If you are looking for an easy body butter, you’ve come to the right place! Most body butters require heating the ingredients in a double boiler (and possibly also an ice bath) which always puts me off. So much faffing around! I always seem to get double boiler things wrong, don’t ask me about that time with the white chocolate. Also, if you overheat shea butter, it can become gross and grainy. When you have gathered the things to make this (especially if you were making this as a gift) screwing it up in the making is a risk I don’t just don’t want to take! You know I won’t post something until I have really researched it. I want to make sure what I post works and is safe and has a known lifespan etc. So I researched and it turns out that the heat really isn’t necessary – who knew! So now that the heat (and faffing) is out of the picture, it’s just whipping with electric beaters and that is easy!
Shea butter is amazingly moisturizing and good for your skin. It is a skin superfood that comes from the seeds of the fruit of the Shea (Karite) tree and that is naturally rich in vitamins A, E and F. It offers UV protection (it is SPF ~6) and provides the skin with essential fatty acids and the nutrients necessary for collagen production. Shea butter has been used in Africa and other countries for years to improve skin and hair. In these countries, they even use it as a cooking oil! I know your next concern is where to get shea butter. If you can, you want to get 100% organic unrefined shea and many say that the best comes from West Africa. I assumed I wouldn’t be able to find that in little ole Adelaide, so I checked out eBay and wasn’t thrilled with the prices or the info about where it came from. A little googling for a local source and I found that there was a local importer of high quality shea near by! Again, who knew? Deluxe shea has ethically sourced 100% organic unrefined shea at terrific prices. I bought 1kg for $30 delivered to my door, as compared with 200g delivered for $34 from eBay! They sell and ship worldwide and mine came super quick, so you can definitely get it for Christmas giving. Not sponsored, just a happy customer.
Anyway, you probably have all of the other things you’ll need to make this body butter. I used olive oil but you could use any liquid carrier oil like grapeseed, avocado or sweet almond. As I was making this to share with my girls, I used the same blend of patchouli, bergamot and geranium from my bath salt and rollerball perfume DIYs. I get it here. They love the scent and it’s anti anxiety, what could be better than that? Of course use what ever you like or have on hand. Peppermint, lavender or tea tree would be lovely and you can probably pick them up at your loc
al chemist or supermarket. The vitamin E isn’t strictly necessary but it is great for skin and will help preserve your body butter. I have a bottle of liquid vitamin E from past projects but a few vitamin E capsules will do fine. Just poke the capsule with a needle and squeeze the contents out. With the vitamin E I would expect this to last at least 6 months but if you want to extend longevity, you can buy cosmetic preservatives from sellers of soap making type stuff.
I love that everything in this is food grade, depending on your choice of oils.It also means I can use my stand mixer and not worry about what’s been in it. Clean up is easy, just lots of hot soapy water. If you can eat it it and have health benefits, it can’t hurt to rub it into your skin. Not to mention that it really makes your skin feel silky and velvety! A little goes a long way but you can also go in hard before bed and wake up glowing. I sent this today to my lovely stepmum Lynne and I know she is a keen gardener and is into some serious, home renovation DIY. I know this will be the perfect salve for her hands after a hard day of work. I really hope she likes it! Of course my girls have been into it already! OMG it made my disgustingly hard and gross elbows very touchable! My legs have never been so pretty. My sisters (box cutting open, working hard) hands are snuggle worthy and mum wants face formulation already. We all love how well it holds the scent of the essential oils. We smell wonderful and we are very soft!
Let’s make this!
- 225g shea butter
- 4 tblsp olive oil
- 2 tsp Vitamin E
- 75- 100 drops essential oils
- Set a bowl on a scale and zero it. Use a fork to mush up the shea butter and then add it to the bowl by the forkful until you have 225g.
- Add the olive oil, vitamin E oil and essential oils and beat with electric beaters or in a stand mixer. Beat for around 10 mins or until it has a fluffy texture, similar to buttercream.
- Scoop into pretty tins or jars. This recipe filled 4 x 100g tins and will keep for up to 6 months.
As you can see, this is pretty easy but also so good! It might be a bit close to Christmas to order these tins (I bought mine on eBay a while ago) but small jars would be great! I know my $2 shop stocks a good range of containers for cheaps. Of course I made nice labels and printed them on sticky paper. I just cut them out with scissors and stuck them on. But you could print on regular paper and glue or if you used those mason type jars with the two piece lid, you could just trap the label between the layers. If you want to use the labels I made, there is an image below. Just right click to save it, drop it into a word document and size to your needs. This was such a nice and easy DIY that is already a fave in my family. If you make it, I’d love to see your version! I wish you happy making and gifting xxx
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