I regularly work with CBD now that it’s legal in Ohio by making tinctures, salves, infused oils, balms and other medicinal herbal products for my community members. These concoctions can be used topically directly applied to the ailment or by way of internal ingestion to where a few drops of a potent extract can be applied under the tongue and held for a time. Although the method I took to create these plant-based medicinals is quite different than historic preparations, herbal medicine has been around since the dawn of time.
To begin, you take dried plant matter and soak it in an ethanol bath and freeze the mixture as it soaks. Ethanol or 190-proof grain alcohol can be used to do this. Because it’s an aggressive alcohol, it pulls out the cannabinoids and plant terpenes, along with the scent and taste of the plant. Once that’s been done, a very fine filtering process must take place to successfully complete a high quality and potent extract. Once that’s complete, I use an ethanol recovery machine like the Source Turbo from ExtractCraft, which essentially boils down the filtered mixture until all that’s left is a thick oil. CBD must be decarbed, meaning it must be heated to activate the CBD molecule to transform it from CBDA to the healing compound of CBD.
Mix this extract oil into MCT (coconut) oil or Olive oil and you have a very workable extract that can be melted into a salve, or simply dropped on the tongue as a tincture. You can also make edibles like CBD gummies, or with this process you can make vaping concentrates as well. The ethanol I work with is the 190-proof high quality grain alcohol made by 42O Extractor, which is a Colorado family distillery, who specialize in high proofed alcohols meant for medicinal extractions like this. While it’s very flammable, nothing else can get the job done to create clean medicinal extracts like this. 42O Extractor was kind enough to send four jugs of their extracting alcohol and I’ve been able to perfect the process with their product.
So if you want to take charge in your life by creating your own medicinal plant extracts and making your own medicine, this is one of the best ways to accomplish the objective. If you would like to learn more about 42O Extractor, click here.