Ingredients List
1 parts comfrey
2 parts calendula
1 parts plantain
olive oil
wheat germ oil or vitamin E oil
beeswax
Supplies List
mason jar
cheese cloth or metal coffee strainer
a sauce pan and a smaller sauce pan that will fit inside of it
Active Ingredients
The active ingredients in this healing salve are comfrey, calendula and plantain. Wheat germ oil is also used to provide vitamin E to the skin, which also aids in healing and prevents scarring.
Comfrey's main active ingredient is Allantoin, which speeds up healing because it breaks down cells, thereby speeding up the scabbing process which naturally occurs in our bodies whenever we have a skin abrasion or cut. Comfrey should not be taken internally because it's ability to break down cells could have carcinogenic effects. Comfrey is only to be used topically. Comfrey also is used to treat pain relief, inflammation, and to treat the symptoms of arthritis. Allantoin content is higher in the roots of the plant, but both the roots and the leaves can be used.
Calendula's main active ingredients are flavonoids, which are plant-based antioxidants that protect cells from being damaged by unstable molecules called free radicals. Calendula is used to treat inflammation, viruses, and bacteria. Calendula helps wounds heal faster by increasing blood flow (and thereby oxygen) to the affected area.
Plantago is a genus of a species of plant commonly found growing wild, the common name of which is plantain. This is not to be confused with the fruit of the same name. In addition to being medicinal, plantain is also edible and makes delicious and nutritious greens that taste best when harvested young. Plantain is high in riboflavin and vitamin B1. Plantain's main active ingredient is the glycoside Aucubin. The Journal of Toxicology has reported Aucubin to be a powerful anti-toxin. Other highly powerful active ingredients include Ascorbic-acid, Apigenin, Baicalein, Benzoic-acid, Chlorogenic-acid, Citric-acid, Ferulic-acid, Oleanolic-acid, Salicylic-acid, and Ursolic-acid.
Wheat germ oil is the highest known natural source of vitamin E. Wheat germ oil contains 149.4mg of vitamin E per 100 grams, which far exceeds any other natural source of vitamin E. Vitamin E is a powerful antioxidant which protects cells from free radicals. Wheat germ oil also increases blood flow and treats certain skin conditions.
Making the Infused Oil
To make the infused oil, you will need to find and gather leaves from the comfrey and the plantain, and the calyxes from the calendula flowers. Calyxes are the center part of the flower which appears between the flower petals. In the case of comfrey, you can also use the roots, but bear in mind doing so will kill the plant so you won't be able to harvest more leaves from that plant later. If you do harvest the roots, be sure and plant of a couple of pieces of root back into the ground so a new plant will grow up again. Also keep in mind that the leaves you gather will need to be dried, and in doing so you will end up with a lot less plant material once it's dried. So be sure to gather about two to three times as much plant material as you'll need to end up with. You can dry the leaves by hanging them in a mesh bag or placing them inside of a brown paper bag. Drying times may vary but generally drying the leaves will take about two weeks.
Once you have dried plant matter, you will need a mason jar and some olive oil. Crush up or grind the plant matter by hand and fill a mason jar of any size halfway with the plant matter. Use 1 parts comfrey, 2 parts calendula and 1 parts plantain. Now fill the mason jar with olive oil until the level of the oil is about an inch higher than the plant matter.
Shake the mason jar vigorously and place the jar in a cool, dark place. Continue vigorously shaking the mason jar once a day for 6 weeks. During this time, if the level of oil in the jar gets lower than the plant matter, you should add more oil into the jar. After six weeks passes, strain the oil out through cheese cloth or a metal coffee strainer and squeeze as much of the oil out of the plant matter as you can.
You now have an infused oil with which you can make salves. Store in a mason jar or bottle and label the infused oil with an expiration date based on the specific type of olive oil you used, and store this infused oil in the refrigerator. Most olive oil will stay fresh for 2 years in the refrigerator.
Making the Healing Salve
Now that you have a healing infused oil, it's time to start making your healing salve in small batches. We recommend wheat germ oil as your source of vitamin E, but keep in mind this will greatly reduce the shelf life of the salve, because wheat germ oil spoils faster than vitamin E oil. It should be noted however, that most of the time vitamin E oil is not sourced naturally. That is, it's synthetically produced, and therefore not something we would recommend you place onto your largest breathing organ of your entire body, your skin. By contrast, wheat germ oil is the highest known natural source of vitamin E.
To melt the ingredients together we need to make what's known as a "double boiler." To do this, take your larger sized sauce pan and fill it 3/4 of the way with water. Place this sauce pan on a stove burner and put the heat setting to medium. Place the smaller sauce pan inside of the larger sauce pan, so it's floating on top of the water. It's best if you find a sauce pan that isn't much smaller than the larger sauce pan, so it won't move around too much once the water starts boiling and dump its contents into the hot water.
Measure your ingredients first and have them ready. Use about 1 ounce of beeswax to every 3 ounces of infused oil, and then add about 20 drops of wheat germ oil. Put the beeswax in first and let it cook on medium in the double boiler until it's fully melted. Be careful not to burn it or get it too hot. Be extremely careful to keep open flames away from the beeswax as it can be flammable. Once the beeswax has melted, put in the olive oil and wheat germ oil and remove the small sauce pan from the hot water. Stir the ingredients until they mix together and then pour into a container to cool down. You can go ahead and place the container in the refrigerator to cool down if you like. Label the salve with an expiration date of 4 months from now if you used the wheat germ oil, or an expiration date of 12 months from now if you used vitamin E oil.
