Whipped Tallow Face Cream, and Why I Micro-Aerate Instead

The first tallow I ever made set up like a candle.

It worked, and nobody wanted to use it, including me. So getting air into it is what made a good fat into something you’d actually reach for on a cold morning.

What Does Whipped Tallow Face Cream Actually Change?

Air, mostly, and what air does to how the fat behaves under your fingers.

Rendered tallow at room temperature is firm. Whipping beats air through it as it cools, which breaks the crystal structure into something softer, so a small amount spreads across a whole face. The fat is chemically the same either way. What changes is how much you use.

How you get the air in matters though, and that is where mine differs. Standard whipping leaves large bubbles and oxidizes the vitamins you paid for. I micro-aerate instead, which means smaller bubbles worked in more slowly, so the A, D, E and K survive the process.

That matters more than it sounds, because the most common way people get a bad result from tallow is using far too much of it.

Why I Micro-Aerate Instead of Whipping

Faces and hands want different things, and the texture is why I micro-aerate mine.

A hard, unaerated tallow is a fight to get out of the jar and a fight to spread. That is why I do not make one. Mine goes on easily and it goes in, wherever you put it.

A face wants it to go in, and wants the dose controlled. Micro-aeration gives you both, since a small amount goes further. Tallow melts around 95F, close to skin temperature, so it softens the moment it’s on you.

1. 1

   Render

   Low and slow, twice

   Kidney suet, twelve hours a pass, strained and chilled between.

2. 2

   Cool to the edge

   Not liquid, not set

   Work it liquid and the air won't hold. Work it set and it tears instead of aerating.

3. 3

   Micro-aerate

   Fine air worked in as it cools

   Small bubbles rather than large ones, so the crystal structure lightens and the vitamins survive.

4. 4

   Jar warm

   Straight into violet glass

   It firms in the jar and holds that texture on a shelf.

Does Whipped Tallow Nourish or Just Sit There?

This was the original argument of this post and it still holds, so here it is properly. It’s the question behind every whipped tallow face cream on a shelf, and behind mine too.

A conventional moisturizer is mostly water, with something occlusive to stop it leaving. It hydrates by delivering water and trapping it. That works, and it’s why skin feels good twenty minutes later.

Tallow does a different job. There’s no water in it, so it isn’t delivering hydration. It gives skin the same fats it already makes. Vitamins A, D, E and K come along because they were in the fat, not because anyone added them.

Neither approach is the correct one. If your skin is short of water, a water-based product has something tallow doesn’t. If your barrier is the problem, the fat is the part that’s missing. Worth knowing where the line sits: a moisturizer is a cosmetic, and the FDA draws that boundary at whether a product claims to treat something.

Where You’ll Want More of It

Heels, elbows and hands that work outdoors take more than a face does. That skin is thicker and it has been through more.

Use a heavier layer at night, under socks or gloves, so it has time to work. If that skin has gone past dry into cracked, Moxie is the one I’d hand you. It’s the heaviest jar I make and it’s built for exactly that.

What About Oily Skin?

Tallow suits oily skin more often than people expect.

There’s a fallacy that putting oil on oily skin makes it worse. It doesn’t work that way, and plenty of oily skin was dry underneath the whole time. Everyone’s skin is different though, so try it on a small area first, especially on your face.

How Much to Use

Less, warmer, and onto damp skin.

Take a pea-sized amount and rub it between your fingertips first. Warming it past its melt point means it goes on as an oil rather than dragging. That one step fixes most complaints about tallow feeling heavy.

Put it on skin that’s still slightly damp from washing. There’s no water in the jar, so damp skin gives it something to hold against, and you’ll need less.

At night you can be more generous, because nothing has to go over the top of it. In the morning, less, and give it two minutes before anything else.

Which Jar I’d Hand You

Ageless is where I start most people. It comes in Citrus Breeze, Rosewood Lavender, Honey Creme and Mango, all the same formula, so pick the one you’d enjoy wearing. Renewal is where I send skin that’s had enough of everything else, in Mandarin Orange or Unscented. Moxie, in Vanilla Spice or Eucalyptus, is for skin that’s gone past dry into cracked. If it’s heels, elbows or hands that have cracked, that’s Moxie.

If you’re weighing tallow against other clean brands rather than against a drugstore cream, I went through that in how I’d pick one if I didn’t make one.

If you came here looking for a whipped tallow face cream, what’s in the full range is micro-aerated instead, which is the same fat with the air worked in differently. Pick on your skin and your nose, start with a pea-sized amount, and give it a month of mornings before you decide. And if you’re trying to cut a shelf down rather than add to it, that’s how one fat replaces a whole shelf.