Make It Yourself : Herbal Ghee
A Guide to Medicinal Butters for Topical Skincare
The very first book I ever bought on the topic of herbal skin care was “Absolute Beauty” by Dr. Pratima Raichur.
Written way back in the 80’s, it was a treasure trove of home remedies easily accessible to a teenager, and using ingredients readily found in a North of England kitchen in pre-internet times. I still have the original copy, which remains one of the most referred to books in my collection.
To my young mind, this magical tome hinted at a staggering revelation:
I would no longer have to rely on the acid burning “dabber” that was Zineryt1 to get rid of my embarrasing spots.
I didn’t have to fork out a fortune for skin care products that never lived up to their lofty claims.2
Contained within the pages was a simple, (yet highly under-rated) recipe that’s so easy, versatile and cheap to make, I’m amazed more people don’t know about it.
For the price of a pack of butter, it literally knocks the socks off some of the most expensive skin care products available on the market. If you only ever try making one topical home remedy in your life - let this be it.
Medicinal ghee.
What is ghee?
Ghee is made by simmering butter until the water evaporates and the milk solids become brown and caramelized. The pure, golden butterfat left behind is called ghee, or clarified butter. Ghee has long been valued by practitioners of Ayurvedic medicine. This is because it acts as a vehicle, carrying the medicinal properties of herbs deep into the tissues, “nourishing the nerves and the mind.”
Washed ghee or Shata Dhauta Ghrita, is said to be the only moisturizer able to penetrate through all seven layers of the skin. The preparation is made by adding butter and water to a copper vessel and manually kneeding until a fluffy, pure white, odourless cream is produced. The process for making this “100 times washed ghee” is laborious. Traditionally made at the time of the full moon, healing mantras are recited over it to imbue the preparation with healing energy. It is reputed to clear blemishes and hyper-pigmentation, reduce fine lines, and cool inflammatory skin conditions like eczema and acne.
