Lard Versus Tallow Shortening

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The fo you had duped smells amazing, I am certainly trying that one this weekend in a soap. And who's dragons blood is this? I think I've only tried BB and couldn't understand all the hoopla over the fragrance but this little baby is delicious!
Had that one duped also and it turned out amazing! Again better than the original and does not go as dark as the one I had duped. The original goes a dark purple brown. I had intended on purchasing the 10 lbs but my friend that had it duped kept it himself and never gave me much of a price break. I was a bit peeved but he has the supply business not me and did get it made for me. He said we would get it considerably cheaper if we can purchase 25 lbs min. If you really like it you can call California Candle Supply and see if he has anymore, I do not know if he got it ordered again, since I have not been to his booth for a couple of weeks at my market. I do know he never put it up on the website, and is only selling it if someone calls for it. Long story... He also has an awesome realistic Plumeria that is his not mine
 
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Darn me too. I was looking for beef tallow here in the valley. you be surprise as the looks and questions. Im like um I make soap.
then i got WHY WOULD YOU WASH YOURSELF WITH GREASE. I HAD TO LAUGH HARD AT THAT ONE. smh. The only ones that understand are the farmers around here. Never tried rendering my own tallow.but i got a butche with six pound of suet for me. I wounder if it will turn out to be 1 pound after i boil it ?

I got 7.45 lbs of tallow from 10.42 lbs of beef fat. I was really surprised I ended up with that much, to tell the truth. I was really looking to get about 5lb only. The dogs all got the meat I removed from the trimmings(cooked, of course), so everyone was happy.
 
I got my samples today. Thank you for the FO, its quite nice. I decided to start testing with the all over dos lard, figured it should get used before its gets any worse. I'm also testing the tallow with the yellow mica. They are very similar but I can tell a difference in lather.

I'm keeping notes and will report back once I've tested all the samples. It may take awhile as I'm only doing 2 at a time. I'd like to use up each bar in the shower but I'm not sure if I'll be able too with the dos lard, it smells pretty bad.

For others who have gotten their samples, can you smell any piggy or beefy scent? I opened all the samples so they can get air and they all smell like animal to me.
 
Sorry I missed this earlier, and thank you very much for the offer. However, with my allergies, I would truly hesitate to accept.
The test samples are done with no fo, water and 100% tallow or lard. I could leave out the fo sample. I have severe allergies so respect all allergies. Just send me a pm if you are interested in the plain test samples. Everything one is packaged.
 
I got my samples today. Thank you for the FO, its quite nice. I decided to start testing with the all over dos lard, figured it should get used before its gets any worse. I'm also testing the tallow with the yellow mica. They are very similar but I can tell a difference in lather.

I'm keeping notes and will report back once I've tested all the samples. It may take awhile as I'm only doing 2 at a time. I'd like to use up each bar in the shower but I'm not sure if I'll be able too with the dos lard, it smells pretty bad.

For others who have gotten their samples, can you smell any piggy or beefy scent? I opened all the samples so they can get air and they all smell like animal to me.

I don't get an animal smell. I've opened the lard dos, and a tallow one (can't get more specific than that at the moment) The lard dos one has a heavy "fatty" and slightly dusty smell to it, according to my nose. Unfresh.

The 100% tallow has less overall smell, but I would categorize it as a "fat" smell. I certainly can't discern a "pig" or "beef" smell.

I've used many containers of Wal Mart lard, and now have a Smart and Final lard. Most of the lard (smelling the product from the bucket) has smelled only fatty to me. However....I bought some wal mart (Farmer John) lard at Christmas that was hugely piggy smelling to me out of the bucket. So much so that I didn't want to use it. I did, and it smelled worse when melting. In the finished soap, I didn't detect a piggy smell....but it sure was a fatty smelling soap. Now, my usual lard recipe with 70% lard, 15, co, 5 castor 10 ho safflower, unscented.....I love the smell. It smells like wholesome old fashioned soap to me, a soap made with fat.

I made a bastille with 85 % oo, and it smells like olive oil, except without the "fresh from the bottle good enough to eat plain" scent.

I have no idea if my opinion is helpful to you, but there it is.

Everyone's noses are different. I wonder if your nose is "smarter" than mine, or if anything that smells fatty to you, makes you think of animal smell??

Oh! None of the tallow I've used (Smart and Final - looks and scoops a lot like Crisco, btw) and the grassfed organic tallow from eBay) has much smell at all to me. In fact, the Smart and Final is virtually scentless to me....even melted.
 
I do have a very sensitive nose to some scents. Its not just a fatty scent, its a rancid animal scent. All the samples have the same sour, rancid animal fat scent which is weird.
I use a lot of lard and my 100% lard bars keep a piggy smell but its never rancid. My home rendered tallow from a older grass fed cow is really strongly scented, ts actually kind of nasty and must be covered with FO.
 
I do have a very sensitive nose to some scents. Its not just a fatty scent, its a rancid animal scent. All the samples have the same sour, rancid animal fat scent which is weird.
I use a lot of lard and my 100% lard bars keep a piggy smell but its never rancid. My home rendered tallow from a older grass fed cow is really strongly scented, ts actually kind of nasty and must be covered with FO.
I get that sour smell with any soap table butter. A few of tried to make butter soap a couple of yrs ago and it was awful. Everytime I washed with it I smelled the sour. With these I smell the fat, but not a rancid sour. And now you know the other reason all the soapies were in their own bag and labeled. 100% tallow from S&F is shortening so it is hydrogenated
 
Yay, got my soapies/goodies today!

Carolyn, thanks so much for doing these single oil experiments. I am always curious about them but inevitably come up with something else to do. And lard and tallow are my favorites, so I it is really good to (a) read about these experiments with them and (b) actually get to physically test the results. My thoughts:

Veggie sample: That was the dragon's blood one, right? Great bubbles I thought, but seemed to make my hands a bit dry. I do have v. dry hands. And I agree, I don't usually like DB at all but found this one v. pleasant.

Farmer John Lard samples: I think you might be right about having reversed the gel/ungelled labeling, my "ungelled" one is a fairly bright yellow-ish orange, the "gelled" one is much paler, creamish white on top and on the bottom and starting to get that yellow-orange tinge along the points of the star in between. Not sure if is DOS, but it doesn't actually look bad, it is kind of pretty and almost looks like it was part of the design (ie. not random discolored spots). Did you color these at all (I like that orangish-yellow, would buy it in a mica! Oops, just reread your post, no color in that one.) Slightly smaller bubbles than the veggie soap, but nice creamy lather. Also, my hands feel less dry than with the veggie.

Butcher lard samples: Both of these were a nice creamy, consistent color. Again, the "ungelled" sample was a tad bit darker than the "gelled". As with the tallow (see below) I was surprised that I felt as if the lather was both more bubbly and creamy with the Farmer John Samples than with the butcher sourced ones, although there was clearly less discoloration with the latter.

Tallow samples: Again, both nice, creamy and consistent coloring w/"ungelled" a bit darker than "gelled". For me, a very counter-intuitive result in use, though, I expected the butcher's tallow to be measurably better somehow than the S&F one. When I used it though, it did not produce a lather which was either bubbly or that creamy. The S&F tallow lather was both more bubbly and creamy (not as creamy as the lard soaps, though). My hands after use feel pretty much like they did with the lard. These were the only ones that smelled a bit meaty to me when I sniffed them before use, not during or after, though.

FO: LOVED it. Even my mother (we always disagree on scents loved it.) If you ever decide to sell any/do a coop, count me in. Great woodsy, musky mix. Thanks so much for including it. I am going to put some in lotion, yummy!

On balance, I think I liked the Farmer Johns lard soap the best. I just hope that it doesn't inevitably lead to DOS, I used it in a lot of my earlier soaps, have switched to S&F lard now, but I think you mentioned in another post that you had encountered problems (if less) with that too.

Final questions, where did you get your little soapie molds? Those are so cute.

Thanks again for doing this and taking the time and trouble to send these out to us lucky recipients!
 
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The Dragon's Blood soap has a cleaning value of 15. I make it for men and actually it is not just a veggie soap. It is a 32% Tallow, 18% Coconut, Palm, RBO, Sunflower, Castor 4% superfat which is higher than I normally soap. I rechecked my notes and did not mix up the gelled and ungelled. Results are interesting. If you use the Hardwood in lotion try about 1-1.5% that fo is very strong. The little yellow soapie (the one colored with mica, lol I picked a dumb color,) was fragranced with 1 oz ppo, my customers like it strong, but many use it around .7 oz ppo I say many, that was when it was available.
 
"The Dragon's Blood soap has a cleaning value of 15. I make it for men and actually it is not just a veggie soap. It is a 32% Tallow, 18% Coconut, Palm, RBO, Sunflower, Castor 4% superfat which is higher than I normally soap"

This is probably why I found it a bit drying - I have super dry skin - I think it is actually a genetic thing, if I don't moisturize well every day my skin gets ashy - and I usually superfat at 7.5-8, thinking of going even higher. One of the reasons I use lard at a minimum of 60 % these days. So (a) I am probably a bad test subject in that respect; and (b) why I did best with the lard soaps.
 
Now that the samples have had a chance to air out, the scents has lessened. Now I'm mostly just getting a fatty smell. I used the FO in batch yesterday at .50oz PPO and its plenty strong. It seems more musky now then OOB, I really like it.
 
Starting with the Farmer John gelled and ungelled. I get the smell, but I don't know if I'd call it a bad smell, just a strong smell. It doesn't seem to stay once I dry my hands, and it's not off putting. Interesting stuff.

Both samples have some yellow. Ungelled is almost completely yellow/orange. Gelled has just a couple spots of yellowish.

Lather is good and creamy for both.

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Did some more testing this morning.

The farmer johns lard has a noticeable difference in how quick it lathers between the ungelled and gelled. I found the ungelled lathers quicker with larger bubbles but they break down quickly into a super creamy lather. Of the two, I prefer the ungelled. Left my hands nice and soft but smelling a bit like old fat.

There was no noticeable differences in the two tallow samples. Both have bigger bubbles then the lard but not as creamy. Very soft skin but also a bit of a oily film, had to wash with salt bar to remove. Definitely like the lard better.

The home rendered lard had a definite piggy smell but its not old or rancid, its more noticable in the unglled. Both have small spots of DOS.
Once again, the ungelled has the better lather. Larger bubbles quicker that break down to a beautiful cream. I like these better then the farmers john.
 
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I’ve been sitting on my samples (not literally) for a while because my seasonal allergies kicked in big time. My sense of smell is finally starting to come back as I relearn how to breathe through my nose (thank you Zyrtec) so I wanted to report back.
First, Carolyn, thank you so much for the samples. The FO is very interesting and I’m planning to use it in a small batch this week. It smells really good OOB so I can’t wait to see how it smells soaped. I liked the Dragon's Blood sample bar, it was a little too cleansing for me (dry skin) but the lather was bubbly and felt nice during use. I've never smelled Dragon's Blood before and assumed it would be overpowering but this is mellow and has a depth that I wasn't expecting. I'm going to use it up as a hand bar.
I tested the #2 Farmer John Lard samples first.
Gelled sample had small spots of DOS on the points while the ungelled sample was completely orange. Both samples lathered quickly with small bubbles that very turned dense and foamy. I like the ungelled better because the lather just felt nicer. Both samples rinsed clean easily. My skin did not feel tight/dry after drying off and actually felt much better than before using the soaps.

Next I tried the #5 Butcher Rendered Lard.
Gelled sample had more spots of DOS than the Farmer John gelled sample while the ungelled sample had much less DOS than the Farmer John ungelled sample. Results were basically the same as above.

Overall impression of the lard samples…all were hard but had a slight tacky feeling and a musky scent that faded significantly after being used and left out in the open (Farmer John gelled has faded completely to just a soapy scent). I did not detect a piggy odor in any of them. The ungelled samples smelled stronger than the gelled but not in a bad way. I guess DOS does not make soap smell gross and rotten to me (not surprised, I once found a bar that I had misplaced for a couple of years and it had DOS all over but never smelled rancid to me). My favorite was the ungelled Butcher Rendered Lard because it seemed like the soap lathered more quickly and the lather was the most rich and dense.
#4 Smart and Final Tallow Shortening Gelled
This sample had slight DOS, has that same musky scent (hasn’t faded yet but I only unwrapped it today so it hasn’t had much time), was very hard and smooth and had an almost pearly translucent quality after the lather dried on the bar. The lather was similar to the gelled lard samples but wasn’t as nice, definitely not as dense. Rinsed clean easily. My skin didn’t feel tight but didn’t feel as nice as after using the lard samples.

#3 Fresh Tallow with Hardwood FO
Soap was hard, smooth. No DOS. The lather had bigger bubbles than the lard samples but faded quickly and was much less creamy. I tried this a few times in a row to see if the lather would improve but it was just “thinner.” Lather rinsed cleanly and I could detect a subtle scent of the FO which was nice.

Overall impression of the tallow samples…these were very hard and smooth. Lather was decent and definitely had more bubbles than the lard initially but did not feel as nice.
Again, I have to thank you for sending out these samples for us to try. The tallow does make a harder, smoother bar but the lard was much gentler on my skin and had such a great creamy lather. Lard wins for me for sure.









 
I have to agree Little CrazyWolf, I prefer the lather and feel of the lard. The Dragon's Blood samples have a cleansing value of 15 with a 4% superfat. They are to cleansing for me also, but my men customers love them. The Hardwood is my second best seller and is fantastic mixed with heavy florals such as jasmine
 
The fragrance is one of my very best sellers and is a great mixer with floral fo's. The original supplier of it closed due to illness so I ended up having it duped. It actually turned out even nicer than the original. Unfortunately even with the purchase of 10 lbs it is an expensive fragrance. Hope you enjoy it

Would you mind if I ask where you had it duped? The only place I know of, one friend had success with them, but another soaper had a terrible experience with them, so I would love to find a supplier that I could recommend for dupes.
 
Would you mind if I ask where you had it duped? The only place I know of, one friend had success with them, but another soaper had a terrible experience with them, so I would love to find a supplier that I could recommend for dupes.
I would love to know of a place myself. This is through a supplier I know that once in awhile he will send in some for me like he is planning on stocking a fragrance, and I do not have a clue what fragrance manufacturing house he uses. It probably would not do me any good if I did know since they most likely will not work with someone that is not a fo supplier. Can you pm me who you tried, since there are a couple I considered trying. Wish I could help you out but I just lucked out that he had it done for me
 
Just a quick update. Think you might be surprised with these soap samples. I know everyone must have thought I have forgotten but alas I have not. The non-gelled lard soap samples with 3% superfat are total orange (dos?) but no off smell. The gelled are now starting to turn these were made on 1/242015. I will be packaging all seperate with notes included. All the soapies were made the same with either 100% tallow, distilled water and citric acid at 1% for chelating, extra lye at 0.624. I am really beginning to wonder about lard. This was rendered lard from a local Hispanic market. The tallow samples are holding up great

I've thought about this thread from time to time since I read it. Wouldn't you suspect your results with the yellowing lard soap are due to an impurity, perhaps from improper rendering?

Experiments were done long ago that demonstrated very short induction times for catalytic oxidation when liquid extracted from muscle was added to lard, or when it was contaminated with iron-rich hemoglobin from blood.

We know there are many different types and sources of lard. Maybe this is a bit of a soaping hazard due to the variability of the product.

It would be good to narrow down a cause for the oxidation, because it seems unlikely that it's an inherent property of the oil. Your results are amazingly dramatic while others experience nothing out of the ordinary.
 
Carolyn, did you chart other people's finding? I know there was a question about whether your gelled and ungelled were mixed up and I am having trouble following who is saying what about which.

One thing I am curious about is that I have found that bars with DOS, early is best before it stinks, seems to lather more abundantly than the same bar without. It makes be wonder if the process of DOS breaks things down such that it actually improves the lather. Not a scientific study, unfortunately.

Also, people are noting a difference in lather between gelled and ungelled. Since there may have been a mix-up, I'm wondering if this was consistent and which seems to have better lather, truly ungelled or gelled or the ones labeled as such? If there is a consistent difference, why? They should all end up with their molecules organized the same (there was talk about that structure on a different thread) in the end, but maybe they don't really. And which one ended up with such bad DOS, really gelled or ungelled, or the labeled ungelled or gelled?
 
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