Essential Oils Distiller

This past week we received the Essential Oils Distiller that was purchased for us by Friends of Ix-canaan and Dr. Bob Dixon in Calgary, Alberta.   It has been our dream, since we began Project Ix-canaan, to create essential oils with the leaves and/or seeds of specific trees, with the goal of finding an essential oil or hydrosol that would be valued on the open market, thus providing a financial reason for keeping the trees.

We carefully unpacked all the pieces …

We decided to use Cuban Oregano for our first batch of essential oil because of its qualities of rapid growth (we have lots of it), strong aroma, and fat leaves.

I chopped up the leaves and stuffed them into the 2-liter flask … we figured to start small while we figured out what we are doing.

We put all the pieces together, and turned it on.

It took about 20 minutes for the water to come to a good rolling boil.  And about another 20 minutes for the steam to work its way up through the plant material and down the condenser tube to the collector at the bottom.

We left the distiller going for about 4 hours, but most of the oil had collected after about the first 20 – 30 minutes.  We also ended up with about a liter of hydrosol .. a clear liquid that, from its smell, was quite strongly mixed with essential oils and can be used for the same things.

In the process of our experiment, we discovered that Oregano has a lot of incredible healing properties.  Amongst other things, it is anti-oxidant, antiseptic, anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-viral, anti-spasmodic, insect repellent and sedative.  We have already had occasion to use it succesfully with patients through the clinic.