Madder Root Stick

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Tais

Active Member
Joined
Oct 8, 2017
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Location
Australia
Hello all
I just started experiment with herbal infusion here, first one I am trying is Madder root.
I am using the sticks instead of the powder, I used 200g of olive oil and 15g of cutted madder root.
The oil is been in my slow cooker for around 5hs now (with no lid cause the jar is too tall) but so far I can't see any colour.
Am I doing something wrong or just being a bit too impatient here?
Cheers :)
 
The big thing with doing infusions or extractions is surface area. The more surface area you have in contact with your infusion or extraction medium, the faster the results will be. Since you're using big (relatively) pieces of madder root, you don't have much surface area in contact with your oil, which means it'll take a lot longer to get the pigment out, and you won't be able to get as much out (the pigments from deep inside the pieces can't get out). If you can, try chopping your pieces very finely, get them as close to a powder as you can.
 
Mortar and pestle

Thanks for you reply Kittish, it totally makes sense what you said. This morning when I woke up, there was still no colour in my infusion. I did cut the stick in small pieces when I added them, but I had this idea not long ago, and just used a mortar and pestle to crush it as much as I could, I have to say they are a very hard wood hehehe I can see a bit of colour in the oil already!!

I am a happier soper here!!

Thanks again!!

Have a great weekend!
 
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