African soap

[jbluedun]

I have been volunteering in Uganda, training refugees in baking (I've been a baker for 45+ years). I've spent two of the past 12 months there, on three separate visits. During my second visit in March, there was a newspaper headline about the rapidly rising cost of soap, due to a shortage of palm oil. I've met refugees who have not had a single bar of soap in over five months. On a third visit to the refugee settlement last month, I brought along 40 bars of soap that I made to give out as gifts. It was eagerly snatched up. I told the refugee bakers that if I could get a recipe for a Ugandan soap, I would try to make it at home and if successful, I would teach it on my next visit. Any product that is both useful and a possible source of income is valuable, and soap is all of that. I've not had luck finding a recipe. Does anyone have one they would share?
Thanks,
Jeffrey Hamelman
Vermont

 

[Babyshoes]

It's great that you're trying to help, however I'm curious why it would need to be a specifically Ugandan recipe?

Isn't it just a matter of figuring out which oils or fats are readily available to your target audience, deciding which of them are suitable for soaping, and developing a basic recipe using those. Or am I missing something?

 

[AliOop]

Hello @jbluedun,

I work with a non-profit called Shared Blessings ICM, which supports an on-the-ground program called Shared Love Uganda in Kampala. I have done some soapmaking lessons with them via Zoom. A positive thing that came out of this was that they did not realize that they didn't have to cook the soap, that it would harden and saponify on its own via cold process soap-making. Any small bit of fuel that they can save by not cooking soap was a huge bonus to them - but it did take some convincing on my part to give it a try. They had simply never heard of it and were quite skeptical. I'm still not entirely sure they have actually done it because they are so very polite about everything.

Another challenge was that Ugandans tend to make soap in loaves, only cutting off one bar at a time as they use it. Also, the same soap is used for handwashing, clothes washing, etc.. For that reason, we had to formulate a softer soap that wouldn't shatter when cut much later than normal, and that had a balance between not being to stripping to skin, and not leaving superfat on clothes. I tried to talk them into making a harder loaf that would have to be cut into bars right away, with the plus being that each bar would last longer. Unfortunately, they said they didn't think people would buy soap bars in the market, as they were all used to buying loaves.

They did have a local recipe which included some unfamiliar ingredients to me; I don't actually have that, sorry. Perhaps you could try reaching out to them to ask if they will share theirs?

Blessings to you as you help them with these projects!