Removing oils with kitchen ingredients?

**teal** · September 20th, 2011, 12:37 PM

I've been doing scalp massages with castor oil, avocado oil and EOs. Sometimes I'll heavily oil the lengths. To get them all out I've been CO-washing with success. No complaints on the final results at all. When I'm not CO-washing I WO wash, or sometimes use diluted BS. Then after every wash (any type) I ACV-rinse at the end.

However, I'd like to move away from storebought conditioners entirely if it's possible. I've already done away with shampoo. It seems like the amount of washing I'd have to do with BS to get the oils out could do more harm than good. Does anyone have suggestions for natural oil removal?

**VikingVampChick** · September 20th, 2011, 01:00 PM

Originally Posted by teal

I've been doing scalp massages with castor oil, avocado oil and EOs. Sometimes I'll heavily oil the lengths. To get them all out I've been CO-washing with success. No complaints on the final results at all. When I'm not CO-washing I WO wash, or sometimes use diluted BS. Then after every wash (any type) I ACV-rinse at the end.

However, I'd like to move away from storebought conditioners entirely if it's possible. I've already done away with shampoo. It seems like the amount of washing I'd have to do with BS to get the oils out could do more harm than good. Does anyone have suggestions for natural oil removal?

The only thing I've found that works really well to get rid of oil when I've overdone it is baking soda/water to clean and acv rinse after. 1 tbls baking soda & 1 cp warm water, 1-2 tbls acv & 1 cp water.

Be careful with the shampoo bars w/oil in them - that's how I ended up overdoing it once. Didn't work too well to remove the way-too-much-coconut-oil in my hair.

**SarahKayfa** · September 20th, 2011, 01:04 PM

You could try simply soaking/rinsing out the oil in a hot bath. I take very hot baths, and when I oil my hair beforehand I'm able to get a lot of it out by soaking my head in the water and swishing my hair with my hands. The oil sort of floats on top and seems to be good for my skin. (I use a blend that doubles as bath oil & skin moisturizer) I'm not sure if that would get your hair clean enough for your liking, but what's left in my hair is usually 'good enough' for me to continue on to my next wash day by wearing my hair up in my bun or something. Throw in a strong tea rinse or something?

**SarahKayfa** · September 20th, 2011, 01:06 PM

Viking Vamp Chick: My hair really really hated baking soda. I always saw tons of white dots after. Do you use distilled water ?

**Anje** · September 20th, 2011, 01:11 PM

It might not be in your kitchen right now, but I've heard good things about washing with pastes, such as chickpea flour (besan) or mung bean flour. The whole thing is very similar to those Indian herb washing techniques, which often require that you pre-oil your hair so they aren't too stripping.

ETA: Maybe this will get you started?

**SarahKayfa** · September 20th, 2011, 01:25 PM

That's an idea! Anything really absorbent might do...like corn starch or maybe flour to absorb excess oil, then brushed out and rinsed?

**teal** · September 20th, 2011, 02:22 PM

Thanks a lot for the suggestions and advice!

Originally Posted by Anje

It might not be in your kitchen right now, but I've heard good things about washing with pastes, such as chickpea flour (besan) or mung bean flour. The whole thing is very similar to those Indian herb washing techniques, which often require that you pre-oil your hair so they aren't too stripping.

ETA: Maybe this will get you started?

Wow, I've never heard of washing with any kind of flour. That's interesting!

Off to do some research...

**PolarCathy** · September 21st, 2011, 01:19 AM

It's interesting that Anje brought this up right now: these days/weeks I have been playing around with all kinds of bean and lentil flours (and I did it before I Googled so I was really just experimenting without really knowing how I am supposed to do it) and I can confirm that chickpea works very well. All of them seem to work but chickpea is probably the best I have tried so far. It removes castor oil from soaking oily, iii hair in ten minutes. I will never use conditioner again, at least not for removing heavy oilings.

First I used thick pastes like henna but I found them too heavy. Now I put about 2 tbsp of whatever bean or lentil flour in a(n empty) conditioner bottle, top it up with water, shake it up, let it sit for 30 minutes or so, shake it up again and wash hair with that as if I was shampooing. I need 2-3 bottles (so 4-6 tbsp of flour) to get rid of tons of olive/almond and castor oil.

**eshta** · September 21st, 2011, 03:47 AM

An egg wash maybe? I used to do egg washes but can't remember if I oiled before washing. I think so because I was also using Indian herbs at the time.

**Aveyronnaise** · September 21st, 2011, 07:03 AM

Yes , I can confirm egg washes can get out heavy oil very well. Someone put a recipe on here a long time ago and i have been using it for shampoo for the last month because i am waiting on my uber gentle shampoo to come into the coop.
here is the recipe

1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 TBSP honey
1 TBSP lemon juice
just beat it with a fork and get all of the viscera out and wash - with COLD WATER unless you like omlette head

My hair has really loved it I plan on doing it maybe 2 times a month after my shampoo comes. My hair always has a ton of volume after