Big balls, small balls, brown balls, black balls, sticky balls, dry balls, broken balls…The soapberry power-ball, has many different looks and feels and a lot of contributing factors determine how these guys will appear in your bag when you get them home.
You may notice varying textures, shapes, sizes and colours.
Sometimes they can be hard, sticky, shiny, a dark blackish brown colour and be completely whole in shape. Others times they can look matte in finish, be closer to amber in colour, feel light and dry and come as half or broken shells. Soapberries contain a seed inside (they’re actually a fruit related to the lychee) and after they’re harvested, the berries are de-seeded, a process which involves hitting them with a piece of wood to remove the seed. This intention is to keep them in their whole form, but this process does sometimes mean the shells are broken and crumbly.
Appearance depends on the time of year the berries have been harvested, the climate and altitude they are grown in and the time they have been given to sun bake and dry out. However they appear in your bag, the one thing that remains the same with every single soapberry… they all contain high amounts of luscious saponin (nature’s soap) and they are all effective, powerful cleaners!