For most of the past year, Daily Kos has been blessed with a really wonderful series of diaries by Wide Eyed Lib, on Free Foods and how to forage for them.
With the onset of winter, the foraging season here in the Northeast has drawn to a close and W.E.L. has decided to take a well-earned break. A few of us have offered to fill in the gap by authoring diaries in the spirit of the series that will focus on some other aspects of the general topic. Today I’m presenting the last of my four-part shift: Making herbal oils and salves.
Making topical herbal preparations, as with the other applications I’ve talked about, is a fairly simple process. You just combine herbs and oil and viola! Well, maybe it’s not quite that easy, but almost. The following directions are pretty typical, and can be used with any dried herbs.
Tonight’s example will demonstrate the fundamentals of making herbal oil, and, by taking one more step, making an herbal slave. We will be using the following ingredients: Calendula Flowers, a good quality olive oil, and beeswax.
First, I’d like to introduce you to the Calendula Flower. Many of you already know this flower as the simple Marigold, or Pot Marigold. I’ve never seen marigolds growing in the wild, so technically, foraging for them isn’t something that I’m going to be able to do, however, they will serve as an excellent example for this diary. The dried flowers are readily available in heath food stores and at your local herbalist (if you have one). They look very much like little yellow dried flowers. Go figure... Note: Do not use the marigolds that you plant in your garden or flower box as they may not be the correct plant.
Calendula officinalis
Calendula oil (and salve) has been used for a very long time for treatment of skin problems, and for its antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties. It can be used for treating insect bites, minor skin irritations, chapped lips, and so on.
"Cautionary note: With any medicinal herbs, I strongly suggest that you do lots of research (including asking questions of an herbalist, if you have access to one) before using them. They all have some potential for interactions with other medications, and possible adverse side effects with existing medical conditions."
Okay, then... on with the show. There are two basic preparation methods that I use for herbal oil productions. Passive (mostly) Solar, and Water Bath. For the solar version, you simply take a sealable jar, like a pint canning jar (no need to make huge amounts of this stuff), and fill it loosely with the dried flowers. You then pour enough good quality olive oil into the jar to just cover the flowers. Close the jar, and place it on a windowsill where it will get lots of sun. Shake it once a day, and after 2-4 weeks (depends on latitude and time of year), you strain out the flower bits and pour the remaining herbal oil into a brown bottle or jar, label and date, and store in a cool dark place.
(Note: Since oils can go stale, some folks add one quarter teaspoon of simple tincture of Benzoin per cup of oil as a preservative. Others add 500 I.U.’s of mixed Tocopherols or Vitamin E to the oil to enhance its properties.)
The water bath method works like this. Take a small saucepan and add an inch or so of water. Bring the water to a simmer. Take a glass bowl that’s larger around then the pan, add your dried flowers, pour in enough oil to just cover the flowers, and place the bowl on top of the pan. Allow the mixture to heat for about 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Then, follow the storage directions above.
I prefer the stove-top, double boiler method as it’s more reliable in my climate.
Now, to magically turn the oil into a salve. Take about half a cup of the herbal oil and heat it in a glass bowl on top of a small pan containing a bit of simmering water (this should sound familiar). When the oil gets pretty warm add about a one inch square chunk of beeswax and slowly stir until the wax is dissolved. Pour the mixture into a small jar (preferably dark glass), label and date, and store in the cool dark space with your other topical preparations, tinctures, and so on. You may need to experiment a bit with the amount of wax to get the texture that you prefer for the slave. I really like salves because they are more portable, and they tend to stay put better that oils. But oils certainly have their advantages, too.
Okay. There you have it. My brief introduction to herbal medicinal preparations. It has been a pleasure writing these diaries over the past few weeks. Thanks for reading. And thanks for adding your comments and suggestions.
And now for a word from Wide Eyed Lib:
If you'd like to learn more about foraging but missed the earlier diaries in the series, you can click here for the previous 36 installments. As always, please feel free to post photos in the comments and I'll do my best to help identify what you've found. (And if you find any errors, let me know.)
Here are some helpful foraging resources:
"Wildman" Steve Brill's site covers many edibles and includes nice drawings.
"Green" Deane Jordan's site is quite comprehensive and has color photos and stories about many plants.
Green Deane's foraging how-to clips on youtube each cover a single plant in reassuring detail.
Linda Runyon's site features only a few plants but has great deals on her dvd, wild cards and books (check out the package deals in particular).
Steve Brill's book, Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants in Wild (and Not So Wild) Places is my primary foraging guide. (Read reviews here, but if you're feeling generous, please buy from Steve's website.)
Linda Runyon's book The Essential Wild Food Survival Guide contains especially detailed information about nutritional content and how to store and preserve wild foods.
Samuel Thayer’s book The Forager's Harvest is perhaps the finest resource out there for the 32 plants covered. The color photos and detailed harvest and preparation information are top-notch.
Steve Brill also offers guided foraging tours in NYC-area parks. Details and contact info are on his website.
Don Wiss’s website is a treasure trove featuring hundreds of photos of common northeastern edibles.
Finally, the USDA plants database is a great place to look up info on all sorts of plants.
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