Soap Is...What!?

Soap Is...What!?

What if I told you that when you use a bar of soap, you are technically washing with a block of salt? Well, sort of...mostly...kind of. Did you know that on a chemical level bar soap actually IS a bar of salt. When fat and sodium hydroxide lye are combined in the process called saponification, a salt is created. The resulting soap is a combination of salts formed from the reaction of a specific fat and the lye. 

Here are a few examples:

sodium tallowate tallow (animal fat) + lye
sodium cocoate coconut oil + lye
sodium palmate palm oil + lye
sodium palm kernelate palm kernel oil + lye
sodium olivate olive oil + lye


When the newly formed soap is now combined with your bath water and oils on your skin it emulsifies them to better be washed from your body.

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