Alfalfa meal
A gentle scrub. Cavitch, The Natural Soap Book primary source
Opens the calculator’s starter recipe, 1000 g of oils, with this additive at the dose it fills in, ready to change.
What it is
Alfalfa meal is ground alfalfa, one of the meals Cavitch stirs into soap for texture. With oatmeal and jojoba meal it is among the gentle ones.
Cavitch, The Natural Soap Book primary source
How much
- 0.67–1.33 tbsp per pound of soap filled in (the source gives it for a batch of stated size, worked out here per pound) Cavitch, The Natural Soap Book primary source
The calculator fills in 0.67 tbsp per pound of soap: 9.4 g for the 1000 g of oils in its starter recipe.
When and how
- Usually: at light trace.
- Stir it in as it is.
Cavitch, The Natural Soap Book primary source
What it does to the recipe
- It changes neither the lye nor the water: it is only weight in the bar.
Spoons and drops
- 1 tsp ≈ 1.48 g (1.23–1.73 g)
- 1 tbsp ≈ 4.44 g (3.7–5.18 g)
- 1 cup ≈ 71 g (59.1–82.8 g)
FAO primary source
INCI name
CosIng has no single INCI name for it: label it by what it contains.
Guides that discuss it
Sources
Susan Miller Cavitch, The Natural Soap Book (Storey Publishing, 1995), chapter 6: clay, "add the clay to your soap just before pouring into molds, using ½ to 1 cup (118 to 237 ml) for a 12-pound (5.45 kg) batch of soap. Before adding the pure essential oils, blend the clay with 2 cups (473 ml) of soap mixture in a small container" (pp. 62–63); "Oatmeal, cornmeal, flax seed meal, juniper berry meal, alfalfa meal, flaked seaweed, and jojoba meal can all be added to soap for texture. Oatmeal, jojoba meal, and alfalfa meal exfoliate gently. Juniper berry, flaked seaweed, and flax seed meals are more coarse, with sharper edges; finely grind them before adding as exfoliants to soap"; "½ to 1 cup (118 to 237 ml) of meal is suggested for a 12-pound (5.45 kg) batch of soap", added "immediately after the soap has saponified" (pp. 66–67). ½–1 cup for 12 pounds is 0.67–1.33 tablespoons per pound of soap.
FAO, feed manufacturing: "Alfalfa, dehydrated | 250-280" kg/m³ (Appendix B, pelletability of selected feedstuffs); "Lucerne (Alfalfa) | 0.25 - 0.35" t/m³ (Table A, examples of bulk density).