This is how I make St. John’s Herbal Oil
As I have mentioned before St. John’s Wort is an amazing anti-inflammatory that I use on clients in my massage biz. I’ve been preparing the formula now for 4 years since I learned it from The California School of Herbal Studies.
- First you have to find it! St. John’s is not native and the state of California considers it an invasive species. This being said they do there best to get rid of it, but you can still find it or grow it your self. I do both. St. John’s loves full sun and disturbed poor soil so look for it near ditches and roadsides. Note of caution here: I consider any herb collected from a highly traveled road polluted, so I look for rural back country roads with little traffic.
- You are only interested in collecting the flowers, but I cut the stem just below the flowers. You will end up with some stem and that is just fine. Immediately when you get home process your herbs.
- You will need a clean gallon jar (I use old pickle or olive jars that I get from our local eatery), pruners, a gallon of olive oil, a long stick or wooden spoon.
- Next I bunch the flower heads together and trim off any excess stems. Now, stuff the flower heads in the jar compacting and squashing them down as you go. You want to pack the entire jar
as tight as possible leaving only a 1/4″ of air space at the top. - Next fill the jar with olive oil. Making sure to get as many as the air bubbles out as you can. This is where your wooden spoon or stick comes in handy. You might want to let it rest for 10 minutes allowing the bubbles to continue to rise, then repeat the process.
You want that oil 1/4 away from the top, but not closer or when it heats up it will leak out. - Next seal the jar and put it in the hottest sunniest location you have for the next week. You will see the oil slowly turning RED everyday! That is what you want. The finished product should be a dark blood red, but I normally don’t extract it till I need it.
However I do move the jar into a nice cool area other wise your oil will go rancid in the sun. Sometimes it takes more than a week. Don’t sweat it, but smell the oil to make sure it is not going bad if you have to leave it out longer. - Next, you will extract your oil in an herb press if you are lucky enough to have one. If not you can you some muslin and good old elbow grease. Basically, an herb press uses two pieces of metal to squeeze out the oil, but you can do the same by putting your mixture in muslin and SQUEEZE! Capture the oil, strain (seeds sometimes escape into the oil) and bottle in a dark glass jar! Store in a dark cool spot and this can last up to 3 years.
If you want to really learn herbal medicine making then this it. It is the one we used in Herbal School and the one I grab all the time. Easy, quick and concise for just about every herb.
