How to make an effective healing salve: Home Medicine Cycle 9

Readers of my Home Medicine Cycle are usually looking for simple, practical ways to use medicinal herbs at home. I go to the doctor as do most of you, I expect. There are a great many good things about modern medicine. 

And yet there are a few things that fresh, home-grown medicinal herbs still do better than the pharmacy.

Skin care is one of them.

From supposedly incurable eczema to allergic reactions and small infected cracks that even antibiotics won't heal, I've seen a lot of skin problems that pharmaceutical ointments were not been able to handle. And more often than not, I've seen medicinal herbs from my humble garden clear them up in less than a week.

I say my garden is humble because it is. I don't grow herbs to sell them and I don't sell my remedies. In fact, I have a hunch that purchased herbs will never be as effective as home-grown and home-brewed remedies unless they are from a tiny cottage industry, because any time you put herbs into a big processing system they end up freeze-dried, preserved and over-processed, which appears to significantly cut their medicinal potency. Maybe there's a way to make effective commercial herbal remedies, but I haven't seen it yet. 

I'm a mother doing this for my family and for the odd friend who drops in. I have two beds of herbs and I gather a few others in nearby empty lots. What I do isn't industrial herbalism and anyone with a garden or even a few window pots can do a lot of what I do. That's the whole point of this Home Medicine Cycle. It's about practical herb lore, herbal remedies that just plain work and things you can do to take back your own health. 

So lets get down to business. The herb harvesting season is finally well underway. I'll be posting here more often over the summer and I'll often focus on one herb at a time and its uses and specific recipes. But this time I want to give you a core herbalist skill - the simple method of salve making. 

I first learned this from Jennifer Moore, an herbalist in La Grande, Oregon, and later read about similar techniques in The Herbal Home Remedy Book, which is a simple, practical guide that's easy for non-experts to follow. I've been making herbal salves for a dozen years now and this method simply works. I've perfected a few of the steps based on experience in my own kitchen. I hope that you can try this out and gain a tool for treating common skin problems, bruises, burns and skinned knees. 

Salve making has several steps. There are three basic stages--collecting herbs, making infused oil and cooking the salve.  The first stage takes however long it takes, but often no more than a few minutes if you have started growing your own herbs. The second stage takes from two to three weeks of mostly passive waiting. The final stage will generally take a couple of hours of kitchen time. I'll list the equipment you'll need for each stage in a box.

Collecting herbs

Step 1:  Choosing herbs and essential oils 

There are a great many herbs you can use to make herbal salves. I will go into depth on some of these in other posts and link from here whenever possible. You can even use only purchased essential oils diluted in a carrier oil and leave out the whole section on infused oils, but I recommend using infused oil together with essential oils, because they each provide different types of medicinal benefits and essential oils alone don't appear to provide the same kind of relief of symptoms.

The second stage of this guide will show you how to make an infused oil that is a key ingredient in medicinal salve. Here's a short list you can use to determine which herb or herbs might be most useful for your specific needs.

Herbs for infused oil:

Mint - image by Gogo of Wikipedia

• Plantain leaves: For an excellent, speedy healing salve and to add to other salves
• Mint leaves: For an amazingly effective eczema salve
• Nettle leaves: For anti-allergenic salve (you’ll need gloves to pick and process them but just do the same as you would with other herbs and the result will reduce itching, rather than causing it)
• The petals of calendula blossoms: For anti-fungal salve and burn remedy to use both to prevent athlete’s foot at the swimming pool and to treat mild sunburns
• Yarrow blossoms: For a healing and mildly disinfectant salve that slows bleeding
• Thyme blossoms and leaves: For healing and disinfectant salve to use on scrapes and small cuts
• Lavender blossoms: For a good smelling salve that helps disinfect and dry out oily adolescent skin
• Lemon balm leaves: For lip gloss that wards off cold sores with specific anti-viral action
• Comfrey leaves:  For bruises, sprains and poorly healing (but thoroughly clean) wounds
• Arnica leaves and flowers: For bruises
• St. John's Wart flowering tops: For disinfectant salve for cuts and for burns (but keep in mind that the salve will increase the skin's sensitivity to the sun, the opposite of sun screen.)

It's also helpful to add some essential oil to your salve. While you won't need this for a couple of weeks, I'm mentioning these here because you may have to order the right essential oils through the mail and now is probably the time to do that, so that you will have them when the time comes. Choose an essential oil or two depending on your specific needs.

Essential oils for use in salve:

• Mint essential oil is good to combine with mint infused oil for an excellent eczema salve. Mint essential oil is quite cooling and will help with any itchy condition, so it is good to add it to nettle, calendula and plantain salves that will often be used for itchy things.
• Pine, sage or thyme essential oils help fight germs, so use them in salves that will be used on scrapes and cuts
• Lavender essential oil smells wonderful and is mildly disinfectant. Good for anti-pimple face salve.
• Tea tree essential oil is strongly anti-fungal but it doesn’t smell very good for general use. Use it for anti-fungal salves, such as for athlete’s foot.

Step 2: Collecting herbs

When you go out to collect herbs, make sure that the area hasn't been sprayed with pesticides and herbicides. Many of these chemicals are highly toxic and those used on lawns and hedges are often not approved for food or medicinal crops, so they are likely to be even worse than those you find on non-organic produce. It is usually inadvisable to collect herbs in maintained parks or other places with mowed lawns, unless the owner has told you they don't spray (and given you permission to gather). 

In stage one you'll need:

• scissors and/or clippers
• a basket or paper bag
• possibly some diluted geranium essential oil to ward off the ticks (see my post on this) 

The herbs I have listed are among the safest herbs for use in salves. Still, it’s best to choose herbs that you already know and can find locally when you’re first starting out. Check your identification of plants and be aware that while it’s rare, some people do have allergic reactions even to mild plants. 

Most salves use above-ground parts of plants, either leaves or flowers. It is rarely necessary to dig up or pull up the plants and this should be avoided. Use scissors or clippers to cut stems and flowers, whenever possible. This will avoid bruising the plants, which is better for your collected herbs and better for the plants that will grow medicine for you again in a few weeks.

Gather enough of the herb so that you can fill a small canning jar with pieces of it. For a family, one quart jar of infused oil per herb is usually plenty for the year. I sometimes make two jars for my most useful salves because I have a lot of friends who come around asking for them. You can store your herbs in the refrigerator for up to two days before going on to the next stage or you can dry them and use dried herbs for the next step, but I recommend using them fresh whenever possible.

Making infused oil

Step 3: Separating and cutting herbs

Separate small flowers such as yarrow and lavender and small leaves such as thyme from the stems by gripping the stem firmly in one hand and the flower or leaves more loosely in the other and pull the stems to strip off leaves and flowers. Cut large leaves or blossoms into half-inch pieces.

Step 4: Putting the herbs into infusing jars

In stage two you will need: 

• a knife
• a cutting board
• clean glass jars with lids
• olive, almond or another oil
• a butter knife or chopstick
• a spoon
• sticky labels or paper and clear tape
• a waterproof, permanent marker
• a sunny window sill or an undisturbed spot outdoors

Try to use jars that are just large enough to contain your herbs. Your oil will be preserved better if the jar is pretty much full of herbs.

Sterilize your jars either by pouring boiling water over them or by running them through the dishwasher.

Gently pack your chopped herbs into clear glass canning jars. They will stay down correctly in the next step if you have packed them in a bit rather than letting them be fluffy and loose. Your salve will also be more potent.

Step 5: Pouring oil into the jars

Choose a base oil for your salve. I use olive oil because it is cheaper than most and good for dry skin. You can also use almond oil or even lard. It may depend on if you have any sensitivities to certain oils and what is available.

Pour your base oil into the jars until the oil completely covers the herbs. Use a butter knife or a chopstick to stab down into the jar and release air bubbles. This will require you to pour in more oil. Keep topping it off until the air bubbles are all gone and the oil stops trickling down inside the jar. Make sure all the bits of herb are under the oil. It’s important to keep them covered or they can grow mold. Use the back of a spoon to gently press stray leaves and petals down under the surface.

Step 6: Labeling your jars

Write the name of the herb and the date on each jar. Do not skip this step. You really will not remember and the herbs will not look the same once the oil is brewed.

Step 7: Brewing your infused oil

Gently close the lids to your jars. Don’t screw them down tight.

Then set your jars someplace where they will get direct sunlight for at least a few hours of the day. The rays of the sun will both act to preserve the oil and release the medicinal compounds of the herbs into the oil.

Check your oil once a day for the first few days. Stick your butter knife or chopstick down to the bottom of the jar again to release any extra bubbles and top off the oil again. Make sure all the leaves and petals are covered by oil and close it up again.

Wait two to three weeks and your oil will be infused by the energy of the sun.

Cooking the salve

Stage three can be done all in one day or you can strain your oil and keep it in the refrigerator for up to two weeks before making salve.

Step 8: Straining your infused oil

In stage three you will need:

• a glass or ceramic bowl
• cheese cloth or straining cloth
• scissors
• more clean jars to store your strained oil in
• A pan (use enamel if possible, otherwise stainless steal, if possible use a pan that will only be used to make salve as it will be difficult to clean)
• a stove with a low heat setting
•  bees wax cut into pieces
• a spoon
• essential oils
• liquid vitamin E or large vitamin E capsules and some very sharp scissors
• new or recycled salve and lotion containers or small jars and plastic containers
• a ladle or a measuring cup with a spout
• a funnel
• Sticky labels or paper and tape, a good permanent pen or a printer

Cut a large piece of cheese cloth for each jar of infused oil. Place a piece of cheese cloth over your bowl and carefully dump the contents of one of your herb-and-oil jars onto it. Grasp the corners of the cheese clothe and lift it so that all the herb material stays in the cheese cloth. Carefully wrap it into a package and wring it out like a wet swimming suit to get all the oil out of the herbs.

Look at the interesting colors of your oil. Some will be very dark green or almost black, others will still be light and golden, some may even be reddish. This depends on which herb you have used.

If necessary, you can store this strained oil for a few days before making salve but you now have to store it in the refrigerator and don’t forget to label it again!

Step 9:  Heating your oil

Pour your infused herbal oil into a pan. You can make several different kinds of salve by heating each type of oil separately, thus intensifying the properties of each herb, or you can make a salve that combines a little of each of the properties of the herbs. If you mix them all together you’ll have a general healing salve, but it won’t be as strong for a specific purpose. Even so, I often add a little plantain to a lot of different salves because it is good for almost everything.

Heat the oil slowly on a low heat while you prepare the other ingredients of your salve. Try NOT to let your oil boil. Some herbs lose medicinal potency if they’re boiled, so use a low heat and keep an eye on it.

Caution: Boiling oil is notorious with good reason. It can spatter, causing significant burns, and even catch fire.

Step 10: Adding wax and testing for consistency

Now is when this starts to look like magic. Once your oil is warm, add some pieces of bees wax to your oil and slowly melt them. The official ratio is about one ounce wax to one cup of oil but this isn’t exact.

I suggest starting with a chunk of wax about as big as a tennis ball for a quart of oil. Let the wax melt into the hot oil. Then turn off the heat and put a small amount of the hot oil onto a spoon and place it in the freezer for 3 to 5 minutes until it is cool but not freezing.

Then test out the consistency of the salve on your skin. You’ll want a different consistency for different things. A lip gloss should be pretty firm and a facial salve will also want a bit of set to it, while a salve for eczema or scrapes will need to be a little softer but still thick enough to hold its shape.

If the salve isn’t thick enough yet, add some smaller pieces of wax, let them melt and try the spoon in the freezer again until you get the right consistency.

Then turn off the heat and take your pan of the stove.

Step 11: Adding good smells and preservatives

This is where you get to use the essential oils you chose in step one.

Both essential oils and vitamin E are heat sensitive, so do this step once the heat is off. Add about 20 to 30 drops of essential oil per half quart of oil. Be careful not to put your face right over the pan while you do this. The vapor from hot essential oil is very intense and can burn your eyes and nose.

Stir and add a teaspoon of vitamin E or cut open and squeeze out five or six capsules of vitamin E. Vitamin E helps to make your salve last longer and it is good for your skin when it’s diluted.

Don’t leave undiluted essential oil or vitamin E on your skin. If you get it on you, wash it off. Even though it doesn’t hurt you immediately, it can cause skin damage.

Step 12:  Pouring your salve into containers

Carefully ladle your oil and wax mixture into salve containers when it is still hot. Don’t let it cool in the pan. The salve will be very hot and hard to remove from skin quickly, so be very careful not to spill it on yourself or on children.

Step 13: Labeling and storing your salve

Let your salve cool and solidify before you move it, but on’t forget to label your salve containers right away. It will be impossible to tell which kind is which later or even to remember what exactly you put in it, even if you made only one kind. Include the date. Salve made like this lasts six months to a year if stored in a cool dark place.

That’s it. You’ve made real medicine that can stand up well in comparison with specialty pharmaceutical salve or ointment for healing ability, anti-fungal action, eczema reduction or allergy control.

I love hearing from you. What are your experiences and experiments with herbs? If you haven't started using herbal medicinals yet, what sparked your interest in this topic? Feel free to comment with the comment button at the bottom of this post on the left or share this post with your social networks using the share button on the bottom right. 

Note:  Please remember that this is not medical advice for your specific needs. 

Nature’s band aid: Home Medicine Cycle 8

There's a Czech proverb usually ascribed to various alcoholic beverages that claims “Where it flows it heals.” I can’t vouch for the truth of this statement with regards to Moravian wine, South Bohemian beer or even highland herbal liquor. 

Creative commons image by Sannse via Wikipedia

But there is one substance of near miraculous topical healing power that I can vouch for (and if you own a small plot of grass it is very likely that you’re already growing it whether you want to or not). That is the humble plantain herb.

To avoid confusion, be advised that this herb is in no way related to anything resembling a banana. Fried plantain bananas are delicious and reasonably good for you, but this kind of plantain is something completely different. If you don’t know it already, it’s likely that you often mistake it for a odd sort of grass.

Medicinal plantain is a plant with long thin leaves. It can be best identified by the deep, stiff ridges that run the length of the leaves. Otherwise the leaves are shaped like long blades. There is a broad-leaf variety with the same ridges but it’s medicinal potency isn’t as strong. 

Narrow-leaf plantain, which grows in yards and other places where brush is cut back in a wide variety of climates, is such a staple of the herbalists cupboard that it is the first herb I would teach children to actively use. It is best used fresh and is essentially nature’s band aid. 

Here’s how to use it for the most basic first aid.

Please note that even small scrapes heal faster if you can wash and disinfect them. But you can’t always do this right away. Pull out any stingers if the problem is a bee sting. If near home, I’d opt for a baking soda and water paste first to suck out any accessible venom and then a plantain poultice. But if you’re out on a hike and don’t have anything with you, plantain is your best friend. 

1. If you have a scratch, scrape, small cut, insect bite or sting while outdoors, look around for some plantain. 
2. Chew or mash a leaf or two of plantain with a little water or saliva.
3. This is called a poultice. Pack it generously over the affected spot. 
4. If possible secure with a band aid. But just rubbing it in and holding it on for a few minutes will suffice for most minor scrapes.
5. Also wet a leaf of plantain and stick it to the skin as a temporary band aid. Children who know from experience that mashed plantain reduces pain willl be doubly soothed by having a plantain band aid.

The plantain will not only lesson the immediate pain significantly, it will also cause the wound to heal much faster than it would on it’s own. 

This is the primary property of plantain. It assists the regeneration of cells. It isn’t particularly disinfectant and lacks antibiotic properties, so it is good to combine it with something disinfectant for any significant wound. However, where plantain is strong—in healing tissue—it is very strong indeed.

Here are the easiest uses of plantain in the home medicine cabinet:

A. In salve for poorly healing wounds: Next week I will post my super quick and easy salve recipe for plantain and other herbs. I have seen plantain salve from this simple recipe do what prescription antibiotic and healing salves could not. In the village where I live I have run into now three people with skin cracks or badly healing sores on areas that are hard to keep absolutely clean and disinfected. Each of these people had already sought out medical advice from doctors and received multiple prescriptions for pharmaceutical ointments—without relief. Each of them found that the cracks or sores closed after a week of using simple plantain salve. Keep in mind that these were cracks and sores from injury, not eczema or an allergic skin condition or a wound requiring antibiotics. But they were serious enough to cause significant pain and they were problems that standard pharmaceutical ointments didn’t heal well. These are the types of wounds where plantain is most helpful.

B. As a base for general skin care salves and washes: If I have enough plantain from the harvest I try to include at least some plantain with most of my general purpose salves, because of its amazing healing power. It is also great to have some dried plantain around to make an infusion to add to bath water for general skin care. It is so healing and soothing to whatever part of the body it touches that your skin will thank you and some conditions that require quick healing before an irritant or infection can set in may clear themselves up, even if the plantain doesn’t address their underlying allergenic or microbial basis.

C. In syrup or tea for stomach troubles, sore throats and coughs: It is good to remember that Czech proverb I mentioned in relation to plantain. Wherever it flows, it heals. Whatever it can physically touch, it will heal. Plantain hasn’t shown much ability to address systemic problems but it's great for the relief of symptoms because of its ability to immediately sooth irritated tissue and promote cell growth and regeneration. Certain types of stomach problems resulting from ulcers or irritation of the walls of the stomach may be helped by drinking strong plantain tea or syrup. Bronchial coughs where the irritation is primarily in upper air passages can be soothed and sore throats will benefit from plantain tea and syrup. Plantain can also be added to teas used for urinary tract infections and kidney stones. Again, plantain won’t solve the root problems of these ailments alone but it can mitigate the pain involved. 

D. As food: Plantain leaves are an excellent source of iron as well as calcium, magnesium and vitamins A, C and K--far better than most garden greens. The taste of young plantain leaves is mild when chopped in a salad. Fresh plantain leaves have many of the same benefits as tea and syrup, so they can be added to food both for the nutritional benefits and to help with symptoms. There is no specific limit on how much plantain a person should consume, but as with all herbs, moderation is a good idea.

E. Vitamin B supplements:  The unremarkable, brown flowers and seed heads of plantain are so high in vitamin B that they can practically be considered a vitamin supplement in and of themselves. Pick them and put them on salads to keep anemia and other health troubles at bay.

Warnings:

I must always end with the warnings, if for no other reason than to let you know what the current research says. Plantain is among the mildest herbs and it is safe for almost everyone. However, there are rare plantain allergies and people who are allergic to melons may have some reaction to plantain as well. Beyond that plantain hasn’t been studied enough when it comes to use in pregnancy, so responsible sources will generally warn off pregnant and breastfeeding women on general principle. 

I add one other warning specifically for plantain because of where it grows rather than because of the plant itself. Please be aware that many grassy areas are sprayed with extremely toxic chemicals. While you can find plantain in great abundance in many parks and other lawns, keep in mind that unless you know for certain that an area of mowed grass is NOT sprayed with pesticides, the chances are very good that it is. Choose your harvest locations with care.

And as with all herbs and medicines, keep in mind that I’m not a doctor and this doesn’t constitute medical advice. While there is a lot you can do for yourself, it is always a good idea to seek out medical help with any significant injury or illness.

Tasty, beautiful, healing violets: Home Medicine Cycle 7

My daughter and I set out with our herb baskets to find violets the other day. They bloom a bit late in our climate, rarely emerging until the end of March and often lasting into May. Violets are shy and they often don't grow in large quantity but they are delicious and full of nutrients. You also don't have to feel bad about picking every one you find, because the purple violet blossoms of spring are not "true flowers" in that they don't produce the seed of the plant. Picking them actually helps the plant produce more.

As we walked along the weedy track behind our house we adapted this little ditty from a similar one in Herbal Roots magazine to the tune of the song Mulberry Bush.

O, violets sweet and shy, sweet and shy, sweet and shy.

O, violets sweet and shy, where shall we find you?

Violets with five irregular petals and heart-shaped leaves - image by H. Zell of Wikipedia

The question was meant quite seriously. My daughter had never been violet hunting before and I am legally blind, so I wasn't sure this was going to work. But as soon as we had sung the the song through one time we found a good patch of violets. We picked the flowers and leaves carefully, in order to get plenty of stem (important for making candied violets later) and to avoid harming the plant or pulling it up. 

We weren't able to find enough violets to make violet syrup for coughs and sore throats, as I'd hoped. But we did find enough to make candied violets and put some on a pretty spring salad. My daughter, who is six and has a sweet tooth, was surprised at how delicious violets are. I suppose being my kid, she's used to having to take some bitter herbal medicines. But violets are mild and sweet enough that even the pickiest kid should be happy to eat them on a salad and they are packed full of vitamins. 

We returned home after our expedition and decided to try a candied-violet recipe I had seen in several different places. My luck with trying strange recipes entirely from books isn't that great. I do better if someone experienced does it with me the first time. But I was desperate. As I said, my daughter has a sweet tooth. She also appears to have particularly severe form of the "food coloring reaction." I know there is a bit of controversy around this, but anyone who doesn't believe that food coloring causes strange reactions in kids only needs to be around my daughter once after she's had food coloring (or corn syrup or certain packaged foods like potato chips). Within a few hours, she will start to act increasingly impulsive and erratic until her frenzy climaxes, usually with her shaking and crying uncontrollably on my lap for a few hours.

The thing is that my daughter also loves pretty, flowery, fairy-like things and she desperately wants to have decorated cakes. I have been experimenting with natural food dies to make pretty cakes. I can make a pretty good pink frosting with beet or blackberry juice mixed into a cream cheese frosting, but it isn't as easy to mold and decorate as corn-syrup-based frosting with food coloring. And my daughter really, really, really wants colored flowers on cakes. Hence my motivation to try candied violets. 

We got everything out and sat down with some trepidation, and for once, the recipe went just as advertised. Here's the idea:

This may not look like a picture from a cookbook but it is my real first attempt. Not bad for a first attempt! They are pretty enough to satisfy my daughter's passionate love of decorated cakes and that is really all that matters.

1. To prepare: Pick violet flowers with long stems. Beat an egg white. Cover a cookie sheet with wax paper. Buy or grind extra-fine sugar. This is the tricky part I think. Fine sugar is not the same as powdered sugar. Powdered sugar would probably turn your candied violets all white and you wouldn't be able to see their beautiful color. It also might not be enough to preserve them. You can buy extra-fine sugar or you can grind your own with a mortar and pestle from regular sugar.

2. Holding the stem of a violet, dip the bloom into the egg white. Use a clean paint brush to coat the flower entirely with egg white, on the front and back of every leaf. 

3. Dip the flower into a saucer of fine sugar and sprinkle more on top of it. Again, coat it well on all sides. 

4. Carefully arrange the blossom on a cookie sheet covered with wax paper. Use a toothpick to gently unfold the petals, so that the flower looks pretty. It will dry that way.

5. Put the cookie sheet full of candied flowers into the oven on the lowest setting (50 degrees Celsius or 100 degrees Fahrenheit) and let them dry for a couple of hours.  

6. Once the candied violets are entirely dry, save them in an airtight container. They are supposed to last quite awhile but they are better within a few weeks. The main thing is that they are a beautiful, natural alternative to harmful food coloring and corn syrup cake decorations. And they taste A LOT better. I was surprised to find that the flavor of the flower is very pleasant and noticeable through the sugar.

Violets can also be used medicinally as a syrup for coughs and sore throats. A warm compress of violets can be helpful on scrapes and bruises. Make a strong infusion (tea) and soak a clean cloth in it. Then put the cloth still warm, on the effected area. There are reports of fresh violet juice and strong infusions being used to effectively treat throat cancer. There are compounds in violets that may be helpful in fighting cancer, but this hasn't been tested enough. What we do know is that violets are edible. You can put them on salad to make it look beautiful, add delicious flavor and bring in a springtime shot of vitamins. 

The anti-allergy medicine you might think is a noxious, stinging weed: Home Medicine Cycle 6

My six-year-old daughter and I went out searching for the earliest herbs on a sunny morning last week. There isn't much growing in our area yet and we were hoping to find chickweed. Instead, my daughter found nettles - the hard way. 

Young nettles can be potent and these stung her right through her pants when she knelt in the grass. Different people have different levels of allergic reaction to nettle stings. My husband is almost immune to both nettles and mosquitoes. He isn't just tough. His skin doesn't react to the irritants. His whole family is like that, possibly because their ancestors lived in a swamp for hundreds of years.  My daughter and I are not so fortunate. Within a few minutes her knee swelled up with painful pustules. 

I often just grit my teeth and ignore it when I'm stung by nettles, but I made the snap decision to teach my daughter a valuable lesson about herbs. There are very few herbal medicines that act as quickly and dramatically as nettle anti-allergy medicine. It is handy that they are their own antidote. I used a piece of paper from our field notebook to protect my fingers while I picked a few sprigs of nettle, while I explained that we really didn't mean to disturb them and thanked the plants for their help.

Then I took my crying child home and quickly boiled some water. I poured the still-bubbling liquid over the nettles and let them steep in a cup. This is one of the few instances where you want fresh boiling water with herbs. Many herbal infusions or teas are better made with slightly cooled water. But the boiling water breaks down the chemical compounds in the nettle that cause allergies and leave the antidote behind. 

You might not believe me. My daughter didn't. She was a little afraid when I dipped a clean cloth in the nettle tea. Nettles hurt after all. That was her first plant lesson ever at the age of eighteen months. 

I waved the cloth in the air to cool it and then pressed it onto her knee. Within a second her eyes widened with surprise. The sting was gone. This works with strong nettle tea, steamed nettle or infused nettle oil and it only takes a second or two. The cooling, soothing action of the herb is so demonstrative that it's easy for a child to observe. 

When I began learning about herbs, I held the common assumptions that herbs are natural and gentle medicine, good for prevention and a little remediation of symptoms if you're willing to wait. With the diluted and over-processed herbal products I'd bought I had become used to the notion that herbs are medicinally weak and always take longer to relieve symptoms than pharmaceuticals.

Nettles were one of the first herbs to teach me the shocking truth. 

I was enjoying a sunny spring day with a friend. She had two daughters ages five and two. The younger child was adopted. We sat on my veranda sipping iced tea and watching as the kids raided my strawberry patch.

"Oh, I do hope she really isn't allergic to strawberries," my friend said, referring to her youngest child.

I asked her what she meant. As an adoptive parent, I know the anxiety about allergies. Without the genetic continuity within a family, it is more likely that unexpected allergies may crop up. My friend explained that her two-year-old had developed a severe rash after eating strawberry jam and that she had never had fresh strawberries before. 

We returned to our conversation but ten minutes later the children came running. Sure enough the two-year-old was covered with the worst skin condition I have ever seen. Her body was covered with bubbles the size of quarters. Some sort of liquid seemed to be inside the bubbles. I had never seen a person's body change so quickly and I was afraid. The child looked like she might have general swelling, like a life-threatening allergic reaction. She was crying and scratching her skin hard enough to draw blood.

And all the while I knew that my friend has a psychiatric condition which can result in anxiety attacks that make it impossible for her to drive. I assumed that we would need to go to the emergency room and I can't drive, because I'm legally blind. Both of our husbands were gone and my friend was the only available driver. I was desperate to keep my friend calm. 

I had read someplace that infused nettle oil could be used to treat allergic reactions on the skin and I had just such oil (a little experiment I planned to try out on my own nettle stings) freshly brewed in my refrigerator. I went and got the jar of oil and told my friend to smear it all over the child. I doubted it would help enough to matter, but it would give the mother something to do and it might sooth the child a little.

Then I grabbed my phone and ran into the other room to call a friend with medical experience. I quickly got the information that a strawberry allergy was very unlikely to be life threatening. I relaxed a little and described the child's condition and wrote down a list of heavy-duty anti-allergy medications we would need from the pharmacy. My friend with the medical background sounded discouraged. She said the child and her mother were in for a very bad night. It would usually take about twenty-four hours for the anti-allergy medicines to really take effect and the itching was going to continue to be very bad. I could tell that our fun day in the spring sunshine was over. 

After I got off the phone I went back out to see my friend with the little girl. About ten minutes had passed and I thought I must be imagining things. The huge bubbles that had been on the child's skin had been reduced to small white bumps. And while her mother continued to apply the nettle salve the bumps disappeared entirely over the next twenty minutes, leaving nothing but the bloody scratches left by the child's fingernails. Both the mother and I were hugely relieved and amazed.

I'm glad that my first reflex was to help the suffering child, but I do wish I had somehow managed to take a picture of the condition because the change was so dramatic that my friend and I both found it hard to believe that what we had seen was real.

We did go to the pharmacy and she picked up the anti-allergy medicine to be on the safe side. But I also sent her home with a jar of the nettle oil. My friend reported that the rash did come back about twelve hours later and she put more of the nettle oil on it and it receded again. 

I have tried nettle oil on other skin conditions and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. I can only conclude that it works for certain types of allergic reactions and when it works it works very well. As soon as there are enough nettles, I'll make some more this spring.

The broader lesson to be learned here about herbs is that herbs are not necessarily slow-acting or less powerful than pharmaceuticals. We have no good controlled trial of nettle oil versus pharmaceutical anti-allergy medicines. I hope there will be one someday. But in this case the nettle oil was at least far better than the standard prediction of how the anti-allergy medicine would work. 

It is worth noting that strawberries are plants too and there is another lesson to be learned from this incident. As quickly as herbal medicinals can help, some herbs can cause toxic and allergic reactions just as swiftly. This is why it's important to treat herbal medicinals with respect and caution. In their fresh forms, many herbs are extraordinarily potent. And not everyone has the same reaction to each one, just as not everyone is allergic to strawberries or to uncooked nettles.

RECIPES:

Nettle infusion

For quick anti-allergy medicine, pick several handfuls of nettles using hand protection of some sort. If possible, chop the nettles up. Put them in a cup and pour freshly boiling water over them. Just cover the nettles with water. Stir well and let the infusion steep for ten minutes. You can dip a cloth into the liquid and then wave it in the air to cool it more quickly. You might be able to use dried nettles for the infusion but the effect might be less dramatic. 

This is the fastest way to make anti-allergy medicine from nettles but it still takes awhile. During the spring gardening season when our yard is surrounded by nettles and bees, I like to keep a jar of nettle infusion in the refrigerator all the time. Then when I'm stung, all I have to do is pour nettle tea over the affected area. The relief is immediate with nettle stings. It is also good for mosquito bites, bee stings and other bites that cause an allergic reaction. 

Nettle oil

For an anti-allergy medicine that will sink into the skin, possibly producing a deeper and longer lasting effect, I make infused nettle oil. The process is the same as for any infused oil, except that it has to be done using fresh nettles, which means most people will have to wear gloves. Pick a basket of nettles and chop them into half-inch sized pieces.

Then pack as much of the chopped nettles as you can into a clean, sterilized jar. (You can sterilize jars in a dishwasher or by boiling them in a large pot of water for a few minutes. Don't forget to sterilize the lids as well.) 

Finally, pour olive oil (or whichever oil is the least likely to cause an allergic reaction in your family) into the jar. Use a thin stick (chopsticks are good) too stab down into the jar to release air bubbles and get as much oil into the jar as possible. The oil should just cover the nettles. (Avoid using a metal knife to work out air bubbles in nettles as the compounds in nettles may react with metal and weaken their medicinal potency. This is one case in which I'd use plastic before metal.) 

Put a loose lid on the jar and set it in a window where it gets as much full sunlight as possible. Check the jar the next day and add oil. It will tend to settle and all the leaves must be covered by oil to avoid mold. Check every day until the leaves stay covered. Leave the infusion in the sun for at least two weeks. Then strain the nettle leaves out. (Use cheese cloth and wring them out to get the last of the oil.) Store infused nettle oil in the refrigerator. I will post later on how to make a salve out of infused oils. This can be done with nettle oil as well. 

Nettle risotto

My children love risotto, which is essentially rice fried on butter and then cooked with vegetables and sprinkled with Parmesan cheese. Adding nettles to your food in the early spring is a great way to get some greens before your garden has a chance to produce any. Beyond that nettle tea and nettles in food help the body rid its self of toxins and heavy metals.

To make simple nettle risotto, heat a few tablespoons of butter in the bottom of a pan, add a chopped onion, a few cloves of chopped garlic, a chopped red pepper and a little frozen corn or peas. Fry very slowly for 15 minutes without letting it burn. When the vegetables have softened, add two cups of rice and turn up the heat. The rice will begin to lightly fry, so keep stirring it. After a minute it will look slightly translucent. At this point you can add a dash of wine if you want. Keep stirring for another minute. Add 4 cups of hot water. Add a teaspoon of salt and some black pepper.

Turn down the heat and let the rice cook. Taste the rice after about 15 minutes and add more hot water if necessary. In a separate pan boil two cups of chopped nettles for five minutes. Pour off the water into a jar and save it for anti-allergy wash in the refrigerator. When the rice is done, mix the chopped nettles into your risotto. Add some butter and Parmesan. 

Warnings:

Some herbalists use nettles as part of a seasonal cleanse meant to clear out toxins and heavy metals after the winter months. I recommend doing this only with the supervision of a professional herbalist or doctor because I have seen nettle cleanses appear to cause anemia. It is possible that nettles tend to help remove iron from the body, just as they remove other heavy metals. Whether or not that is the problem, I suggest eating nettles only once or twice a week unless you are doing a monitored cleanse.

Please note that this post doesn't constitute medical advice from a doctor. You should consult a doctor with health problems, such as allergies, in order to make informed decisions.

Five Amazing Things You Can Do with Essential Oils: Home Medicine Cycle 5

Herb harvesting season hasn’t hit yet, so I’m still working on things that don’t come directly from your garden, meadow or vacant lot. I do prefer to garden and wildcraft as much of my medicine as I can. I like to know where the ingredients come from both for the safety of the moment and for the purposes of quality control and getting a sense of what really works.

Image by Hugo.arg at the Samogitian language Wikipedia 

But there are a few things that I’ve learned to do with essential oils over the years that I simply can’t replicate with fresh, dried, infused or tinctured herbs. And given that I can’t make my own essential oils I’m always on the look-out for high quality essential oils. This is more of an issue than you might think. While essential oils may look and smell very similar regardless of the manufacturer, there can be huge differences in the quality and the actual ingredients. Big Herba can be as problematic as Big Pharma (as well as being less regulated).

For this reason I suggest doing some research in order to find a good local supplier of essential oils. In Central Europe, Karel Hadek is a reputable source that I use. In the US, Mountain Rose Herbs is a well-respected company.

Now let's get on to the eminently practical things you can do with essential oils. Obviously essential oils can smell very good. You add them to salves, soaps, candles and bath water for fun, relaxation and health benefits. Some people really enjoy putting them in those little candle-powered aromatherapy diffusers. And there are extensive lists of aromatherapy benefits that may or may not be born out in practice. Given that they smell so good, many people just use them and hope.

I am sure that some of the benefits espoused by aromatherapy probably do have some practical use. The smell of lavender has a clearly demonstrable effect on stress and anxiety. I’ll grant the aromatherapy industry that. But for many people, aromatherapy is still an under-documented field. And my specialty is herbal remedies that you can use at home and which simply work.

So, here are my five amazing tips for things to do with essential oils that are not based on aromatherapy but rather on the same mechanisms as other herbal medicinals.

Tea tree oil for yeast infections

This is one of those few areas of herbal medicine where I suspect the pharmaceutical industry of actively covering up information. Given the incredible anti-fungal power of tea tree oil, it simply makes no sense that we see so little use of tea tree essential oil. Instead we have a plethora of pharmaceutical anti-fungal medicines in pharmacies, many of which don’t actually work.

Years ago, when I went through the wringer of medical fertility treatments and hormone medications, my immune system was extraordinarily weak. As happens with immune deficiencies, I soon had fungal infections everywhere. It was so unpleasant that I tried every pharmaceutical I could get my hands on. Nothing worked. The infections either didn’t respond at all to the treatments or they went away briefly and soon came back. I tried all kinds of other things as well (even boiling my socks and underwear). Nothing worked and doctors were no help, simply saying that I had to keep trying and live with it.

Finally, I read about this simple recipe using tea tree essential oil diluted in olive oil. The strength may depend on various factors, so start with a low concentration and carefully work your way up. You do NOT want to use undiluted tea tree essential oil anywhere on your body, let alone on sensitive areas. It is powerful enough to destroy cells and wreak havoc on your mucus membranes.

Put two tablespoons of olive oil in a small glass jar with a good lid. Add 10 drops of tea tree essential oil. And voila you have topical anti-fungal medicine. You can use it on intimate areas. It should have a distinct cooling feel. If it doesn’t, add more tea tree. If it stings, add more olive oil. You don’t want it to hurt. You can use somewhat higher concentrations for the no-fuss treatment of athlete’s foot.

A slightly different use of tea tree oil is effective with thrush and other mouth and gum infections. Dilute the tea tree oil in warm water instead of olive oil and use it as a mouth wash. It doesn’t taste delicious and it isn’t advisable to swallow it. In fact, you might want to refrain from this if you are pregnant, pending further research. Tea tree shouldn’t be used internally during pregnancy, given what is known or suspected at present.

Mint for Eczema

I don’t personally suffer from eczema, a blessing for which I am grateful. But I have encountered a number of people who have seen my homemade salves and asked me for a salve for eczema. Some of the first were family friends with a two-year-old daughter. This was a fairly wealthy family and they had been to all the major experts and tried many pharmaceutical treatments. The little girl had terrible eczema on her hands and wrists which itched so much that it was usually bleeding from her scratching.

At the time, I was just starting out in herbalism and when the family asked me about herbal salves, I really had no idea. I remembered reading that mint is good for eczema and I assumed that was like saying ginger is good for upset stomachs, i.e. it helps a little most of the time but sometimes not at all. Mint is after all a very common, mild herb consumed by almost everyone. If it was some sort of miracle cure we would have heard about it. We use it for toothpaste. It isn’t a medical secret.

Or is it?

I gave the family a jar of my mint salve, which I had made because I love the way it feels cool on chapped lips. And I really like the smell of mint. I had used infused mint oil and mint essential oil for this salve. And in a week the family was back begging for more. They had never seen their daughter’s eczema so calmed.

Since then I’ve seen this happen again and again. I am confused as to why the pharmaceutical industry, which isn’t actually adverse to using mint, doesn’t use it more intensively in salves and creams for eczema. It is obviously very effective, both as fresh infused oil and as essential oil.

For the quickest remedy, just make diluted mint essential oil. Again use olive oil or whatever neutral oil doesn’t irritate your sensitive skin. Put 2 tablespoons of neutral oil in a jar with a good lid. Add 10 drops of mint essential oil. If that is gently cooling and doesn’t irritate your skin you can even try more mint oil. It should be gently cooling and should not sting or irritate the skin. If it hurts, don’t do it.

Patchouli for Lice Prevention

We have never had lice in our family since discovering this little trick, so I can’t say whether or not getting them correlates with forgetting to use it or not. But I have read that putting a few drops of patchouli oil in warm water and using that water to comb your children’s hair is a great way to prevent lice.

I started doing this about two years ago. About a year ago my son’s preschool class had a lice outbreak. We were fortunately spared. Maybe it was the patchouli oil. Studies have shown that lice avoid patchouli oil and many anecdotes by parents point to the same conclusion.

I personally like the smell of patchouli. Unfortunately, my children’s preschool teachers don’t, so I have to go easy on it.

Geranium for Tick Repellent

Another essential oil to use as bug repellent is geranium. A few years ago I ran across this idea on a blog about dogs. The dog owner put a drop of geranium on her dog before going out in the woods each day and then found no more ticks on her dog.

I tried this on my cat and on my children and on myself. For my children and me I use geranium oil diluted in almond oil. (There is some evidence that ticks may like olive oil, which is my usual base.) For the cat, I just put a drop behind her neck, which she admittedly hates. My children and I have never had a tick while wearing our geranium repellent. We have had ticks when we forgot to put it on. I’d say the record is pretty good.

My cat does still get ticks unless she is wearing both geranium repellent and a chemical repellent collar. That said, we live in an epidemic tick area where bacterial diseases carried by ticks are so common that my husband and several neighbors have had serious illnesses because of them. Without using both the geranium oil repellent and a collar (even if using either alone), our cat will return from daily rambles in the summer literally studded with ticks. So, geranium oil alone may work even for animals in areas with an intense tick problem. In any event, geranium oil has at least added to the protection of our cat and largely solved the problem for the humans of the household.

Sage for preventing the spred of viral infections

This is something I need to do more often myself. You know how it is when flu and cold season comes around. Especially if you have small children, it is nearly impossible to keep infections from spreading in the household.

Sage essential oil is another tool in your arsenal. This time it is closer to the traditional idea of aromatherapy but only in technique not in the actual function. You heat a small amount of water on a cook stove or in a small container on a wood stove or in one of those candle-powered diffusers. Add a few drops of sage oil.

If you have boiling water, be careful not to put your face right into the steam, unless you’ve only used one drop. To produce a strong effect for an entire room you may need 10 or 20 drops but the steam could hurt your eyes if you get right in it.

The idea is to spread the strong sage essential oil throughout the air as much as possible during the peak infection period when someone in the household is sick and others don’t want to get sick. Airborne sage will contribute to cutting down the spread of infection. Some herbalists claim that smudging with dried sage elicits a similar effect.

That said, the first line of defense is always covering coughs and sneezes and lots of hand washing.

Note: Please remember that this doesn’t constitute medical advice and you should consult a doctor for medical conditions.