Whenever I suggest that someone start using beef tallow for their skin or use one of our beef tallow balms or soaps, they usually assume they would smell bad. And sometimes that is the case if they use typical grain-fed tallow meant for cooking. However, there are a few ways to tell whether your typical beef tallow would smell on your skin, and which skincare products don't smell bad.

Does Beef Tallow Skincare Smell Bad?

Your typical beef tallow skincare product will most likely not smell bad. It's unusual for tallow balms or soaps to have dirty, beefy smells. And if there is, then the product wasn't made properly or was made with cheap ingredients.  

There are three main reasons why a tallow product for skincare would smell foul: made with beef trimmings and not with pure white odorless suet(fat that surrounds the kidneys), overcooking the tallow when rendering or melting to make the product, and improper storage of the tallow.

What should tallow skincare smell like?

Properly made skincare should never have a foul smell, but either a neutral smell or sometimes a smell like your typical natural products. Tallow products that are made from fresh grass-fed tallow and that have gone through a slow process of rendering should come out to have a neutral or even sometimes a slightly sweet smell. However, many businesses add essential oils and scents to their products. 

Properly made beef tallow skincare products(without essential oils or scents) should smell like;

• Slightly sweet like ice cream
• Faintly earthy 
• Hints of fresh milk

However, once applied to the skin, it will have zero smell.

How to know whether or not a beef tallow skincare product will smell bad or not?

I know a lot of people will stumble across this article to know whether or not a product that they want to buy will smell beefy. So here are a few tips:

• Understand that you pay for what you get. Small businesses tend to try to undercut in pricing and do so by buying cheaper cow fat or not properly rendering the fat before actually making the product.
• Seek out products that are either entirely or mostly made with suet and not beef fat trimmings.
• If only using 100% beef tallow for your skin, make sure it has been rendered specifically for skincare and not cooking. Cooking tallow is typically made with the yellow beef fat trimmings that have less nutrition and much more smell.

It's also important to note that almost every business adds essential oils to its products. Although they may be slightly beneficial for your skin, they are typically used to mask the smell of their poorly made products. Beef tallow, olive oil, and beeswax are the only ingredients required to make a great beef tallow balm. And that's the only ingredients we use for our traditional beef tallow balm, which smells good despite its three simple ingredients. And this is only possible by using grass-fed beef tallow that has been properly rendered, and using high-quality olive oil and beeswax that have been slowly melted into the tallow without cooking away any nutrients. 

Don't be worried about smelling like beef or even a stinky cow when using beef tallow products. Very rarely do people come across potent-smelling products. And typically, whoever made it accidentally overcooked the tallow when rendering it or was only able to use beef fat trimmings instead of the pure white suet(fat surrounding the kidneys) that they typically use.

However, if you follow the tips or buy anything from our store, you are guaranteed to find beef tallow products that don't stink.