Lemon essential oil is a natural, multi-use product that few people know.
In addition to its uses to perfume or disinfect the home, lemon essential oil has multiple benefits recognized for centuries.
In traditional Arab medicine, lemon was considered a real panacea for cleaning wounds, relieving burns or fighting skin diseases.
Easily preserved and highly concentrated in vitamin C, the lemon was the ally of the great navigators of the 15th and 16th centuries to avoid scurvy.
Lemon essential oil is today a grandmother's remedy still used in particular as:
• Antiseptic: vitamin C and antioxidants in lemon boost the immune system. Pour 3 drops on a handkerchief and breathe it in regularly to fight winter viruses. When diffused, lemon essential oil sanitizes the house.
• Mouth and throat care: against canker sores, angina, hoarse voice, pour 2 drops of essential oil in a glass of water and make a gargle.
• Against gastroenteritis: diffuse a few drops of essential oil in the house to limit the spread of the virus.
• Against heavy legs: massage yourself from the ankles upwards with essential oil diluted 20% in vegetable oil (eg organic olive oil).
• De-stressing: diffuse a few drops of essential oil around the house.
Lemon essential oil is easily found in organic stores or here on the Internet.
But the best thing is to make this lemon essence yourself!
Know that this homemade recipe is not strictly speaking "essential oil", but rather a lemon macerate.
Either way, the lemon essence you get with this method is just as effective and has the same benefits as regular lemon essential oil.
The big advantage of this homemade recipe is that you don't need a still, distiller or other complicated equipment, or even alcohol.
Here is the economical and super easy recipe for making lemon essential oil:
- 2 pans
- 2 organic lemons
- 200ml of water
- 100 ml of organic virgin olive oil
- 1 glass jar with lid that resists high temperatures
- container for storing essential oil
1. Heat 200 ml of water in a saucepan until it simmers.
2. Then peel the lemons so as to remove only the rind without the white part.
3. Remove the pan from the heat and put the lemon peel in hot water to eliminate its bitter taste.
4. Let them steep in the water for 1 or 2 minutes. You will see that the rind of the lemon will slightly tint the water a yellow color.
5. In another empty saucepan, place the jar upright without a lid.
6. Pour the olive oil inside the jar.
7. Transfer the lemon peels to the same jar, without the water that has turned yellow.
8. Halfway fill the pan in which the jar is located with water.
9. Turn on the fire under the saucepan to gently heat the jar in a bain-marie.
10. Heat over low heat for about 3 hours.
11. Remove from heat and let stand at room temperature for 24 hours.
12. Then pour this lemon essence into the small containers for essential oil.
There you go, your homemade lemon essence is already ready :-)
Easy, fast and economical, right?
As you can see, making your own lemon essence is very simple and economical. Nothing fancy!
Remember to store your homemade essential oil containers, tightly closed, in a cool, dry place.
- as indicated above, this homemade recipe makes it possible to obtain lemon essence and not lemon essential oil . Therefore, you cannot use it in an essential oil diffuser like this.
- when you peel the lemons, be sure to remove the white part below the rind. Indeed, only the yellow part (the zest) is useful for this homemade recipe.
