Hi friends, how are we all keeping during these times? What are you doing to stay busy and healthy? We thought we would share with you how our beautiful Lemon Myrtle Oil is made, since so many of you have been LOVING it in our newest body bar, Lemon Myrtle Oil + Manuka Honey.
The first step of course is to gather the fresh Lemon Myrtle. Lemon Myrtle is actually called Backhousia Citriodora, this is the botanical name commonly used in ingredient lists or when referring to the therapeutic properties of the oil. We have an abundance of Lemon Myrtle plantations at our lovely farm on the Mid-North Coast of NSW. We just love the smell of Lemon Myrtle and knew it would be a perfect essential oil to include in our products.
The next step is where the distilling fun begins! Once the Lemon Myrtle has been harvested, it is placed into a large vessel. A second vessel, filled with water, is then heated to produce steam which travels into the vessel containing the Lemon Myrtle plants. The steam will extract the essential oils from the Lemon Myrtle and allow the essential oil molecules to rise to the top of the vessel.
The steam containing the essential oil molecules is then transferred through a cold “condenser.” This cooling will convert the steam back to water, which is moved to a final vessel containing floral water at the bottom and the essential oil at the top. Think of it like Rose Oil and Rosewater, the Rosewater is just less potent with the essential oil.
The Lemon Myrtle Essential Oil is then transported back to our factory on the Northern Beaches of Sydney, to be made into soap for all of you lovely people! We highly recommend trying our Lemon Myrtle + Manuka Honey Body Bar, the smell is just gorgeous and not to mention Lemon Myrtle is extremely beneficial to the skin with antioxidants, anti-bacterial, and anti-inflammatory properties.
We hope you enjoyed this little insight into how we craft our products! Do you have a favourite essential oil? Comment below!
Lots of love, Freshwater Farm xo