Tinctures, Infused Oils, and Salves: An Afternoon with Ashley

Apologies for the extended absence! It's been a crazy month here at Buckhorn, but I'm going to try to update you with as much as I can. This post will be devoted to telling you about the afternoon we spent with our friend Ashley, who is an intern at Dancing Willow in Durango. She shared with us her knowledge of making tinctures, infused oils, and salves out of herbs from our garden.

We planned ahead and picked several herbs to dry the day before the session. Borage, comfrey, calendula, ashwagandha, and gotu kola were the herbs we picked ahead of time. We harvested rosemary the day of the session and made fresh rosemary oil.

We used the dried borage, comfrey, and calendula to make an infused oil using cold pressed olive oil and a blender. The ashwagandha was used to make a tincture by soaking its dried root in a large jar full of grain alcohol.

Our last and most ambitious project was the salve we made at the end of the day. We used 2 ounces of beeswax, 2 ounces of cocoa butter, 1/2 ounce of the comfrey/borage/calendula oil, 1/2 ounce of purchased essential rose oil, 4 ounces of pure oil (not infused or essential), and 2 ounces of shea butter. We heated all of it in a double boiler, poured it into small containers, and let it harden overnight. In the morning we had a fabulous hand salve!


Crushed borage and comfrey on the left, dried calendula flowers ready to crushed in the food processor


Breigh pouring infused rosemary oil out of a blender through a cheesecloth


I'm helping Breigh get every last drop of that rosemary oil


Pouring the hot salve into vessels to harden