How To Make Tincture With Herbs and Mushrooms

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Have you ever made an herbal or mushroom tincture at home, or wondered how? If not, it’s incredibly easy. There are so many ways you can make herbal preparations and extractions, but in this article I’ll just be talking about alcohol tinctures. I’ve been doing lots of foraging lately, so this is one of the best ways for me to preserve and use what I find for medicine. If you want to learn more about herbalism and foraging skip to the end of this article for a list of some of my favorite books.

What is a Tincture

A tincture is an extraction of plant or mushroom material made by soaking the material in alcohol for a period of time. Tinctures are potent, have a shelf life of a few years, and are an easy and portable way to take your herbal medicine.

Reasons To Make Your Own Tincture

Maybe you were given some herbs from a friend’s garden, or found the motherload of turkey tail mushrooms on a log and you’re wondering what to do with them? Perhaps you bought a 2 lb bag of dried tulsi on Amazon Prime Day and realized you can’t possibly drink that much tea (that was me actually) so you’re looking for more options. Even if you don’t forage or do any gardening there are plenty of reasons you might want to make your own tinctures.

Quality. Knowing what you’re getting is extremely important. The health and wellness industry is absolutely huge, and adulterated with sketchy sellers just like every other industry. There are countless brands out there and plenty of them are honest and reputable, but it’s almost a full time job trying to research it. When you make your own tincture you know exactly what is going into that bottle.

Potency. Let’s be realistic, you would have to drink 3 gallons of tea in a day to really get the medicinal benefits of some plants. Don’t get me wrong, I love drinking herbal tea and it has it’s benefits for sure, but it’s not always enough. Many times a strong extract will serve you best.

Ease of use and good for travel. Sometimes it’s just easier to take a dose of tincture which is usually only around 1 ml or less. A lot easier than drinking loads of tea, especially when you’re on the go.

Shelf life. Tinctures keep for a long time, longer than dried herbs which will eventually get stale much sooner than a tincture will degrade.

Gratification. I just get a warm fuzzy feeling knowing I made my own medicine from these amazing plants, and it’s even better when shared with friends and family.

Cost. Foraging is free, and growing your own herbs is very economical. You’d be amazed at how many medicinal plants are probably growing right in your front yard and are considered weeds. Even if you have to purchase fresh or dried plant material, it is still going to cost you much less to do extractions yourself.

Maybe you’re not much into growing but you take a turmeric supplement. A full pound of turmeric root from Whole Paycheck (I know you know who I’m talking about) is $14.99/lb and you do not need that much. That’s not even as much as the average cost of one bottle of turmeric capsules. A 1 oz bottle of Bloobity Blah Botanicals Sunshine Blend can cost anywhere from $15-$100 depending on brand. A 1.5 L bottle of 100 proof vodka costs me $16.99.

Even if you buy extremely high quality organic liquor ounce for ounce you will likely be paying less. I’m not going to do the math but that 1.5 L bottle makes quite a few 1 oz bottles of tincture. You can reuse any glass jars with lids and tincture bottles you already have, or purchase them. Obviously this all can vary. The bottom line is the upfront starting cost is going to be about the same as purchasing one bottle of commercial tincture or supplement capsules.

Okay, Let’s Get Started. You Will Need:

• Glass jars with lids
• Knife and cutting board
• Fine mesh strainer, sieve, or cheese cloth. These little nut bags are awesome!
• Small pitcher or liquid measuring cup with a spout
• Small funnel
• Bottles for storing final product, preferable with droppers.

Optional items that will get the job done quicker and more efficiently:

• Small blender or food processor, like a Magic Bullet or Ninja
• Mortal and pestle
• Tincture press or French coffee press
• Kitchen scale

Ingredients needed include dry or fresh plant material. This can be roots, stems, flowers, or the whole plant. Parts used depends on the particular plant you’re making tincture with. For example, all parts of dandelion can be used, and each part has different medicinal benefits. Other herbs you might only use the flowering tops, such as goldenrod. A google search should get you the answer and I have a whole list of books and resources I recommend at the end of this article. You can also tincture mushrooms fresh or dry.

What About The Booze?

You will need alcohol for your extraction. Any alcohol you can drink. Yes that’s right, if you like tequila, rum, bourbon, whatever, it is perfectly fine to use. Most people just use vodka because it’s cheap with the least flavor. The only rule is it should be a minimum of 80 proof (40% alcohol.) I prefer 100 proof. You can go even higher and use Everclear, a strong grain alcohol but it’s usually not necessary. I’m just generalizing here, we can make this as complicated as we want but to keep it simple, in most cases you will only need 100 proof alcohol. If you’re reading about a plant or mushroom and Everclear is recommended, then use the Everclear. I’m a fan of saving money and our local liquor store has a nice cheap 100 proof vodka so that’s what I go with. A final dosage is going to be 1 ml at most so I’m not trying to savor the flavor.

Ratios for Making Tincture

There is a precise method and there is the folk method. The folk method is basically just a nice way of saying “I don’t want to measure so I’m going to stuff this jar and cover the material with alcohol.” I am a folk method kind of girl. It works perfectly fine. Measuring is not a bad idea though especially to better help with calculating dosages because you will know exactly how much plant material you used per ml of alcohol.

For the folk method fill your jar with herbs leaving around an inch at the top. Really stuff the jar if the herbs are fresh. Then just fill the jar and cover with alcohol. Make sure all plant material is fully covered by the alcohol and you’re good to go.

If you are the measuring type, the gold standard ratio is: 1:5 for dry herbs which means 1 part (weight) dry material to 5 parts (volume) alcohol. If you are using fresh plants, the ratio is 1:2. For example: 100 grams of dried catnip leaves would require around 500 ML of alcohol. Often times when measuring you’ll notice it seems like way too much plant material and not enough alcohol. I always struggle with this and end up using more. Some stuff will be heavier or fluffier with a lot more volume so it doesn’t seem to work as well. This is why I just use the folk method and enough alcohol to barely cover the herbs. Neither way is wrong or right, just different.

Some plants it’s preferable to tincture fresh as quickly as possible since the active ingredients degrade very quickly. St John’s wort is one example. It loses potency if dried. I’ve read everything from it being a little weaker, to being completely useless dried and almost immediate. I always tincture this plant fresh just in case. If a plant is really juicy, like jewelweed, you may want to let it dry some or use a higher alcohol percentage to keep it from diluting too much and spoiling. Just keep this in mind and use your own judgement.

Storage

Almost done! Screw the jar lid on tight, and give it a shake. Your jar should sit for 4-6 weeks, and shake it up daily. You can use a piece of plastic wrap or wax paper over the jar underneath the lid to avoid corrosion. Keep the jar out of direct sunlight, but put it somewhere in sight so you don’t forget about it completely.

Almost Done!

After time is up, strain your liquid with a fine mesh strainer or cheese cloth into a glass pitcher of appropriate size. Squeeze as much liquid out as possible with clean hands. This is where a tincture or coffee press can come in handy to push out every last bit of liquid. You don’t have to spend a ton of money. An inexpensive French press can do the job and they come in different sizes for big and small batches. In some cases you may need to do a final strain through a coffee filter if there is a lot of sediment. Then just funnel into your dropper bottles and you’re done. Store in a cool spot, and your tincture has a shelf life of years. Congrats, you just made your own medicine!

Take It One More Step (optional)

To extract the most out of your plants or mushrooms you can do what is called a double extraction. This is where you combine a water extraction with the alcohol extraction. Instead of discarding the plant material that has been sitting in alcohol, you combine it with water and simmer on the stove, strain, and reduce. A full double extraction article will be posted, and I’ll update this last bit when it’s up. If you read this far, thank you and I hope it was helpful. I’d love to hear about what you’re in the process of making. Leave a comment below!

Resources and Book Recommendations

For information on herbalism:

• Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine: 550 Herbs and Remedies for Common Ailments
• Herbalism for beginners: A practical guide on how to improve your health by using inexpensive, accessible herbs 
• Native American Herbalism For Families: Develop Herbal Intuition With 100 Western Medicinal Plants – an Herbalism for Beginners Book with Illustrations – The Premier Native American Herbalist Bible 

Foraging information:

• Wildcrafting Weeds: 20 Easy to Forage Edible and Medicinal Plants (that might be growing in your backyard!)
• Northeast Medicinal Plants: Identify, Harvest, and Use 111 Wild Herbs for Health and Wellness
• Pacific Northwest Medicinal Plants: Identify, Harvest, and Use 120 Wild Herbs for Health and Wellness 
• Southwest Medicinal Plants: Identify, Harvest, and Use 112 Wild Herbs for Health and Wellness 

This post may contain affiliate links. See full disclosure page here. Your support is much appreciated and helps keep this site running. Thank you for being here!