Coconut-free bar
A mild, unscented bar with no coconut, palm kernel or babassu oil at all: olive oil and lard for a firm, creamy bar, shea butter, and 10 % castor oil with a spoonful of sugar in the lye water to lift the lather. Made at a 7 % superfat.
- Skill
- Beginner
- Method
- Cold process
- Batch
- 1000 g of oils about 1390 g of batter
- Hands-on
- 1 hour
- Cure
- 6 weeks
- Gel phase
- Either way gel or not, both work
What you need
For 1000 g of oils, which fills a 1.5 litre loaf mould. Weigh everything, liquids included.
| Olive Oil · 45.0 % | 450 g | 15.87 oz |
| Lard · 30.0 % | 300 g | 10.58 oz |
| Castor Oil · 10.0 % | 100 g | 3.53 oz |
| Shea Butter · 15.0 % | 150 g | 5.29 oz |
| Sodium hydroxide (NaOH) · the lye, 100 % pure | 126.0 g | 4.45 oz |
| Distilled water · for a 33 % lye solution | 255.9 g | 9.03 oz |
| Sugar · 2 tsp, dissolved in the water before the lye goes in, for more lather | 8.4 g | 0.30 oz |
- Superfat
- 7 %
- Temperatures
- Oils and lye solution each at 35 to 40 °C (95 to 104 °F)
Method
-
Get ready
Put on splash goggles, nitrile gloves and long sleeves, open a window or turn on the extractor fan, and keep children and pets out of the room. Line a 1.5 litre loaf mould and set it on a level surface where it can stay for two days. -
Weigh the fats
Weigh 300 g lard and 150 g shea butter into the soaping pot, and 450 g olive oil and 100 g castor oil into a jug. -
Dissolve the sugar
Weigh 255.9 g distilled water into a heat-safe jug and stir in 2 tsp (8.4 g) sugar until no grains are left. Weigh 126.0 g sodium hydroxide into a dry container. -
Make the lye solution
At the open window or under the fan, pour the lye slowly into the sugar water, never the water onto the lye, and stir until clear. The sugar makes it run a little hotter and may tint it pale yellow; leave it to cool, labelled and out of reach. -
Melt the fats
Melt the lard and shea butter together on the lowest heat until clear, take the pot off the heat and pour in the olive and castor oils. -
Check the temperatures
Carry on when the oils and the lye solution are each between 35 and 40 °C (95 and 104 °F). -
Blend to light trace
Pour the lye solution into the oils down the shaft of the stick blender, tap the blender to let trapped air out, then pulse for a few seconds at a time and stir between pulses. Stop when the batter is opaque and a drizzle leaves a faint line on the surface; it can take several minutes. -
Pour and cover
Pour into the mould, tap it on the worktop to raise air bubbles, and smooth or swirl the top with the back of a spoon. Cover it with a board or lid, adding a towel only in a cold room, since the sugar adds a little heat of its own. -
Clean up
With your gloves still on, wipe the batter off the pot and tools with paper towels into the bin, then wash them in hot soapy water. -
Unmould and cut
After 36 to 48 hours, when the loaf is firm and has pulled away from the sides, unmould it with gloves on and cut it into bars about 2.5 cm (1 in) thick. If it still dents under a finger, wait another day. -
Cure
Stand the bars on edge on a rack in a dry, airy room for six weeks, turning them every few days. Lard bars keep hardening for months, and the lather gets creamier as they dry.
Tips
- Use plain, pure rendered lard with nothing added: leaf lard gives the whitest, most neutral bar. Lard sold as a baking fat is fine if the only ingredient is lard; avoid anything hydrogenated or blended.
- Expect a low, creamy lather rather than big bubbles: with no lauric oil, the calculator puts cleansing at 1. That is the point of the bar, and the lather improves as it cures.
- For a vegan bar with no coconut, see the coconut-free oat and chamomile bar. If you would rather keep a little coconut, the low-cleansing bar holds it to 10 %.
The oils
| Oil | Share |
|---|---|
| Olive Oil (virgin / refined / olive oil) | 45.0 % |
| Lard (pure rendered pork fat) | 30.0 % |
| Castor Oil | 10.0 % |
| Shea Butter | 15.0 % |
How it is made
| Process | Cold process |
| Alkali | NaOH |
| Superfat | 7 % |
| Water | lye water at 33 % |
| Iodine value | 72 |
| INS | 118 |
Why make it
Some people find coconut-rich soap drying, or say they react to it, and this bar leaves every lauric oil out: it scores 1 for cleansing on our scale and 71 for conditioning. Coconut soap's bite comes mostly from its lauric acid; in a Dutch repeated-exposure test, pure sodium laurate soap irritated most volunteers, though the authors note that real bars are milder mixtures. Lard was the farmhouse soap fat for generations, rendered at butchering time, and it gives a white, firm bar with a creamy lather. With no coconut the lather is low and lotion-like, so castor oil and a spoonful of sugar in the lye water, a long-standing maker's way to more bubbles, do what they can. It is unscented, in line with dermatologists' advice to choose fragrance-free products for dry, sensitive skin. It is not vegan; the coconut-free oat and chamomile bar is.
Sources
- Irritancy testing of sodium laurate and other anionic detergents using an open exposure model · Skin Research and Technology (Tupker, Vermeulen, Fidler and Coenraads), 1997
- Smart Soapmaking (Anne L. Watson) · Shepard Publications, 2013
- Pure Soapmaking (Anne-Marie Faiola) · Storey Publishing, 2016
- Dermatologists' top tips for relieving dry skin · American Academy of Dermatology, 2026
What tradition, makers' experience and research say about soaps like this, each labelled for what it is. It is not medical advice, and no soap treats a skin condition: if you have one, ask a doctor or pharmacist.
What the numbers say
- Palmitic acid 14.4 %
- Stearic acid 12.2 %
- Ricinoleic acid 8.9 %
- Oleic acid 52.1 %
- Linoleic acid 9.3 %
- Other 3.2 %
Saturated : unsaturated 27 : 73
Computed from the fatty acids of the fats above. The bands are what the craft has settled on, not chemistry — a bar outside one is not wrong.
Try it differently
11 variationsThe same soap with one thing moved. Each opens in the calculator ready to change again.
- Edible Tallow (beef/mutton dripping) instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat)
- Palm Oil instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat)
- Cocoa Butter (Theobroma Oil) instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat)
- 5 % superfat
- 10 % superfat
- Edible Tallow (beef/mutton dripping) instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat) and 5 % superfat
- Edible Tallow (beef/mutton dripping) instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat) and 10 % superfat
- Palm Oil instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat) and 5 % superfat
- Palm Oil instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat) and 10 % superfat
- Cocoa Butter (Theobroma Oil) instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat) and 5 % superfat
- Cocoa Butter (Theobroma Oil) instead of Lard (pure rendered pork fat) and 10 % superfat
From the guides
All guides
Lard and tallow: soaping with animal fats
Why lard and tallow make hard, mild, creamy soap, how to render and store them at home, how beef, mutton and pork fat differ, and classic recipes.
Palm-free soap: what takes palm oil's place
What palm oil does in a bar of soap, why makers drop it, and how lard, tallow, shea, cocoa, kokum or stearic acid take its place, with worked palm-free recipes.
Fatty acids and soap qualities: what the numbers mean
The eight fatty acids behind how a bar behaves, how the five quality numbers are summed from them, where the usual ranges came from and when to ignore them.
Where these proportions come from
Our own formulation, for makers who find coconut soap drying or react to it: no lauric oil at all (no coconut, palm kernel or babassu), lard and shea butter for firmness, and lather from 10 % castor oil rather than lauric oils, at a 7 % superfat. The sugar in the lye water follows Anne-Marie Faiola's advice for more lather.