Pairing botanical oils with herbal constituents for herbal skin care

What herbal constituents get extracted into herbal infused oils?

I have been pondering this question for a long time.

“But you have a PhD in chemistry – shouldn’t you be able to figure this out?!” I hear you ask.

I mean, yes, I do have quite a good idea which herbal constituents from which plants make it into herbal oils. (And I will generously share about them in Oily Craft - 3-part online course on botanical oils (& tallow), herbal infused oils & herbal salves, balms and body butters.) But I am always hungry for more specific detail.

Recently I came across claims such as:

“Oil X is better for extraction of {insert name of a herbal constituent} than oil Y.” etc.

which sparked both my interest and suspicion. 

Should we select botanical oils based on the oil-soluble herbal constituents we wish to extract? Contrary to recently popular internet belief, I argue that apart from following through with several general considerations, we need not worry about such pairing for the purposes of small-scale herbal skin care making. Below is why (briefly). 

How can we tell what we extracted into herbal infused oils?

When assessing the molecular composition of a herbal infused oil (at home), we can rely on:

1. An organoleptic analysis

i.e. Use our senses of sight, smell and taste to understand what herbal constituents made it into the herbal infusion.

2. Chemistry knowledge

We can lean into general chemistry principles to make educated guesses about what constituents are extracted. This will inform us about the molecular composition of herbal oils in more detail.

3. Review of scientific literature

Finally, we can further underpin the above by reviewing published scientific literature. Such a review is not a trivial thing and can easily take months/year(s) of full-time work (yes, even with access to AI tools). It is also handy if you are at least semi-proficient in chemical analysis and its methodologies.

What do these tools allow us to say about our herbal oils?

Even if all this information was available to you, I argue that there would still be data missing. Yes, essentially, I am saying that there should be more experimental work done before making conclusions about pairing botanical oils with herbal constituents for use in herbal skin care making.

Without performing an actual analytical measurement of our herbal oils, our knowledge of their exact molecular composition simply can’t be accurate enough to justify claims such as:

“I made my extract with tallow instead of olive oil, so my extract is richer on carotenoids (and therefore more effective) than yours.” 

We may theorize about it on the above grounds, but it remains in the realm of an interesting scientific discussion. Because (to sum up):

1. There is no consensus on this in the scientific literature (yet).
2. There are far too many extraction variables that will influence the outcome and that we simply cannot account for in our small home labs.
3. You need an analytical measurement to be this precise with your claims.

Even if you could confirm that generally tallow extracts and retains carotenoids better than olive oil. Would this be the only variable governing the formulation of your product? It might, if carotenoids were all that you cared about. But there are other variables to consider:

• Effect of tallow vs. olive on the skin
• Accessibility
• Price
• The overall formulation
  

The - likely marginal – difference between extracted carotenoids in tallow and olive oil (still only hypothetical in my line of reasoning) would be offset by the other factors. Ultimately, you could make way more effective formulation using olive oil, even if the amount of extracted carotenoids was slightly lower than in tallow. Bear in mind that the selected botanical oil is not just a solvent but an active ingredient in your skin care product, too!

In Oily Craft, specifically in Module 2, you will learn about:

• What types of herbal constituents can you expect to find in your herbal infused oils.
• How to tell they are there (and can you tell in what concentration?). 
• What do they do to the skin and which herbs are rich on them? 
• Relevant factors that actually matter when selecting a botanical oil for your herbal oil infusion.
• Number of methods for infusing oils with herbs - how they actually work, their pros & cons etc.
• How to avoid bold inaccurate statements that might not be valid for your particular extract anyway.

While Module 1 is solely dedicated to differences between botanical oils and how to choose them for your herbal skin care formulas.