Homemade Body Wash & No-Grate Review

***Update: Check out my update on homemade body wash for all the tips and tricks I've developed that make the whole process easier, faster, and so worth the effort for the end result!***

I'm the kind of person that can't justify making a new product to try if I still have some store-bought product left to use. So when I ran out of body wash the other day, it was the perfect time to try homemade body wash from One Good Thing by Jillee. And the best part (or so I thought)- I didn't have to grate the soap! We just happened to have a bar of Dove soap laying around so it was perfect. I was so excited! The stars definitely aligned for me on this project.

No-Grate Homemade Bodywash

1 bar of soap

(I used Dove, but its entirely up to you)

3 cups of water

Jillee's recipe calls for 2 cups of water per bar of soap, but after making my Shmancy Liquid Hand Soap and seeing how much that solidified while cooling, I decided to add another cup to be safe.

I brought the water to a boil on the stove then turned it down to medium. Then, I stuck the whole bar of soap in a microwave-safe bowl and set it for 90 seconds.  Be sure to watch it constantly because it will overflow. I added the soap to the water and waited for it to dissolve completely. Once it was done, I put it in a glass container to cool off, probably for only about an hour or two. After that, I put it in my cleaned out body wash container, stuck it in my shower and waited for the next time I needed a bath.

A few notes on this project- I personally didn't like the no-grate method. I wouldn't call the consistency of the soap "melted," per se.  I'd refer to it more as "foamy," so it didn't just pour out of the bowl into the pot. I had to use 2 spoons and scrape the soap off of each of them.  I had more dirty dishes when I was done and they were completely caked in soap. It also took longer to dissolve in the water than if it had been grated. I, personally, don't think it was worth saving myself from grating the soap. I probably won't do it again.

However, I am very pleased with the body wash itself. I'm glad I added the extra cup of water because the consistency came out like a slightly thicker version of body wash. I need to keep my container upside down so it doesn't stay stuck to the bottom, but that doesn't bother me. I'm a big advocate of the no-suds soap, as I talk about in my Shmancy Liquid Hand Soap post, but when it comes to body wash, I love a nice, luxurious, lather. This definitely delivers and it doesn't require as much product to produce it. It also doesn't leave you with that draggy feeling after rinsing that bar soap sometimes can.  My skin felt very soft, clean, and moisturized.

I'd say this is a great money-saving project with results even better than store-bought body wash. As you can see, it only filled up about half of my bottle, so I'll probably double the batch next time. I hope if you try melting the soap, you have better luck than I did.

***Don't forget to check out my update on homemade body wash so you can see all the little tips and tricks that will make your body wash-making experience so much faster and easier and definitely worth it!***