Rose Water

I've been reading through one of my herb books a lot lately, and getting lots of ideas for things that I want to do/make/etc. The latest thing to catch my eye was two recipes for rose water.

Traditional rose water is distilled, taking 2-3 quarts (!) of fresh rose petals to make about a quart of excellent quality rose water. Originally, the idea was to experiment with that tonight--but the recipe was rather involved and I wasn't going to be able to get started until 9:30 PM.

So. With that in mind, I've saved the distilled version for another day and settled on a simpler recipe. The roses were acquired from a house that I cleaned today (the yard at said house is packed with all different kinds of flowers and herbs and vegetables, and there were tons of heirloom roses in various areas), along with some cuttings off the rose plants in an attempt to grow my own.

Aren't they gorgeous? They were so fragrant that I could smell them from several feet away while picking them. *glee*

The recipe thus far is very simple:

Rose petals

1 part distilled water (I used filtered)

3 parts witch hazel

I had about a cup of petals from all the flowers.

The finished result...dated and labeled.

In 2-3 weeks (according to my book) this will be ready to be strained off and used for whatever I need. Another recipe I have my eye on is a light cream in the same book that calls for rose water...or I can use this as a facial toner, ingredient for other recipes, etc. Some other time I'll try the distilling method and compare the two results to each other. And I need to get more rose petals to dry for teas and salves...there's too many things to try and not enough time to do them. Sigh.

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I don't have pictures for this, but for the last two nights I've been doing hair rinses with comfrey (the first night) and a comfrey/rosemary blend (tonight). I prefer the second so far--comfrey by itself seems to make my hair a bit dry and somewhat 'snarly', for lack of a better word. Plus the rosemary smells better. Comfrey makes a really pretty clear green tea, but it tastes and smells...not disgusting by any means, but distinctive and isn't exactly pleasant.

I also tried to make a homemade shampoo with some rebatched soap my mom made (I took 4 tablespoons of grated soap, mixed it with 1 1/2 cups of tea and a couple tablespoons of glycerin and let it cool. The result is...viscous. And thick.). I'm not sure what to think thus far, except that it may have to grow on me. The effect is somewhat stripping, and after my normal routine of baking soda rinse followed by a vinegar rinse, it feels rather weird.

Tomorrow I shall expound and possibly take pictures. Until then, good night little interwebs world.