Thursday, August 7, 2014

A Guide On How To Make Homemade Essential Oils

By Annabelle Holman


Essential oils have already been used for therapeutic and medicinal purposes since ages ago. Aside from that, they have been used for culinary reasons, as well. These essential liquid are extracted from flowers, plants, and even peelings of citrus fruits.

With this, there is a possibility that a person can make his own essential oil. Several steps are to be followed on how to make homemade essential oils. However, the final outcome of this homemade process will not be as potent as essential oils that can be purchased commercially.

The three most frequently used methods for creating essential oils are extraction, expression or the method of pressing the plant mechanically, and distillation. There are also other methods in making the essential oil. For homemade procedures, the best and easiest method to employ among the three would be distillation.

The producer should keep in mind several pointers prior to commencing distillation. It would be good if he can do a thorough research regarding the plant he will be using as different organic materials will produce different outcomes. He can use any flora which could from plants, flowers, spices, to fruit peelings. He should ensure that these materials are clean and have not been exposed to chemicals like pesticides.

A still is the primary apparatus used for distillation. These stills may be expensive and could cost a large sum of money if bought from commercial business. The producer can actually make his own homemade still, if he is on a budget. The four parts that should be present on this still are the furnace used for heating, the tank or pot for holding water, the condenser for cooling the steam collected from heating, and the separator for filtering the essential fluids from the water.

He should then be able to gather the raw materials that he need. For those herbs that he can get from his own backyard, he should carefully handle them to make sure that the herbs will not be damaged. He may also buy the organic materials from the market. He needs to select those that are in whole form and still in good condition.

To make sure that there will be a bigger amount of produce, drying the organic plants that are to be distilled is recommended. Ideally, the flora should be dried under the shade or inside a very dark room. This is to lessen the amount of oil that will be lost, as well. The plants should stay dry and should not be exposed to sunlight directly.

The pot or holding tank should be filled with water at this point. The pot should be filled with clean, possibly filtered water or distilled water. The dried herbs will then be placed inside the heated tank and left to boil. Depending on the quality of the material used as well as its quantity, the heating step may take up to several hours.

Once the distillation has ended, the producer will then separate the oil from the water by pouring them into glass receptacles through the use of a cheesecloth or any fabric. The cheesecloth should be clean as well as dry so that the liquid will not be contaminated. The finished product should be kept inside rooms where only a little amount of light can enter.




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