Tallow skincare has a long history, going back to long before synthetic moisturisers existed. It fell out of fashion for decades once mass-produced creams took over, and it's now finding its way back.
A lot of people want to try making it themselves before buying a finished product, and that's a completely reasonable place to start.
Here's what the process actually involves, including the parts most recipes online leave out.
Before making a batch, read what tallow can and cannot do for your skin.
Buying instead of making? Our hand care guide compares tallow creams and balms for dry hands.
Why people are trying this at home
Beef tallow was a normal part of skincare for generations before the mid-20th century, when synthetic, water-based creams became cheaper to mass produce.
Interest has picked back up recently, mostly among people who've found modern moisturisers too full of ingredients they can't identify.
Making it yourself feels like the most direct way to know exactly what's going into something you put on your skin.
What you actually need
Rendered beef tallow, ideally from grass-fed suet, forms the base of everything.
You'll also want a carrier oil such as jojoba, almond or olive oil, a double boiler or slow cooker for gentle heat, and a hand mixer for whipping.
Sterilised glass jars matter more than people expect, since contamination is one of the easiest ways for a batch to go wrong.
The basic method
Render the suet slowly over low heat until the fat separates from any remaining tissue, then strain it through cheesecloth while it's still warm.
Let it cool slightly, then whip it with your chosen oil using a hand mixer until the texture turns light and fluffy rather than dense.
Transfer it into sterilised jars while still soft enough to spread evenly, then let it set fully before sealing.
Where most home attempts go wrong
Rendering temperature is the first place things go sideways. Too high, and the tallow scorches, leaving a strong, hard to mask meaty smell that no amount of essential oil fully covers.
Deodorising properly takes multiple filtration passes, and most home recipes skip straight past this step entirely.
If honey is added for its moisturising properties, raw liquid honey introduces real separation and microbial risk in an oil-based formula unless it's specifically treated first, something that's easy to miss without a background in cosmetic formulation.
The halal question
If halal sourcing matters to you, making tallow cream at home doesn't solve that problem, it just moves it earlier in the chain.
You'd still need to source suet from a halal-certified supplier, which most butchers and supermarkets can't confirm on request.
This is one of the harder parts of DIY tallow skincare to get right, and it's one reason we built certification into our own process from the start rather than leaving it to chance.
Before choosing your ingredients, read our guide to checking whether beef tallow is halal for skincare.
If you'd rather skip the trial and error
Making your own tallow cream is genuinely doable, and plenty of people enjoy the process for its own sake.
If you'd rather have the deodorising, the stability testing and the halal sourcing already sorted, that's exactly what our balm and cream are built to offer.
Both use the same grass-fed, halal-certified tallow discussed here, just without the guesswork.
Common questions about making tallow cream
Can you really make beef tallow face cream at home?
Yes, and the process itself isn't complicated. The parts that are genuinely difficult to get right are deodorising the tallow fully and keeping the finished cream stable over time.
Is homemade tallow cream safe to use?
It can be, provided the tallow is rendered and stored properly and any water-containing ingredients like raw honey are handled carefully. Poor rendering or contaminated jars are the most common causes of a batch going wrong.
Why does homemade tallow sometimes smell strongly of meat?
This usually comes down to rendering temperature and insufficient filtering. A single filtration pass rarely removes enough of the natural odour, which is why most commercial tallow goes through several rounds of purification.
How long does homemade tallow cream last?
Without an added antioxidant like vitamin E, homemade batches tend to turn rancid faster than commercially formulated versions, often within a few weeks rather than months.
Is tallow cream halal if I render it myself?
Only if the suet itself came from a halal-certified source to begin with. Rendering it at home doesn't change where the fat originally came from.