Your skin will love this divinely creamy and deeply moisturising 2-in-1 DIY shea body butter. It’s a 2-in-1 because I use it to protect the skin around your hairline when dyeing your hair with henna – and I use it as an all-over body butter.
I like to make my 2-in-1 in small batches because a little goes a long way, but feel free to double the quantities if you prefer to prepare in bigger batches.
You’ll find the list of butters and oils and quantities at the end of this post.
Fill the base of your double boiler to about half way and bring the water to the boil.
While the water’s boiling, put all of the butters into the top of the double boiler. Turn off the heat. Place the top boiler containing the butters on top of the base of the double boiker and wait until the butters melt.
Once all the butters have melted, remove the top boiler and set it aside for a few minutes to let it cool slightly. Add the coconut oil, sweet almond oil and vitamin E oil and stir in. I like to add the oils at this stage to preserve as many nutrients as possible.
Let your mixture cool and then put it in the fridge for 1-2 hours. I left mine overnight because I wanted to continue the preparation and filming during daylight hours, and if you happen to leave yours in overnight too, be sure to break up the solidified butters and oils before you start trying to whisk them!
Whisking the butter mixture
Cover your mixture with cardboard (cut out a thin slot for the electric whisk arms). The cardboard will stop the mixture from flying all over the place and by keeping the mixture nicely contained in the mixing bowl. Ingenious eh?
So whisk away until the mixture is light and fluffy. I don’t set a time on how long to whisk for because it depends on how much you’re mixing, how hard your mixture is, the speed of your electric whisk and your whisking technique. But once you find there is no resistance in the mixture and it’s all whipped up into a creamy consistency that you want to eat, it’s ready!
Your whipped shea butter mix is ready
Decant into clean containers of your choice and it’s ready for use. You can put the mixture into a zip lock bag and pipe it into your jars, but my mixtures are for home use by the family, and I’m happy to scoop it all in with a spatula so that I waste as little of the rich butters as possible.
This butter will literally melt into your skin, with very little rubbing in needed. It is supremely moisturising, and I just can’t get enough of it.
Ingredients
Shea butter ½ cup
Cacao butter ¼ cup
Capuacu butter ¼ cup
Kokum butter ¼ cup
Coconut oil ¼ cup
Sweet almond oil 5 tbl
Vitamin E oil 1 tbl
Lavender essential oil (optional extra) 8-12 drops
I say the essential oil is optional because this mix of butters and oils will emit a deeply, rich chocolatey odour that you may wish to enjoy just as it is without competition from the scents of essential oils. If you use essential oils, stick to this ratio, to ensure you keep within the safe zone.
Adding lavender essential oil will provide you with some additional benefits. Including scent. Lavender essential oil is soothing and healing to the skin, helps soothe dry skin conditions e.g. eczema, and it has antiseptic qualities. Lavender essential oil also has well-being benefits; it can help to manage stress and anxiety, a few drops on your pillowcase at bedtime are a great way to help you if you’re going through a stressful phase. But I digress! Back to the whipped shea butter.]
Tools
Food whisk
Double boiler
If you don’t have a double boiler, you can use a large pot with a Pyrex bowl over the top without any gaps around the sides, and make sure that you don’t leave it there boiling away until steam enters your mixture, as the water will make your butter and oil mixture turn rancid.
Let me know how you get on when you make it.
