Hand Made Soap

It was a very interesting article in the Green Parent, Melinda Coss is very well known in the soap business and it was to me a real accolade to be included alongside her.  It is very true what the article says there is no soap like homemade.  When it says homemade check how it was made, if it was made in large batches of over a 500 soaps it was mechanical the only homemade/handmade was cutting the blocks and packaging.  Interestingly while reading some articles I read that if a soap says it is a beauty bar then it is not soap but synthetic soap made for commercial re-sale.  Hand made is in my kitchen, I started by making in small molds, then onto using empty pringle tins, now I use small crates like the ones the mushrooms come in.  I used to make one batch at a time, I now make four at a time but this will only make around thirty to forty soaps and to make more I will need a lot more room.  Reading the article I knew about sodium laurly sulphate, not to be confused with the milder sodium laureth sulphate, both of which are not in my soaps.  I did not realise the other agents that went into commercial soap, no wonder so many people say to me they cannot use soap.  I always say, it is not that you cannot use soap, you cannot have on your skin what they put into the soap, pure soap has nothing more than Olive Oil, coconut oil, palm or sunflower oil added shea butter, cocoa butter and to this is added sodium hydroxide which creates the process for the oils to saponify, turning them into soap.  Other than essential oil, benzoin for holding the smell and vitamin e, nothing else is really needed.  Milling soap dries it dreadfully, making the soap take from the skin the moisture it is missing.