Soap has been made with tallow and lard (beef and pig fat) for as long as soapmaking has been around. While I wouldn't want to give up plant oils, like olive and coconut, there are qualities in animal fat that can't be duplicated by plant oils. Last week I thought I would try my hand at rendering, the process of purifying fat, separating it from all the other "junk." I was able to get some nice big chunks of beef fat from a local butcher shop. This is 11 pounds of fat. I chopped it up into small chunks and put it in the biggest stock pot I have, which isn't enormous. I didn't want to risk burning it so I only used about half the fat that I had for this batch. I decided that this way, I could test the whole process without getting overwhelmed. To keep the fat from burning and stinking up the house (rendering's reputation) I added water to the pot. I didn't want to risk the water evaporating, so I added a lot--probably more water than I had fat. H...
life in and out of the soap studio