At the Athens Georgia Farmer’s Market on Saturdays in the spring, summer and fall, every week we hear the same questions and comments. The incredulous “beer soap???” (translation, “are you kidding?”)
The crowd favorite question (seemingly tongue in cheek, and 99% coming from men is, “heh, heh, will I smell like beer?” – what they really want us to say is “yes, just like a brewery!”
Then there are the purists who are annoyed that we would “waste” good beer to make beer soap. I know someone with a brew shop who hasn’t the slightest bit of interest in even trying our soap. However, they just had a baby and the soap is great for baby skin, so who knows…
To say that the response has been interesting is a gross understatement. What started out as a fun little adventure is becoming quite a good little business.
Beer soap is a little treacherous to make as the beer/lye mixture is much more volatile than lye with water. It starts out docile enough, but as you add more lye it becomes an angry, vicious rolling boil. One way to calm the boil is to refrigerate the flat beer (emphasis on FLAT) before mixing it with the lye.
We ALWAYS mix the beer/lye mixture outside or in the garage if the weather is unfriendly. I mixed some up yesterday in the garage and today it still smells like a brewery! Not a bad thing…..
So, should you want to try making beer soap yourself – here’s a simple recipe. I selected this recipe because the ingredients are easy for anyone to find –
You can fragrance with citrus essential oils, however unscented is really great!
Combine the oils and heat to 180 degrees.
Combine the flat beer with the lye, mix outside and be very careful of the fumes and the heat that is generated. Always use a stainless steel LARGE pan to avoid any overspill.
When the beer/lye mixture and the oil mixture have both reached 120 degrees, slowly combine the lye mixtures into the beer mixture with a stick blender. You can also do this by hand – trace (thickening of the mixture) occurs rapidly with beer soap.
Once the mixture is of a buttermilk consistency you’re ready to pour the mixture into your mold. Some people use an old dresser drawer lined with wax paper. There are very nice commercial molds available too.
Cover the soap with plastic wrap and wrap the mold in towels – this is called putting the soap to bed. Let sit undisturbed for 24 hours. Turn your mold over and release the soap, let dry for 12 hours before cutting. Place on racks to dry further.
Hope you try it – just be careful!
24 oz. coconut oil
24 oz. olive oil
38 oz. Crisco
32 oz. FLAT BEER
12 oz. lye
What we don't see 