Classic Cook Books
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page 189
and about ten gallons of water in a large iron pot; boil it over the fire, and
it will make good thick soap in a few hours; it need only boil long enough to
dissolve the potash, which is sometimes in very hard lumps.
If you use the crumbled potash, you must put rather more of it, as it is not so
strong, and a little lump of quick lime will make it turn quicker.
ANOTHER RECEIPT.
Two days before you wish to commence your soap, pour about two gallons of
boiling water on ten or twelve pounds of potash, to dissolve it; then put it in
an iron pot or kettle, with ten gallons of rain water; hang it over the fire,
and when it has dissolved, pour twelve pounds of grease, which has been purified
by boiling in water, (or weak ley,) into a well hooped barrel, (an oil barrel
from which one head has been taken, and the bung well fastened, is best;) then
pour the water in which the potash was dissolved over the grease in the barrel,
and stir it for half an hour; afterwards fill up the barrel with cold soft
water, and stir it every day for two weeks. If at the end of that time, the fat
swims on the top, beat a pound or two more of potash fine, throw it in the
barrel, stir it well, and the soap will be finished.
Labor-saving Soap.
Take two pounds sal soda, two pounds yellow bar soap, ten quarts of water. Cut
the soap in thin slices, and boil all together two hours, and strain it through
a cloth, let it cool and it is fit for use. Put the clothes in soak the night
before you wash, and to every pail of water in which you boil them, add one
pound of the soap. They will need no rubbing, merely rinse
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Classic Cook Books
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