{"id":1414,"date":"2026-10-19T16:00:05","date_gmt":"2026-10-19T16:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/?p=1414"},"modified":"2026-10-19T16:00:05","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T16:00:05","slug":"how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Make a Mullein Flower Infused Oil"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s a mullein stalk that comes up every summer along the fence line below my drying shed, tall as a grandchild by August, with those soft flannel leaves and a spike of little yellow flowers that open a few at a time. My grandmother picked those flowers every year of her life she could get to them, and I&#8217;ve never stopped either.<\/p>\n<p>Mullein flower oil is one of the plainest preparations I make \u2014 no fancy equipment, no tricky timing \u2014 and it&#8217;s stayed on my shelf my whole adult life because it&#8217;s genuinely useful, not because it&#8217;s traditional for tradition&#8217;s sake. Here&#8217;s how I make it, the same slow way I was taught.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"cmg-supplies\"><p class=\"cmg-supplies__title\">What I use for a mullein flower infusion<\/p><div class=\"cmg-supplies__body\"><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B07PNYG6J1?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Jojoba oil<\/a> \u2014 my carrier of choice; it doesn&#8217;t turn rancid on a slow shelf-infusion the way a lot of oils will<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B001DIZ1NO?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Wide-mouth mason jars<\/a> \u2014 for the infusion itself and for storing the strained oil after<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B072V18F5L?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Grade-90 cheesecloth<\/a> \u2014 for straining the flowers back out once the oil&#8217;s done its work<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B07V71SQPP?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2oz tins<\/a> \u2014 if you want a portion of the finished oil in a smaller, easier-to-carry container<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><\/div><\/aside>\n<h2>Picking the flowers<\/h2>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil-02-picking.jpg\" alt=\"Tall mullein flower stalk by a fence line below a weathered drying shed with a basket of picked yellow blossoms\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>Mullein flowers open a handful at a time along the stalk, usually starting in early-to-mid summer here and running for weeks. Pick only the fresh open blossoms, not the ones already browning at the edge, and pick in the late morning after any dew&#8217;s burned off \u2014 wet flowers bring moisture into your oil, and moisture is what turns an infused oil moldy on the shelf before it&#8217;s finished doing anything useful.<\/p>\n<p>I pick into a shallow basket, not a closed bag, so the flowers don&#8217;t steam and wilt on the walk back to the house. A single stalk in a good year gives you flowers a few times over if you keep picking rather than let them all go to seed at once.<\/p>\n<h2>Drying the flowers first \u2014 don&#8217;t skip this<\/h2>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil-03-drying.jpg\" alt=\"Picked yellow mullein flowers wilting in a single layer on a wooden-framed screen inside a drying shed\" \/><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Fresh flowers straight into oil is the mistake I made my first year, and I lost the whole batch to mold inside a week.<\/strong> Water and oil don&#8217;t mix, and a fresh flower is mostly water. Spread the picked blossoms in a single layer on a screen or a clean towel, out of direct sun, and let them wilt down for a full day \u2014 not bone dry, just past the point of being fresh and damp. That&#8217;s enough moisture loss to keep the oil from spoiling underneath it.<\/p>\n<h2>The slow infusion<\/h2>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil-04-infusion.jpg\" alt=\"Capped mason jar of wilted mullein blossoms fully covered in pale golden oil on a sunny windowsill\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>Pack the wilted flowers loosely into a clean <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B001DIZ1NO?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">mason jar<\/a> \u2014 loosely, not jammed tight, so the oil can move around them \u2014 and pour <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B07PNYG6J1?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">jojoba oil<\/a> over until the flowers are fully covered by at least half an inch. Give it a stir with a clean spoon to work out any air pockets, cap it, and set it on a sunny windowsill.<\/p>\n<p>I let mine sit for a full three to four weeks, giving the jar a gentle shake every few days. Some people use gentle heat to speed this along \u2014 a dehydrator on its lowest setting, or a double-boiler kept just warm \u2014 but I&#8217;ve always been a patient-shelf-infusion woman myself. The slow way is how my grandmother did it, and I&#8217;ve never found a reason to rush it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Watch for any sign of cloudiness or a sour smell partway through.<\/strong> That&#8217;s mold finding a foothold, and if you see it, the batch is done for \u2014 better to start over than to strain and use an oil that&#8217;s gone wrong.<\/p>\n<h2>Straining and storing<\/h2>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil-05-straining.jpg\" alt=\"Pale gold mullein oil dripping through cheesecloth into a jar beside spent flowers and small empty tins\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>Once the infusion&#8217;s ready, strain it through a few layers of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B072V18F5L?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">cheesecloth<\/a> set over a clean jar, and press the spent flowers gently to get the last of the oil out of them. What comes through should be a pale gold, with the faint sweet-hay smell of dried mullein flower.<\/p>\n<p>Store the finished oil in a jar or divided into a few <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B07V71SQPP?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">2oz tins<\/a> if you want a portion easy to carry or give away, keeping it somewhere cool and out of direct light. Kept that way, it holds well through the winter.<\/p>\n<h2>What this oil is traditionally for<\/h2>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/how-to-make-a-mullein-flower-infused-oil-06-traditional.jpg\" alt=\"Small jar of mullein flower oil and a round tin on a wooden shelf beside a folded cloth and dried mullein spike\" \/><\/figure>\n<p>Mullein flower oil has a long history in mountain households as a topical rub for dry, chapped, or irritated skin, and \u2014 the use my grandmother swore by \u2014 as a warm oil for the outer ear on a cold night, worked gently around the opening rather than dropped in deep. <strong>That is a traditional folk use, passed down the way most of what I write about was passed down, and it is not a substitute for seeing a doctor about ear pain, drainage, or anything that doesn&#8217;t clear up on its own.<\/strong> If an earache lingers or gets worse, that calls for a clinic visit, not a jar off my shelf.<\/p>\n<p>I keep this oil in the medicine cabinet the same unglamorous way I keep most things I make \u2014 used plainly, refilled every summer, no fuss made over it.<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;re new to infused oils generally, <a href=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/how-to-make-a-yarrow-salve\">my yarrow salve post<\/a> walks through the same basic method with a different plant, and once you&#8217;ve got a shelf of these going, <a href=\"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/how-to-store-mountain-herbs-through-a-humid-appalachian-winter\">keeping a drying shed through a humid winter<\/a> is worth reading so none of it goes to waste before spring.<\/p>\n<p>I write about mullein and the rest of what grows on this mountain in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/B0H8X9J63Z?tag=almanachouse-20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Appalachian Medicinal Plants<\/em><\/a>. This post is one plant, one jar. The book is the whole hollow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How I make mullein flower infused oil the way my grandmother did \u2014 the flowers to pick, the slow-infusion method, and what this old mountain standby is actually for.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2152,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4],"class_list":["post-1414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-foraging","tag-affiliate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1414"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2158,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1414\/revisions\/2158"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confluencemediagroup.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}