Shampoo FAIL

I'm almost out of shampoo and since, admittedly, my hair has always been my greatest vanity, I was eager to find a chemical-free solution that didn't compromise it.  I did a ton of Internet research.  It was obvious pretty quickly that loosing shampoo altogether in favor of baking soda & vinegar just wasn't my cup of tea.  Many of the shampoo recipes I found involved liquid castile, so I made some in preparation and started concocting. 

My hair tends to run normal to oily.  Chamomile and honey nourish and condition and rosemary is good for oily hair. I mixed up a 1/4 c. of very strong chamomile & rosemary tea and mixed it & some honey into the liquid castile and hopped in the shower.  It was so liquid that I couldn't get a lather out of it.  Of course lather doesn't actually clean, but most people would agree that some amount of lather is needed to get the soap around to all of your hair.  I reached for the liquid castile.  It lathered, but left my hair feeling "squeaky" after rinsing.  Afterwards, my hair was dry & felt like I had soap build-up, so I put it in a bun. 

I decided to try a mayonnaise conditioner before I washed, since it felt so dry.  I used an egg yolk, coconut oil, and lime juice.  Unfortunately, making mayonnaise is exactly as hard as I've heard it is, so it was more of a oil & egg mix than mayo.  It took days just to get it out.  I tried mixing baking soda into liquid castile and it lost it's sud.  I wound up using regular bar soap because it cleaned the best.  We have hard water (as does everyone in swpa), which makes the scales of your hair stand on end, so I tried a vinegar rinse to make them lay flat. 

At the end of almost a week, I couldn't wait to get out my bottle of chemical-ridden shampoo.  I have by no means given up (I have a batch of shampoo bars curing as we speak), but it is tabled for more experimentation. 

Churning Butter

This one started the other day when I was visiting my good friend Bethany.  We were talking about some of my current and upcoming projects and said she was really curious about making butter.  Honestly, it was kind of far down my list, as the ingredient list on most butters is cream and salt.  Of course, in most cases, one never knows what those cows were fed or injected with or whatever.  I remembered that in kindergarten we just put cream in a mason jar and shook.  Bethany said she'd used a churn in girl scouts.  Then I looked it up on the Internet (raise your hand if you're surprised).  Did you know it only takes heavy cream, a food processor and 3 minutes to make butter? And you feel a sense of accomplishment, having made it yourself.  I may never buy it again. 

I started with chilled heavy cream from the springhouse (guaranteed hormone free!)

It was just the little container, but it made a slightly larger than store bought stick and exactly filled my food processor exactly to the liquid line.

I filled my food processor and turned it on.  If you don't have a food processor, shaking a mason jar will work, but it'll take longer.  A lot longer. 

The whole process took less than 3 minutes in my food processor, so don't go anywhere.  When it starts to get little butter chunks in it, add any herbs, salt, cinnamon & honey, you please. 

You'll know its done when all of it forms one or two big balls.  Mine just all camped out in one big hunk. 

 

Pour off any excess water, and dump it out onto a double or triple thickness stack of paper towels. 

Squeeze every last drop of liquid off.  The more liquid, the more likely it is to spoil. 

Put it in a tub or on some plastic wrap or wax paper and package it up.  Chill & enjoy!

Frozen Tomatoes

Tomatoes can very well but I don't own canning supplies (maybe I'll get some for next year).  That's not to say that you can't can without specialized equipment, but I'd be afraid of botulism if I didn't feel I had done my best to can them.  Also freezing actually saves energy by packing already operating units. 

Find a bunch of ripe (but not over-ripe) tomatoes.  Roma are best for freezing because they have so much more meat than water, but any tomato will do. 

Boil for 45ish seconds, and plunge immediately into waiting ice water.  This makes the skins come off well. 

Trim off anything tough or spoiled, peel skins and quickly remove seeds (it doesn't have to be perfect).  Cut into manageable pieces (halves for roma, quarters for most regular tomatoes. 

Pack in a bag, remove air (either by the old fashioned squeeze & suck method or with a vaccuum sealer) and freeze!

Corn also freezes well, but there's no real method... just cut off the cob (or put the whole cob in if you like) and freeze.

Liquid Castile Soap & other cleaning substances

Liquid Castile soap is considered by many the liquid gold of cleaning products because it is the base for so many other low-chemical products, from shampoo to laundry and dish detergent.  It is totally purchasable online or at an organics store if you have one near you.  I didn't want to pay for shipping and I don't mind making it, so here it is.  

LIQUID CASTILE SOAP

1 c. Shaved Soap
4 c. Water
2 tbsp. Glycerin (you can get it at most pharmacies, though it may be kept behind the counter)
Essential Oil, if you like

If you recall from "My weekend, the FAIL Blog", I haven't had so much luck making liquid soap straight from lye, oil  & water, so I did it the long way just to see what all the hype was about.  I used Crock Pot Hot Process Castile Soap (Castile, in this instance, meaning 100% Olive Oil).  This was the first time I had made an all olive oil soap and after all the hype I heard about it, I was disappointed.  The bars were dry and crumbly and the soap had little to no lather.  Some of this probably could have been avoided if I had been patient enough to make cold process soap instead, but it actually came in handy.  The first step in turning it into liquid Castile is to shred it.  If the soap had been hard, I would have grated it with the small side of a cheese grater.  If you do this, be careful! the soap easily becomes aerosol.  Since my soap was crumbly, already, I chopped it up and put it in my food processor.  It worked beautifully.  Don't worry if you have extra soap shavings, they're also really useful!

P.S. I don't recommend using a nice muffin tin like the one above, it got ruined!

Bring your water to a boil and slowly add glycerin, essential oil, and soap shavings.  The soap shavings will probably clump no matter how slowly you add them.  Stir (with a spoon you don't mind loosing or that's plastic) and cook until everything is completely dissolved. 

Transfer to a heat-proof container to cool.  Don't worry if its watery, it'll gel up as it cools.  Wash your pot immediately.  While the soap is very mild, cooking it can be hard on pots (especially if there is a lot of aluminum in them).  It makes a great hand soap as is, but I'll post a bunch more recipes including this stuff!

 

POWDER LAUNDRY DETERGENT

1 c. Borax
1 c. Washing soda (it took a while, but i found it at Shop'n'Save in Washington & country fresh market in Richeyville)
1  c. (or 1 bar) shaved soap

Mix together and store in an air-tight container so it doesn't clump.  Use 1-2 tbsp. per load, depending how soiled. 

POWDER DISHWASHER DETERGENT 

1 c. Borax
1 c. Washing soda
1/2 c. Salt
1/2 c. Citric Acid (lemon kool-aid mix, fruit fresh, or powdered citric acid if you can find it)

Mix and store.  1-2 tbsp per load.  This one clumps easily so keep the humidity away!  Put vinegar in the rinse-aid slot if you find the dishes to have a white film on them. 

ALL-PURPOSE CLEANER

1 tsp Borax
1/2 tsp Washing Soda
2 tbsp Lemon Juice
1 c Hot Water
Citrus Essential Oil, if you like

Pour into spray bottle, shake and go at it!

Whole Wheat "Bisquick"

• 4 cups whole wheat flour
  
• 2 1/2 tablespoons baking powder (non-aluminum)
  
• 1/2 tablespoon sea salt
  
• 3/4 cup powdered milk (organic)
  
• 1/2 cup canola oil

Add all of the dry ingredients and mix.  Add canola oil and mix thoroughly, using your fingers to "de-lump" if necessary.  Store in the refrigerator. 

I used it in my zucchini appetizer recipe and, while it def changed the appearance, taste-wise you could hardly tell! I wonder how pancakes will turn out. 

Products I Like: Oils

Part of making this transition easy on my wallet is limiting the amount of driving I have to do to get to my food.  The nearest grocery stores and bastions of civilization aren't exactly close, so I try not to stray too far from them in my shopping excursions, our gas bill is high enough as is. 

This series is on products I can buy that are natural and/or organic, convenient and reasonably priced. 

SPECTRUM OILS

These guys make a ton of organic oils and oil products (mayonnaise, salad dressing, vinegars).  Their coconut oils are what I use in my soaps as well as lots of beauty applications.  Their High Hear Canola Spray is the only organic high heat I have ever seen.  High heat oils are great both for grilling and any sort of quick pan frying.  Their resistance to higher heats allows them to not burn and create a very difficult to remove residue on your pans.  Sold at Giant Eagle. 

 

FULL CIRCLE

These guys offer organic spray oils available at  Giant Eagle. 

NATURE'S BASKET

Giant Eagle's natural generic brand.  They make a mean organic olive oil. 

Finding Direction

I realized the other day that, while it was floating around in my head, I hadn't actually stated my goal for this little blog, so here goes:

My goal is to slowly find ways to reduce the amount of chemicals in my life in ways that are sustainable within my budget and lifestyle.  This means finding low chemical or chemical-free solutions whose cost, taste, quality and level of convenience I can live with. 

I'm going to try to replace things as I run out of them, so as to reduce waste.  If I can't find a good solution, I'll table it until I do.  This probably won't lead to the perfect green lifestyle, but it will still be healthier than what I had before and I'm OK with that.  All things in moderation.