lye free soap?

[user 22966]

Greetings
Here is my soap recipe and it has worked very well for me
20oz coconut oil 1.25
20oz olive oil 1.25
18oz goat's milk 1.13
7.5 oz lye
13 oz lard
Is it possible to replace the lye with another ingredient and keep the integrity of the soap? And what would I use and would I need to change my basic recipe?
Thank You

 

[Hendejm]

Nope! Keep in mind that while Lye is used to make soap - there isn’t any in the final product after it has gone through saponification.

If you don’t want to work with lye - then melt and pour is the way to go as that step has been done for you. If you choose that route - know that other chemicals/products have been added so that the soap base is meltable.

 

[DeeAnna]

Another option besides using melt-and-pour soap is to buy soap noodles or flakes (regular lye-based soap that's pre-made by someone else) and basically do a rebatch. I think Brambleberry sells this. Or at least they used to.

If you want to make soap from scratch starting with fat, then, no, it is not possible to saponify fat into soap without using a strong alkali (lye).

Old books and some internet tutorials claim to "make soap without lye" but that's not exactly true. These tutorials start with washing soda, not actual NaOH. This is the reason for their "no lye" claim, but these methods then convert the soda into NaOH by reacting it with lime. They are STILL making soap from NaOH (lye), it's just they're adding an extra step to the beginning by creating the NaOH by reacting washing soda and lime. So they're really not "making soap without lye" it's just the way they get the lye that's different.