I have gone through many journeys with my bath and body care products. I’ve tossed out tons of my makeup and bought new makeup that I thought was better . . . just to discover that it wasn’t (and I was allergic to it). I tossed away the last squeeze-tube of toothpaste and discovered that I can make my own tooth powder (which is still going strong). However for the longest time, my hair journey was stunted. I was absolutely stuck. I wanted to join the myriads of ladies who were POOless (without shampoo), but I tried it. And I failed.
My Egg Yolk Shampoo
I failed at finding a solution until I realized that a lot of the problem with shampoos and no-poo methods were the absolute disregard for pH balance. Shampoos strip out your hairs natural oils and many leave your hair pH a mess. Most shampoo companies then encourage you to restore your oil balance by applying conditioners that re-moisturize your hair. Great, so strip it all out and put it all back on. They say the same with our faces. Wash your face, use toner on your face to erase the wicked natural oils on your face, and then reapply “correct” moisturizers. Who says that factory made conditioners and moisturizers are best suited to our hair? Wouldn’t our own perfect pH-balanced natural hair oils be the best for our hair?
I wanted a pH balanced way to cleanse my hair. I wanted something natural and was fine with it being a little bit out of the box. The magical word for me was emulsifier.
I had my first exposure to the idea of using an egg yolk to wash my hair when I was researching natural hair shampoo options. I read a post by another blogger who was using an egg yolk and I thought the idea was so strange. Why would it work? How could it work? As I researched I found out that it was the perfect shampoo. It is pH balanced. It has a natural version of lecithin, which is an emulsifier. I’ll stop with that one and elaborate.
Why is emulsifier the magical word? Egg yolk shampoo works due to the lecithin acting as an emulsifier. An emulsifying agent binds with water and oil. In cooking, you’ll use an emulsifier to combine ingredients when baking. For instance, you use an egg yolk to combine oil and lemon juice (or vinegar) to create mayonnaise. In your hair, the egg and water bind with the extra oil in your hair. When you finish, you rinse away the emulsion and you are left with hair that is pH balanced and has just enough oil left over.
I can personally attest to the Egg Yolk Shampoo method since I’ve been using it for about a year. I have not had to change back to regular shampoo during the entire time. Now, my hair puts out less oil than it did with conventional shampoo and I only have wash my hair every 4-5 days. Let me give you a step by step process.
Step by Step: Egg Yolk Shampoo
Step 1
Crack the egg, placing only the egg yolk in a small bowl, jar, or pitcher. This can get a bit messy when you are trying to pull off all of the stringy egg white. If you miss a bit of the egg white on this step, you’ll be able to get it out in the next step.
Once you have the egg yolk in a container, add about 2 Tablespoons to 1/4 Cup of warm shower water to the cup. Use your fingers to mix the water and the egg together pulling out any of the extra pieces of egg white that were left behind.
Step 3
Wet your hair fully, pulling your fingers from your scalp down through your hair. Pour about a Tablespoon at a time out into your hand and put it onto your scalp in sections. I normally start in the front right above the ears, do the top, then work backwards. If I had an area that was particularly oily in the last few days, I focus my efforts in that area.
Note: You are only cleaning your scalp and the hair closest to the scalp. The rest of your hair will not have oil built up on it if you regularly use this process.
This process takes the most patience. You have to splash, scrub it gently with your finger tips into your scalp, then splash another section and scrub into your scalp. At the end, I normally take my fingers and run them from my scalp outward pulling the egg yolk through a few inches of my hair. I have NEVER had too much oil accumulate on the rest of my hair. Only the scalp and first 2-4 inches need to have some oils removed.
Step 4
Rinse your emulsion out of your hair! It comes right out and your hair immediately feels different. You do not need to add anything else to your hair at this stage to facilitate the egg yolk shampoo removal. At times, if you accidently leave some egg white in your shampoo, you’ll have to remove a speck of white from your hair, but that’s it!
Different Hair Types
This simple egg yolk shampoo will work for many different people with many different hair types. However, sometimes our water changes, our location changes, the weather changes, or our bodies change. I’ve figured out easy solutions that work to add moisture or remove excess oil depending on your hair needs!
More Moisture
If the egg yolk is removing too much moisture and you feel dry, then add a Teaspoon of plain yogurt to your egg yolk before adding the water. This will help some of the lecithin to bind to the yogurt and not to the oils in your hair. If it is still drying you out, add a second Teaspoon.
Note: Be sure that you are eating enough healthy fats if your scalp is dry. Sometimes our skin and scalp are dry because our body is lacking the natural oils it needs to have proper oil output.
Less Moisture
If the egg yolk seems to be leaving too much oil behind in your hair (especially after you’ve been using it for a few weeks), then you may need to up your egg yolk usage. Try cleaning every other week with two egg yolks. This should remove the excess oil and help to balance your bodies natural oil output.
What No-Poos Didn’t Work
Now that I’ve told you what works, let me go over a few of the options that didn’t work. Every single person’s hair is unique and just because it didn’t work for me doesn’t mean it won’t work for anyone. Here were my tries and fails.
Baking Soda and Vinegar – I tried the one that everyone was raving about first. BS and V. As far as I was considered, it was well labeled. I mixed up baking soda and water in a jar. Let is sit until the baking soda was completely dissolved. I put it through my hair and scrubbed. Then I took my Bragg’s Vinegar and water mixture and rinsed it all out. I personally rinsed out the vinegar because I don’t really love the smell.
I was a MESS. My hair had a film all over it. My scalp had baking soda residue no matter what I did. I itched!!!! I felt like I had lice. My hair looked limp and unhealthy.
Here’s why: When you apply the baking soda, your hair pH is pulled to a very alkaline state. When you apply the vinegar water, your hair pH is yanked the opposite direction for pH to an acidic state. Many people rationalize that your hair is then left at a balanced state since you countered the high pH (alkaline) with a low pH (acid), but your hair isn’t a science beaker. Some areas are going to hold onto the baking soda (such as the scalp) and some areas are going to be highly affected by the acid (such as the tips of your hair).
Final decision: I haven’t met a lady who has done the BS/V method who still does the BS/V method. It’s normally everyone’s first step on their no-poo journey, but definitely not the last. It may get you used to having less perfect hair and being okay with that and honestly, that’s great. We all need to realize that our hair is not our identity and bad hair days don’t define who we are.
Warm Water Rinse – I tried using no products on my hair. Quite a few people have great success with just rinsing the extra oils out of their hair with just warm water.
For me, this didn’t work at all. My hair produced more oil than that. I needed something to pull the oil out and the water just couldn’t lift it. Eventually, people using no products at all would need something to help exfoliate their scalps to lift dead skin. I’ve only tried this for a short time before giving up, perhaps your scalp would even out!
Final decision: I couldn’t do a warm water rinse alone unless my hair were to change quite a bit. My oil production is enough that every four to five days, I need some help getting the extra oils ousted from my scalp and the hair next to my scalp.
Note: If you are one of the people having to add two or more teaspoons of yogurt each time you do the egg yolk shampoo, you may want to consider trying the warm water rinse. You may in fact be one of the lucky people who have a naturally very low output of oils that can easily maintain clean hair by just rinsing!
Kefir Rinse – After having a problem with an itchy scalp caused by a mold filled hotel room, I was desperate for relief. In fact, that situation was one of the reasons I began to search for other ways to remedy my hair. I didn’t want to slather an anti-fungal cream in my hair! Thus I began to experiment. One experiment was with Kefir. We had some Kefir that was overripe in our fridge and I decided that I’d apply it to my hair and scalp to see what would happen.
While the Kefir Rinse was not a shampoo, it was conditioning. It not only stopped my scalp from its final bit of itching, it also made my hair come alive. My hair was shiny and healthy.
Final decision: Not an option for a shampoo, but a great conditioning mask.
Questions?
Do you have any questions about making an egg yolk shampoo to wash your hair? Do you have any suggestions for others using egg yolks?
Thanks for reading!
Brooke Shambley
THE Boholistic Mom
My Sources
My first exposure to using egg yolks as shampoo: http://www.ingodseconomy.com/best-of-naturally-frugal-egg-yolk-shampoo/
More on Emulsification: http://www.modernistcookingmadeeasy.com/info/modernist-techniques/more/emulsifying-technique
Enzyme-rich Mayonnaise Recipe: http://www.foodrenegade.com/enzyme-rich-mayonnaise/
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Hi
Very informative post, thank you! What are you washing your hair with these days and do you still do an egg wash every so often? Did you used to apply the egg to dry or wet hair?
I still use an egg yolk. For a year, I had to use a non-toxic shampoo as we encountered soft water. Wet hair. Dry hair would be pretty gross with egg in it.
I have soft water. Am i correct in reading that soft water and egg yolk are not as effective in cleaning the hair?
What do you now suggest?
I am a former baking soda user for 1.5 years and it worked great until one day it didn’t work as well. I have no idea why.
I currently shampoo with an artisan probiotic shampoo bar and I like it.
It is much more difficult to use an egg yolk as shampoo with soft water. Unfortunately, it just doesn’t have the same effect. However, you can do an egg yolk mask to add nutrients to your hair.
Since I am also in a location with soft water at this time, I have started to use John Masters Organic shampoo. Due to the soft water, I tend to be drier, so I’m planning to purchase the –> John Masters Organics – Evening Primrose Shampoo for Dry Hair (Affiliate link) next.
A probiotic shampoo bar sounds very interesting! How do they integrate probiotics into a product meant to pull oils from the hair? Wouldn’t all the probiotics just wash right off again?
I am so happy to have found this site! And that someone asked about how often to wash with egg yolk as a person who regularly works out/gets sweaty. I’ve been no poo for about 5 months. I have been using honey (melted into water) with mostly satisfying results. Lately, however, it feels like my hair is looking good/clean less often. Before going back to regular shampoo, I want to try a few other ideas. My question for you – is egg yolk safe to use on color treated hair?
Since many people use egg yolk as a conditioner, my guess is that it would be fine color treated hair. It doesn’t really strip your hair as much as it adds vitamins and binds with the exterior oils. However, I haven’t personally tested it on color treated hair.
Let me know if you give it a try! I’d love to hear back about your success!
I just tried this and it worked for me! 1 eggyolk in 2 Tbn water and staying on the scalp. My hair now looks better than it has for a while. The very dry winter weather this time of the year (Johannesburg South Africa) can render one’s hair unmanageable. This is the best no-poo method I have tried yet. Thank you!
I have never tried leaving it on my scalp. Did it dry thick? I’m so glad the egg yolk method worked for you! It is so moisturizing!
I have actually been to Johannesburg before! I spent two months in a small town in Kwazula-Natale in 2015.
This though! Thank you. I’d been trying to BS method this week but yesterday my hair looked like an oil slick. I washed it with two of my duck’s egg yolks last night. I should have properly read this before hand, but today – clean hair!! Do you use anything to condition your hair?
If you only use one yolk, you shouldn’t need to condition. Two yolks (especially large duck ones) might emulsify too much oil from your scalp. You can add in a little yogurt if even one yolk is too effective.
The yolk has so many nutrients and even a little healthy fats, so you should be left with soft vibrant hair. Many people use egg yolks as masks to condition their hair, but so few know that it can be used as a shampoo.
Hi. I am really interested in trying egg yolks as a shampoo, but the swishing and splashing onto the hair sounds a bit frustrating and time consuming. Have you ever tried putting the mixture in a squirt bottle (like ketchup or mustard would be served in, with the pointy, open, squirt-spout) to make applying easier? I may try it to see if I could apply the mixture more evenly and easily. Also, my hair is just plain weird…very fine and sort of curly but un-curly. If I dry it then I can get it more straight and not have an unruly bird’s nest; however, my hair also gets very oily just in the front around my bangs every night when I have just washed it that very morning. Do you have any suggestions for starting out on the right foot with this? I appreciate all of your information, especially based on your painstaking trials and errors.
1. I have not tried putting the egg yolk wash into a squirt bottle, but I supposed it could work. Worth a shot!
2. I also have soft hair that is wavy. I found that it took a little time to balance the oil in my hair. Your scalp produces extra oil when you remove it often, so when you begin to stagger your washes your scalp will need time to rebalance. You may also want to use a natural facial cleanser method, because excess oil on your face can cause your bangs to get oily. Have you ever tried using olive oil and castor oil facial cleanser? It will balance your facial oil and your face will begin to produce less oil (or more oil if you are dry).
3. I think starting out, you just have to be patient. It takes a little getting used to, but I really love my hair when I wash it with egg yolk. It is so balanced and healthy!
Let me know how it goes!
Thank you for the response. I appreciate your suggestions. I will give it all a shot and let you know how it goes!
Hi. I have a lot of sensitivity to scented shampoos and conditioners of any kind. I have spent a lot of money for some that my scalp breaks out after the first use. In saying all of that, I am excited about this. I do have hard water. I also, have dry hair. I do take a lot of medication that has caused hair loss thru the year. So my hair is very thin. If you have any ideas to help, I will be thrilled. I am unable to take supplements, such as biotin and pre-natal vitamins do to my medical condition. I am trying to use more natural products all through the house. Thank you for your help.
If you have brittle dry hair, the egg yolk could really help your hair to recover. The egg yolk nourishes your hair and may help your scalp with the natural Vitamin E. I hope it works for you!
I don’t know what type of condition you are dealing with, but I have found immense help to my own issues by changing my diet. I eat a traditional real food diet, much like the recipes found in Nourishing Traditions. Often times, when you heal your gut, your body recovers so much of the nutrients, minerals, and vitamins that your hair is healthier and you will not have as many of the sensitivities that you had before. What type of a diet do you eat right now?
This was so timely! I too learned that high pH shampoo and so-called natural cleansers were no good for my hair. Co-washing made my scalp so gooey and coated! I went back to commercial brands as I am not one of those ppl who is petrified by science and don’t think all things processed are bad. I was hoping to have a nice mix of commercial (“natural” and “non-natural”) and natural (homemade/minimally processed) products. It dawned on me to search for natural emulsifiers and egg yolk kept popping up (which led to your article). Definitely going to give this a try!
Great! I hope it works for you!
Hello! Thanks for your post. I’m from Argentina, i been trying natural ways of washing my hair since february this year. Was using rye flour with an apple cider vinegar, and it was working amazing, silky, smooth, shiny, with some troubles also (like it leaves the hair heavy, and you need to wash it every 2 days), but it seems that after a few months the protein start to built up (i think now) and my hair smelled. I got oily-fine hair. So i was trying the apple cider vinegar to wash, it didnt worked as well. Recently i tried the egg yolk wash (just yesterday), and i’m amazed. After weeks of not getting my hair really clean, i finally get to see it like i wanted, clean, shine, and lasting, you know.
The thing is that im reading that it can also built up in the protein, so my question is: what can i use in between egg-washes? What do you use?
(Sorry for my writting)
Thanks.
I used the egg yolk wash for about two years and just recently had to change my tactics due to soft water. With hard water or normal tap water, I had no problem all two years with a protein build up. The egg white has most of the protein; I believe the yolk has much less protein. If you use egg whites, then you would have a severe protein build up and this is why some people think that eggs do not work. They try using the entire egg! Not a good idea 😉
If you do have a problem with build up, I would try Dr. Bronner’s soap products. They would probably be great for stripping your hair once in a while to remove any build up.
Thanks for writing! I’m so glad you are having luck with the egg yolks!
Do you need to condition after you rinse out the egg yoke? Apple cider vinegar for example? Also, I have hard water and I am unable to use several no poo methods because of this. Does the yolk wash require soft water that you know of? Thanks so much!
I’m so glad you asked! I had hard water when I first began using the egg yolk shampoo method. I would put it my hair swish it around until I finished all of my hair. I’d let it sit a minute to bind with as much oil as it would, then I’d rinse with water. The yolk itself is a conditioner! It’s like natures shampoo/conditioner combo.
I’d have to actually do more testing in soft water conditions to see how it would work then. Right now, we have neutral water and I actually find my hair gets oily faster. I’m in the process of figuring out how to refine my process.
Hi, I would love to try this egg yolk method. but I have a super oily scalp and I workout 5 days a week that leave my hair sweaty. I have to wash hair almost daily. By washing hair daily, my scalp has become more stimulated thus by producing more oil.
I want to stop this and try no poo method. Any advice pls.
Because you wash your hair so frequently, your body has begun to overproduce oils in your scalp to give your hair the oil it needs to be healthy. Our face does this as well. If we wash our face without replenishing the natural oils, our face will overproduce oil causing oily skin.
Let me give you a step by step to switching over from daily use.
I would suggest substituting the egg yolk for your shampoo every day you wash your hair. This will allow your hair to detox from the chemicals in the shampoo.
Once you’ve done this for a week or two, begin spacing out your shampooing. Give it a day between washes. On the day in between, feel free to rinse your body (and hair if you need to), but don’t shampoo your hair with the egg yolk.
When your hair becomes used to the egg yolk and used to every other day shampooing, you may be able to add another day between washes. While sweaty hair may seem nasty, it’s mainly water with salt in it. If you rinse it out with water, you’ll rid your hair of the extra salt and you really have no need to shampoo your hair after every work out.
I hope you have great success in switching over to the egg yolk method!
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