Herbal Medicine Chest for Beginners {What To Have In There!}

Learning Herbal Medicine

For other items in your home herbal medicine chest, I suggest the following items to help make your herbal emergency medicine kit. These will be helpful as you are learning herbal medicine and how to use it safely.

• Vodka, brandy or nonalcohol menstruums. You can use food grade glycerine or apple cider vinegar. These are a must for making herbal tinctures, as they “pull” the medicinal qualities from the herb. Normally, for alcohol, you would use 5 mL of liquid for every gram of dried herb. Since it’s medicinal, you NEED to measure by weight. For glycerine and apple cider vinegar, you would use 3mL of that liquid PLUS 2 mL of water for each gram of herb.
• Garlic-most households will already have fresh garlic in their kitchen for culinary uses. Garlic also has medicinal qualities to it that make this a MUST have on hand. Garlic infused olive oil is great for ear aches, or even used on warts. You can also assist the body in shortening the life of a cold or flu by liberally adding this to your food. Again, letting “food be your medicine” is a great choice. My mother in love used to feed my hubby raw garlic on buttered bread when he was sick. It wasn’t his favorite, but he felt it worked at getting him over being sick sooner.

These herbs are my personal favorites, and the ones we always have on hand.

Building our herbal medicine cabinet has helped us save time and money. We do not have to go to the doctor every time we have a cough and sniffle, and I feel better that we are assisting our bodies naturally during stressful times, colds, coughs, the flu, and minor burns, cuts, and scrapes.