making your own essential oil?....

[witchywoo]

sorry if this has been done before but i cant find anything tht would be useful to me on the net,,,,i want to boil the herbs somehow...or soak them...i have no idea ! lol dont want to go down the distilling route as i cant afford any extra equipment...any ideas greatly appreciated!
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[chickenchargrill]

It depends on what you want it for I think. You can leave the herb or flower in a carrier oil. Store in a warm place and shake each day for 3 weeks then transfer the oil to brown glass containers.

For a water, bruise the petals or herbs and place in water in a heavy pan. Place a bowl in the middle of the pan, and put the lid for it upside down. As it's cooking on low - the steam will collect and drop into the bowl. I make rose and lavender water this way. If you can, keep putting ice on top of the lid - so the steam is turned into water quicker.

These may be of use too - http://www.ehow.co.uk/how-does_4853279_ ... -oils.html
http://www.ehow.co.uk/how_5157208_make- ... -oils.html

[Green Aura]

You can't make a true essential oil without distilling it but as ccg says you can make a macerated oil easily enough.

Use a good quality carrier oil though - supermarket stuff is bleached, deodorised and coloured again but any therapeutic grade oil is good. Sunflower or sweet almond are the usual carriers but olive oil would work too - just stick it on a sunny windowsill.

When it's finished macerating, unless you're going to use it fairly quickly, you need to put some Vit E in it - you can get capsules quite cheaply from any health food place.

[frozenthunderbolt]

I have made oregano oil before. using fresh herb in a musling bag with water in a pressure cooker. FLared some copper pipe to fit over the pressure release then ran it up, along, down and through a coil in a bucket of cold water.
This would be viewed as a distialation device so check your local laws before construction.
With this set up you MUST bag your herbs as if they are lose and block the pressure release you dont have an oil still any more, your have a steam powered bomb.
If i was to do this again, i would get another pressurecooker (old one) and drill and extra hole an mount a second pressure release in the lid incase the outlet that i had taking the steam got blocked. - talk to a boilermaker.

Failing this i believe an air still TM (eetc) is ok for esential oils. I sure hope so, as the booze it creates is shite.

NOTE: I live in NZ where personal distilation is completely legal. YMMV.