Tallow!

[Yooper]

I had such a nice surprise today. We drove over to a friend's hobby farm to pick her grapes to make wine, and I gifted her with a couple of bottles of wine and some nice soaps to thank her. She exclaimed, "Oh, I didn't know you made soap! I was going to do it, but never did. Could you use some beef fat that I already rendered and froze?" She has grass fed beef, and the fat was from butchering.

Of course, I said "YES!!!!" and she handed me a huge Tupperware bowl of beautiful frozen white tallow!

I'm so excited, since I've never used tallow before and was hoping to try it! I was planning on trying it with deer tallow this fall, if I'm lucky enough to get one with my bow. But this is already rendered, superclean, and ready to use.

I'd like to make a great batch of soap, as a thank you to her, but I have no idea where to start. I've looked at many recipes with tallow, and I understand it makes a nice white hard bar with creamy later. I've seen most recipes use tallow at about 40% max, and then with 30% CO and 30% OO.

I have most common oils, and I'd love to make a good "everyday" bar for bath and body. I've been playing with soapcalc, but I wanted to see if anybody with experience with tallow could give me some advice and pointers- like how fast does it trace, if it's "too hard", or if there is anything else I should know before trying it.

Thanks a bunch!

 

[Yooper]

Re: Tallow! (and beer?)

Oh, and I am sorry to post again so quickly, but I had another question/thought.

I'm a homebrewer, and I've yet to incorporate beer into my soap. I wonder if a beer/tallow soap would really be a nice way to thank her. She and her husband are into "self sufficiency" and homegrown things, and they enjoyed some of my beer today since I brought a growler over. I've read on this forum that many people like soaps made with beer, and wondered what that would bring to the bars of soap.

 

[AlchemyandAshes]

I bet your friend would LOVE to receive some handmade tallow/beer soap! That would be a great way to thank her for the tallow, and show off some skills :wink:
The sugar in beer adds a nice lather, and I think my soaps are creamier with it.
CountyMounty22 also stated: "Hops containts polyphenols which is thought to be anti-bacterial. Beer also contains skin softening amino acids. I would like to see a scientific study on beer soap to see what vitamins and acids make it through the soaping process."
Here's my previous thread with a couple of my beer soaps:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=32790
I prefer to add my beer at trace instead of in the lye mixture (that stinks to high heaven :shock: ). Just don't insulate it too much or it will overheat, like any soap with added sugars.
I don't use animal fats in my soaps (nothing against it), but I know tallow makes a great bar. I was considering making a deer tallow soap for my "wild huntsman" dad this year if he gets anything. I made him a soap recently for this hunting season...it's an experiment :idea: : Essential Oils of Anise (cover scent and supposedly attracts deer), Pine, and Cedarwood with Slippery Elm Bark Powder. I know most hunter's soaps are unscented, or something is used to mask the scent...but I'm hoping the essential oils will work to cover human scent and possibly attract white tail. My nephew loved it, my uncles were hesitant, and my dad thinks it stinks I personally think it smells like "the woods". My dad makes deer jerky, deer sausage, antler beads, and the like (nothing goes to waste!)...so he probably already has some fats in the freezer ready to be rendered. I think I'll ask him to do the rendering, and I'll just make the soap :wink:

 

[Yooper]

Great tips- thank you so much!

I think I will make one 100% tallow soap, and then one with 40% tallow and 25% of CO and OO. That way, I can see what the tallow is, on it's own. Plus, the 100% tallow, combined with some homebrewed beer, is local and totally handmade which would be cool even if not an outstanding soap.

I didn't think of the sugar content in the beer- that's a great point and should enhance the lathering.

 

[judymoody]

100% tallow will give you a dense creamy lather, not so much on the bubbly front. Single oil soaps are a great way to experiment to see what each oil brings to the table. I'd keep my batch size on the small side, though, in case you don't care for the result.

I have rendered elk tallow and used it at 30-40% of my recipe. It made a beautiful soap.

I think that beer and tallow together would be great and much appreciated by your friend. I love beer soaps - great lather and the guys love them. The scent of the beer tends not to carry through too much - I get more of a yeasty smell like bread.

 

[Lynnz]

Tallow is still I my must try list has been for a while now LOL Looking forward to hearing what you end up doing with it..............Love the suggestion of a beer soap

 

[Yooper]

Well, I made a small batch (25 ounces). It went fine, as I boiled the beer to 1/2 the volume (it was flat).

I read somewhere to not discount the water, so went with 38% liquid to oil weight. I used 6 ounces of condensed beer, and 3.5 ounces of water for my 9.5 ounces of liquid. I used 25 ounces of tallow (melted and poured through a strainer to catch any remaining chunks), and 3.28 ounces (92.98 grams) of lye. That should be an 8% SF.

But even with the stick blender, it seemed to never want to trace! I thought it was never going to trace. It got thicker, and looked "normal" but no trace. I thought I was going to burn up my stick blender, and switched between hand stirring and the blender. I thought maybe it was a temperature issue- lye was at 115 and oil at 115, because I read somewhere (here?) that I wanted to stay above the melting point for tallow to avoid false trace. I checked the temperature to see if it was heating up or cooling down, and it was gradually falling to 113, 110. But it never dropped below 108.

Finally, it got thick and exhibited a medium trace so I poured it into the mold.

Even my OO soaps, notorious for a slow trace, don't take more than a few minutes. I don't know if this is normal, or if this is going to be a problem.

 

[AlchemyandAshes]

Did you add your beer concentrate at trace or to the lye mixture?
Although I don't soap with tallow, I do use a slightly higher percentage of hard oils, and experienced false trace before if I soap at too low of a temperature, so I do not think that was the issue. I usually soap around 110-115 deg f. Does your homemade brew possibly have a lower sugar content? I've soaped with hard cider and that took a while to trace compared to other beer soaps for me.
As long as there's no separation, you should be fine. I also ran your recipe through SoapCalcPro and your measurements look right for an 8% sf.

 

[Yooper]

Thank you so much for "checking my work"- I appreciate it so much!

I added the condensed beer to the water and lye.

But the next batch, with CO and OO (and only water) did pretty much the same thing (with 40% tallow). It thickened, like pudding, looked and smelled right, and just never really traced until a medium to thick trace.

I have to believe it's the tallow itself. The soap is still in the molds (two small 25 ounce batches in loaf pans) and look fine. No seizing, bubbles, separation, etc. But it was so weird that I was expecting something odd to happen. I've never seen anything like it- a thickened soap after much stick blending but other than thickening, no signs of a trace happening until the soap was pretty thick. It still poured fine, but I wouldn't have wanted to be swirling or adding FOs to those batches!