It’s time to STOP throwing all our used oils down the sink!
Have you ever stopped to wonder how eco-friendly are we actually and how big our carbon footprint is? Well, this Malaysian has and she uses her love for the environment to transform items we’re so used to throwing into daily usage items.
Twitter user, MokMeow(@FiqhTabayyun) posted on how she transformed 2kgs of cooking oil into soaps that can be used in households. We got intrigued and asked Fiqh how exactly did she set out to recycle her cooking oils into soaps!
Here’s what you need for this recycling project:
- Water – 472.15g
- Lye (Sodium hydroxide-NaOH) -202.35g
- Used palm oil – 1.5kg
- Fragrance-46.88g
Now that we have the ingredients, its recycle-o-clock:
1. Strain the used cooking oil using an old T-shirt first to remove any food debris in it.
2. Then, put the oil in a pot on the stove and put in pandan leaves or serai (lemongrass) leaves to infuse the oils with these fragrant leaves and to reduce the food smell in the oil.
3. Then, weigh out the amount of lye needed to saponify the amount of oil you’re using and mix it with the right amount of water to make mixing easier.
4. Then mix the lye water solution to the used cooking oils and stir either using a whisk or a hand blender until it reaches the emulsion or trace stage.
5. Emulsion or trace means it will thicken into a batter-like consistency.
6. Then pour the batter into containers
Fiqh said that she doesn’t use or buy new containers but instead she reuses packet drinks or santan boxes to store the soaps. If you wish to use the soap to wash your clothes, scrape the soap thinly and just add some borax with sodium carbonate. 100gram of sodium carbonate and borax per kilo of soap can last one household a month.
If you wish to use the soap to mop your floors, just dissolve the soap with hot water and add a few drops of eucalyptus oil. Similarly, to use the soap as a multipurpose wipe, dissolve the soap with hot water, pour it into a spray bottle, add a few drops of tea tree oil and voila!
Speaking to WORLD OF BUZZ, Fiqh said she has been practising a plastic-free and zero-waste lifestyle slowly in small areas of her life and her family has a completely plastic-free bathroom now as she makes all their stuff including shampoo bars, lotion bars, soap bars, facial scrub and toothpaste.
“What prompted me to do this is the realisation that a household throws away from its bathroom 6-7 plastic bottles every month. And there are no awareness nor any products to help ease consumers into a plastic-free kind of lifestyle.”
If you’re interested in these eco-friendly soaps, you can also check out her soaps on these pages that are available for purchase:
- Whatsapp: Le Starry Natural
- Facebook: Le Starry Natural Products
- Instagram: @lestarrynatural
Will you be trying to convert your used cooking oils into soaps? Let us know in the comments section!
Also read: Here’s a List of Places in Malaysia You Can Recycle or Donate Old Items & Even Earn Some Extra Cash
