes

Simple Tallow Soap Recipe

How to make simple tallow soap using ninety-percent tallow with coconut oil and castor oil to help boost the lather. This 1lb (454g) cold process recipe makes six bars when using the recommended cavity soap mold. Use the toggle below to double or triple the batch. Be aware that the soaping temperature is higher than that of other soap recipes since tallow has a higher melting point than many other oils. This recipe uses sheep tallow, but goat and deer tallow are direct substitutes. You can also use beef tallow, but the amount of lye will need to be adjusted. Further information is in the notes section. This recipe has a 5% superfat and a 33% lye concentration.
Keyword soap, soap recipe, tallow
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Curing time 28 days
Total Time 28 days 1 hour
Servings 6 bars
Author Lovely Greens
Cost 5

Equipment

Ingredients

Lye Solution

Soaping Oils

  • 408 g sheep, deer, or goat tallow 14.41 oz / You can also use beef tallow, but please see the notes section for changing the lye amount / 90%
  • 23 g coconut oil (refined) 0.8 oz / 5%
  • 23 g castor oil 0.8 oz / 5%

After Trace (optional ingredients)

Instructions

Organize Your Workspace

  • Cold-process soapmaking is chemistry, and this recipe uses lye. Lye is a caustic substance that is completely neutralized in the soapmaking process, but it can be harmful if not handled correctly. Please read this soap making safety guidance before proceeding.
  • Before you make this soap recipe, it's safety first. Make sure to be wearing closed-toe shoes, long sleeves, eye protection (goggles), and rubber/latex gloves.
  • Pre-measure the ingredients and organize your work surface with all the tools and equipment you'll need. Open a window for ventilation, keep pets and kids in another room, and have everything you need prepared.

Create the Lye Solution

  • Work in a well-ventilated area (near an open window or outside) and ensure that your goggles and gloves are on. Pour the lye into the distilled water and stir well. Steam, fumes, and heat are the products of water and lye interacting. Be prepared, and don't breathe in the fumes.
  • Place the steaming lye solution in a safe place to cool. Cool it to about 120°F (49°C), which is slightly higher than the melted oils' temperature will be. This helps stop tallow from solidifying when you pour it in.

Melt the Oils

  • Melt the oils (tallow, coconut, and castor) together on low heat. When just a few pieces of solid oil are floating in the pan, turn off the heat and move the pan to a potholder. Stir with your spatula until it's fully melted. If necessary, scrape the sides of the pan to ensure all the oil has melted.
  • Take the melted oil's temperature. You're aiming to bring it down to about 115°F (46°C).

Bring the Soap Ingredients to Trace

  • When the lye solution and oils are at or near the target temperatures, mix them together. They don't have to be exactly that temperature, but around ten degrees of it, and on the warmer side if possible. Try also to ensure that the lye solution is warmer than the oils.
  • Gently pour the lye solution into the warm oil in the pan. I recommend pouring it through a sieve and against a spatula or the side of the immersion blender placed in the oil. This reduces the risk of air bubbles or undissolved lye getting into the soap.
  • Next, bring the soap to a light trace. You can hand-stir this recipe with a spatula or spoon, or you can use an immersion blender (also called a stick blender) cautiously. If you do, be aware that tallow soap recipes can trace quickly.

Immersion Blending

  • If using an immersion blender, dip the head into the pan and keep it submerged throughout the process. While it's turned off, you can use it as a spoon, but for small batches like this, keep the immersion blender stationary when it's on. This is for safety as it will help stop splattering and reduce air bubbles in your final bars.
  • Alternate stirring the ingredients and giving a few short pulses. The soap batter has reached a light trace once it's thickened to the consistency of warm custard—that can happen quite fast in this recipe. A dribble from the immersion blender will leave a thin drizzle on the surface before sinking back down.

Stir in the Essential Oil

  • Although optional, essential oils can help mask any remaining tallow scent in the soap. Stir them in now, at light trace. The blend has deep and medium notes that are both beautiful and strong. After stirring them in, the soap batter will probably be thicker still, like pudding.

Pouring the Soap

  • Next, pour the soap batter into the mold(s). Once the soap batter is in, you can add a texture to the tops of the bars if you wish. With the ones in the photos, I swirled a skewer in tight circles back and forth along the soap.
  • If you use slab or cavity mold(s), leave them uncovered on a kitchen worktop at room temperature for at least two days. If you use loaf molds, leave them on the kitchen worktop, as well. Leave them uncovered unless the room is cold. If it is, cover them with a piece of cardboard to help them gel. Tallow soap tends to gel easily, so there's no need to oven process.

Unmolding and Cutting Tallow Soap

  • You can pop the soap out of the cavity molds 2 days after pouring. With loaves or slabs, you have to be mindful of when you take the soap out and cut it. Cut too early or too late, and you could end up with soap that crumbles or breaks.
  • When cutting tallow soap, wait until it's fully cooled—about 6-12 hours after pouring it—and has the firmness, yet give of cheddar cheese. Cutting before this time could cause it to crumble, and cutting after this time could be difficult because the soap will become hard and brittle. Use a wire cutter to cut tallow soap.

Cure the Tallow Soap

  • Now you will need to cure the soap. Curing is a necessary step for all cold-process soap recipes, and for tallow soap, it requires at least 6 weeks. Eight weeks is even better! The soap finishes saponification during the cure time, and excess water evaporates from the bars. Another thing that happens is that the crystalline structure of soap forms. The latter cannot be hurried up and is essential for a good, gentle soap.
  • Cure the tallow soap on a layer of grease-proof paper in an out-of-the-way, low-humidity place. It should be airy, out of direct sunlight, and away from curious pets and kiddos. Leave them there for 6-8 weeks before using the bars. Once made, the soap will have a shelf life of up to two years.

Video

Notes

  1. For small 1-lb batches, you could increase the soaping temperature of the oils and lye solution to 125°F (52°C). This increases the speed at which the recipe comes to trace, though.
  2. This recipe uses sheep tallow, which some consider the best tallow for making gentle bars of soap. However, beef, goat, and deer tallow can all be used instead. If you opt for one of these other tallows, the only alteration you may need to make is in the amount of lye used. That's only the case in using beef tallow (beef fat), though, since it needs slightly more lye than the others. For a single 454 g batch, use these amounts of lye (also called Sodium hydroxide or NaOH) instead:
  • Goat tallow soap - no change in the lye amount
  • Deer tallow soap - no change in the lye amount
  • Bear tallow soap - no change in the lye amount
  • Beef tallow soap - 62 g (2.19 oz) lye. If you mistakenly use 60 g (2.13 oz) PPO as listed in the materials list, don't worry—it's safe to use. Your soap will be just as hard and cleansing, but it will have an 8% superfat instead of 5%. That means more excess unsaponified oil (conditioning factor) in the finished soap.