How To: Lemon Glycerine Extract

After discovering how fabulously glycerine captures the freshness of cucumber, I had to see if it was just as good at capturing lemon.

Guess what!?

Yeah, you guessed - it's GREAT!

Let's make lemon glycerine extract!

Calculating the Percentage

Glycerine extracts are commonly made with dried plant materials that are reconstituted with water, then added to the glycerine.

The usual ratio of water to glycerine is 50/50. But we're using fresh ingredients here, so we need to do a titch of calculation.

Fresh lemon is about 50% water, so we’re going to need double lemon to glycerine giving us a ratio that looks like this:

• 33.3 % Glycerine
• 66.1 % Organic Lemon
• 0.5 % Preservative (I used benzyl alcohol)

Even though this is a glycerine extract (and would not normally need preservation), Aroma Zone (whos method I have followed for this and the previously made glycerine extract) recommends adding preservative.

Method

• Sanitize the jar and your equipment
• Wash and and slice the lemon, removing any seeds
• Weigh and add the lemon
• Weigh and add glycerine
• Add preservative
• Place lid on jar
• Keep jar in a dark and not too warm area
• Agitate the jar daily for 1 week

Tip: Always always measure your ingredients by weight - this is the only accurate way to be sure of your amounts in any formula.

Straining

To strain and bottle the extract, you'll need:

• Funnel
• Container to strain into (choose something you can easily sterilize and pour from)
• Filter of some type (coffee filters or cheesecloth)
• Container for your extract
• Labels

Place the funnel into the container and line it with your chosen filter.
Strain the glycerine.

I wish there was a sniff button here - the glycerine has beautifully captured the scent of the lemon.

Final step: transfer to your final container.
Label and date
Use within 6 months.

Storing

Here's the final product. As you can see, it has taken on a golden hue from the lemon.

To Use

The extract can be used in place of glycerine in any formula. I've tried this one in skin tonic and the previously-made cucumber extract in an eye cream.

Coming Up Next

We're not done making glycerine extracts just yet... stay tuned for a strawberry glycerine extract.

More How-to's

Cucumber Glycerine Extract - 1
Cucumber Glycerine Extract- 2
Visit the How To Page

Final Note

Thank you María for the inspiration - you've really started something here!