You are here: Home / Archives for Recipes / Non-food recipes

DIY Body Wash and Liquid Hand Soap

February 15, 2012 by 13 Comments

As you can imagine, a home with five sons, an evil genius handyman husband, two dogs, an elderly cat and fifteen chickens can get a little -how to say- malodorous. Don’t misunderstand, I love every one of the aforementioned scent producers, but people… it can be a little hard on the nose around here.

Par example: I sent one of my children (name redacted for the sake of their future pride. We’ll refer to him here as Stanky Hank.) to the shower. Stanky Hank was in the shower for ten minutes. He emerged soaking wet and still covered with dirt. The conversation went a little something like this:

Me: You were in there for ten minutes. Why are your hands, feet, arms, and knees still covered with dirt stains?

Stanky Hank: Oh, I was supposed to get rid of those?

If I told you this was the rule rather than the exception, would you faint? Because I’m feeling a little faint thinking about it. And before anyone offers me smelling salts, remember, I live with a bunch of walking smelling salts.*

*Free social history lesson. Do you know what smelling salts actually were? They were bottles of ammonia solids mixed with aromatic essences. In short? They smelled like cat pee mixed with perfume. Remember, they were designed to wake you up. Now I’m not accusing my kids of smelling of cat pee, I’m just saying they have the potential to wake you up. But I digress.

Foodie With Family Trivia Moment: I’m obsessed with triple-milled French castile soaps. For those not equally obsessed with soap, castile soap is made with olive oil (translation: great for your skin). And the triple-milled soaps? Lush. Lush is the best word. My obsession extends most specifically to my favourite soap brand: Pre de Provence.

 

These massive bars of soap are unparalleled in the world of pretty smelling things. In scents like Coconut, Rose, Linden, Sage, Mint Leaf, Honey Almond Lavender, and my favourite- Green Tea- this soap makes me want to strap a bar to my nose just to get through life a little more happily. Although, upon reflection, walking around with a bar of soap strapped to my head might provide it’s own set of challenges…

…But I’m belabouring the point. I have used these soaps for a long time. The guys, however, didn’t want to use my pretty smelling soaps because they favour body wash over bar soap. They favour liquid hand soap over soap dishes. Sigh. My adorable cretins.

I’ve already told you about my happy, happy, super cheap and mega-effective homemade laundry detergent and my allergy-sufferer friendly unbelievably easy homemade air fresheners. You know I love to make pretty smelling things. Between that and the description I just gave you about my menfolk you can imagine that when I ran into this over on Pinterest, I was ready to make it immediately. STAT. Right away. Now. Time was a-wastin’.

Thanks to a proclivity for collecting lovely smelling soaps and a stash of vegetable glycerine from my previous Grand Marnier making forays, all I needed was to boil a gallon of distilled water.*

*Since even we cannot go through a gallon of soap in a week, I opted to use the boiled distilled water to slow any potential microbial growth in the soap. Distilled water has minerals removed (I used this because our water is hard) but still needs to be brought to a boiling temperature to kill any bacteria in it. I think we can all agree that a petri dish full of soap does not sound appealing, right? “Hi. My name is Rebecca and I’m a germaphobe.”

That’s right. It’s just three ingredients. THREE.

And because it is just three I have three pieces of advice about the choice of soap:

  1. Use one whose smell you love in the bar form because it will intensify a bit in the liquid form. It doesn’t have to be my beloved Pre de Provence. Just choose one that you adore.
  2. Choose a non-lotion soap. The lotion will prevent the soap from setting up well.
  3. Don’t choose a soap based on colour. Whichever colour soap you choose, your liquid soap will pretty much end up the same pearlescent shade of white.
  4. Did you know WordPress doesn’t recognize pearlescent as being spelled correctly? But by the same token WordPress doesn’t recognize itself as being spelled correctly. Yes. I know this is a fourth bullet point, but it’s not advice. So there.

I followed instructions and let the soap set up overnight. This leads me to two very important pieces of advice.

  1. Do not  put a lid that can absorb odours on top of your pan. Mainly because it will.
  2. Don’t panic if you have what looks (and feels, at first) like a solid mass of soap because it will loosen up.

Regarding that second piece of advice, I do not own a hand-mixer. WHAT? Yes. It’s true. I got rid of it because my husband insisted that he make mashed potatoes with them. After I made mashed potatoes with a ricer and a wooden spoon, he agreed, but I decided to remove temptation and thus avoid gluey potatoes from here on in… but again? I digress.

When I removed my now permanently scented lid from my pan, I touched the top of the soap and thought, “Well, that’s nice. I have a giant disc of soap jello.” After I jabbed at it a few times with my whisk, it started breaking down a bit. It was still a little too, er, chunky for our liking.

I found my egg beaters and set my very energetic six year old to mixing up the goo.

Do you have a six year old lying around? They’re dead handy.

Would this be easier using a hand mixer? You betcha… but an eggbeater and a six year old is an equally effective if slightly slower solution. If it had been any thicker, I might’ve heated it back up, added a bit more water and stirred it in then let it cool again to test the viscosity before bottling. As it was, I was happy. The now lovely smelling six year old and I ladled the liquid soap (which has a bit of a stringy consistency that doesn’t effect the overall product but takes a bit of adjustment if you’re using to the usual liquid soaps) into the gallon jug that had held the distilled water and found we needed more containers. We went on to fill an empty liquid hand soap container and an empty mid-sized body wash container. The breakdown on cost is:

  • For a gallon of distilled water ($0.69)
  • A bar of Pre de Provence Green Tea Soap ($6.69)
  • Two tablespoons of vegetable glycerine ($0.75ish)
  • Yield of about a gallon and a quarter, give or take a bit ($8.13).

My guys smell good. Really, really good. As in, “DAD! Mom keeps sniffing me!” good. $8.13 for a giant jug of body wash and hand soap is reason enough to make it, but the way they smell is priceless.

And lest you worry about nostril bombing with perfume, let me reassure you. My husband, as part of his Evil Genius job qualifications, is a super sniffer. His nose is very sensitive indeed. If this was overwhelmingly perfumey you wouldn’t be able to get him near it even with a ten foot pole. Whether it’s the fact that this particular soap -Pre de Provence Green Tea- is just a straight up wonderful and mild manly scent, I can’t say. But I can promise that Mr. Twitchy Nose and the five little urchins love it. And me?

Well, I get to swoon for an entirely different reason now.

Print
DIY Body Wash and Liquid Hand Soap

DIY Body Wash and Liquid Hand Soap

Make your own custom body wash and liquid hand soap with just three easily find-able ingredients for a fraction of the cost of pricey store versions. Be prepared to smell fantastic!

Recipe from and method adapted slightly from The Farmer's Nest

Ingredients

  • 1 (8 ounce) bar of castile soap (Pre de Provence, Dr. Bronner's, etc...)
  • 1 gallon distilled water
  • 2 tablespoons vegetable glycerine

Instructions

Bring the water to a boil in a large non-reactive pot (stainless steel or glass). Grate the bar of soap on a metal box grater. Add the soap shavings and vegetable glycerine to the boiling water, stirring frequently, until the soap shavings are completely dissolved into the water. Remove the pan from the heat, cover tightly, and let rest undisturbed overnight or for at least 8 hours.

After it has rested, break up with an egg beater or with a hand mixer until smooth. If it is too solid, warm over the heat again, add a little distilled water and let cool again to test the consistency. Repeat until you reach the desired viscosity for your soap.

Put a funnel into the now empty distilled water jug and ladle the soap into the jug. Ladle any extra soap into empty hand soap bottles or jars with tight fitting lids.

Use like you normally use body wash or liquid hand soap.

Store unused soap in a cool, dark place. If you're a nervous Nelly type, you can store it in the refrigerator.

http://www.foodiewithfamily.com/2012/02/15/diy-body-wash-and-liquid-hand-soap/

 

Do you want to try out my favourite soap? You can click on the “Books, Gear, and Supplies” tab right below the header, then click on the “Make it Smell Good!” category.

 

 

 

Filed Under: Kitchen Techniques and Hints, Non-food recipes, Rebecca, Recipes, Stretching your dollars Tagged With: , , , ,

Spicy Cocktail Nuts and a Giveaway! (Updated)

November 3, 2010 by 76 Comments

We have a winner!  Connie… You were picked by the random number generator.

“Connie

I am surprised you are out of the competition. Your recipes are so delicious and extremely helpful. Hope you have a wonderful weekend.”

Contact me for instructions on how to redeem your prize!  Congratulations!

Aw, nuts!

…Or so I said when I learned that my tenure in the Project Food Blog competition was done. After a brief spell of sitting on my bar stool at my counter indulging in self-pity, I came to three conclusions.

  1. I was truly proud of each and every entry I submitted to the competition because each one represented my approach and attitude toward food.
  2. I was kind of relieved. I had a pumpkin carving party to attend that night and that meant I could really have fun without worrying about a deadline.
  3. I have the most loyal, kind, sweet, and hilarious readers ever created. The emails and messages of support left on the Foodie With Family fan page were and are much appreciated.  And truth be told, you guys kind of choked me up a little bit.  Thank you for all your support for me both during and after the competition.  You are awesome.

Now, that being said, I thought the most appropriate way to say ‘thank you’ and express my opinion about being foisted from the competish was to make some nuts.  As in aw, nuts.  As in I’m nutty.  As in I’m nuts for you guys.  As in…  let’s just make these nuts already, eh?

Spicy, sweet, salty, and totally addictive, these nuts will become an instant necessity in your holiday food arsenal.  You will dream about these.  Years ago (and we won’t say how many because I might be having an aging crisis), a friend brought these to an event that I organized at the office*.  Let’s just say that these didn’t make it past my desk to the buffet table.  They stayed with me.  And my friend wasn’t allowed to pass the desk until he jotted down the recipe for me.  Because I’m just that kind of person.

*The aforementioned event -my brainchild- was “PigFest” wherein we spent each Friday in November bringing in dishes to pass with the express aim of expanding our stomachs to better hold the bounty that would be lain before us at upcoming holiday events.  Who ever said advertising people were impractical?

Let’s talk about these nuts for a moment.  You can serve them warm (kept that way in a little slow-cooker) or room temperature; either way has its advantages. You can change out the seasonings used to spice them up.  You can ratchet up or scale back on the heat.  You can swap out walnuts, cashews, peanuts, Brazil nuts or whatever floats your boat for the almonds. You can pour a bunch of the cooled nuts into a clean canning jar, wrap some ribbon or rafia around it and give it as a fabulous hostess gift.  But what you can’t do is skip making these.

Before we go any further, let me tell you about this giveaway.  Aside from the nuts, it is another way of saying thank you for being here!  The nice folks at CSN (and have you LOOKED at their sites?  They have over 200 of them!  It’s like my own personal candy store! That bar stool link above is to one of their sites.) have offered a $50 gift certificate just in time to stock up with the gear you need to turn out the best holiday meals you possibly can.  Thank you, CSN!  So the rules.  First, I’m tired of contest rules so we’ll keep it simple.

Da Rules

  1. Leave a comment.
  2. That’s it.  You’re entered.
  3. If you really need more rules, perhaps you should make them up and leave them in the comment area.
  4. I love you guys.
  5. Really.  Those are all the rules.
  6. Oh geez, you slave drivers.  Okay.  One more thing.  I’ll pick the winner at random on Saturday morning at an as-yet undetermined time.  Because I told you, tired of the rules.

Now, we cook.

Aw, nuts.

Spicy Cocktail Nuts

Scroll to the bottom for an easy-print version of this recipe!

Recipe by Emeril Lagasse

  • 1 large egg white
  • 1 teaspoon water
  • 4 cups raw almonds (…or raw walnuts, pecans, or peanuts)
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 2 tablespoons Emeril’s Essence, recipe follows (or whichever spice blend you prefer…)
  • 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 250 degrees F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, whisk together egg white and water until frothy. Add the nuts and toss to coat. In a small bowl, combine the sugar, Essence, cayenne, and salt. Add to the nuts and stir to coat evenly. Spread the nuts on the prepared pan and bake until dry, about 45 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes. Remove from the oven and stir to separate. Let cool on the baking sheet. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Essence (Emeril’s Creole Seasoning)

Recipe by Emeril Lagasse

  • 2- 1/2 tablespoons paprika
  • 2 tablespoons salt
  • 2 tablespoons garlic powder
  • 1 tablespoon black pepper
  • 1 tablespoon onion powder
  • 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper
  • 1 tablespoon dried leaf oregano
  • 1 tablespoon dried thyme

Combine all ingredients thoroughly and store in an airtight jar or container. Yield: about 2/3 cup

Print
Spicy Cocktail Nuts and a Giveaway! (Updated)
Author: 
Recipe type: Snack, Appetizer, Hors d’oeuvres
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 

Serves: Lots
 

Addictive. That’s the only word to describe these spicy, sweet, crunchy, roasty-toasty cocktail nuts. Make with almonds, cashews, peanuts, walnuts… You choose!
Ingredients
  • 1 large egg white
  • 1 teaspoon water
  • 4 cups raw almonds (…or raw walnuts, pecans, or peanuts)
  • ½ cup sugar
  • 2 tablespoons Emeril’s Essence, recipe follows in notes (or whichever spice blend you prefer…)
  • ½ teaspoon cayenne
  • ¼ teaspoon salt

Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
  2. In a large bowl, whisk together egg white and water until frothy. Add the nuts and toss to coat. In a small bowl, combine the sugar, Essence, cayenne, and salt. Add to the nuts and stir to coat evenly. Spread the nuts on the prepared pan and bake until dry, about 45 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes. Remove from the oven and stir to separate. Let cool on the baking sheet. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Notes
Essence (Emeril’s Creole Seasoning) Recipe by Emeril Lagasse * 2- ½ tablespoons paprika * 2 tablespoons salt * 2 tablespoons garlic powder * 1 tablespoon black pepper * 1 tablespoon onion powder * 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper * 1 tablespoon dried leaf oregano * 1 tablespoon dried thyme Combine all ingredients thoroughly and store in an airtight jar or container. Yield: about ⅔ cup

WordPress Recipe Plugin by EasyRecipe

 

Filed Under: Appetizers & Snacks, Breakfast Foods, Gifts, Holiday Food, Instructional, kid food, Kitchen Techniques and Hints, Non-food recipes, Party Food, Project Food Blog 2010, Rebecca, Recipes, Stretching your dollars, Vegetarian Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Homemade Essential Oil Air Fresheners

March 17, 2010 by 66 Comments

Have you ever noticed that males of all species have a tendency to (How can I put this delicately?) be malodorous?

I’m talking from a position of knowledge and experience here; I have a husband, five sons, and two male dogs.  We also have chickens and a cat. My boys tromp all over the yard without regard to the location of dog or chicken scat.  I feed my family a great deal of beans. My dogs get gassy when they’re nervous.* There are ample opportunities for ‘the stink’ to arise.

*Boy, do I wish I was joking about that.  Last summer we took the dogs to a family reunion in Southern Michigan.  We got stuck on the Ohio Turnpike in 90°F temperatures.  Our air conditioning broke and only one of the windows in the van worked.  It was the window next to yours-truly’s head.  So all the air exiting the van went right. past. my. face.  Remember that.  It will become very important to my story in mere moments. And the dogs?  Well, let’s just say being stuck in traffic was as hard on their nerves as ours.  Being stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic in sweltering temperatures with a flatulent eighty-five pound hound dog and his equally foul-smelling and obese beagle buddy was -in a word- horrific. You could have calibrated a 30-second hourglass by timing the brief respite between ‘episodes’ from Hambone and Diggedy.  I was traumatized. We all were.

I learned early on in my mother-of-many-boys career that eliminating the causes of ‘the stink’ was nearly impossible; I learned it was all about making a pleasant smelling oasis in each room.  And I spent money on it.  Oooh, baby, did I spend money; scented candles, gel air fresheners, room sprays, linen sprays, plug-in room deodorizers, misters, potpourri (sidebar: My mom fed boiled potpourri on a taco to my German exchange student friend in high school.  But that’s a story for another time. Hi, Mom!)

When I learned that three of my babies had asthma, all that stuff went out the window.  Actually, it went in the trash, but you savvy, right?  All the pretty smelling stuff went buh-bye.  Laundry detergent, fabric softener, cleaners?  All unscented.  Boo hoo.  Poor me.

The allergist told me I could use essential oils in small amounts in little bowls or reed diffusers, but I found that the scent dissipated too quickly.  I had to find something that smelled nice (or an inexpensive carbon filter face mask comfortable enough to wear 24/7) or risk losing what little sanity I had left.  It took five years…

You’ve heard that necessity is the mother of invention?  Well, I’m the mother of five little necessities and I had a perspiration. (My Dad defines ‘Perspiration’ as an inspiration that hurts.)  Homemade all-natural, essential oil powered, gel based air fresheners.  They met all the requirements to keep my poor asthmatic kids from doubling over and wheezing.  They smelled great.  They lasted a good long time.  They were cheap to make.  They had five ingredients you could find at any grocery or department store.  And this mom was happy.

Now a word or two about essential oils: they’re pretty powerfully scented, so go easy on how much you add.  You don’t want to add more than 30 drops per air freshener until you know just how strong your oil is.  The basic air freshener base recipe is listed and my favorite scent combinations are given below it.

For a printer-friendly version of this recipe sans photos and yakety-yakety, click here!

Homemade Essential Oil Air Fresheners

Ingredients:

  • 1 ounce granulated or powdered gelatin
  • 2 cups cold water, divided
  • 20-30 drops of your choice of essential oil
  • 1 Tablespoon salt
  • optional, food coloring to tint the air freshener

Also needed:

  • heat-proof jars to hold the hot gelatin liquid
  • a disposable chopstick or skewer to use as a stir stick

Bring one cup of water to a boil in a small saucepan.  Sprinkle the gelatin over the boiling water and whisk until smooth and all the gelatin is dissolved.  Add the salt and the second cup of cold water and whisk.  Set aside.

Add the desired amount of essential oil and food coloring, if using, to the jar(s).  Quickly pour the hot liquid gelatin over the essential oil and food coloring.  Stir until evenly colored.

Allow to cool, uncovered on a heat-proof surface.  When it reaches room temperature, place wherever you want a lovely scent.

Sweet Basil and Lemon  Air Freshener

  • 20 drops Sweet Basil essential oil
  • 8 drops Lemon essential oil

Rosemary Orange  Air Freshener

  • 25 drops Sweet Orange essential oil
  • 5 drops Rosemary essential oil (The Rosemary essential oil is mighty strong stuff.  Keep a light hand with this!)

Fresh Pine Scent Air Freshener

  • 25 drops Fir Pine essential oil
  • 3 drops Lemon essential oil
  • 2 drops Sweet Orange essential oil
  • 1 drop Bergamot essential oil

Pure Lavender Air Freshener

  • 30 drops of Lavender essential oil

Essence of Provençe Air Freshener

  • 20 drops Lavender essential oil
  • 5 drops Thyme essential oil
  • 2 drops Lemon essential oil

~~~

This year, if we have to take the dogs on another road trip, I’m prepared; I’ll just cram one of these up each nostril and pray.



Filed Under: Gifts, Household Hints, Instructional, Non-food recipes, Rebecca, Recipes, Stretching your dollars

Homemade Laundry Soap

February 22, 2010 by 41 Comments

Laundry has never been my friend.

I need to make this perfectly clear.  I’ve never liked it; emptying pockets, washing clothes, drying clothes, folding and sorting clothes and putting them away.  Ugh.  I am not naturally inclined toward good housekeeping.  I’d much rather sit down with a cup of tea and a good book or some knitting or quilt blocks.  I might even rather have extensive dental work done rather than tackle a pile of dirty clothes.

Over the years, my ability to ignore laundry has become legendary.  And the problem has grown as my family did. 5 active boys + 1 Evil Genius + 1 clothes horse/baker/homeschooling Mom = 1 big-old-laundry pile.  And thus far, my patient and studied approach of ignoring it long enough for someone to invent self-cleaning/folding/putting away laundry* has gone unrewarded.

*To my husband, The Evil Genius:  Hello, sweetie.  If you read that paragraph above, please know that I am in no way disparaging your progress in inventing self-cleaning laundry.  I understand that it is lower on the priority list than ruling the universe, tesseracting, and DIY space/time continuum rift kits, but if you get a few spare moments…

And I have another good reason to detest laundry.  We have many allergies in our family.  (I’m convinced that I  have an allergy to laundry and they just haven’t discovered the test to prove it.  But that’s not my point; I am referring to my kids’ perfume and dye allergies…) This means that I’ve sprung mad cash on ‘Dye Free/Fragrance Free’ laundry soaps over the years.  Mucho deniro.  Beaucoup d’argent.  Mega bucks.  And I am cheap.  It pained me to spend so much money on an activity that I dislike so very much.

So, when I did began the series in early January on saving money around the kitchen (see Parts I, II, III, and IV ) and I asked for readers’ money saving tips, I was intrigued when I read these two comments:

“Jennifer

I make my own laundry soap. I can make a batch that lasts me the month for approx $1.”

and

“Marcia

I make my own laundry soap, which costs about 1 cent a load. I am going to try the twix bars, they look wonderful!”

Jennifer and Marcia had my interest.  A buck a month?  A penny a load?  Well, geez.  Even I could get excited about THAT little laundry innovation.  I got in touch with Jennifer (because -quite conveniently- she is married to my cousin.  Does that make her my cousin-in-law? ) and she was kind enough to share her recipe for homemade laundry soap.  She also told me that she’s been using this homemade laundry soap for about four months and that she does a great deal of laundry.  (Poor thing.  She has my sympathy.)

Laundry soap for a penny per load was not a difficult experiment to sell to The Evil Genius because his affinity for saving money overrode any skepticism he may have had over the science of the endeavour.  I made a batch.  I tried the soap.  I rejoiced.  Let me tell you, this laundry soap is -in a word- awesome.  My laundry -without using any fabric softeners- came out of the washer and dryer more soft and supple, more vibrant, and better smelling than it has with even the best allergen free laundry soap I’ve ever bought.

No cries of foul allowed; I have a high efficiency washing machine, Jennifer has a 13 year old regular top-loader.  If it worked for both of us, it’ll work for you! I washed an incredibly dirty load that included jeans my son had worn to dirt bomb down our hill and jeans that I had worn for a marathon baking session.  They both came out cleaner than I could have ever imagined.  Go on and look at me.  Am I getting excited about laundry?  I have photographic proof:

Aidan’s jeans after dirt-bombing.  These jeans sat in the hamper for 9 days before being washed.  I had written them off completely.  (I TOLD you I’m bad at laundry.)

Before:

Okay, it didn’t get the stain out.  But the light stain?  That was nine-days-in-the-hamper-my-fault.  It ended up much, much better than I expected and the resulting jeans are perfectly acceptable for everything from visiting with friends to spending the day in town.  That is an improvement over the ‘only-good-for-further-dirt-bombinb’ appearance I expected.

After:

Now, for my jeans.  Check out the fact that the entire leg is dusted with flour while there are many little areas of ground in, caked on bread dough.  If they were human I’d tell you to look at their pallid color; all dingy and faded.  So sad.  I feared for my jeans.

Before:

Wowza!  Look how clean they got.  There’s no foolery here.  These are the same jeans! Not a trace of the full-leg coating of flour OR of the little mini-loaves of bread that were ground into the fabric.  Total, 100% win on these!

After:

Look at the advantages:

  1. It is really, really inexpensive.
  2. It is environmentally and septic-system friendly.  No worries about phosphates or other nasties.
  3. You can customize the scent of your laundry.  Want lavender, lemon, orange, fir pine, or coffee scented clothes?  No prob.  Just grab the appropriate essential oil.  Want to repel mosquitos with your clothes?  Add citronella essential oil.  Want no scent at all?  Don’t add oil!  Piece of cake!
  4. It’s really cheap.
  5. It is allergy-sufferer friendly.  You can use the mildest bar soap on the market (Dr. Bronner’s Mild All-In-One for Babies gets my vote.)
  6. There are no dyes in it to irritate sensitive skin.
  7. Did I mention it saves you a ton of money?

Let me break down the cost for you:

The amounts needed end up costing this:

  • Washing soda: $0.35 for one batch (10 batches worth in the box.)
  • Borax:  $0.17 for one batch (24 batches worth in the box.)
  • Soap: $0.50 for one batch (3 batches worth in the three-pack.)
  • Essential Oil: $0.10 (this is an estimate based on pure guess work.  It’s a big bottle of oil and I used very little.)

Total cost for the batch: $1.12.  If I left out the essential oil, the batch would have cost $1.02.  Let me repeat: $1.12 for nearly five gallons of allergy-sufferer friendly, superior laundry detergent.  Beat that.

For a photo-free, printer-friendly version of this ‘recipe’, click here!

Homemade Laundry Soap

Ingredients:

  • One five gallon plastic bucket with a tight fitting lid.  (Can be found at Walmart or Home Depot near the paint sections.)
  • One bar of gentle soap  (You can use Ivory, Dr. Bronner’s or any other non-beauty bar.  In other words, no lotion in the soap!  My Amish friends told me they use 1/3 of a bar of Fels-Naptha for their homemade soap.  That’s a little harsher than I want to use on my allergy-prone babies, but there’s no doubt that’ll get dirt out of anything…)
  • 1 cup Washing Soda (This is available in the laundry aisle at Walmart and my tiny small-town grocery store.  I’m sure you can find it.  If you don’t have luck, Amazon.com carries it.)
  • 1/2 cup Borax (This is also available in laundry aisles and Amazon.com.)
  • 4 cups warm water plus 4 gallons warm water, separated.
  • Optional, 10-40 drops of essential oil of your choice (Strictly optional, folks.  But shhhh… I used 35 drops of lavender essential oil.  Don’t tell the menfolk.  They don’t care for smellin’ purty.)

Grate the bar of soap on a metal cheese grater.

There is a large part of me that is so conditioned to what you normally do with cheese graters that I had to restrain myself from eating the soap.  Doesn’t it look like a beautiful pile of mozzarella?  It looked so good that I was tempted to cuss just so I could try washing my mouth out with it.  But I didn’t…

Do not use a plastic cheese grater as plastic is more likely to absorb odors from the soap. Put into a stainless steel or glass saucepan on the stove with 4 cups of warm water.  The same warning applies here as to the cheese grater. Don’t use a pan that will absorb odors.  Non-stick surfaces are more likely to soak up that soapy scent and flavor.

Heat while stirring until the soap is all dissolved.  Set aside.

Put 4 gallons of warm water into the large bucket and thoroughly stir in the Borax and Washing Soda. When those are dissolved into the water, stir in the melted soap. After pouring the melted soap into the bucket, plunge the pan up and down in the water a few times to stir the contents.

Look at that squeaky clean pan.  Stir and clean at the same time?  I’m all about efficiency!  But don’t forget to rinse it thoroughly before drying.  Nothing like soapy soup to bring you down.

Stir in the essential oil at this point if you are using it.

Allow the soap to sit, tightly covered, overnight.

The next morning you will find the soap to have a thick, gelatinous appearance.  Use a long spoon to break it up and stir it.  And don’t forget- use a spoon that won’t soak up the scent or soap flavor.

Hey look- this soap looks like brains.  The kids have been sick and I’ve had very little sleep. You could probably transplant this into my cranium with no appreciable difference in performance.

You will probably not be able to completely break up the lumps, but this is not a problem.

Congratulations: You have now joined the Tightwad Fraternity.  But you don’t have to tell anyone.  Just reap the compliments when people remark that your clothes look so nice and so clean and smell so fresh.

This is now usable!  Store tightly lidded for up to two months.*

*If you cannot use this quantity of laundry soap within two months, you can definitely reduce it.  To make a much smaller batch: use 1/4 of a bar of soap, grated into 1 cup of warm water; 1/4 cup of washing soda, 1/8 cup of Borax, and 1 gallon of warm water.  If you opt to use the essential oil, you would use between 3 and 10 drops in the micro-batch.

To use:

Use one cup (8 liquid ounces) of the laundry soap per load of laundry.  As this soap does not create suds, it is acceptable for use in high-efficiency machines as well as being good for the standard top-loading machines.


Filed Under: Household Hints, Instructional, Kitchen Techniques and Hints, Non-food recipes, Rebecca, Recipes, Stretching your dollars Tagged With: , ,

Mystical Magical Slime. Hours of fun for kids of all ages.

February 16, 2009 by 7 Comments

Please allow a departure from the normal for a moment. It isn’t that I’m lacking a recipe to share with you.  It’s just that the recipe isn’t one to eat.  The blog is titled, “Foodie With Family”, right?  Well, today’s post is for the kids (and the kids at heart.)  Those of you who have school aged kids might be looking at a couple days or a week’s worth of break from school.  And since you’re with me on the departure from the norm, how about sticking with me for an aside from the departure.  When did this happen?  I don’t remember getting a week off for Presidents’ Day.  And since I sound like an old codger already, I might as well drive the nail into the coffin by saying that in my day it wasn’t even called Presidents’ Day.  We had an individual birthday celebration for Washington and Lincoln and I’m pretty sure we got those corresponding days off.  See that?  I’m even too old and too codgery to remember whether I got those days off.  It’s all downhill from here.

But back to the point.  What was that dratted point?  Oh yes.  It was that many of you may find yourself with a kid (or a bunch of them) who need some activities to keep those brains and hands from plotting nefarious time-off deeds involving dogs, dutch ovens filled with gravel and mud of questionable origins, your good whisk and indelible marker in the newly repainted den.  Trust me when I say it behooves you to spend the small amount of time to keep them occupied or you may find yourself with a ‘magic eraser’ trying desperately to remove Sharpie and muddy paw prints  from the recently-but-no-longer bright white closet door in the aforementioned den while wondering just how they got your whisk to stand up straight in a pile of mud that looks remarkably like it came from the  floor of the chicken coop.  Just saying…

What to do, what to do?  You don’t want to run to the store with those honyaks.  Dig into the laundry supplies for some borax and the craft bin for some glue and make yourself some Mystical Magical Slime.  It has the tactile play that kids love so much but it cleans up really nicely.  Well, except from nice tablecloths, but who has any of those if they have kids?  I recommend using a not-well-loved vinyl or plastic tablecloth for playing with the gunk.  When it comes time to clean up,  let it dry on surfaces where it’s not going to do harm and then sweep it up.   Whip up a batch of this and do what you have to do.  This will keep them occupied.  But don’t be surprised if you find yourself playing alongside them.  It’s Mystical and Magical like that…

Hey you folks who aren’t overrun by children!  You’re not off the hook here.  This stuff is just plain fun and it’s not like it requires a massive investment.  Try making this.  I’m willing to bet you’ll find it a stress reliever even if you do feel a little silly when you start making the stuff.  Live a little.  Reconnect with your inner child.

And you fellow homeschooling types out there?  You can turn this into a science lesson.  Check out this link for more information on the mystical magical properties of polymers…

Mystical Magical Slime

Ingredients:

  • 4 ounces white school glue (Elmer’s, Ross, doesn’t matter, just use white school glue.)
  • 1 teaspoon powdered borax
  • 1/2 cup warm water
  • food coloring, optional (We used beet powder for our gruesome slime, but standard food coloring would work fine!)

Helpful equipment:

  • 8 ounce measuring cup
  • stain-proof mixing bowl
  • vinyl or plastic tablecloth
  • mixing spoon that you don’t love enough to worry about
  • zipper top bag

To make Mystical Magical Slime you begin by changing into clothes to which you and the children are not emotionally attached.  Now add the entire contents of the glue to a mixing bowl.  Add warm water to the glue bottle, screw the lid back on tightly and shake.  Empty the water/glue mixture to the glue in the bowl and mix well with a spoon.  If you’d like to make colored slime, just add a couple drops of food coloring here.   Again, mix well.

Add 1/2 cup warm water to your measuring cup and stir in 1 teaspoon of borax powder.  Stir with a fork, but don’t worry if some of the powder doesn’t dissolve.  It’s not a biggie.  You have now created the Mystical Magical Slime Activator.  Or you can call it Mystical Magical Potion, or Mystical Magical Power Liquid or whatever you want that makes your kids’ eyes get bigger and makes them stare at you in anticipation.  Your call.  “Mystical, Magical Slime Activator Potion” is what gets them all quivery with excitement over here.

Now, while stirring the glue and water mixture, slowly add about 2 Tablespoons of the “Mystical, Magical Slime Activator Potion”.  You’ll immediately feel resistence against the spoon while the strands of slime form in the bowl.  You may want to use your hand for the remaining mixing!  If the slime is to your liking, you can stop here, but if you want slime that is a little more like silly putty, you can keep adding the activator little by little, mixing well between each addition until it reaches the desired consistency.  Now PLAY!  Have fun!  Get messy!

When you’re done, store the Mystical Magical Slime in a mystical magical zipper top bag.

We had a house full of family on New Year’s Day.  My sister, Jessamine, and her husband, Jeremy, wisely brought the ingredients for this project as a gift for Ty’s birthday knowing that he had never made it before.  Coincidentally, friends of ours had created and given Ty a kit to make this as well. As you can see from the pictures below, the whole crew -ages 3 through 42 and everywhere in between loved it.

The evil mastermind for the Mystical Magical Slime was my brother-in-law, Jeremy. He teaches kindergarten. Live in fear for the next generation, people. Just kidding. Don't fear the Jeremy.

The evil mastermind for the Mystical Magical Slime was my brother-in-law, Jeremy. He teaches kindergarten. Live in fear for the next generation, people. Just kidding. Don't fear the Jeremy.

Aidan was thrilled that the slime resembled the deer guts he saw when his Uncle Greg field dressed a deer in the backyard. Ew.

Aidan was thrilled that the slime resembled the deer guts he saw when his Uncle Greg field dressed a deer in the backyard. Ew.

I guess it does kind of look like deer innards with that beet coloring. Double ick.

I guess it does kind of look like deer innards with that beet coloring. Double ick.

Airlia is really grossed out by the slime. Either that or my morning breath.

Airlia is really grossed out by the slime. Either that or my morning breath.

Since she'll hate me for putting in that previous picture I'd better throw in one that shows how she normally looks. Isn't she gorgeous?

Since she'll hate me for putting in that previous picture I'd better throw in one that shows how she normally looks. Isn't she gorgeous?

Shake hands and forgive me, Air? Sisters don't shake hands. Jess will smooch you for me.

Shake hands and forgive me, Air? Sisters don't shake hands. Jess will smooch you for me.

Wahoo! Slime hands.

Wahoo! Slime hands.

Niece Willow isn't sure what to make of my crazy boys.

Niece Willow isn't sure what to make of my crazy boys.

Maybe because Ty keeps waving his 'slime brain' at her and saying, "Do you like my BRAIN?"

Maybe because Ty keeps waving his 'slime brain' at her and saying, "Do you like my BRAIN?"

My nephew Ezra was REALLY into it.

My nephew Ezra was REALLY into it.

That's right. Some grown-ups, who shall remain unnamed, were pushing kids out of the way to play with the slime.

That's right. Some grown-ups, who shall remain unnamed, were pushing kids out of the way to play with the slime.

Using grown-up arms to steal the children's slime. Shame on you, Evil Genius. Shame on your naughty polymer-loving eyes.

Using grown-up arms to steal the children's slime. Shame on you, Evil Genius. Shame on your naughty polymer-loving eyes.

Jess and Leif are demonstrating their maniacal laughs for us. Very effective.

Jess and Leif are demonstrating their maniacal laughs for us. Very effective.

Liam is entering the mystical magical age where he prefers to scowl at the camera. Actually, maybe he's just annoyed because I keep telling him to look at Mommy.

Liam is entering the mystical magical age where he prefers to scowl at the camera. Actually, maybe he's just annoyed because I keep telling him to look at Mommy.

Now that's one happy birthday boy. I want to bite his cheeks in this picture.

Now that's one happy birthday boy. I want to bite his cheeks in this picture.

Filed Under: Non-food recipes, Rebecca Tagged With: , ,