Fire Cider, Salves and Tinctures

 It's that time of year when I make fire cider to get us through winter and harvest the things I need for tinctures and salves. Most anything within reason can be used in fire cider. Today I used oranges, lemons, garlic, horseradish, turmeric, rosemary, ginger, onion, dried elderberries and jalapeno peppers. Everything except the oranges and lemons came from our garden.

Left side is rosemary in vodka which will sit for at least two months, probably three or four because I still have plenty of this tincture left. I made it today because the rosemary needed trimming.  The center jar is the fire cider. The jar on the right is a jar of olive oil with dried American Beauty Berry leaves which will steep for about six months before I make that into a salve. Also, there's another jar that was upstairs and didn't get into the picture that has American Beauty Berry leaves that are infusing into witch hazel and that will be our bug spray for next year.

I will make another jar of fire cider. One will not be enough if both of us it daily but, I'm out of half gallon jars. I have more on my next Azure Standard order but I'm sure I'll empty one soon and can use it to make more cider. 

It's been a fun day in the kitchen!