All Organic Body Wash made with African Black Soap and Shea

[Marla]

:? I want to make a liquid soap that's 100% Organic. I have purchased 100% Organic African Black Soap (I will refer to it as ABS from now on) in bulk form. It's wonderful stuff, it lathers well, it's for sensitive skin like mine, it cleans to a squeak! It's not drying per sey, but I want something that is very moisturizing. You can even wash your hair with the ABS, altho I don't think it works well on bleached hair. Anyway, I also purchased African 100% Organic Shea Butter in bulk. I love the butter too. Both awesome products.

I want to turn these 2 things into a nice 100% Organic Body Wash. I have been studying some and learning but I still don't understand what I need to do? My sister and myself suffer from terrible itching and I understand that a great EO is Lavender for it. A lot of the itching comes from dry skin. Later I want to make us a nice lotion out of the Shea Butter.

Any help and advise would be greatly appreciated!

Marla

 

[Becky]

Hi Marla, welcome to the forum

I wouldn't recommend trying to turn your ABS & shea into a body wash - I would consider it a waste of 2 really lovely products!

People often try to make liquid soap or body wash etc by grating bar soap & adding water to it, but generally you will end up with a snotty mess. Add shea butter to that, it's not going to get much better.

If you want a body wash, you really need to investigate the world of surfectants (there are some very gentle 'nearly natural' surfectants available to the home crafter these days), or you should learn how to make liquid or cream soap. Catherine Failors books 'Making Natural Liquid Soaps' and 'Making Cream Soap' are a good starting point for this.

As for the shea, use it to make yourself a lovely nourishing lotion or moisturiser.

 

[Marla]

thank you!

I always appreciate good advise and I will keep that in mind. I actually found someone who gave a recipe for this on Ebay. Interesting, tell me what you think? : For a liquid black soap, fill a container with the soft African Black Soap, crumbled or broken into smaller, more easily dissolved pieces. Add 20% purified or distilled water; again, that's 2 parts water to 8 parts black soap. Seal the container and set aside for several hours. This makes an excellent shampoo or shower gel as is or can be thickened by adding a shower gel base. Use this with a back brush in the shower and you just may find that you no longer need that back scratcher.

African Black Soap contains a whopping 48% unrefined shea butter! The commercial soaps and lotions only add 1% to 4% ultra refined, which is too little shea and it has the healing properties removed; it most likely was refined using a chemical process that leaves trace chemicals in the shea butter. The average homemade shea soap can only handle 10% shea butter. How will I know the difference? Oh, you'll know!

 

[IanT]

I really want to make my own ABS...I heard it was made with ash, burnt plantain skins, shea butter and some other stuff....its supposed to be Godly...

 

[Marla]

Where I purchase the black soap here's what they say (the real deal is not made with Shea Butter, that's why I want to put it in for more moisture!): Active ingredients in Black Soap:

Water, cocoa pod ashes, plantain skins ashes, and palm oil.

Bulk African Black Soap - Traditionally made in Ghana, West Africa (this kind is also made in Nigeria, West Africa) Totally organic, this black soap is the REAL thing!

I don't know if I'd be tackling making it myself, but that's just me. I love the stuff though!
:wink:

 

[mcleodnaturals]

just a quick side question....where did you buy your organic shea butter from???

thx,

 

[Marla]

African Shea Butter

I got it at theAfrican Store.com.

 

[jentlesoaps]

Black soaps are potassium based so they make lovely bodywash. Thicken up with guar gum or other thickeners.

 

[SavonP]

I really want to make my own ABS...I heard it was made with ash, burnt plantain skins, shea butter and some other stuff....its supposed to be Godly...

I lived in Ghana and I think making REAL African black will be difficult outside of West Africa.You can make something similar but not real African black soap so shouldn’t be caked such. I saw from living in Ghana that recipes recipes vary from village to village. In the north they’ll use Shea butter because that’s where shea is grown. In the south it’s different. So for someone to say without Shea is not the real deal is misleading.

You can try to make ABS, but it will never be the real African black soap. For eg, where are you going to get the plaintain ash that some use, or the other Ingreduents I saw my ex’s mother use in the north. There are alot of people ( Africans included )who make false claims. My ex’s mother used to make it. She’s from the north and she used Shea and a powder I can’t spell or pronounce. They don’t grow plaintain there. I lived in the south they didn’t use Shea, but palm and cocoa butter and the plantain ash.

Soap101 on YouTube has a video on her take on it but makes it clear it’s not real African black soap. Have a look. It’s quite good.

Also be careful where you buy it, there’s lots of fake African black soap claiming to be such. Most of what we get here in the West ( I live in the UK and I imagine the same for the US is not real if you’ve known, seen and used real ABS. Many are on jumping on the bandwagon and trying to capitalise on it.

A great place to get excellent Shea, cocoa butte, and palm oil is a company called Barack. It’s expensive but excellent quality. They buy straight from wonens’ communities in Ghana.

 

[jentlesoaps]

I went to the Ghana Soap School and learned how to make authentic ABS. It took a little time to source the proper ingredients that are available here in North America and I found some African YouTubers who also have shared some of their skills making authentic African Black Soap. It is not made with lye which is really hard for the hydroxide soap makers to comprehend. Think of Granny in the Beverly Hillbillies Show. She made her own lye from ashes. It is made the same way in Africa but with plantain, cocoa pods and even bamboo (regional). Here in Canada we have a nature identical potash that we mine and ship all over the world. It is called inorganic potash or potassium carbonate (K2CO3) in Africa they use the organic form of K2CO3 that is leached and turned into a powder called Kaun. Here is a link to my discovery video and one to a African creator using Kaun to make her black soap at home...

PS it is a very SMOKY process and should be made OUTSIDE or in a well ventilated outdoor/indoor patio. I love making it and have made some very lovely authentic black soaps this year. I call them NABS because I am currently using inorganic potash sourced in Canada.
Authentic African Black Soap
North American Black Soap: