Herbal salve is often times used for supporting various skin ailments. Learn how to make comfrey salve as a healing herbal salve for skin.
Our skin is our largest organ. Healing salves can be a tremendous support for skin – by mixing medicinal herbs with oil, and then combining with beeswax, you can create a beautiful and supportive herbal salve.
These salves can be the perfect way to provide healing to skin to aid in tissue repair.
Why Comfrey?
Comfrey is a popular herb that has been around for thousands of years. Not only is it ideal to use in your vermicompost, it’s just as spectacular for skin. A healer for wounds, skin issues, bruises and even joints, comfrey helps to speed healing and encourage new skin and cell growth. Comfrey contains allantoin – an anti-inflammatory.
That anti-inflammatory speeds healing of the skin and aids in relieving the inflammation that can sometimes cause the skin issue.
Creating a salve with comfrey will give you a leg up on the healing process. It’s a wonderful salve to have at home no matter what time of the year. Your family might just reach for this comfrey salve before anything else – and you can enjoy the benefits of healing your skin issues naturally.
If you don’t grow your own comfrey to dry and use in salves, you can also order it online (Mountain Rose Herbs or Amazon both carry it).
Homemade Comfrey Salve Recipe
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- 1.5 C olive oil
- 1 C. dry comfrey leaves
- 1/4 C. beexwax pellets
Instructions:
Make an infusion with the olive oil and dried herb – you can do this any of several ways:
- Add 1 C. of dry comfrey to a mason jar and top with 1.5 C. olive oil. Tightly lid, place a brown bag over the top and allow to sit in the sun for 8-12 weeks. Give it a good shake every so often.
- Or, add 1 C. of dry comfrey to a mason jar and top with 1.5 C. olive oil. Place in a crock pot and add enough water to come within 2 inches of the top of the jar. Set on warm for 8 hours if not overnight.
- Instead of the crock pot you can place the jar in a small pot on the stove, and add enough water to come within a few inches of the top of the jar. Turn the stove on low for 2-3 hours taking care not to forget about your infusion.
Strain the hot oil through a fine mesh colander or cheesecloth. Add the beeswax and stir until the mixture is completely and thoroughly melted.
Pour that hot liquid into the jars/tins. I love using 2 oz tins, but you can also use glass jars. Allow those jars/tins to sit – do not move them!
Wait a few hours for the salve to harden up – if you move them, even slightly, during the process, you’ll ruin the perfect tops on your salve.
Comfrey Salve
Ingredients
- 1 C dry comfrey leaves
- 1.5 C olive oil
- 1/4 C beeswax pellets
Instructions
- Make an infusion with the olive oil and dried comfrey.
- Strain the infused oil through a fine mesh colander or cheesecloth into a large measuring cup.
- Add the beeswax and stir until completely melted.
- Once the mixture is melted, pour into containers of your choice. This recipe makes 8 oz of salve - or four 2-oz tins.
Other healing salve and skin recipes:
I’ve looked at several recipes and a few of them used comfrey powder, so I let my leaves hang dry, and then put them in a food processor. Now I have powder I like your recipe very much and I wonder if I shouldn’t decrease instead of one cup of leaves, perhaps half a cup of powder?
You could try that. Leaves will grind down to a very small amount of powder — you can aim for 2 Tbsp of powdered comfrey to 1 C of oil for infusing. Let me know how it turns out!
I’ve already made the infused oils
How much would I use of that plus the other ingredients
Hi Cheryl – if you have Comfrey Infused Oil, then simply combine with beeswax to make the salve. I usually divide the infused oil by 4.5 to determine how much beeswax. For example: if I have 4 oz of infused oil, then I’ll divide that by 4.5 = that’s the number of oz for beeswax. I find that ratio to be the perfect hardness for my salve here in Arizona. Not too soft, but hard enough to where it can ship in the mail – even in our hot 115 degree summers. I hope that helps!