Category: Technique

Glossary of Helpful Terms – A work in progress

Amber Glass:  Any dark-brown to light-brown colored glass.  The dark color blocks transmission of ultraviolet light to the contents of the bottle, protecting the contents from premature degradation or other loss of quality.  Other colors of glass do not provide the same UV blocking properties as amber glass.

Buchner Funnel: a fine particulate filter setup, where flow of a liquid to be filtered is pulled through the filter medium using a vacuum, FMI visit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%BCchner_funnel

Filter: Any

Infusion:

Liquid: A term used on tincture.recipes to describe the solvent that will draw characteristics from the provided solid component of the tincture.  See also, Menstruum.

Marc:

Menstruum:

Light-blocking: See amber glass

Solids: A term used on tincture.recipes to describe the physical ingredient that will provide characteristics to the liquid solvent component of the tincture. See also, Marc.

Tincture:

 

 

 

Glossary of Helpful Terms

All tinctures contain the same two components: the liquid and the solid.

The liquid component of every tincture is responsible for acquiring properties obtained by the solid.  The official tincture term for the liquid component is menstruum, but we’ll refer to it as “the liquid” when sharing recipes.

The solid component of every tincture is responsible for providing properties to the liquid.  The official tincture term for the solid component of the tincture is “marc”, but we’ll refer to these components as “the solids” throughout this site.

A tincture recipe is a simplified set of instructions to guide each individual herbalist on the best practices for creating a tincture with predictable and repeatable effects.  Recipes will contain the same basic 3 components: how to prepare the solid, how to prepare the liquid, and how to combine the two to maximize extraction.

If you have ever made coffee or tea, you are already an experienced tincture maker.

In the coffee example, coffee grounds are the solid, and hot water is the liquid.

Tincture can be made with any liquid that will dissolve some property from the solid.