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About conkers washing powder, ivy and soap nuts

2017: my first try. About enthusiasm and disappointment.

The first time I came across washing powder made of conkers (aka horse chestnuts) was in an Insta post, in autumn 2017. I already knew soap nuts from my mother-in-law's Ayurveda phase but I have never used them myself. The idea of using a local nut instead of an imported species seemed brilliant to me. so, a few days later, I collected conkers fallen from the trees next to a bus stop I had to wait at for several minutes. I took my harvest home in a reusable cotton bag (I always have a whole lot of these in my bag). It consisted of all conkers I had found on the foot of the trees. Back home I reread the tutorial I had found earlier and spent an extra hour googling which blenders are able to break conkers into pieces and which blenders break into pieces when blending conkers. In the absence of an allegedly suited Thermomix and enough trust into my smoothie maker and due to the fact that I could never forgive myself breaking the "KRUPS Speedy Pro" I inherited from my grandma, I decided to use a kitchen knife and my muscles to cut and chop the conkers. On the next day, I fought a relentless battle against the horse chestnuts for hours and no clear winner could be made out - the conkers ended up chopped, though mostly unpeeled (it was impossible to get the skin off the nuts), and my hands red, numb and achy (cutting the incredibly hard skin was real torture and only possible by hitting the knife with sheer brute force and while bellowing). But I was finally done and had really earned an eco-friendly washed load of laundry!

As I had read that unpeeled conkers are only suitable for colour wash and not for whites, I prepared washing liquid, which I let it steep overnight and then, on the next morning poured it into the detergent drawer and washed a load of reddish laundry. I was convinced by the smell (I didn't add anything fragrant like essential oils, a neutral smell was convenient for me) and also by the overall cleanness - except that two clothes had brown stains (apparently caused by conker skin crumbles, which found their way into the machine passing through the strainer). They came out with another wash (with regular detergent) but as this was not what I had expected or intended and separating the skin from the chestnuts was just impossible, I rejected this good idea. Still, this unsuccessful attempt had taught me a lesson:

ONLY USE PEELED CONKERS FOR WASHING POWDER - FOR ANY SORT OF LAUNDRY!*

2018: my second try. About tips and success.

A few weeks ago I visited a dear friend, who was profiting from her free sunday to have a washday. And that's how it came to her showing me her conker detergent stock: the remainder of the washing powder she had made three years ago - one and a half Mason jars full. I told her the while story about last year's trial and my struggle with the hard chestnut skins. She listened closely and explained:

 

"I know what went wrong last year. You were too late, when collecting them. The chestnuts have to have freshly fallen off the tree in order to be easily processable."

 

Having heard this useful advice, I promised her to give the sustainable and natural detergent another chance and try. A few days later, back home, I went off to the mentioned bus stop in the morning and collected conkers - only fresh, light, reddish-brown ones, some from the ground and most right out of their green spiked shell. Although I didn't find many chestnuts (only 2 or 3 kilos from half a dozen trees), it still was a sufficient amount for a second trial.

Back home I started: after an hour's work the first good third of conkers was cut into quarters, peeled and chopped. Cutting them into quarters actually turned out to be fairly easy, comparable with cutting raw potatoes or pumpkins, and peeling them also went quite well (for some skins my long fingernails turned out to be quite a useful tool but most of the chestnut skins went off the quarters in one piece). The hardest work step of all was, by far, the chopping! Like last year, I chose kitchen knife and muscles and no blender. I spread the conker chunks out on the cutting board I had chopped them on and placed them on the balcony, where they spent the afternoon in the blazing sun at about 40°C (104°F). After drying and shrinking for 4-5 hours they ended up bone dry and ready. In the meantime i had cut, peeled and chopped the rest of the conkers but as the sun was nearly gone by the time a had finished the job, I dried them on the next day after they had spent the night on the kitchen counter. When they had cooled down completely, I filled all the dried chunks into a jar. Here's what I learned:

  • processing one kilo of conkers takes about an hour
  • to obtain a full Mason jar of conker washing powder, 2-3 kilos of fruit have to be collected

I was really pleased with the sun blazing this day, allowing me to sun-dry my conker chunks as I didn't want to spend extra energy on the drying process (having the oven run at low-temperature for several hours would have rendered the output less eco-friendly for me). In case the sun is not as cooperative as this year the next time I make detergent, I'll probably experiment on drying the chunks (or powder - I'd chop them longer of even grind them in this case) with the residual heat of the oven after baking or stove after cooking (on a metal cake rack or so).

Talking about the expenditure of energy necessary to obtain washing liquid brings me to the ivy I mention in the title. I read that it was an alternative natural detergent, when clicking through several tutorials on how to prepare the washing liquid from the conked chunks. But as you have to cook the ivy in boiling water and hence use extra electric energy (unless you're cooking over open fire), the horse chestnuts are my personal first choice, although processing them means a higher effort BUT, using muscular and solar power, conker washing powder can be produced entirely emission-free, which makes it worth the effort for me. The conkers' advantage over the imported soap nuts from India is hence so obvious that further explications are unnecessary.

EDIT (12 Oktober 2018): Today, I learned that ivy doesn't have to be cooked in order to use it as laundry detergent. You just have to cut it into pieces, put these into a sock or washing net and put it into the washing machine together with your laundry. That makes it a super alternative, especially when you have ivy growing nearby.! And hence ivy doesn't have to be peeled and dried and is much easier to cut, the necessary effort is smaller as well.

Furthermore, the conker chunks can be dried and reused up to 3 times (after the first wash, I could dry them in the sun but I guess that I can/have to test how the residual heat drying works out next time). By the way, the first wash worked out great (again, I didn't add any fragrances - especially as I read that the laundry's smell of essential oil added mostly evaporates while it dries and in this case you can rather save the effort and money right away). I can't wait to find out how long the jar full of detergent will last using 3 tbsp of washing powder for 3-4 wash loads. (I'll keep you updated. ☺)

 

Application notes & useful advice:

For the first wash, I put 6 tsp of the washing powder and 300 ml of tap water into a glass bottle and let it sit for half an hour. I find it easier to use a bottle instead of a jar as it makes it easier to hit the strainer and the detergent drawer without spilling washing liquid. Using a little strainer and no bigger kitchen sieve is equally helpful. As tablespoons do not fit through my bottle's neck, I put the quantity as 6 teaspoons - in case your bottle neck is wide enough or you use a jar, you can take 3 tablespoons, of course. Another hint concerning the bottle and an avoidable "stupid mistake": never ever shake the bottle! The conkers lather a lot and the lather will mix with the chunks when you pour the liquid out, which prevents the chunks from falling out of the bottle into the strainer. Then, the only possibility to get them out is to pour more water into the bottle to wash them out of it. - and as a nasty side effect, quite some of their remaining natural soap will be washed out and wasted.

Squeeze out the chunks in the strainer and spread them out to dry - if possible in the sun. Wether or not the residual heat drying works out - I'll let you know about my trials.

When the washing powder was used as often as it could, you can put it onto the compost. If any of you have a worm box at home, please let us know wether the worms should be fed the horse chestnuts or rather not.

 

Thanks a lot, dear Katha! ❤

 

* except black laundry, maybe - but I still wouldn't use anything but peeled conkers to wash

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