I’ve been looking for an alternative to my dish soap for a while. Despite being touted as environmentally friendly, the ingredient list is confusing at best and misleading at worst. I hate that I can’t precisely figure out just what’s in there without doing days of research and making phone calls. In general, I’m increasingly unhappy with commercially available products, their dubious “green” claims and ever increasing prices. The price is especially outrageous, when most list water as their first ingredient. Really, water.
I decided it was time to figure out a way to make it for myself. Turns out this is easy, peasy and takes about 5 minutes per batch to make.
For a small batch, here’s the recipe. It easily doubles or quadruples for that matter:
Homemade Dish Washing Liquid
- 4 Tablespoons of Liquid Castile Soap
- 2 teaspoons Vegetable Glycerine
- 2 Tablespoons Vinegar
- 2 Cups Warm Water
- 3 Drops Tea Tree Oil (Optional but I like the antibacterial qualities)
Mix everything in a clean container and use as you would normally. You could add a drop or two of another essential oil for scent if you’re so inclined, but I rather like the tea tree scent. I’m storing mine in an old plastic dish soap bottle. It doesn’t get as sudsy as the store bought stuff, but it does work really well. If you have hard water, like we do; the vinegar helps with spots when you leave things to airdry.
I’ve been trying to figure out the cost savings, which took a little doing but I figured at the prices I paid for the ingredients the homemade dish soap costs about 5 cents per ounce. Tea Tree oil being the most expensive ingredient, but it is used sparingly. I imagine I could bring that down by buying the ingredients in larger quantities too, which I’m looking into. Dish soaps that claim to be environmentally friendly can range any where from 7 cents per ounce for the Costco / Kirkland brand to 22 cents per ounce for the 7th Generation stuff and I imagine even higher. While cost savings wasn’t my primary motive in this endeavor I like knowing I’m saving a bit of money too.
Please note the cost savings info can vary widely depending on prices in your local area. Do your own figuring to be sure.
{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }
Ok how much do you use? I buy a currently “green” dish soap and that fact that is says to keep out of reach of children concerns me. My other concern is that while I can wash the dishes with out leaving any greasy residue (really hot water), my 12 yo is currently washing the dishes and she can’t use the hot hot water that I do so it seems many things are coated in grease? She doesn’t measure the soap so we have given her an old medicine cup to measure out 2 TBPS per dish load to see if that helps.
I have Dr Bronners (which is castile soap) and I have white vinegar, what I lack is vegetable glycerin, can you or anyone tell me why its important or can I just skip it.
I use about 2 Tablespoons per sink full. However, I have extremely hard water and I always feel like I use more soap than I would if my water was softer. Glycerin is really just to keep it from getting to drying on your skin, you could probably skip it. I use Dr. Bronner’s too
Also, I always wash in hot water, but rinse in cold water. Even with the cold water rinse, I have no greasy residue with this homemade soap.
Interesting. I hate to say that I’ve tried ‘green’ products and keep coming back to Dawn because of how well it cuts through grease and oil. Anything else I’ve tried leaves a film on the dishes and I have to use a LOT more to actually clean than what I use with Dawn. I may need to give this recipe a try.
Also, we’ve been thinking of mixing our own laundry detergent and I can’t remember where I saw the recipe. Can you point me in the right direction?
I’ve been making my own laundry soap too. There’s tons of great recipes and ideas online. Soulemama just recently posted hers: http://www.soulemama.com/soulemama/2010/05/on-the-laundry-line.html and Rhonda has some great ones here: http://down—to—earth.blogspot.com/2007/08/various-recipes-for-green-cleaning.html
I use a variation on several but the one I use is a gelatinous one. I rarely wash in hot water and I find the powders don’t dissolve as well in cold.
Great post, I’ve been making my own all purpose and dishwasher soap for a while now and I’m almost out of my dish soap and have been planning on making my own so this post couldn’t have come at a better time…thank you!
Most welcome! I hope the recipe serves you well.
I tried this a few years ago and it just didn’t get our dishes clean. Of course, with 5 kids and no electric dishwasher, we wash a lot of dishes. So we’re using Dawn. It is one of the few purchased items we use. And the homemade laundry detergents didn’t work well either. Of course, it could be the washing machine too. I suspect these front loaders don’t clean as well as they claim. My kids get dirty!
We’re still plugging away at a bottle of Mrs. Meyers for hand-washing. If only my stupid dishwasher actually washed my dishes for me. Sigh.
Anyway, I thought of you and this post when I saw this cute idea in the paper for a green cleaning party!
This looks to so easy….if only I could find a recipe that works in my dishwasher-Our water is really hard so I use food grade citric acid as a rinse aid. But other than that-nothing works quite right.
jana
Thank you for the dish washing liquid recipe. I have wanted to get away from the expensive environmentally friendly liquid, but I didn’t like the results when using just Castile Soap, I will give this a try.
-Brenda
Made this on the weekend and I’m not finding it cutting through the grease at all. I also don’t get any suds really. Did I fail? Or do you have some suggestions.
It doesn’t get super sudsy and if you have hard water, you won’t get any…
Hard water could be the problem for sure. Any tips then for extra grease fighting agents?
I always just use extra vinegar for particularly greasy items and that seems to work – very hot water too.
Just thought I would pass this along as I didn’t know vinegar and castile soap don’t mix well. http://pinterest.com/pin/106749453639201560/
I’m enjoying your site and posts. I think I’ll be whipping up some nail lotion today…winter is so rough. =)
obviously like your website but you need to check the spelling on quite a few of your posts. A number of them are rife with spelling problems and I find it very troublesome to inform the truth however I will definitely come back again.
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