In the midst of winter, life can become a challenge. Between extreme temperatures and buildings heated too warm and low humidity, our lips become chapped and needing help. What did those hardy frontier folks do?
They made their own chap stick. Below is a recipe, or as they called it, a receipt for Lip Salve from the 1810 book, How To Cook. The remedies and cosmetics found in this book are fun to read about and to try to replicate. Although, I will admit that this recipe is beyond me.
Lip Salve – Take 2 oz. of best white wax, 2 ozs. of ox marrow, that has been well steeped in water for 3 days; melt them in a bath heat, then squeeze in a pound of best musk grapes, through a fine sieve; add a drachma of alkanet. Let them simmer, then beat it with a silver spoon till nearly cold, when you must run it into the boxes.
Mmmm...Ox marrow – I’m not sure where I would get this. And then there’s Alkanet root – a plant that makes a red dye. I wouldn’t need much as a drachma – dram – is only 1/8 of a gram. I think I’ll just stop by the drugstore.
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