Washing soda is a powerful cleaner and a key ingredient in things like homemade laundry detergent. It can be a little hard to find in some areas, so here’s how you can make your own! It’s ridiculously easy!
I love to use baking soda for all kinds of different cleaning purposes and it’s great, but you may have noticed that some homemade cleaner recipes call for washing soda, rather than baking soda? So what’s the difference? Well, basically it comes down to the fact that baking soda is sodium bicarbonate, while washing soda is just sodium carbonate. Science. 🙂
The proportions of sodium, carbon, and hydrogen make washing soda really effective as a natural cleaner and stain remover. Washing soda can be made from the ashes of plants growing in certain types of soil or it can be made synthetically. It’s often available in grocery stores, or you can find it online, but it’s sometimes a bit hard to come by in some areas. I’ve looked for it in my small town and haven’t been able to find it. Luckily, it’s super easy to make at home out of regular baking soda!
How to Make Washing Soda
You can create washing soda by a simple chemical reaction that you can allow to happen using your oven!
Here’s what you do!
Take a metal or glass baking dish and pour some baking soda into it. You want the layer of baking soda to be about 1/2″ thick.
Place the baking dish into a 400 degree oven for about an hour, stirring once about half way through the baking process.
That’s it!
After an hour, the sodium bicarbonate will have released excess steam and carbon dioxide and will have become sodium carbonate!
You’ll be able to tell when this chemical reaction has taken place because the washing soda will look a little bit grainy and ashy, and not as smooth as regular baking soda.
And Now You Know!
Now the next time you see a cleaning recipe that you want to try that uses washing soda, you’ll know just what to do! You can buy some at the store, or you can make it yourself using baking soda!
This is yet another reason why I always buy baking soda in large quantities. It just has so many amazing uses!
Like this other amazing baking soda transformation trick: How to Make Baking Powder at Home
Did you know that you can make your own washing soda?
Don’t forget to pin this idea so you have it for the next time you need washing soda for a homemade cleaner recipe!
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Courtenay Hartford is the author of creeklinehouse.com, a blog based on her adventures renovating a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural Ontario, Canada. On her blog, Courtenay shares interior design tips based on her own farmhouse and her work as founder and stylist of the interior photography firm Art & Spaces. She also writes about her farmhouse garden, plant-based recipes, family travel, and homekeeping best practices. Courtenay is the author of the book The Cleaning Ninja and has been featured in numerous magazines including Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, Better Homes and Gardens, Parents Magazine, Real Simple, and Our Homes.