From their website: "...SoapNuts are a berry that grows in the Himalayas that naturally produces a soap. The soap is called saponin, a natural cleaner that works as a surfactant, breaking the surface tension of the water to penetrate the fibers of your clothing, lifting stains from the fabric and leaving dirt suspended in the water that is rinsed away."
I'd heard a lot about them, even saw them on Shark Tank once, and general consensus is that they are gentle enough to be used for face wash, yet effective enough for laundry detergent....I'm focusing on its use as a detergent here. I also have another tutorial on DIY detergent (here) but that version isn't cloth diaper safe. I love the way it makes everything smell and feel, and it's my beloved inexpensive go-to detergent for all our other clothes, but I needed to find something money-smart to use on the cloth diapers...so, here it is!
I lucked out and had a friend who invited me to a co-op so we got an incredibly low price for a large lot of SoapNuts, but they can also be purchased from the company (here) in different quantities (anywhere from samplers, to 10 loads worth for $4.50, to 360 loads worth for $29.95...still cheaper than store bought at 90 loads for $20!!)
For no reason other than I just like liquid detergents, I searched the internet for a way to make liquid detergent out of them (the company sells the liquid, but I got the deal on the nuts themselves, so I'll just have to make it.) As with most organic and DIY products, I found a lot of different ways to make it. It was trial and error, but this being my first trial I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! Here's how I did it:
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Step 1: Gathering the supplies!
- 4 cups of water (then 3 more later)
- 15 soap nuts
- A medium sized pot
- A clean container to store your detergent
(I used my empty Charlie's Soap liquid bottle
because it has that nifty 1oz measuring cup on top!)
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Step 2: Put 4 cups of water in the pot, and let your assistant add in the nuts.
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Step 3: Boil the nuts!
Set the stove to medium-high: they will boil over like noodles so adjust the heat if needed, you only want a nice rolling boil. I used a meat tenderizer to smush them a little during cooking. In the laundry they're bumped around to release the soap, so I chose to immitate (overboard) that during this stage.
I also checked the color of the nuts periodically. When all the soap is out of them they are a dull gray-brown color, so I was checking that their rich chocolate color was gone (that's truthfuly how I judged how long to boil them for!). About every 20 minutes I added 1 cup of water to replace what was evaporating, and did this over a 1 hour period.
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Step 4: Let it cool, filter, and bottle it!
You don't have to wait too long to filter and bottle it, just long enough to be able to handle it and not have it melt your container ;)
I use my cloth diaper wipes (cut up t-shirts) as filters with all my homemade products, but cheesecloth will work too.
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And here is the finished product! This is good stored in the laundry room cabinet for 3 weeks, longer if you store it refrigerated. (I'm using 2oz per load, seems to be just right.) The detergent itself has a soft nutty smell, but the laundry doesn't pick that up...it's just clean.
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**SPECIAL NOTE**
When I strained the detergent I had a handful of almost-gray hulls, but in stead of tossing them I'm going to keep them frozen until I make this again. There's no harm in using them again, it can only draw more soap from them, and I'd hate to waste any bit of soap these things have in them.
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