My Honest Take on All-Natural Soap (After Years of Making It by Hand)

Let's talk about soap (the real stuff)

I have a confession to make. For years, I didn't think twice about the bright blue, plastic squeeze bottle by my kitchen sink. It got the dishes clean, and that felt like enough.

But something changed between then and now.

I started reading labels. I started caring more about what products I keep around my house. And I started to care about how those products affect the environment. 

Consider this my honest, no-fluff take on all-natural soap: what it does really well, where it isn't perfect, and the few bars I actually reach for every single day.

So grab your coffee! This is the same chat I'd have with you leaning on my kitchen counter. 😉

What actually makes soap "natural"?

Here's the thing most people don't know: a lot of what we call soap at the store isn't technically soap. It's detergent.

Most liquid dish soaps and body washes are built on synthetic surfactants, then topped off with fragrance, dyes, and preservatives so they stay shelf-stable in a plastic bottle.

Real soap is much simpler. You combine fat, lye, and water, and a reaction called saponification turns them into soap. Once the bar cures for a few weeks, no lye is left. Just soap!

That's the "secret." Families made it this way for generations, long before liquid dish soap showed up on the shelves in the 1980s.

When I say all-natural soap, here's what I really mean:

• Made from real animal fats like lard and tallow, plus a few simple oils like coconut and castor
• No synthetic fragrance (scent comes from essential oils, honey, or nothing at all)
• No SLS, SLES, phosphates, parabens, or artificial dyes
• An ingredient list you can actually pronounce

The bar that replaced my dish soap bottle

When friends find out I wash my dishes with lard soap, they usually make a face. Lard? On the plates you eat off of?

Yes. And it works better than you'd think. 😏

My Traditional Lard Dish Soap is made with exactly four ingredients: pasture-raised lard, coconut oil, organic castor oil, and water. The lard makes a rich, stable lather. The coconut oil helps cut through grease. The castor oil makes the suds fluffy. That's the whole list.

Here's how I use it every night:

1. Wet a dish brush or cloth
2. Rub it across the bar a few times until it gets sudsy
3. Wash like normal and rinse well
4. Set the bar back on a draining dish so it can dry out

It handles greasy skillets, sticky casserole dishes, and cereal bowls with that one stubborn corn flake glued to the side. It rinses clean with no film. And my hands are no longer dry and rough by the end of winter, which honestly might be my favorite part. 💅

Each 5 oz bar lasts about two weeks with daily dishwashing, so a 3-pack gets most families through about six weeks. 

The bars I keep in my shower

Once you switch your dish soap, the bathroom is next. It happens to everyone, I promise. Here's what's in my family's bathroom and how I use each one:

For your face: Honey Turmeric Tallow Face Soap. Grass-fed tallow, raw honey, turmeric, castor oil, and a little frankincense essential oil. Tallow is surprisingly close to the oils your skin makes on its own, and honey naturally pulls moisture in. It cleans without that tight, squeaky feeling some face washes leave behind. Each little flower-shaped bar comes with a soap saver bag and lasts about three to four weeks. My one tip: turmeric can tint white washcloths over time, so grab a darker one.

For a wake-up shower: Turmeric & Peppermint Brightening Body Bars. A creamy lard base with organic turmeric and certified organic peppermint essential oil. That cool tingle is better than a second cup of coffee on slow mornings, and it's lovely after a long day in the garden. Honest heads-up: peppermint is strong stuff. Keep it away from your eyes and sensitive spots, and pick a different bar for your face!

For the whole family: Raw Milk & Tallow Body Bars. Three ingredients: grass-fed raw milk, pasture-raised tallow, and water. Totally unscented. This is the bar I'd point to for sensitive skin, little ones (spot test first, always), and anyone who seems to react to everything. Some customers say it has a faint vanilla-almond smell, and I don't disagree.

Quick pick: which bar is right for you?

The prettiest soap at my sink (it lives in a vintage ramekin)

Okay, this one is my favorite thing we make, and I will happily gush about it. ☺️

Our Vintage Soap-Filled Ramekins start with old kitchenware I find one at a time at small antique markets in Ohio. Little custard cups, floral dishes with lids, a sailboat mug, the occasional duck. I pour three-ingredient lard soap (rendered lard, organic coconut oil, organic castor oil) right into each one by hand, so the soap takes the exact shape of the dish.

You use it at your kitchen or bathroom sink with a damp brush or washcloth. A medium ramekin lasts most homes two to three months. When the soap is gone, you wash it out and keep a piece of kitchen history for custards, salt, or your rings by the sink!

No plastic pump. No refill pouch. Every single one is one of a kind, and the one in the photo is the one that shows up at your door. They make the sweetest gift for the friend who loves vintage things and also reads every label. 

How to make handmade soap last longer

This is the number one question I get, so here's everything I do:

• Let it dry out. A bar sitting in a puddle turns soft and mushy fast. Use a draining dish or a soap saver bag, never a flat saucer.
• Keep it out of the spray. Set body bars on a shelf away from the shower head.
• Use one bar at a time. Store the rest of the pack somewhere cool and dry. A little extra cure time only makes them harder and longer-lasting.
• Lather the tool, not the bar. Rub a damp brush, sponge, or cloth across the soap instead of dunking the whole bar in the dishwater.
• Save the slivers. Press the last thin piece onto a fresh bar while both are damp, and they'll stick together.

The honest part: what natural soap won't do

I promised you my honest take, so here are the trade-offs nobody puts on the label.

• You won't get a sink full of foam. Real soap makes creamy, lower suds instead of giant bubbles. Your dishes are still clean. The bubbles were mostly for show anyway.
• There's a short learning curve. Swiping a brush across a bar feels strange for about three days. Then it feels normal, and the bottle starts to look silly.
• It hates sitting in water. Leave a bar in a puddle and it turns to mush. A draining dish fixes this completely.
• Hard water can leave a light film. If your water is very hard, a splash of white vinegar in your rinse water clears it right up.
• It costs more up front than a grocery store bottle. One 5 oz dish bar lasts about two weeks, though, and you're paying for real ingredients and no plastic.

If any of those are deal breakers for you, that's completely fine. But for most people I talk to, they're small trade-offs for knowing exactly what's touching their skin and their dinner plates.

Your natural soap questions, answered by muah:

What is all-natural soap?

All-natural soap is true soap made from fats, lye, and water, with no synthetic detergents, fragrances, dyes, or preservatives. After the bar cures, no lye remains. Ours use lard or tallow plus a few simple oils.

Is lard soap safe to use on dishes?

Yes. Lard soap is plain, old-fashioned soap, and it rinses completely clean with no film when you rinse well. Families washed dishes this way for generations before liquid dish soap took over.

Does natural dish soap actually cut grease?

Yes. Coconut oil in our lard dish soap helps it cut through grease on skillets and baking pans. For really baked-on messes, let the pan soak in hot water for a few minutes first.

What's the difference between lard soap and tallow soap?

Lard comes from pork fat and tallow comes from beef fat. Both make rich, creamy, conditioning soap. We use lard for our dish and ramekin soaps, and tallow in our face and raw milk body bars.

Is tallow soap good for your face?

For many people, yes. Tallow is similar to the natural oils in your skin, so it cleans without stripping. Our Honey Turmeric Tallow Face Soap is made just for faces, including sensitive and mature skin.

Is raw milk soap safe for kids?

Our Raw Milk & Tallow Body Bars are unscented and made with only three ingredients, which is why so many families use them on little ones (we use it on our toddler daily)! As with any new soap, spot test first.

How long does a bar of handmade soap last?

With daily use and a draining dish, a 5 oz dish bar lasts about two weeks and a body or face bar lasts about three to four weeks. A medium soap-filled ramekin lasts two to three months.

Is handmade soap plastic-free?

Ours is. There are no plastic bottles or pumps, and our vintage ramekins are reusable once the soap is gone.

My honest bottom line

Is all-natural soap worth it? For me, absolutely. Not because it's trendy, but because it's simple. Real fat, real milk, real honey, and nothing I have to look up.

Soap is where my heart is these days. Stirring a pot of it in my kitchen, pouring it into a little vintage dish I found on a Saturday morning, and knowing it's going to end up by your sink. That's my favorite part of this whole thing.

If you're curious but not sure where to start, here's what I'd tell a friend: swap your dish soap first with a 3-pack of lard dish soap. It's the easiest change you'll make all year, and your hands will notice by the end of the week.

And if you've already made the switch, leave a review and tell me which bar you can't live without! I read every single one. ☺️

With clean hands and a full heart,

Liz Haselmayer
Founder, Haselmayer Goods