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Due to the difficulty in finding food grade sodium hydroxide and safety concerns, I'd like use calcium hydroxide instead. Specifically, some recipes call for a solution of NaOH and NaCl, would Ca(OH)2 (and NaCl) work here instead? I understand traditional recipes use weaker reagents like wood ash

I'm planning to use chicken eggs if that makes a difference

Shane
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    What safety concern do you have with NaOH but not with Ca(OH)2? – cbeleites unhappy with SX Aug 11 '20 at 22:29
  • English Wikipedia gives both NaCl and CaO/Ca(OH)2 as typical ingredients both in traditional and modern recipes, and NaOH, Ca(OH)2 and KOH are all strong bases from a chemical point of view. Carbonates are weaker, and/but they will anyways form over time when the hydroxides react with CO2 from the air (in the presence of moisture from the air) – cbeleites unhappy with SX Aug 11 '20 at 22:37
  • The actual traditional approach is to mix potassium carbonate and calcium hydroxide to generate potassium hydroxide on site, partially sodium hydroxide or even sodium carbonate is hard to come by, partially because hydroxide is too strong so you end up with too strong that doesn't last very long, while a small amount of sodium/potassium carbonate mixed a larger amount of calcium hydroxide creates a more moderated and long lasting mixure. – user3528438 Aug 12 '20 at 01:39

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