Herb vinegar

Herb vinegar is my favourite salad dressing and it takes just a few minutes to make. All you need are herbs, white vinegar and an old glass sauce or oil bottle. I used an old sesame oil bottle.

Store it in a dark place when made. It's ready to use in about 2 weeks - when it smells "herby" it's ready to use and will develop more "herbiness" over time.

I now have enough herbs on the balcony to make a bottle.

Wash and dry the herbs

Pick a few different herbs - any combination is fine.

For this batch I used:
- oregano
- thyme
- rosemary
- vietnamese mint
- basil
- a piece of green onion (shallot)

Pack the herbs into the bottle

Fill with white vinegar

Extracting aloe vera gel

Aloe vera is a hardy succulent that has a long history of being used for medicinal purposes. It's easy to grow and has many uses in our homes.

The large Aloe vera on my balcony

A quick search on the internet will give you many uses for aloe and many things that it supposedly will cure. I can't vouch for all of them, but I do like it in my smoothies (aids digestion), for soothing skin and I've been experimenting with it in hand sanitiser

WARNING: Not all Aloe Vera varieties are considered edible, so check that you have a plant that is safe to eat. Edible Aloe vera is referred to as either Aloe vera barbadensis, Aloe barbadensis or Aloe vera barbadensis var. miller. It's the plain green one with thick, juicy leaves.

Growing

Aloe vera happily grows in poor soil and in hot, dry, sunny locations, but it can also be grown as an indoor plant as long as it's near a window with bright natural light. As a succulent it doesn't need a lot of water. I've had some pulled out of their pot and sitting in an empty bucket for 2 weeks and they still look succulent!

In the ground or a large pot they can grow rather large - I have one on the balcony that has leaves 45cm long and 10cm wide at the base.

 

Extracting the gel

Aloe vera has a sticky gel inside the long, spiky leaves that can be applied directly to your skin (great for relieving burns and sunburn), used to make homemade beauty products or added to food or drinks.

The easiest way I've found to extract it is to slice the spiky bits off then run your knife along under the skin - a bit like filleting a fish. Once you've lifted the top green layer off, run your knife under the gel to loosen it from the other side of the leaf.

Then it's just a matter of lifting the gel up and into a container. The video below shows how I go about it.

 

Storing the gel

If you have a lot of Aloe vera to process at one time, the easiest way to store it is in the freezer.

I whizz it up with the stick blender then pour into ice cube trays. Once frozen, I tip the ice blocks into another container to store in the freezer.

It's easy to add one to a smoothie, or your cooking, or to defrost however many you need for skin products.