What to do with those ugly end bits?

[Sonya is soaping]

I like to cut the ends off my soap but it seems a waste to throw them out. What could I do with them?

 

[Relle]

You can still use them for the vanity for hand washing or shred them and use them in a confetti soap, use them for a travel soap or for camping.

 

[SaltedFig]

I've taken to putting them into a plastic bag until I have quite a few - they stay malleable for a while that way, and you can use them almost like soap clay & mold them into new shapes when you've got enough (soap rocks).

(This doesn't work for salt bars - they get too hard and brittle almost straight away, but it's fun for most other soap types).

 

[penelopejane]

My DH likes to use them because they are not chunky.

 

[earlene]

I use them for travel, but still there are just too many even for me. So I add them to the confetti soap bucket more often than not. Other than that, I have also started adding them to the 'soap dough' baggie to try using them up that way. So far, I haven't done much along those lines except once, and it worked out fairly well.

You can also use plastic cookie cutters while the soap is still soft enough and get a couple of small embeds out of some of those ends.

 

[amd]

I use at the bathroom sinks for handwashing to test out the soap. I also cut in half to hand out for samples (I sell).

 

[cmzaha]

I use my two end cuts for smell samples at market, but my end cuts are probably a little bigger at aprox .35" each. I also save a lot of them for my daughter who likes slices instead of full bars.

 

[Obsidian]

I no longer cut thin end pieces, it was just too much waste. Now I get one 1/2" thick end piece that I cut in half and use for testing or to give out as samples.

 

[DeeAnna]

I do something like Obsidian does. I plane the least amount possible off the best end of the loaf -- whatever it takes to make that end tidy and presentable. I then cut my bars starting at that end.

The bit at the other end after all the bars are cut is 1/4" to 5/8" thick. If this end bit is on the thicker side, I'll split it into two thinner slices. I usually give these slices as samples.

After beveling off the corners, I combine the trimmings from the loaf end with these corner trimmings. These bits get smooshed together by hand into a rustic looking puck of soap. That's we use in the shower and at the sink.

 

[lenarenee]

That reminds me when I first started making soap and saw that many soapers saved the end pieces and other "rejects" for themselves I couldn't believe it! I promised I would give myself the good bars! Well, that quickly flipped around and I no longer see the rejects as "bad" - I'm too impatient to finish a full size bar of soap before trying another scent. Sure....I have several bars hanging around the shower and sink, but that in itself is good reason to relish those end pieces because the full size ones will never get used up.

Now, my absolute faves I do give myself a full size bar.

 

[jcandleattic]

I travel quite a bit, but also get tired of the same scent in the shower quite often, so I use them myself. I have so many though, at some point when there are just too many to use in a reasonable amount of time, and I have enough, I will make into a small rebatched loaf, or shred and make confetti soaps.

 

[NsMar42111]

I bought a cutter and don't have end cuts any more . Any leftover batter due to miscalculations etc goes into a small mold for me use or to give away, and any bad bars/pot scrapings/etc is in a bucket awaiting rebatching into confetti scrap soap .

 

[Sonya is soaping]

Thankyou everyone! I've got some ideas now.. Samples for people, some for me when I travel and confetti soap sound interesting.
Now off to look up how to do that!

 

[Domestic Delight]

One of my favorite soaps was made by re-batching all my scraps and bits in a crock pot and scenting with my "bug off" EO blend: lemongrass, eucalyptus citronella and lavender. I put it in a loaf mold and cut it into generous rustic slabs, cut a hole in the middle and ran some para-cord through it and sold it as camping soap. The strong scent overpowered all the other scents so it became a truly new product. It was really well received. I like trying something wild with scraps because I'm not as afraid of wasting ingredients.

 

[TeresaT]

I use my scraps at the kitchen sink for hand washing. I save a lot of dish soap that way. I never realized how often I washed my hands at the kitchen sink using dish soap until I started using the soap scraps. My dish soap lasts three times what it used to.

 

[msunnerstood]

That reminds me when I first started making soap and saw that many soapers saved the end pieces and other "rejects" for themselves I couldn't believe it! I promised I would give myself the good bars! Well, that quickly flipped around and I no longer see the rejects as "bad" - I'm too impatient to finish a full size bar of soap before trying another scent. Sure....I have several bars hanging around the shower and sink, but that in itself is good reason to relish those end pieces because the full size ones will never get used up.

Now, my absolute faves I do give myself a full size bar.

I thought it was just me. I never give myself a full bar and I use the thinner end cuts for myself.

 

[Primrose]

I just use end pieces for us at home. I don't think they are really that ugly and they are good soap

 

[Alfa_Lazcares]

I use my scraps at the kitchen sink for hand washing. I save a lot of dish soap that way. I never realized how often I washed my hands at the kitchen sink using dish soap until I started using the soap scraps. My dish soap lasts three times what it used to.

Oh... that’s... that’s.... kinda brilliant! I too find myself washing my hands on the kitchen sink a lot and never crossed my mind to use my “scraps balls” there... thanks for the idea!

 

[earlene]

Me, too. Before I started making soap I NEVER kept bar soap in the kitchen. Now I have several test bars by the kitchen sink and I have also noticed the dish soap lasts longer between re-fills. I'm not sure why, but I think it's cuz my mom never kept bar soap at the kitchen sink either. Partly it was to discourage husbands from washing hands in the kitchen after working on cars. That's one thing I can't stand - cleaning motor greasiness out of my sink before I can make dinner. Who knows what he does when I'm gone, though.

 

[CaraBou]

You can also make designs by embedding a few ends parallel with the long side of your mold, like these:

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