Troubleshooting Tallow Soap

[soadsudz]

Hey everyone!

so I am trying to troubleshoot this tallow soap recipe I put together. I wanted to add some more bubbles and lather to 100% tallow recipe so I added a little coconut and castor

Tallow 90%
Coconut 5%
Castor. 5%

super fat 5% lye calculator said 134.57g for 1000g batch I rounded down to 134

its only been cured for a couple of weeks but its pretty drying..... the bubbles I wanted are perfect

I know I know patience! but I've been making soap for a long time with plant based oils and I never experienced my hands being dry after testing it out after a week. Tallow is new for me. I had referenced another thread on here about tallow being pretty cleansing (Does anyone find high % tallow soaps drying?) but it was from 2017 so I wanted to reach out and see if anyone had any more insight on the topic.

Thank you!

 

[lsg]

If you want a more bubbly lather, I think you will need to add more coconut oil.

 

[soadsudz]

If you want a more bubbly lather, I think you will need to add more coconut oil.

the bubbles are good in recipe but the bar is drying

might have to wait and see after a full cure

 

[Kari Howie]

I have little insight to offer because I’ve never used tallow, but when I ran your formula through soapcalc (assuming you were using beef tallow) it showed a cleansing factor of 11, which is pretty low so you’d think it would be gentle and not strip the oils off your skin. However the conditioning number was only 41 so maybe that accounts for the dryness. Also, I know tallow, unlike lard for example, can be used to make candles presumably because of its high hardness factor. I wonder if you add more conditioning oils and/or butters if that would alleviate some of the drying effects of your soap. Maybe the tallow experts can weigh in.

 

[Ladka]

Hi, Soapsudz!
It surprises me that soap with high (beef) tallow should be drying to your skin.
If you usually do not use CO or use it in lower percentages in your formulas I guess CO is the culprit.
I love beef tallow in soap and use it in high percentages. Since my young grandsons like soap to produce bubbles and/or lather I use up to 3 % CO, not more, cause it strips my daughter's skin. To enhance bubbling I use sugar and a SF not higher than 2 % instead.
My current recipes all contain at least 90 % beef tallow and my daughter loves it, her skin being very sensitive and dry.