Introducing Tutorials

I’m pretty excited to be able to introduce you to my very first tutorial - right here on the website!

Squee!

If you have been following me for a while, you already know I love working with botanicals of all types for all kinds of things. One increasing interest in recent years has been creating flavour oils. It began with lip balms in mind, but as I started getting more and more into combining ingredients to smell nice as well as taste nice, I kept coming up with even more things I wanted to try.

I’m not even going to mention how long my to-do list is at the moment.

This particular challenge (capturing the flavours of a classic gin and tonic) has taken much longer than I expected (that seems to be a bit of a pattern when I start out thinking I can ‘knock something out relatively quickly’). Many of the initial batches started out well, but then the fragrance faded, or flavour changed, or something else went annoyingly wrong.

Fast forward 3 years and a few more batches than I originally thought were going to be necessary, and finally I could say I was happy with the results.

The star of this tutorial is making the flavour oil (which is super for several different products), but I’ve also created a couple of lip balm formulas to use the flavour oil in: a vegan version and a version featuring beeswax.

Wouldn’t you know the balms also took a bit longer than expected to get right (I’m looking at you vegan waxes), but as it turned out, quite a bit of it was solved when I got the flavour oil right.

Does this sound complicated? Well, before I had figured out how to do it, it was, but when you know how to do it, it’s not that complicated. (Isn’t that true of so many things?)

Are you a little curious about getting busy making your own?

Click the picture below to read more.

Tutorials

Make your own bespoke ingredients and use them in your cosmetics. Tutorials feature immediate and unlimited access.

PS: The formulas for both of these balms as well as the flavour oil are free for LisaLise Club members. If you think you might want to check out becoming a member, click the picture below.

Club

If you love working with plants, making your own extracts, and incorporating them into your personal care products, then check out the Club where members have access to exclusive content. Please note: membership spots are limited.

Understanding Cloudiness in Vinegar Tinctures

Even though tincture making has been around for ages, it is perhaps more known as something created specifically for consumption. And while I love using herbal tinctures in the kitchen (and for health and well being), I’ve been just as busy making and using them as cosmetic ingredients. And apparently, so are more and more cosmetic makers.

It has been a thrill for me to see a widespread increase in interest for vinegar tinctures. And with growing interest comes an increase in questions - like what cloudiness means. Today, we’re going to take a look at what it can mean if a vinegar tincture is cloudy.

Defining Cloudiness

Cloudiness is used to describe any vinegar (or alcohol-based) tincture where the liquid is semi-opaque or opaque. If you can't see through the liquid in the bottle, then you've got cloudiness.

To illustrate, the top of this post shows a cloudy tincture.

The picture was taken shortly after straining and bottling. This tincture was made with distilled white vinegar and crushed juniper berries.

A Cloudy Tincture Isn't Necessarily Bad

An opaque tincture doesn't necessarily mean it is wonky. As you can see from the picture above, even a freshly made tincture can be quite cloudy.

Here are a couple of the most common reasons for cloudiness.

1. Type of Vinegar Used

One reason for cloudiness could be the vinegar. Not all vinegars are the same.

Check the post that uses coconut vinegar. My description of the vinegar is 'frosted white'. It kind of goes without saying if the vinegar isn't crystal clear to begin with, the end product won't be either. (but I said it anyway)

2. Material Used

Another possible reason for cloudiness is the infused material. Some herbs and plant materials disintegrate into particles that are so fine they become difficult to remove – even after straining.

Juniper is one example. To extract the most from juniper berries, it is recommended to crush or grind them before infusing.

And that's what I did. These were whacked to smithereens with a rolling pin prior to infusing.

Note how opaque the liquid is in the picture at the top. Despite being strained through several layers of muslin and followed by 2 passes through paper filters, the liquid is still cloudy.

If the material is the cause of the cloudiness, to all you need to do is let the tincture stand undisturbed for a while (read: it could be anything from a few days to 2-3 weeks)

Below is one of the juniper tincture bottles (after some use) and a couple of undisturbed weeks in my ingredients fridge.

Seeing residue settled at the bottom of a bottle might look worrying, but in this instance, it's a bit of good news.

The clear liquid (that took 14 days to achieve by letting nature take its course) might have been achievable with advanced filtering equipment, but that's not even necessarily the case.

Even some commercially produced tinctures will have residue. I've experienced this on more than one occasion.

Tip For Using Tinctures With Residue

If your requirement is a crystal clear tincture and you have a very steady hand, it is possible to carefully decant the clear liquid into a new bottle. Use the remainder of the tincture in a product that doesn't require a clear liquid.

(This post is an updated version of a post from 2018)

Do Tell

Have you ever experienced cloudiness in one of your vinegar tinctures? Did you discover the cause? Please feel free to share in a comment below.

PS. LisaLise Club members have access to this as well as a section of posts and tutorials about making and using vinegar tinctures for cosmetics. Think you want to start this year as a Club member? Click the picture below to read more about what the Club has to offer you.

Club

If you love working with plants, making your own extracts, and incorporating them into your personal care products, then check out the Club where members have access to exclusive content. Please note: membership spots are limited.

Vinegar as Medicine and For Cosmetics

You might be shaking your head at this title, and I really don't blame you. Not too terribly many years ago, I would probably have scoffed a little at the idea of using vinegar in anything cosmetics related.

I mean, seriously?

It's vinegar!

Think salad, think cooking, but cosmetics?

But before you dismiss this pungent liquid from your cosmetics ingredients list, let's take a closer look at some of vinegar's uses and capabilities.

Historic Vinegar

Vinegar has been used for centuries for health and well being. You might have heard of the historically famous 4 Thieves Vinegar: a vinegar brew with a selection of carefully chosen herbs.

As the story goes, this herbal-infused vinegar functioned as an antibacterial guard for 4 plundering thieves during the plague. They doused themselves in the mixture (and perhaps drank some too) to stave off bacteria as they ruthlessly (and successfully) robbed plague victims without becoming ill.

When they were finally caught after a lengthy spree of robbing the sick and dying, the authorities were amazed they had been able to survive without catching the plague themselves and demanded to know their secret. They promised to share if they were granted some leniency.

And after revealing their recipe, they were subsequently executed for their crimes.

Is this story true? No one knows.

I imagine you're curious, so here's what is claimed as the most historically accepted version of this magical concoction.

Classic Four Thieves Vinegar

Ingredient	Amount
White wine vinegar	3 pints
Wild Marjoram	handful
Juniper Berries	handful
Meadowsweet	handful
Wormwood	handful
Sage	handful
Elecampane Root	2 ounces
Angelica	2 ounces
Rosemary	2 ounces
Horehound	2 ounces
Cloves	50
Camphor	3 grams

The method for making it was described in few words.

1. Add ingredients to liquid

2. Allow to brew for 7 days, then strain

I couldn't help but smile at the lack of continuity of these measurements. Ounces, grams and 'handfuls'.

Nonetheless, the combination of herbs with this common liquid has been the basis for several beneficial uses throughout history.

Among other things, it has been tested and studied as an antibacterial agent that helps aid wound healing. (links below).

Vinegar for Hair

It has been common knowledge for ages that a vinegar rinse helps remove any last remains of shampoo and provide a healthy shine to the hair.

Does it work?

Yes, indeedy.

And if you check this link to the Korean Institute of Science and Technology, you'll find vinegar has shown promise as a hair-growth-boosting ingredient in a study (using rodents).

It's quite fun to see science catching up with grandma's old haircare tips, wouldn't you say?

What About Now

In this day and age, vinegar is just as useful and multifunctional as it has always been. There are numerous bonuses to working with vinegar. Not only is it widely available, but it can be made from a plethora of sources and is so pocketbook friendly, you can allow yourself to splash out a bit in the experimenting department.

Vinegar can be a very useful component of cosmetics. Transformed into a tincture, it can function as a colorant, fragrance (yes, you read correctly), pH adjuster, and even more.

Which brings me to the picture at the top of this post. That, my friends, is an example of vinegar transformed. What you are looking at is the aftermath of a hibiscus-vinegar squeezing pH performance of multicolored magnificence that demanded to be photographed and shared with you.

Do Tell

Have you ever used a vinegar hair rinse? Did it make your hair shiny?

More About Vinegar

Medicinal Uses and Antiglycemic effect, ncbi, Medscape General Medicine (LINK)

Assessment of antifungal potential of apple cider vinegar, Iraqi Scientific Academic Journals (LINK)

Evaluation of Stability in Purified Wood Vinegar for Hair Growth, Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (LINK)

Effect of Apple Cider Vinegar on the Healing of Experimentally Induced Wounds... Reasearchgate (LINK)

Wound Healing Through the Ages, Indian Journal of Plastic Surgery (LINK)

The History of Vinegar and of its Acetification Systems, (article) Archives Des Sciences, 2009, 62: 147-160

Four Thieves Historic Anti-plague remedy, Kitchen Doctor (LINK)

Four Thieves Vinegar by Kami McBride (LINK)

PS: in the LisaLisa Club members area there is a section on making (and using) vinegar tinctures. If you think you’d like to join us, click the picture below to read what’s in it for you.

Club

If you love working with plants, making your own extracts, and incorporating them into your personal care products, then check out the Club where members have access to exclusive content. Please note: membership spots are limited.

Easy Rose Exfoliating Paste

This simple exfoliant ticks all of my favourite boxes:

• All natural (read: plant-based and organic)

• Vegan-friendly

• Beginner-friendly

• Gentle

• Effective

• Planet friendly

• Reasonably priced

The best part? It contains a mere 3 ingredients – one of which I know you have already guessed.

Are you ready to make your own rose exfoliant?

It Starts With Rose-Infused Oil

This product begins with your own rose-infused oil, so if you don't happen to have one brewing, you can learn how to make one right here.

If you have followed me for a while, you will probably know I have been making rose-infused oils for many years.

With that in mind, I'm almost embarrassed to tell you this next part.

Up until 2018, I discarded the spent plant material after straining my rose infusions.

(insert shock-faced emoji here)

But when my batches (finally) started resulting in the most heavenly fragranced oil, it became physically impossible for me to toss the spent material.

Then it hit me: Repurpose!

Instead of tossing the roses, I turned them into a luxuriously fragrant exfoliant. Here’s how easy it is to make your own.

Making Rose Exfoliating Paste

After straining your rose infusion, you are left with a straining cloth full of roses with some residual oil.

1. Place the oily roses into a chopper/grinder

2. Pulse until you have a paste

3. Test the texture for the skin feel you like and if necessary, keep pulsing/grinding until you are happy with the texture

4. Transfer the paste to a jar

5. Label and date the jar

6. Keep the contents free of moisture and use within 3 months (alternatively, add a preservative if you want to be able to dip wet fingers into the jar and use with abandon)

Here's what it looks like straight out of the jar. This paste makes a lovely hand exfoliant without the addition of anything else, but you could also add some fine himalayan pink salt to extend the amount and turn it into a luxurious rose body exfoliant.

Enjoy!

Do Tell

What do you do with the spent plant material from your oil infusions?

Want to incorporate your essential oil blends safely into a series of fabulous bath products? The e-book below might be just the thing!

Create Your Own Bath Products With Essential Oils

Rose-Infused Oil With the Cold Infusion Method

Today, I'm going to show you how I make cold-infused rose oil. And if you decide to make your own, I'll show you how to use the leftovers to make another product in an upcoming post.

Are you a little excited?

Excellent!

Let's get busy!

The Rose Quest

Apart from being a major fan of rose hydrosol, essential oil, powder, wax, and every other imaginable kind of rose I can get my hands on, I have also experimented with infusing rose into different fixed/carrier oils for quite some time.

Powder, dried petals, and dried buds of different types from a variety of different suppliers around the globe have made their way into my infusion jars.

The reason is simple.

I've been on a quest to

• find which precise combination of oil and rose type produce the most fragrance

• find optimal infusion time

This is admittedly a self-appointed 'against-all-odds' kind of a challenge. A cold oil infusion with rose doesn't generally produce much in the way of scent.

But, on occasion I have produced a very discernible and pleasant fragrance. And every good result has inspired me to continue and try to optimise even further.

So here are a few of my best cold infusion tips.

Infusing Oil with Dried Rose: Optimising the Fragrance

The solution is deceptively simple: use quality raw materials from start to finish. There is, of course, a hard part or this wouldn't have been an ongoing quest.

The hard part is finding the roses.

Now, I know there are a lot of suppliers who deliver top quality, but there's an additional factor.

Even though we are infusing dried material, we are looking for the freshest (read: most freshly-harvested) and most recently dried material. And that's the hard part, because the really fragrant rose types have a short season.

Therefore, if you are not growing, processing, and drying your own roses, your best bet is to source from producers of the raw material.

In my experience, many producers of dried roses also happen to be distillers of hydrosols and essential oils. Look for a company that specialises in rose products. Not only are they the folks who will be able to deliver the goods, but they are also passionate about what they do and therefore knowledgeable about the material.

Which roses are the most fragrant?

• Rosa damascena (damask roses)

• Rosa Centifolia (cabbage roses)

You could in principle use any roses you choose, but if fragrance is your goal, look to these first.

That said, I've also had some pretty good results with dogwood roses/wild roses (rosa canina) when I have had occasion to forage and dry them myself.

Which Oil to Use

As for oils, there are numerous possibilities that will provide a good result, but as a general guideline choose an oil that has

• Long shelf life

• Neutral scent

• Function you like, want, and need

• Skin feel you like, want, and need

There are several oils that fit this category. My personal faves are

• Sweet Almond oil

• Apricot Kernel Oil

• Jojoba

• Fractionated Coconut Oil*

• Castor Oil

*this oil has no nutrients to offer in the way of skincare, but does have a very long shelf life and is quite forgiving to work with

Feel free to use any oil you prefer, but if you are on a fragrance-capturing quest, start with something from the list above.

So, now that you have sourced your dried roses and chosen your oil, you're ready to get busy infusing!

Here is the formula:

LisaLise's Rose Infused Oil

Ingredient	Percent
Oil of Choice	84.5
Dried Rose	15.0
Vitamin E Antioxidant	0.5

Method

Choose a container size that fits with your batch to avoid too much 'air headroom' in the jar.

1. Weigh ingredients

2. Place ingredients in a sanitised container

3. Place lid on container and label with date and contents

4. Allow to infuse for 4-8 weeks at room temperature. Place the container where the temperature does not fluctuate very much. Some prefer placing a cloth of some type over the container.

5. Agitate the container daily (and tell it how pretty it is to make it feel good)

6. Strain through tightly woven cloth (muslin or layers of cheesecloth)

Pictured above: organic sweet almond oil infused with rose. That golden color came about after 6 weeks of careful pampering (read: daily agitation and whispering sweet nothings at the infusion in progress).

Coming Up

Next time we get busy with rose, we'll use the leftovers from the infusion to make a brand new product.

Do Tell

Have you been successful capturing the scent of roses in an oil infusion? Please feel free to drop a comment below!

Want more oil infusion fun? The book below shows you how to make oil infusions with the heated method (as well as how to make your own stunning balms). Click the picture to read more.

Book of Natural Balms - Volume 1

Herbal Tea: Health and Skincare Inside and Out

Throughout this summer, I have been enjoying herbal tea as a refreshing all-day cool drink. Almost every herbal tea functions equally well hot or cold. Come to think of it, I can’t recall a single herbal brew I didn’t enjoy equally as an iced tea.

This particular blend has been my go-to during the past months. I happened to serve up a glass to a family member who popped by on a very hot day and it was instant hit. When I offered her some to bring home, the reply was “I thought you’d never ask”.

If you happen to work with botanicals and have a selection of dried herbs in stock, it’s pretty easy to make your own herbal blends. The advantages are multiple as you are getting the (water-soluble) benefits of the botanicals as you enjoy your refreshing drink.

I’ve made quite a few blends over the years and have discovered there are a few things you can do to take your creations to the next level.

Today, I’m sharing a few tips that have worked for me. You might already know some of these, but hopefully there is a bit of inspiration too.

How to Make Your Own Herbal Tea Blends

In my experience, composing an herbal tea is a bit reminiscent of creating a fragrance blend. If you compose a blend of only top notes, it’s going to lack depth and ‘roundness’.

It can make quite a difference to the taste (and herb synergy) if you choose a few ‘background’ herbs to function a bit like a taste-and-fragrance anchor. These may be (super beneficial) herbs that may seem a little boring-tasting on their own, or could be herbs you normally wouldn’t consider using in a blend at all. (Can you tell I’ve experimented quite a bit over the years?)

As an example, here’s are some of the ‘background herbs’ I am using in my current blend

• Horsetail

• Red Clover

The ‘middle and top note’ herbs

• Lemon verbena

• Wild rose

• Hibiscus

• Chamomile

• Rose

Choosing Proportions

I am very instinctive when making herbal tea blends. Nothing is weighed or measured, but merely mixed into a large bowl in proportions that suit me at that moment. Herbs are chosen from my stock ‘instinctively’ as well. Gazing into the stock cupboard is inspirational for me as I have quite a collection of dried botanicals.

If this sounds a little daunting and you haven’t tried this before, may I suggest using about 1/3 of the blend as ‘background herbs’ and 2/3 with the herbs you want to be dominant in taste.

In the blend above, I am using a proportionately larger amount of chamomile and rose petals as I like these to stand out. The lemon verbena gives these dominant ‘flowery herbs’ a bit of crispness and depth. Hibiscus was added after my first few batches because I wanted a pinker brew. It also adds to the experience if the color of the brew matches the taste.

How to Make an All Day Herbal Brew

To have enough to sip on all day (and serve to lovely guests who happen to pop by), make a potful (I make 1 liter) at a time.

1. Fill a large tea filter with your chosen amount of herb blend (I generally use about 5-8 grams)

2. Pour boiling water over the herbs and allow to infuse. While most herbal brews generally take between 5-10 minutes to infuse, I usually infuse between 15-20 minutes.

3. Sweeten if desired (I generally add a spoon/dipper of raw honey)

4. Drink some immediately and/or allow to cool and serve over ice with a slice of lemon.

And if you want to get a little fancy, serve up in a stemmed glass.

Enjoy!

Bellow is my latest publication that shows you how to compose your own bi-phase cleansers and make-up removers.

Bi-Phase Cleansers