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Ingredients:
Propolis: The primary magic of our product comes from the propolis we harvest from our bee colonies. There are more people on Earth who keep bees for propolis than for honey. It is the medicine of the hive. In the global south, Asia and Eastern Europe, propolis is made into tinctures, balms, butters, toothpaste and a host of other remedies—even a chewing gum! Natural medicine practitioners use propolis for the relief of various conditions, including inflammations, viral diseases, ulcers, superficial burns or scalds, and to strengthen the immune system. Its anti-bacterial, anti-fungal qualities make it an excellent healing salve.
Beeswax: Our beeswax comes from the top bar combs we harvest from the Beepods. Wax is amazing material —both strong and flexible AND weak and fragile depending on its temperature. It’s edible, high in antioxidants, and has been shown to lower cholesterol. Beeswax was once the main ingredient in chewing gum. Made by bees excreting tiny platelets from their abdomens, they use their tiny mouth-hands, or mandibles, to mold the wax pieces into hexagonal combs for their bedrooms and food pantries. Some call wax combs the bones of the colony. Beeswax is excellent for skin products as it forms a protective coating on your skin to hold in moisture.
Raw Honey: Raw honey is the both the food and warmth of the hive. Bees use their stored honey as electric blankets throughout the winter, moving through the hive heating and eating the honey. Raw honey is high in antioxidants, naturally antibacterial, and never goes bad. It can be used to heal burns, you can wash your hair with it, you can even combine it with lemon as a daily scar-reducing face wash. We add honey to our products as it is a fantastic moisturizer.
Shea: Shea’s blend of vitamins A, E and F help soften dry and chapped skin, inhibit irritation and protect skin. We import our shea butter from a woman’s cooperative in Ghana. The pure ivory unrefined butter is made of shea nuts crushed and boiled by hand. Check out YouTube videos to see this process. Shea is the perfect aid to nourish and protect dry skin.
Sunflower Oil: Sunflower Oil is rich in Omega-6, a vital component of cellular membranes, this oil nourishes and protects skin from everyday environmental irritations. It is also an excellent conditioner for dry, damaged and fragile hair. Our sunflower oil is locally sourced from Century Sun Oils in Wisconsin. It is first-pressed, cold-filtered, organic sunflower oil. It is perfect for your at home infusions as well.
Extra Virgin Olive Oil: This oil is a favorite for dry skin. Rich in vitamins and antioxidants, it is highly effective in neutralizing the free radicals that damage healthy skin. Olive oil also helps balance your skin’s moisture. It is our preferred oil to infuse the propolis, but any oil will work.
Essential Oils: Essential oils add not only scent (easy aromatherapy), but can have topical healing properties as well, depending on the oils. We use a variety of brands of oils, and are beginning to infuse some of our own.
The Process:
The balm making process can be segmented into four parts: Rendering, Infusing, Mixing, & Packaging. In the video, we will actually show you in detail and other parts we will simply demonstrate.
Station One: Infusing
We will go over how we infuse the propolis into oil. Low and slow is the name of the game. Be careful when doing heat infusions to be aware of the kill temperature of whatever you are infusing, and to stay well below that threshold. We like to stay at least 20 degrees below the kill temp, more if possible. The kill temp is the point when the ingredient will begin losing beneficial properties and enzymes. With the propolis infusion, it is important to keep the temperature below 130F.
We will also show you how to begin infusing in your own home. Simple infusions involve putting something in a jar with oil and waiting. No heat needed. This method is perfect for herbs and flowers.
Station Two: Rendering Wax
We will be doing the final wax render, and briefly talking over how to render wax from start to finish:
Wax is rendered in a two-step filtering process where we also create other beneficial byproducts…nothing from the bees goes to waste.
The first filter is the large-scale meltdown of wax combs and honey extraction cappings. It’s messy but fun, and adds a full day to the process. The first render basically melts wax in large kettle filled with water and heated to 150F temp (do not exceed 200F). We put in some pretty yucky comb —all brown and musty with moldy bees and wax worms, but it’s okay. Once everything melts the slurry is poured through a strainer into 5 gal buckets. That stuff, called Slumgum is harvested into patties for chicken food or used as a fire-starter.
The bucket of filtered slurry liquid is left overnight to cure. Pure wax floats to the top creating a beautiful yellow wax cap. Underneath that is hardened #2 Propolis that can be scraped off, harvested and sold for cosmetic renderings. Even the black water contains beneficial nutrients for your garden. Pour it into the soil after it cools.
On day two, you scrape and wire brush the wax caps clean then re-melt them in a double-boiler (or rice cooker) then strain through cheesecloth. We recommend pouring the wax onto oiled baking sheets in thin layers. This makes it very easy to break apart pieces to achieve the correct weights.
Activity:
- Melt the wax in the rice-cooker.
- It should be melted at 150F, do not exceed 180F.
- Oil sheet pans.
- Line strainer with cheesecloth.
- Pour melted wax through strainer onto an oiled sheet pan.
- Thin layers are best.
- Let cool and repeat.
Station Three: Mixing
Combine all the ingredients to create a salve. We will the talk over the endless possible variations: balms, creamier salves, various oils, etc.
Activity:
- Gather and measure the ingredients into our double boiler.
- Heat keeping a very close eye on temperature.
- When it’s melted it will move on to station four.
Station Four: Packaging
Activity:
- Pour the liquid salve into tins.
- Add your unique mix of essential oils to create a scent blend of your choice!
Recipe:
Below is a basic salve recipe. There are endless variations you can make. For example: Use argan or coconut oil, use carrot oil or vitamin E, add a herb infusion from your garden. Our goal is to get you mixing! If you aren’t satisfied with the texture of your salve, reheat and adjust. Adding more wax will make it firmer, adding more shea will make it creamier, etc. Experimentation is the name of the game.
Skin Salve
- makes roughly 10 tins
- 300g Liquid Oils
- 75g Beeswax
- 100g Shea
- ½ tsp Honey
- Essential Oils
First, melt wax in double boiler. Add shea butter once wax is fully melted. Add liquid oils after shea is incorporated into melted wax. When liquified, mix in essential oils, then pour into 2-ounce tins.
Allow to cool before adding lids.