Conifer Tree Potions (Solstice Medicine - or How to use your Christmas Tree)

Solstice Medicine

~ Conifer Tree Potions ~

Solstice / Christmas trees can be timely medicine, and a way to bring the magic of your tree to further purpose and honor. If your tree isn't sprayed or somehow compromised, you can easily make a cabinet full of wonderful healing treasures from it, to give as gifts (ask your tree provider for clipping scraps!) or as winter medicines.

Elixir 

Elixirs are simple and a medicine easy to savor and enjoy over time. I spend the most part of elixir creating being with the plant; carefully gathering the plant and preparing if for medicine; which might be taking leaves from stems, plucking tiny flowers, clipping needles, or carving bark from twigs. This, to me, is where the culmination of magic and intention is created. By the time I place the charmed plant material in the jar and soak it with spirits and honey, everything is potent with goodness. Then it’s just a matter of letting the osmosis do its part over the next 4-6 weeks before decanting.

Conifer needles are rewarding to craft with in the winter; bringing crisp warmth and circulatory support for the lungs and body as a whole. Conifers make exceptional expectorants and additions to cough syrups.

To make an elixir, fill a quart size jar full with fresh pine, spruce, or fir needles and a few twigs. Feel free to add some resin drops if you have collected those too. They are common to find on white pine cones – you can pluck off the shingles with spots of resin and add them. Next, fill your jar ¾ of the way up with your preferred alcohol, (drinkable – do not use rubbing alcohol!). Fill the remainder of the jar with a good quality raw/local honey. Add a tight fitting lid, and shake every so often. Be sure to label and date it!!

To decant, simply pour through a muslin or cheesecloth lined strainer into a clean glass bowl or pyrex, and pour into your favorite apothecary bottles.

This will keep indefinitely if stored out of light and heat.

If you have also made a ginger or mint preparation, they make a very fine pair.

Spice Mix/Rub

Juniper, fir needles, pine needles, and various flavorful shrubs that are less popular (like spice bush) make very lovely nuances to cooking and pay homage to the local landscape.

First, you’ll want to let your needles dry. Place the whole twigs in a paper bag or cardboard box for about a week. When the needles are dry, they will effortlessly fall from the twigs.

Collect the needles, leaving behind ones that have yellowed.

Combine in a bowl:

2 parts:

Conifer needles
Rosemary leaves
Juniper berries
Salt Crystals
Peppercorns, cracked if you like

1 part:

Lavender flowers
Sage leaves, crumbled
Orange peel bits

Options for further refinement of purpose might be

 – chili, garlic, and paprika for a meat rub
 – allspice, coriander, and clove for a corned beef or pickling mix
 – dried onion, dried mushrooms, astragalus, and seaweed for a soup stock/ bone broth making blend.
--play!

Mix it all together, and place in little baggies or spice jars, with a label an idea for how to use it.

You can use a suribachi to refine the blend if you like, or you can offer a gift of the spice blend with  a suribachi, and inspire the chef in someone you love.

This spice blend is delicious as an infused vinegar – start some now and it will be ready for your holiday feasting!  It also makes a wonderful gravy or stuffing flavor. Any way you might use herbs de provence, you can use your conifer spice blend.

Infused oil 

If you know me, I don’t have to tell you how much I love making tree oils and tree balms. White fir being among my ultimate favorites, Yule time is a good excuse to make a batch.

First, I let the twigs wilt for a day or so. Then, I pack a jar with needles and twigs (same as I would with the above elixir instructions). Then, cover the plant material with a good quality oil; olive, jojoba, or coconut (warm to melt coconut oil).  Add a lid, place inside a paper or canvas bag, and put in a warm spot – near a radiator, wood stove, boiler, or heating vent. Be sure to not create a fire hazard. Let infuse for 1-4 weeks, strain and enjoy as an elegant culinary oil or a medicinal skin care oil. Whit fir needles (Abies concolor) are my favorite so far, for their strong orangey aroma and utter deliciousness.

You can then use your oils to create salves, by melting in just enough beeswax to thicken it. You can also find my Tree Medicine Salve set in the shop right now (but there are only a few):

Wild Forest Incense 

Loose incense is simple, beautiful, and rewarding. Blend your conifer needles (and some small broken up twig pieces) with your favorite fragrant coal herbs. Roses, White Sage, Sweetgrass, Pine resin tears, Cinnamon, Lavender, Rosemary, Frankincense, Copal, Myrrh, and Artemisia are all beautiful choices.

Mix together your blend, emphasizing the notes you wish to be stronger by using more of that herb. I generally try my blend a few times on a smoldering coal and adjust of needed before I decide if it is to my standards.

Package however you like, with a little instruction note and a roll of self-lighting charcoals and a ceramic incense dish.  Wrap some matches and a smudge feather as gifts to make it extra special, or make this for your own circle time.

If you're feeling adventurous, you can go for a more complex, Kyphi style incense. Kiva Rose offers a helpful article on the process here. 

And of course, you can always make a smudge wand:

Bundle up your twigs and wrap with natural string, hang and let dry in a ventilated area for about two weeks, out of direct sun or heat. 

Infused Butter/Ghee  

Conifer  needles make a delicious ghee. Simply warm the ghee over low heat, and stir in your fresh (1/2 day wilted) needles. Cover, leaving just a crack open at the side of the lid. Let infuse warm for about 8 hours. Strain and jar, letting cool to solid before capping.  

You can do the same thing to flavor your local pig lard, beef tallow, bear fat, or bacon fat for extra special cooking adventures. This makes an awesome gift for the hunter, primitive skills folk, or outdoorsman in your life.

If you have good clean deer tallow, it makes an incredibly beautiful natural salve when herbally infused.

For butter, chop fresh needles and sage leaves, stir into warmed butter, and when cool, roll into logs using parchment paper. You can also make decorative butter pats using candy molds. Refrigerate these herbal butters, and be sure your needles are not too bitter and not too hard to chew. 

Healing Needle Honey

To make a tree needle honey, simply fill your quart sized jar half way full with fresh needles. *taste* your needles to get a feel for the strength and bitterness! Fill your jar with good honey, and each day invert the jar so the honey completely saturates the needles. If this step is missed, your honey could either mold or ferment. If done properly, your infused honey will last you all year long (or longer) whether you choose to strain it or not. Personally I rarely strain my honeys. I like the crystalline herb leaves and petals, and add them to my tea as well. When I've gotten all the honey I can, I use the rest to brew a nice strong pot of tea or syrup, or I freeze it to use over time.

Tree needle honey is beautiful for everyday use, but especially helpful for the lungs when expectoration and loosening of congestion is needed. It is mildly stimulating to the mucosa and would be less desirable for an extremely dry condition. In that case, I would first use demulcents, and then a small amount of the tree needle honey.

Conifer Shrub

A shrub or oxymel is a mixture of vinegar and honey that is infused with herbs. It’s a traditional preparation (common in the Appalachia region). It makes a great gift and a very nice remedy for coughs, colds, and the flu. It’s awesome in salad dressing and sparkly beverages! Shrubs are a world of herbal fun and extremely easy to make.

Fill your quart or half gallon sized jar 1/3 of the way with plant material, dried or fresh.

For example:
1 part Tree needles
1 Part Orange peel
1 Part Elderberries

Cover the herbs well with good honey. You want to stay around the 1/3 amount of your total … unless you like your oxymel really sweet. 

Fill the rest of the way with apple cider vinegar, or other favorite naturally fermented vinegar (avoid distilled vinegars like white vinegar.) Cover and infuse for 5-20 days. Strain if you wish. We like to make individual bottlesfor gifts. 

If you have homemade vinegar, or home harvested honey, that’s really special!

Nourishing Needle Vinegar

Vinegar is a deeply nutritious preparation used for food and medicine. Vinegar withdraws all of the minerals from our plant friends and is excellent for our bone health, digestive health, and circulation. Tree needle vinegar is unique and wildly flavorful!

First, make sure you have tasted your needles. Add less if they are very bitter, more if they are less bitter.
Fill your jar 1/8 to 1/4 way full with needles, fresh. Fill to the top with good vinegar, and let infuse 3-6 weeks. Use a plastic lid, or on with a rubber gasket, as metal will rust.

Conifer needle vinegar can also be packed with items you wish to brine …. Hard boiled eggs, Olives, Carrots, Burdock roots, Turnips, or Beets – just add them to the jar before you pour the vinegar.

Juniper & Pine Needle Gin

Juniper – Pine gin, with a pinch of mugwort and lavender. Mmmmm a very classy gift indeed. How about an herbal smoking blend and a corn cob pipe with that? How about a fancy flask or a witchy spirits glass?

To Make:

Fill your jar (yep, your 1 quart jar again ;)
- 2/3 cup Juniper berries
- 2/3 cup fresh conifer needles
- 1 tablespoon allspice berries
- pinch of grated nutmeg, pepper, or cardamom if desired.
- pinch of mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris, or Artemisia absinthium)
-Cover with your favorite Gin or Scotch
-Lid and label
-Keep out of reach of children and away from fire hazard areas!

Let extract for at least a week. If you’re in a time crunch, make in individual bottles so you can leave the herbs in, simply label it with a “ready by” date for the recipient. Chances are it will be potent even after a few days.

Potpourri without Chemicals

Mix in a bowl:
Conifer needles (the majority quantity)
Rose petals
Sage leaves
Lavender flowers
Bay leaves, Sweet gale, or Eaucalyptus leaves.
Bark pieces, small … oak, paper birch, or shagbark hickory, if you like to gather these.
Acorn caps, dry.
Moss – Spanish moss is often available at craft stores, or you can use locally gathered beard moss or common stringy mosses (please be careful not to harvest anything at risk)

Drip into your mix, essential oils:
20 - 40 drops pine needle and/or Juniper berry
20 - 40 drops Cedar wood
10 - 20 drops Oakmoss absolute (highly viscous, be aware)
20 – 40 Orange essential oil if desired. 

Mix with a metal or glass spoon, and place in decorate bowls, glasses, or sachets wherever you like. Play with the amount of essential oils  - this is a forgiving recipe and you have all the room in the world to use less or more, and other oils you might wish to try. 

If you have extra essential oils you want to use, consider saturating some of the moss with it, and placing it in a tight container with a stack of stationery to create beautiful scented paper, and keep until Valentine ’s Day or the moment you’re moved to write a love letter. J

Bath Bags

Fill a muslin bag with equal parts conifer needles, roses, and peppermint. Add to your bath as it fills for a gentle healing tub for kids and adults alike. For a bedtime blend, use lavender, chamomile, hops, or jasmine in place of the mint. Oatmeal is a very nice addition as well.

Tea Blends - Try my Black Forest Chai Recipe From my recent archives: 

BLACK FOREST CHAI

An intense herbal brew for your days hiding in the Cave.

Into a pot on the stove or wood stove, add 2 to 3 quarts filtered or well water. 

Add: 

~ 1, One inch sized root of Osha, dried.

~ One tablespoon Smoked black tea, such as Lapsang Souchong, or a roasted Mate

~ 1 tablespoon  Licorice root

~ 1 tablespoon Cardamom seeds

~ 1-2 tablespoons Ginger, fresh minced

~ 1-2 Springs freshly gathered conifer twigs with needles (spruce, fir, or pine)

~ 1 handful fresh Black Birch twigs cut into 1 inch bits

~ 5-10 Juniper berries

~ One inch piece dried mushroom (chaga, reishi, or shitake) if desired

~ grated Nutmeg to taste

~ Black Peppercorns as desired

~ 1 Handful of your favorite nuts; walnuts, almonds, or hazelnuts work well)

Directions: Gently simmer all ingredients for 30-45 minutes (longer will make it stronger). When ready, ladle out cupfuls as you desire, into your favorite mug. Add cream and honey and herbal elixirs as desired. Enjoy.

Ornaments

Using candy molds, sprinkle bits of needles and petals into each one, and pour over with melted beeswax. When partially cooled but still soft, use a toothpick to poke holes for string.

Syrup

If you're in the mood to make a pine syrup, you can reference my previous article on the process HERE.

Share with us *your* favorite way to make goodies from your Yule tree! Leave a comment below, or come play on Facebook

And remember to check out the Apothecary before it's too late to order - right now it's stocked with limited edition botanical perfumes, aromatherapy/elixir support, dreaming goddess night cream, and tree medicine balms.....

~ Nymphaea ~ Honey Lotus Botanical Perfume Solid ~ Lt'd Ed. 2012 ~

Blessings to you on this paradox holiday.....

Love,
Ananda

Herbal Simple Syrups: Easy, Delicious Gifts!

Yuletide is different for everyone. Some of us get excited and filled with joy at the many ways we can give, exchange, share, and create.

And some of us feel tired. Perhaps we have worked all year long and not gotten ahead yet, or perhaps we have a large family with all different personalities.

Perhaps we are stumped at what to offer our neighbors that would be lovely, personal, simple, yet not too freaky-deaky!

Herbal Syrups can provide a beautiful nature-connected gift that is simple, easy, versatile, and extremely cheap to make.

Yes, it has sugar. White sugar. So it's no good for those struggling with blood sugar issues. For them .... infuse the herbs into vinegar, oil, or butter ;)

Herbal Syrup


~ Start with a simple syrup in a non-reactive pot. A simple syrup is equal parts water and sugar. For proportion's sake, lets say we put 4 cups of water and 4 cups of sugar into the pot. 


~ Next, add your herbs! Don't worry about exact amounts, just use common sense. 


~ Add 1/2 - 1 cup of herb if it's really strong, like Nutmeg, Clove, Hot Pepper, or Garlic.


~ Add about 1-2 cups of herb if it's on the strong side, like Ginger root. 


~ Add about 3-4 cups of herb if it's a medium and palatable strength herb, like Pine Needles, Peppermint, Cinnamon, or Licorice.


~ Gently keep the syrup at medium heat (always keep under boiling) until you reach the desired strength of flavor. This may take 20-40 minutes depending on the plant you've chosen. 


~ Strain carefully (simple syrups can seriously burn) through a cheesecloth lined strainer into a large pyrex with a pour spout. 


~ Bottle into food-grade bottles and label as desired.

White Pine Needle Syrup

Citrus Fruits are also fun to experiment with. I'm doing Meyer lemons this week! Keep in mind the sugar ratio though - if your fruit is going to add a lot more water content, you'll want to match that with more sugar. Otherwise it will not have the same preserving capability and will grow mold.

Traditional syrups are still valuable. If you have Elder berries, they make a wonderful purple syrup with flu-fighting properties. Pine needle syrup is excellent for lung congestion, and Peppermint is festive and helpful after a big meal. Ginger syrup is one of my favorites, and usually is a by-product of making crystallized ginger. However the syrup is soooo wonderful and appreciated at the holidays that now I make it for gifts!

Floral syrups are also lovely. Roses, Lavender, Jasmine, or Bee Balm flower syrups are all a welcome drizzle on ice cream, cake, or in a dessert cordial. How romantic!

Blends: Play around! Orange and clove make a classic pairing. Roses and Cocoa bits are decadent together, and traditional Chai spices can be combined to impress your Barista friends. (Ginger, Black Tea, Cinnamon, Cardamom, Black Pepper, Clove, and a little Nutmeg)

Vanilla Bean is perhaps, the shining star of all things lovely in the kitchen, and makes the rounds as a welcomed gift for all tastes. Pair with homemade vanilla extract, of course.

Love,

Ananda

Foraged Autumn Olives and Rose Hips, on their way to syrup together

This article was released for Poppy Swap! Where People and Herbs come together. Check it out! 

Storefront Launch at PoppySwap!

Come visit my store at PoppySwap where you will find my limited edition handcrafted collections of seasonal potions, elixirs, aroma-wear, and unguents. A little incarnation of my woodland wanderings and imagination combined with over 15 years of wildcrafting and making herbals.

Blessings and Gratitude,

Ananda

*please forward freely, including all text and links shown here. <3 thank you <3

Herbal Beads

Creativity can easily be thwarted when you consult the cabinets. I wanted to make cream but was out of beeswax. I wanted to make lip balm but was out of tubes. And on the list went. Out of frustration I forced myself to just look at what I did have, and see if there was something fun to make from that. What I did have, was some really fine herbal powders..... pink roses, red sandalwood, and green lavender...... and in the deep well of my "to-do-someday" list, herbal beads came up. 

I've never made them before, so I didn't know what to expect. I was suspicious that they wouldn't harden right or be durable. 

I mixed a simple paste from the recipes I have read and are also randomly listed on the internet, as approximately

1/2 cup herbal powder

2 Tablespoons all purpose flour

water, little by little until you have a workable dough

essential oils, optional and added last.

What I didn't expect, was the length of time it took me to roll all the beads... somewhere around 4 hours. 

Of course, when your hands are filled with sweet aromas, it's not too hard to let go of the clock and loose yourself in the rhythm. 

I found that making the holes with a medium sized metal crochet needle was much smoother than using wood (toothpick) or a tiny needle. Once I had the hole made I carefully strung it onto some hemp cord to dry. Newspaper is a good bed. 

I enjoyed watching the colors shift as the water left and the beads solidified. They are still fragrant and oh so lovely. They hardened quite well.

I also read that the original rosary beads were made from roses (hence the name) and while I have no proof of this, it sure makes sense..... and even more so when I think of how many rose bushes adorn the homes in my local Italian neighborhoods. Especially the apricot colored ones. Supposedly they were made from fresh, though, not dried, by making a slow cooked mash. It's the dead of winter here so I can't harvest fresh ones. 

 

I'm not Catholic - but I am more than willing to pray along a string of roses! 

Now, I can't see these being that durable, considering the contents, I imagine a drop of water would simply melt it back to goo. But I wouldn't want to lacquer them either, as that would block all of the lovely scent, and probably the natural texture, too.

I have seen that The Essential Herbal sells herbal bead making kits ( I haven't tried it) so maybe they know some additional secrets that I don't, if you are inspired and want some guidance.

For now, I love my sweet and simple beads, and will keep them for special friends and meaningful moments. I cherish the odd shaped chunky ones my children fashioned, and the square ones their best -yet suspicious - friend made ("you're a..... green witch??? what does that mean?") she says, as she requests more of that yummy 'leaf fusion', and 'leaf' soup.

Snippets of Yule

As a bonafide bah humbug, it is useful for me to consciously focus on the parts of Yule that bring me very special moments and memories, and that align with my core values. Here are a few of them......

Lighting my son's hand made tallow candle. In his Pioneers course, they rendered some beautiful deer tallow from a deer that the instructor had taken in as a mercy killing after it had been brutally hit by a car.

A green Yule...... I decided against wrapping paper this year. Everything we wrapped was in re-used stuff: Paper bags, last year's stuff, and extra packaging material from shipped boxes. The coolest ones were the bubble wrap (which my nine year old loves to pop) and the no-longer-needed blueprint paper. The Trader Joe's bags are pretty groovy too.

The amount of herbal gifts I give has drastically reduced from a large basket of maybe 20 goods in it per person or couple, to just one or two. Since working at Great Hollow I just don't have the time to keep up on home made herbal products or inventory for that matter. But I did manage to make a coupe really nice things..... a lovely sacred solstice smudge blend, containing red cedar needles I harvested, rose petals from an organic bouquet my hubby gave me, copal, myrrh, frankincense, lavender, and white sage. mmmmmmm. and the little finishing touch is the shell to scoop it out with.

A delicious and supremely soothing staple is a good quality comfrey salve. This one I kicked up a notch for gift giving - ok fine, for my own guilty pleasure! I put in a little cocoa absolute and clementine co2 and it smells out of this world delicious! The wrap on the left is a wash cloth I crocheted out of some really buttery wool blend yarn, and tied up in it is some good soap.

Now what did I get for Yule? Well, I got a few really special things, but topping the list is a generous antidote to my above stated dilemma...... HERBS! Yes, my Mama herbalist came through with flying colors and granted me a beautiful basket of organic and locally harvested bulk herbs, labeled "to my Medicine Woman Daughter" - almost needed the tissues for that one! Oats, Nettle, Red Raspberry leaf, Peppermint, Sassafras, and Astragalus. Perfect.

Recovery will be a breeze.............
I can sit back for a little while and sip my infusion amidst the boxes, new books and calendars, and watch the juncos collect seeds,

...and the Pileated Woodpeckers as they spiral up the hemlocks in a glorious and rhythmic tandem dance. Happy inbetween days everyone........