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I forgot to add: if the tallow is fresh, the smell is no worse than roasting meat but it is pervasive.

I always render my tallow in the winter months, and I do mine pretty much the same way but in several crock pots on low heat. As the fat cooks out, I strain/ladle it into my stainless steel pots and add more raw chopped-up tallow to the crockpots. Eventually all of the fat is melted out and then...

I'm so glad to see the "Mount Sappo" myth debunked. Really tired of seeing that one repeated ad nauseum.

I would love to start making kombucha again: I stopped because of an article I read about some people making themselves sick with homemade kombucha because their scoby became contaminated with wild yeast. Then I had a new donated scoby grow maggots (I kept it covered so the eggs must have been...

Do you think the harm is primarily caused by people who take eo's internally, or apply them to the skin neat?

My tall cages are arriving today! Amazon is limiting the number one person can order, and our local Lowes and Home Depot only have those short round ones that are useless. I'm worried about the buckets getting too top heavy and am working to solve that problem too. Beats making soap for a...

I was warned by my oncologist not to use CBD oil in any form. When my five years is up and I get off my aromatase inhibitors then I'd be interested in finding out more about it.

Good idea! I never thought of that. Exactly. I make goat milk soap too, and some (mostly new) customers immediately ask for it and they seem surprised that I would make any other kind of soap - I guess they've encountered the magical goat milk soap vendors and have bought the line.

I think I'm doing ok, although I pruned a determinate Speckled Roma because I thought it was an indeterminate. Oops. I'm enjoying having more time for the garden, with the markets closed. I could get used to this....

I also have a steady source of saffron from family in Italy. I made a shaving soap colored with saffron: the color survives the lye but it will fade with time. I did it just once because it sounded luxurious and I wanted to try it, but I'd rather save my saffron for risotto!

What are they colored with?

In my experience, lavender buds in soap sound like a better idea than they actually are....ants come to mind....

I found the contact page and am writing to her. I'm trying to be tactful, but I'm at a loss for words: the claims include curing acne, diabetic lesions, eczema, lice, menopause, psoriasis, rashes, and wrinkles. No weights listed for products, no ingredient lists (mentions goat milk, lard and lye...

I just got an unsolicited email that raised my blood pressure to the danger zone. I don't know how the heck I got on this mailing list but the website is over-the-top self-promotion and breaking FDA regulations. Apparently this stuff (goat's milk soaps and creams) cures everything from diabetic...

That's been my experience too. I don't know how to explain it, but I haven't had hardly any customers complain about them being drying. Of course, maybe they just buy something else and never mention why!

I lived in Guatemala for one summer (45 years ago!) and washed my clothes by hand but no one ever showed me the potash/masa trick. I remember ladies beating their wet laundry with paddles.

I use an 18% superfat in mine and fine salt at 83% of the oils. I also use mine after a normal cure and have never found it to be overly drying but maybe my skin isn't particularly sensitive. I try to time batches so that I'll have several months before I have to sell it, but I'll grab a bar for...

Does anyone here know a lot about pruning tomatoes? I bought several different types of tomatoes at our farmer's market and while Youtubing looking for growing tips, I discovered that there are determinate and indeterminate tomatoes and you're not supposed to prune the determinate kind but you...

I mix my eo's or fragrance with a small amount of Natrasorb tapioca powder in a sandwich bag and squish it around until its evenly distributed, Then I add some powder base to that and keep squishing and adding powder base until I'm satisfied that there are no clumps and it's fairly dry. Then I...

That's funny because you'd think that soap is absolutely an essential item! The farmers markets that I go to are all still running, with strict social distancing, masks, hand sanitizer, one-directional foot traffic, long lines and a post-apocalyptic feel. One of them says they don't have room to...