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Natural Handmade Soaps

Hi, I'm Liz, welcome to Eight Acres. I live on a small farm in Kumbia, Australia, with my husband, Pete, and our dogs Taz and Gus. This website started off as a blog for sharing all the things we make and grow on our small farm. We keep a small herd of beef cattle and a few dairy cows. We also have lots of chickens, bees and a vege garden.

Now as well as sharing what I'm learning, I can share what we make through our virtual farmgate (online shop), where I sell natural handmade tallow soap and raw chemical-free honey and beeswax.

If you want to find out more about what we do on the farm and where these products come from, you can read more in my blog, follow any of my social links or send me an email, I'd love to hear from you. Please join my mailing list, then you'll never miss an update from Eight Acres.

Cleaning my kitchen with Biome

May 17 2017 1 Comment Tags: cleaning

As you know, I do not enjoy cleaning at all, it just feels like a waste of good gardening time. However I do enjoy living in a clean and tidy house, so it is a necessary evil. My aim is to spend minimal time cleaning, and I also don't like to use chemicals. Recently Biome sent me some natural cleaning products to try out in our new kitchen. If you haven't heard of Biome, they can be found online as well as five locations in Brisbane. They believe in zero waste, toxin free and ethical choices, so its just the kind of business that I like to support, and they have some great options for cleaning. Lucky for me, as there is nowhere local to buy this kind of thing in rural QLD, so I have to order everything online or make my own.

The new dishdrawer
In particular I was looking for a suitable dishwasher detergent as we had never owned a dishwasher before and I really didn't know where to start. I read some of the ingredients of the supermarket standard dishwasher detergents, even the supposedly "eco"/earth-friendly brands, and I was not impressed with the chemicals. Fortunately KinKin makes a lovely dishwasher detergent Kin Kin Naturals Dishwasher Powder (I also use their Kin Kin Naturals Dishwasher Powder, it smells wonderful, makes washing up more pleasant).

Dishwashing tips:

Rinse aid is really just to help dry the dishes properly, white vinegar is working for us and is a cheaper chemical-free option.
You can also try making your own dishwashing detergent from baking soda (or washing soda), citric acid and salt, and tailor it to match your water - as we are using rainwater we don't actually need the extra salt, for hardwater you might add more again. I haven't made any yet, but this is the recipe that I intend to try, mainly because I want to have a back-up in case I forget to order from Biome and run out of the KinKin product.

Handwashing

Even with the dishdrawer, we still handwash our pots and pans and rinse some dishes before loading the dishdrawer (as we only need to run it once a day or less). Biome sent me Ecologic Dishwashing Liquid to compare to the KinKin brand that I usually use, and I like it just as much, with a lavender essential oil, it also smells lovely.

And they sent me a wooden brush, which has been a suprising success - I usually get really dry skin from washing dishes and have to wear gloves, but with this brush you hardly need to put your hands in the water, so I haven't had to wear gloves at all. I'm feeling really good about this as I hadn't found any biodegradable gloves and I hated going through all those plastic gloves (they only last so long before they start leaking!). The long handled Ecostore Dish Scrubber Brush and the Pot scrubbing brush are handy, I also like the biodegradable Safix Coco Fibre Pad.

Handwashing tips:

I also use homemade tallow soap in a soap shaker - this works great for rainwater, but not for hard-water, as I found out when I stayed in Brisbane. Its gets most things clean and I can save the dishwashing liquid for cleaning up greasy dishes. You can now buy my cleaning soap in my Etsy store with my other soaps, the recipe for the cleaning soap is also back here.
I just started using Enjo cloths for dishwashing (anything the brush won't remove) and wiping benches etc, they are great and no chemicals required. Biome also have a range of Microfibre cloths, which as very similar to the Enjo cloths.

Bonus - toilet cleaner

I also asked for a toilet cleaner as we have had issues with our previous septic tank and I was having trouble finding something that was truly septic friendly. This Ecologica toilet cleaner seems to do the job without any nasty chemicals, and it smells lovely.

Toilet cleaning tips:

I chose a toilet with a very plain profile, I used to hate cleaning the pipe at the back, but this one has a everything hidden in the pedestal, so there is nowhere for dust to gather. Read more about our bathroom design here.
If you have a septic, you can also get tablets with good bacteria to keep your septic healthy, we use these ones.

Bonus - laundry detergent

Biome have a couple of great options for Laundry products. I have also lately been using Soapberries
(soap nuts) on any loads that are not dirty work clothes (love that they can be composted). Read more about how I use soap nuts here.

Do you have any cleaning tips to share? Anything that makes it quicker and chemical-free! Anyone else love ordering from Biome? :)

** Biome sent me four products to test, as mentioned in this post and I also bought several products prior to that offer, and all links to Biome products are affiliate links (I get a small commission if you buy through these links). Biome is a store that I love and regularly buy from, so I am very comfortable supporting their business by reviewing these products and I hope you find this useful too**

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Hi Liz and Pete
I have just placed my first order with you, so excited to get your soaps, but I was just wondering where you got the soap shaker from. I have looked on ebay and can only find an old vintage one!
Can you help? I have some old rebatched Turkish pine tar/olive oil soap that i would like to use for dish washing with a shaker. I don’t like the small of pine tar so I thought that using it to wash dishes would be a good way to use it up. Many thanks and LOVE your web page and way of life.

Jo Allsopp on Jun 30, 2018