For quite a while now I’ve used simply coconut oil as my ‘body butter’, make-up remover, as well as in cooking. However, I’ve recently decided to try cacao butter as a base in combination with some dietary manipulations to help treat some skin irritations as it’s worked for others and is a relatively low-reactive oil.
Cacao butter, however is solid at room temperature (in winter anyway) and somewhat difficult to rub into the body. So I concocted this combination with macadamia oil to reduce the melting point of the body butter and make it more malleable. I’ve added lavender essential oil here for its healing properties but feel free to spice the mixture up with your favourite essential oils, or omit completely if you like.
In summertime you might want to decrease the proportion of macadamia oil as it make the butter liquid at room temperature. Another option is to use Coconut oil as the base, or any combination of these 3 oils (Cacao, Coconut, Macadamia) then just add you favourite essential oil.
Ingredients:
- 1/2 C melted cacao butter
- 1/2 C macadamia oil
- 15-20 drops lavender essential oil (or any mix of your favourite essential oil depending on the properties you desire)
Method:
- Melt the cacao butter in a glass or steel bowl that sits over a bath of very hot water.
- Add the macadamia and lavender oils and stir together well.
- Transfer to a glass jar that you wish to store the body butter in.
- Place it in the fridge to set (this speeds up the setting process meaning the oils don’t have time to separate).
- Once set, remove from the fridge. I keep mine in the bathroom because that’s where I use it most – to moisturise my face and body after a shower!
- You can also transfer some to a smaller jar/container to carry around with you in your hand bag for hand cream.