I made my own laundry detergent! 20 minutes and I had 2 gallons of lovely smelling cleanliness — at a fraction of the cost of pre-made detergents.
The ingredients are simple:
1 cup Borax ($2.98 per box)
1 cup washing soda ($3.24 per box)
1 bar of soap (97¢ per bar)
2 gallons of water
Utensils needed are:
Large pot
Spoon
Grater
2-1 gallon containers
Funnel
The Borax and the washing soda were conveniently located side-by-side in the detergent section in Alcoa Wal-Mart. They were between the fabric softeners and the stain removers. There was also a bar of soap beside them that I suppose you could use. I forget the brand, but it said it was for stain removal. It didn’t smell fresh enough for me, so I opted for a bar of Yardley English Lavender in the Bath & Beauty section.
Grate the bar of soap in your pot. Add one gallon of water, heat and stir until the soap dissolves. Add the Borax and the washing soda. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. The “brew” will thicken as it begins to boil. Divide the concoction equally between the gallon containers. Then top it off by dividing the second gallon of water between the containers. Put the lid on the containers and give them a shake to mix it all up.
This detergent works for any machine. It is low sudsing (is that a word) which is perfect with the frontloading HE machines. But as the author of the blog where I found the recipe noted, suds do not equal clean, so it works just as well with the non-HE machines.*
Sidenote: The original blogger recycled empty milk jugs to store her detergent. I collect bottles and a few years ago Adam lugged home two glass bleach jugs he found in an abandoned home place. They were grimy and not especially interesting, so Jerry was amused that I instantly fell in love with them. How awesome is it that those once-grimy old jugs are now restored to their original glory?!
Bonus: Be sure to choose a dirty spot in your kitchen to transfer the detergent to your containers — when you’re cleaning up the detergent spillage (oh, and there will be spillage), you are simultaneously cleaning the work area. My stove top never looked so good!
p.s. The box of Borax and box of washing soda (adding a bar of soap and 2 gallons of water with each new batch) make enough detergent to launder 576 loads of laundry using 1/2 cup of the detergent per load.
p.s.s. Honestly the time this took was so minimal — most of it was grating the soap and then filling the jugs. Of course, it may have gone a little quicker for me if I had a proper funnel. I don’t even know how many years we’ve had this prize. For the record, Jerry drug this one home.
p.s.s.s. You can’t make fun of my ’90′s wallpaper. It was cool when we hung it in 2001. Well, it was somewhat cool. Okay. You can make fun of it. I’m removing it anyway. I’m itching to try out a homemade wallpaper remover solution recipe …
Update: Now that the mixture has had time to set up, it’s very “gloopy”. So gloopy that it’s more difficult than ketchup to pour from the bottle. Also too gloopy for it to drain from the detergent drawer of our HE machine. I’m putting in w/ the laundry. I’ve read that using 1/2 of the bar soap would help it congeal less. I will try that with the next batch. I also read that you can add a dropper or two essential oil to the mixture — which I did and it smells even MORE divine. In the meantime, I’ve transferred everything to a scoopable container. I may even try a dry recipe next time, using the Borax and washing soda. Whatever, the case, it works wonderfully, smells great, and is a fraction of the cost of pre-made detergent.
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