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Homemade Plantain Salve

                       

(old photo of picked plantain, but I used both broad leaf and narrow-leafed plantain for the salve)


 I completely forgot to share our newest addition to the medicine cabinet  - plantain salve.  It's a homemade drawing salve.  Plantain  (a weed that grows wild) is what saved me when I had a very nasty spider bite years ago.  I asked my husband to go outside and pick it, macerate it, and make a poultice.  I used it until I found a decent doctor (which was hard to do at the time).

I used 1/2 cup infused oil (used grapeseed oil to infuse it), and 2 Tbsp. of beeswax.  Heat together until the beeswax is melted, pour into jars and cool completely.  You can add essential oils too, but add them after you take the melted oil/beeswax off the heat.

By the way, before this was made, and I needed a drawing salve, I used a mix of homemade calendula oil, some store purchased chickweed salve (has plantain in it), and homemade yarrow salve.  It worked until I had my own salve made.  Not sure if one ingredient was better, but together it did the job.  

You can use dehydrated plantain for making tea (soothes an upset stomach), and infusing oils with dried plantain and chickweed to make a chickweed/plantain salve (great for mosquito bites, poison ivy, burns, rashes etc).

(from my experiences with plantain)

Has anyone eaten the young leaves in a salad? I also read the older leaves can be stewed or boiled for soups.  Anyone?  I am very interested in this, as I am learning about the nutrients in the leaves.

Homemade Plantain Salve © January 2025 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart


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Comments

Carol said…
These weeds grow in our yard, but I did not realize that they could be used for anything.
January 24, 2025 at 10:40 AM
Pioneer Woman at Heart said…
Carol, the weed is very very useful. One year I got stung by a wasp. I picked the plantain, macerated it, and applied it to the sting for 20 minutes. Not one sign was left (or pain) that I was ever stung by a wasp. It worked very quickly and better than anything I have ever used for a sting. A very resourceful weed for sure.
January 24, 2025 at 1:13 PM
Anne in the kitchen said…
I have never seen it and have none in my yard. Looks like I am missing something valuable.
January 25, 2025 at 12:47 AM
Pioneer Woman at Heart said…
Anne in the kitchen, if you spray weed killer on your lawn you won't have it growing. We do not put any chemicals on our grass here. First, we had goats, still have chickens, had barn cats in the past too, and had a lot of dogs here. No chemical land for our furbabies and us. Also, there are more weeds than plantain we pick here. In the spring, I pick wild violets. We get purslane, chickweed, clevers, chickory and more. It is a haven for medicinal and healthy foraging here.
January 25, 2025 at 9:16 AM
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