Nourishing Shea and Hand Balm Recipe

Shea butter is an incredibly versatile and nourishing ingredient to keep at home. I love adding it to everything, and I love making my skincare with it! Today, we’re making shea hand balm.

The recipe makes a fragrant, vegan, nourishing, and conditioning balm that easily nurtures the skin, feeding it all that good stuff, while protecting it from the environmental influences: harsh winds, cold weather. This is a great hand balm for all who are gardening, working with their hands a lot, or having your hands exposed to anything that dries the skin and damages them in the long run (water, chemicals, trees, plants, etc.).

This recipe is very easy, even if you’re a complete beginner! It only requires a bit of weighing, a bit of melting, and some waiting.

Before we get to the actual recipe, let’s have a word about the ingredients used in the recipe:

Vitamin E oil is an antioxidant. It helps prolong the shelf-life of this balm, and it adds extra nourishing properties to it.

Candelilla wax is a vegan alternative to beeswax. If you’re not vegan, you can substitute it with beeswax. Candelilla is also very nourishing even though it leaves a faint scent in the recipe.

I couldn’t resist adding bentonite clay to the recipe because it’s healing and one of my all-time favorite ingredients.

Mango butter is another beautiful butter, and it’s a less greasy alternative to shea. It has nourishing properties; it soaks into the skin quickly, leaving it smooth and soft.

It only makes sense to add olive oil to something that states nourishing and conditioning. I have home-grown EVOO in the family (oh, the tiresome November olive harvests!) and it’s a regular ingredient in my recipes. Get EVOO if you can (organic, cold pressed) or nothing!

Apricot kernel oil is anti-inflammatory, which means it can help soothe the skin, heal it, and moisturize it. It’s gentle and it promotes glowing skin.

And the star of the recipe: shea butter. It’s creamy, gorgeous, healing, regenerating, and non-comedogenic. There are two things you should pay attention to when working with shea: the unrefined version has a strong-ish nutty and earthly smell you may not love (but it pairs great with sweet orange EO). The refined version is scent-free but also free of many nutrients.

The second thing: if using unrefined shea in your recipes, make sure not to overheat it. That’s not what you want. I’ve mentioned a method on how to avoid this below. You can follow it easily; it’s far from complicated!

Now, let’s have a look at the recipe!

Shea Butter Hand Cream Recipe

Ingredients:

• 15g shea butter
• 10g apricot kernel oil
• 10g olive oil
• 10 g mango butter
• 2g bentonite clay
• 2g candelilla wax
• 0.5g vitamin E oil
• 5 drops lemongrass essential oil
• 5 drops sweet orange essential oil
• 3 drops cedarwood essential oil

Instructions:

1. Melt candelilla wax in a double boiler in a heat-resistant cup (Pyrex works well).
2. Add mango butter and melt it on low heat.
3. Cut shea into small pieces.
4. Remove cup from heat and start adding shea butter bit by bit until all has melted in the mango butter. Stir all the time (a silicone spatula works best) until shea has melted. You can pop the cup back into the water for a few seconds to reheat it a bit.
5. Once melted, add the rest of the ingredients, stirring the mixture well after each one.
6. Pour the balm into a clean, dry container and wait for it to cool down.
7. Start dipping your hands into it!

Use and enjoy, or package and give to special people. It makes an incredible gift!

Order Baraka Shea Butter and Coconut Oil HERE.

For more recipes like this one, please visit Wild for Nature.