Tinctures take a little effort to make but are well worth the investment of time and materials. They are just herbal constituents extracted in alcohol rather than any of the other solvents listed on our Remedy Making page Tinctures are used for –

• solubility -some compounds are soluble in alcohol, some in water, this makes tincturing the perfect blend.
• strength – tinctures extract the best from a plant in a very concentrated form.
• palatability – a little tincture from a bad tasting herb is far better than a teapot full!
• storability – extended shelf life (5-10 years)
• portability – they’re easy to carry around in a dropper bottle.

Tincturing terminology

Tincturing is as much art as it is science, craft and cooking. It has its own terminology that isn’t that difficult to get your head around. Some are so basic that I don’t need to list them. Below are the key terms (there are many more but these are all we’ll need for our purposes –

• Alcohol – a colourless, flammale liquid formed by the fermentation of sugar. It is our primary solvent in kitchen herbalism.
• Decant – pour a liquid from one container to another in order to separate sediment.
• Double extraction – a two stage process of extracting constituents from a herb using both water and alcohol.
• Ethanol – the kind of alcohol that we use in tincturing. DO NOT USE ANY OTHER TYPE OF ALCOHOL!
• Infuse – to soak a herb in a liquid in order to extract it’s beneficial constituents. In kitchen herbalism, infusing is done in water, tincturing in alcohol.
• Macerate – softening a herb by steeping or soaking so as to separate it into its constituents.
• Marc – the plant material left after the tincture has been filtered (don’t throw it away, it’s very useful for improving your tincture).
• Menstruum – the solvent used to extract and dissolve a herb’s constituents.
• Percolate – to trickle a solvent through finely ground material so that it extracts the material’s constituents.
• Precipitate – to fall out of solution.
• Solute – the substance dissolved in the solvent.
• Solvent – the liquid that dissolves the herb’s medicinal constituents for the tincture.
• Tincture – a medicine made by dissolving a compound in alcohol

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There are four ways of making tinctures, 3 of which we use at Ligaya Garden. The fourth is a bit complicated for kitchen herbalists.

3 ways to tincture

The best alcohol concentrations for tincturing different types of herbs

Because of the physical characteristics of the herb, its constituents and moisture level, some concentrations of alcohol are better at extracting constituents from different herbs.

Best ranges for the type of herb

40-50%  – extracts water-soluble properties, used for most dried herbs and fresh herbs that aren’t too juicy.

50-60% – is a great range for tincturing soft, moist herbs such as Cleaveres and Chickweed. Their high levels of moisture can dilute the solvent, so a slightly higher concentration compensates.

70 – 85% – extracts most volatiles, good for high moisture herbs, great for  Mints, berries and roots.

85% – 95% – Extract tightly bound aromatics and oils.

Higher % alcohol destroys cell walls and draws water out of the plant, allowing better extraction from tougher plant material.

Some tips for tincturing

• Cut or grind your herbs as finely as possible without turning them to dust. This allows more surface area to be exposed to the alcohol, which leads to faster and better extraction.
• Too finely grinding your herbs will quickly clog any filters that you may use to filter the tincture. That’s time-consuming and frustrating, not to mention a waste of coffee filters!
• Pour your fresh tincture into a decanter before filtering it and let it settle. That way, any suspended solids will settle to the bottom. You can then pour off the clear tincture (which will go pretty well straight through your filter unhindered). Then change your filter and pour in the cloudy material at the bottom of the decanter – that’s the bit that takes a long time to work its way through filters nd may end up clogging them too miuch.
• If you have a handle on using alcohol (see our page ‘A little about alcohol‘ to learn more about using that solvent), you may want to start macerating your herbs in the strongest alcohol that you can get. Leave the brew for a couple of days, then add the right amount of water to dilute the alcohol to the strength and amount that you want to finally use. Very strong alcohol (greater than 70%) can break down the plant’s strong cell walls and allow you faster access to the goodies inside.
• On a similar note, it is possible to freeze your some fresh herbs overnight to break down the cell walls of the herbs. The water in the cells expands as it freezes, rupturing the walls of the cells, once again, allowing you faster access. to the cell’s contents.
• Some constituents, such as beta-glucans in Oats and Fungi are water soluble but insoluble in alcohol. If you add alcohol to any water extraction (or vice versa) containing polysaccharides they will precipitate out, turning the solution cloudy and eventually settling at the bottom of the storage bottle. A quick shake of the bottle before dispensing the tincture will get the polysaccharides mixed in wth the rest of the tincture. Check our post ‘what’s this goo in my tincture‘ for more info on this phenomenon.

Does the moisture in fresh herbs affect the alcohol concentration?

Some plants are full of moisture. I sometimes get asked if that affects alcohol concentration in your tincture. There’s the answer on this page.

It doesn’t affect tinctures made by the percolation method because, in that case, we are using dried material. It can affect both folk and ratio method extractions, but only if you’re using very moist herbs such as Chickweed.

For very moist herbs such as Cleavers and Chickweed, I recommend using a higher alcohol concentration, around 50% – 60%, to compensate.

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