I think my favorite season will always be autumn, but every year I appreciate the springtime more and more. And as my interest in gardening and using herbs grows, I'm always finding new reasons to love the spring.
Last year I discovered that dandelions are not weed! Seriously. I'm 29 years old and I'm just learning this? I always did think that if they were a weed, then they were one of the prettiest weeds I'd seen. But it turns out that they actually are an herb. And every part of a dandelion is beneficial, from the root to the flower and everything in between.
The scientific name for the dandelion is "Taraxacum officinale". I'm not really one that cares for learning the scientific names of species, but this means "The official remedy for disorders", and I thought that was pretty interesting.
I've done a lot of reading on the many benefits of dandelions and I have learned that the root and leaves have been used since the bible times to help with every thing from regulating blood sugar levels, cleansing the liver, digestive health, healing acne, and I even read of a case where they helped cure cancer!
You can open the stem of the dandelion and use the milk inside to help bug bites as well.
You can purchase dandelion leaves and roots in bulk to be used for teas and other recipes. I purchase all of my herbs for such uses from The Bulk Herb Store. They do not pay me to endorse them. I discovered this site a couple of years ago and I love it.
You can also spend some time pursuing the web to learn more about this awesome herb and the many different ways you can incorporate it into your diet or daily routine.
Today I am going to show you a very simple recipe that you can do to create a salve. A salve, in case you don't know, is a "medical ointment used to sooth the surface of the body" (thank you wikipedia).
You can make or purchase salves that do many different things, but this salve will be useful not only for helping to heal those cracked and dried hands, but to help ease muscle pain and help achy joints.
I am a skeptic. So when I first discovered this and made my own, I did so as more of an experiment than anything else. I fell in love. I have since used this recipe for gifts and every person I have ever gifted this to has asked me for more. It works. Here a a couple examples:
- My mother-in-law gets very sore hands. She is a quilter and she loves to garden too. I made her some of this salve for Mother's Day last year and she said that she could tell the difference in the way her muscles felt in her hands when she used it. I think she was surprised. She's a skeptic too.
- A friend of mine was complaining of chapped and broken skin so I made her some as a gift. She loved it so much she made a special order for some more and purchased it for gifts. She said it worked wonders on her cold sore as well.
- My son has EXTREMELY dry skin and I use this salve to help moisten it up
These are real examples , and I could share more, but i think you will find that you'll be able to testify for yourself once you've tried this.
My recipe originates from The Nerdy Farmwife's blog. She has many recipes for dandelions, but you can find recipes like this all over and they are all very similar. The only change I made to it was that I added about 20 drops of lavender oil to mine. Dandelions don't smell horrible, but lavender smells much better and don't even get me going on the healing benefits of that! Lavender is awesome and if I were stranded on an island and had only one essential oil to take with me, I'd pick lavender.
Anyway - here we go...
I am a picture person. I like to see how things come together as you will notice. I took a picture of things you'll need to get started. Here's my list:
- Dandelions heads
- Lavender Oil (or whatever other scent you love)
- A Carrier oil. I've used sunflower, olive, safflower..... whatever you do, use organic. This is going on your skin and your skin is an organ, and every thing you put on your skin will be absorbed into your bloodstream. That's a fact.
- Beeswax Pellets
- A couple of canning jars (size will depend on how much your making)
- Little jars to put the salve in. I usually use baby food jars that I saved, but sometimes I buy cute little containers from the local health store if I'm making a gift.
In order to make the salve you must first make an infused oil with the dandelions.
1. Gather your dandelion heads and lay them out on a cookie sheet to dry out for a day or two. If it's not too breezy and the sun is shining, you can sit them in the sun to help them dry faster.
2. Once you are confident that they are dry, fill a jar about 1/2 to 3/4 full of the dandelion heads and then pour your carrier oil over them and fill the jar to the top and seal it.
3. You can heat the jar in boiling water for a few hours to jump start the process, or let it is steep in a cool, dark place for a few weeks. If you heat the jar in water, I still recommend letting the jar steep for a few days to a week. You want the oil to have a high concentration of that dandelion goodness. I promise it will be worth the wait. If you skimp out on this part of the process, all your efforts will be in vain because your salve won't be very potent.
4. Strain your oil with a cheese cloth or something similar and discard the dandelions. Pour your newly infused oil back into the jar and seal it! Store in a cool and dry place for safe keeping.
You'll need about 0.5oz of beeswax pellets and 3.5oz of your dandelion oil to yield one serving size...depending on how big of a jar you are using (this will fill a few 1oz baby food jars). I recommend starting out with this ratio until your are comfortable with the process and then you can play around with the recipe to make as much or as little at a time as you'd like. For the purposes of this tutorial, that is the ratio I am using. Also, keep in mind that a little salve goes long way.
1. Measure out your beeswax and put it into a jar (for this ratio, a 1/2 pint jar will suffice) and measure out your oil.
2. Combine the two ingredients by pouring your infused oil into the canning jar.
3. Fill a small sauce pan about 1/2 full of water and put it on the stove with medium heat.
4. Place your jar in the pan and let it heat up with the water.
5. Continue to heat your jar of oil until all the beeswax has melted. It won't take too long and sometimes I have to stick a butter knife in to stir up the wax a little. This is also the point that I'll add about 15-20 drops of lavender oil, which makes the house smell lovely as it heats up.
6. Once its melted. Turn off the heat and using something other than your bare hand, remove the HOT JAR from the boiling water and pour your concoction into whatever container you are using. Let it sit on the counter for a bit to cool and harden. And you're done!
Now you can enjoy your new salve and fall in love with it as much as I did and make fun gifts for all your friends that they will love and enjoy too!
Now go grab a basket (and maybe some kids) and pick some dandelions! And don't pick them from other peoples yard because you may not know if they spray stuff on their lawn. You want organic dandelions for the same reason that you want to use organic oil that I mentioned above.
Good Luck! Please let know if you do this and how it goes, or if you have any questions!
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