Type “buy tallow balm” into Google and you’ll find a ton of different options.
But, beef tallow for skin is a pretty new thing. It wasn’t that long ago that the only place you could find tallow balm was at a random farmer’s market or an Etsy shop, but now? Beef tallow skin care brands are popping up everywhere.
Yes, tallow is getting more popular, but with this surge in popularity is a lot of fakes and knock-offs.
Some of these cheaper brands can cause acne due to their cheaper ingredients and alternative processing methods.
So, how do you pick the right one? And how do you decipher the fake tallow balms from the real ones?
Here are some signs that the tallow balm you bought is low quality and may cause skin issues down the road.
1. It’s made with “grass fed” tallow
We saw a tallow balm priced at around $4 USD on Temu claiming to be “grass fed”.
First of all, considering the price, there’s a huge chance they’re not using true “grass fed” tallow at all and instead using the cheapest beef tallow they can find.
Here’s the thing about the “grass fed” label, most cows are fed grass in the beginning of their life. It’s at the end of their lives that they’re fed genetically modified corn and random food waste to fatten them up for slaughter.
If you were a farmer, wouldn’t you want your cows to be as fat as possible before you sold them for meat? Of course you would!
But, because the cows were technically “grass fed” in the beginning of their lives, they still slap on the “grass fed” label.
Beware of this.
If it doesn’t say “grass fed & finished” then you can bet that the cows were fattened with grains (which by the way are usually genetically modified and sprayed with pesticides).
And, animals store toxins in their fat, this has been proven by science.
And what is beef tallow made of? Fat!
You definitely don’t want to be spreading pesticides right on your skin.
This is when you get people claiming that beef tallow caused them to break out. No, it’s not that tallow in general is bad for your skin, it’s just that the cheap tallows are unclean and full of toxins.
2. The price is suspiciously low
Any tallow balm selling for as low as $4 is going to cause skin problems down the road.
The thing is, making tallow balm on a mass scale takes a lot of time and effort. The process of rendering the tallow alone takes almost a whole day.
A lot of the cheap tallow brands will be using a ‘wet-rendering’ process which is basically just boiling the tallow with water.
The problem with this method is that the tallow can get contaminated by whatever’s in the water, and if it’s a cheap, knock off brand that’s shipping in from overseas, they may not have the same regulations on water that we do in the US.
So, the tallow could have been rendered in unclean water.
To avoid this, try to find a tallow brand that is manufactured in the US, so even if they do use a wet-rendering process (as opposed to dry which takes longer and is more costly), at least you know that the water has been treated or filtered in some way.3. It has lots of other oils added
You’ll find that the knock-off tallow balms will have a lot of oils added. Why do you think they do that? Maybe because plant oils are a lot cheaper than tallow?
This $4 tallow balm on Temu has both coconut oil and olive oil added. Olive oil is okay, but it will be hard to tell how much coconut oil because it looks so similar to tallow.
Also, coconut oil is comedogenic, it scores a 4 on the (1-5) comedogenic scale and should not be used on the face because it can cause breakouts.
If you’re paying for tallow balm, it should be mostly tallow.
4. It smells too much like beef
If your tallow balm is unscented, it should smell like close to nothing (a little beef smell is unavoidable). If there’s fragrance added, obviously it should smell like the fragrance, but if the company uses quality filtered beef tallow, it should only have a light hint of beef smell, if any.
The complaints you see online that tallow makes their skin smell ‘beefy’ are from people who are most likely making their tallow balm at home or using it raw and not putting it through an intensive filtering and cleansing process.
If your tallow balm does smell like beef then chances are it wasn’t filtered enough. This takes time and money and is something that the cheaper brand may cut corners with.
5. They use muscle fat instead of suet tallow
Not many people know this but… that fat you get from muscle meat is NOT ‘real tallow’, it’s just ‘fat’.
Real tallow comes from a specific type of fat from ruminant animals (cow, lamb, bison etc…). This type of fat is harder than regular fat and is found around the organs of the animal. It’s sometimes called ‘leaf fat’ or ‘suet’.
Suet is less greasy than muscle fat, has a higher melting point and keeps longer on the shelf. Fat from muscle meat is fine to cook with, but it’s not considered tallow in the traditional sense.
So, when you’re buying a tallow balm, you really have to make sure the company is using the ‘right’ type of fat to make their tallow. A lot of companies out there will mix in other fats from the animal because… why not? It’s cheap and it’s easy to do.
In conclusion:
To wrap it up:
- Make sure your tallow balm is “grass fed & finished” not just “grass fed”.
- Choose a brand that’s “Made in the USA”
- If it has added oils, make sure they are non-comedogenic and don’t over-crowd the tallow
- Make sure your tallow balm smells neutral, there should be no ‘beefy’ smell
- Choose a tallow balm that’s made from 100% suet tallow with no added muscle fat mixed in.
If you’re looking for a reliable tallow balm that checks all of these boxes, our Evil Goods Whipped Honey Tallow Balm is a pretty good contender! Click here to grab a jar now.