St. John's wort: infused oil.

Newsgroups: alt.aromatherapy,alt.folklore.herbs
Subject: Re: St. John's Wort Oil
From: Henriette Kress <hetta.saunalahti.fi>
Date: Sun, 09 Jan 2000 12:37:42 +0200

herblady.newsguy.com (Rastapoodle) wrote:
>catefjones.aol.com (Cate Jones) wrote:
>>Anyone have a web resource for St. John' Wort Oil. I can't find any.
>In the same vein, I have been thinking about getting dried SJW flowers to make the oil myself. Anyone done this before? Penn Herb Co. has it for $16/lb. I trust that company, so I'll buy from them if someone gives a 'recipe'.

Put flowers in jar, top them with oil, cover with cheesecloth - this lessens the risk of a sorry soggy smelly mess because the water can evaporate, let sit in sunlight for 3-4 weeks, strain.

>Any advantage to using fresh flowers? I want to avoid any chance of botulism, hence the dried flowers. I'm growing calendula flowers right now to make infused oil. :-)

[Update: Dried SJW flowers won't turn the oil red. Dunno if the oil still works for bruises etc., though.]

If you want to use SJW oil in cooking you can make your oil in a waterbath: put your flowers into a jar, cover with oil, put on top of a pot with water in it in such a way that the walls of the jar don't touch the sides of the pot (I use three chopsticks). Boil the water, don't let it boil dry, don't let the oil in the jar smoke or boil. Let sit there for 2-3 hours, stir now and then. Take jar off pot, strain, bottle, keep in fridge.

Any herbal oil made the windowsill way is a risk in foods. They should only be used topically as oils or made into salves.

Cheers
Henriette