Name: Thrive! NCHE Homeschool Conference
Start: 2025-05-22T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-05-24T23:59:59-05:00
Location: Winston-Salem, NC

This topic has 8 replies, 7 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 2 months ago by caycecronk.

Viewing 9 posts - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)

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March 1, 2013 at 3:24 pm
Sue
Participant
Can you tell me what ingredients I should be seeing on the label of a pure, unscented liquid castile soap? I’m looking at a couple, but I don’t know if they’ve added ingredients to the original Dr. Bronner’s formula or even if the one called Dr. Bronner’s is still the original formula. Thanks.
March 1, 2013 at 4:23 pm
Linabean
Participant
Castile soap in it’s most pure form should be made with olive oil (or other oils, but traditionally, it was made with olive oil) and lye. This would make a traditional hard bar, though.
To make liquid castile soap you should see mostly oils (olive, coconut, jojoba, various essential oils, etc.) and then potassium hydroxide instead of normal lye. There should be NONE remaining after the saponification process, however. Just as there should be NO LYE left in bars of soap after the saponificaion process. You can also see citric acid as an ingredient as well. Though I am not sure as to the exact reason why, it is a common ingredient in natural cleaners and bath products. The other thing you can see on the ingredients list often is tocopherol which is a naturally occuring chemical that is often used and even referred to as vitamin E. I am not sure, though, if it is “real” vitamin E or just very close to it and can be used as it.
HTH
-Miranda
March 1, 2013 at 4:27 pm
Linabean
Participant
Oh, I just saw that you wanted unscented only. It should say that it is unscented and if so, it should not really need any E.O. Though, they can be used for cleaning, skin problems, etc. I understand them to be used mostly for scent in commercial soaps. I may be wrong, though. You could go to a health store and tell them exactly what you want and what you want it for and they should be able to help answer a lot of your questions and point you in the right direction.
-Miranda
March 1, 2013 at 4:30 pm
blue j
Participant
The original definition is this: Castile soap is a name used in English-speaking countries for olive oil based soap made in a style similar to that originating in the Castile region of Spain. – Wikipedia
Now that term is often used to include soaps that are made with shea butter, coconut oil and palm oil, etc. as well. While not technically correct when used this way, it’s one way that people/ companies use to denote a product that is made with vegetable fats rather than animal fats.
List of castile soaps off the top of my head – ie. not comprehensive by any stretch of the imagination:
Dr. Bronner’s
Kirk’s Natural
Kiss My Face Oil Oil Soap (various scents or the plain jane variety – we use these)
Dr. Woods
Desert Essence has one as well, I believe
There are various small companies that have a line of castile soaps as well. Does that help?

March 1, 2013 at 5:26 pm
Sue
Participant
Yes, that is very helpful – from both of you. I am looking into making a natural shampoo and adding tea tree oil to it because my son has scalp psoriasis & uses a commercial tea tree oil shampoo. Not only is it rather expensive, I don’t like all of the added chemicals in it. It helps him somewhat, but I think all of the extra stuff is counterproductive.
March 1, 2013 at 11:09 pm
lauraz76
Participant
So funny you posted about this…I’m currently doing a ‘chemical cleanout’ of our house (not 100%, but as much as I can). And during all my research, I discovered Castille soap. Apparently you can make lots of all-around cleaning solutions with it. If anyone has any ‘recipes’ or tips for this, let me know!
March 2, 2013 at 12:45 am
Rachel White
Participant
I just made my tooth soap with Dr. B’s. I still need to tweak the flavor, but the results are good. I plan on getting the Dr. Wood’s for shaving. I prefer Simply Green for cleaning.
Here’s a site that may be useful to you:
http://lisa.drbronner.com/?page_id=2
March 3, 2013 at 2:00 am
Melissa Ott
Participant
I just recently started using castile soap. I use Dr. Bronner’s, and have so far loved it. I use it to make my homemade all-purpose/glass/disinfectant cleaner (yes, it does all three beatifully). I fill a 64 oz industrial spray bottle with half water and half white distilled vinegar, then I add about a teaspoon of castile soap and about 10 drops of essential oil (tea tree, pine, sweet orange, or lavender all have disinfectant properties). You have to let it sit for a bit, because once you add the castile soap to the water/vinegar solution, it hardens. If you let it sit for about a half hour, the soap will dissolve and mix easily with the vinegar and water. Just give the bottle a quick shake whenever you use it. I also use Dr. Bronner’s castile soap in bar form for bathing, and just tried a new recipe using the liquid castile soap for laundry detergent. The jury’s still out on whether or not it’s working like it should. This last load didn’t come out quite as clean as I would have liked, though the load before that was a load of sheets my cat had hacked up a hairball on, and those cleaned up nicely. I’ll post a link to the recipe if it winds up working for me consistently.
March 3, 2013 at 2:38 pm
caycecronk
Member
We use the Dr. Bronners baby castile soap which is unscented and very delicate for the skin! Both my kids have skin issues now and then so we have to use minimal amounts of soap, etc!