I will happily confess that I have a bit of a thing for gingerbread. It’s delicious, and it smells fantastic. It is also a beautiful, deep colour that seems to be to hearken to days gone by, where rye bread, dark liquor, and unrefined foods abounded. A bit overly romantic, I’m sure, but it’s a nice wintery image all the same.
I no longer recommend making this as it no longer lives up to my formulation standards. This lip balm is much better!
Gingerbread lip balm is a bit different than straight-up normal lip balm as it requires me to incorporate something water soluble (the blackstrap molasses & vegetable glycerine (USA / Canada)) into something that is typically entirely oil based. All this requires is a healthy dose of whisking as the glycerin emulsifies the blackstrap molasses and oils together.
The end product is softer than your typical lip balm despite higher than usual percentages of beeswax and cocoa butter (USA / Canada), so I’ve opted for a tin over tubes.
The molasses/glycerin mixture just added to the melted oils.
After a bit of whisking. Yup, things are looking pretty bad right about now.
The final lip balm is wonderfully creamy, smells and tastes fantastic, and delivers a fantastic does of moisture. I’m a big fan, and I think you will be, too.
And we have an emulsion, folks!
This is after I whisked in 3 drops of liquid carmine dye. You don’t have to do this.
I no longer recommend making this as it no longer lives up to my formulation standards.
Gingerbread Lip Balm
3g | 0.1oz beeswax (USA / Canada)
3g | 0.1oz virgin coconut oil
4g | 0.14oz raw cocoa butter (USA / Canada)
5g | 0.17oz sweet almond oil (USA / Canada)
5 drops Vitamin E MT-50 (USA / Canada)1g | 0.03oz vegetable glycerine (USA / Canada)
3g | 0.1oz blackstrap molasses3 drops liquid carmine dye (optional—you can also use a pinch of red iron oxide, but it will be more of a ruddy brown than red)
3 drops cinnamon bark essential oil
2 drops ginger essential oil
3 drops vanilla essential oilCombine all the oils and waxes together in a small saucepan and melt over low heat, taking care to watch them so they don’t scorch.
As the oils are melting, combine the vegetable glycerine (USA / Canada) and molasses in a small glass dish. Stir together, using a couple short blasts in the microwave to soften everything up enough to properly stir it.
Once the oils have melted, remove them from the heat. Add the molasses mixture. The two will not want anything to do with each other at all. Start whisking—you’ll break up the blob of molasses into a bunch of tiny blobs of molasses. I know it looks pretty bad at this point, but keep whisking away. As the mixture cools it’ll suddenly emulsify, and you’ll end up with a creamy brown mixture.
Whisk in the essential oils now. We usually can’t use vanilla essential oil in lip balms because it is water soluble, but because we’ve already got an emulsion going, we can here—awesome!
I added three drops of liquid carmine dye at this point as well, to get a red tinge going on. This part is totally optional.
Decant into a 30mL/1oz tin—makes 30mL/1oz.
Don’t have the carrier oils called for in the recipe? Read this for a guide on how to choose appropriate alternatives.
Does the molasses make the lip balm go rancid quicker? Interesting recipe, I have never thought to mix molasses with lip balm!
In theory it should (because of the water), but it does have quite a lot of sugar in it, so that should help counter spoilage (I’ve never heard of molasses going bad…). My lip balm is about three weeks old now and it’s still totally fine, I’ll report back if it spoils on me.
I like this because I believe you can never really have too much balm.
Damn straight, Neil. If I don’t have 10+ lip balms going at any given time, something is wrong.
Hi, I made this balm last night after finding organic black strap molasses at the local shop 🙂
Just letting you know that red oxide will not color it red like yours but darker brown. I won’t be able to give it to my little girls as you have to apply it carefully just on lips otherwise it looks like you pigged out on a huge pot of cocolate pudding ha ha. One very surprising thing with this formulation is how amazingly moisturizing it is. I can’t quite believe it. It’s better that any luxurious butters, oils ect I have ever come across. I lathered it on my dry cracked soles of feet and put socks over it for bed. Woke up with Kitty Softpaws 😉 love love lovexoxo
Awesome! I’ve noted your colour discovery in the recipe—thanks for that! I often add red oxides or red clays to things like my gingerbread or hot chocolate soap to just warm up the colour a bit (the hot chocolate soap is an especially cool grey-brown without), so I suppose I should have guessed this 😛
Honey gets an awesome reputation for being uber moisturizing, and as a result molasses is often left behind, but it’s just as awesome (with lots more iron to boot). Molasses is what makes brown sugar brown, and what makes brown sugar an awesome humectant, keeping cookies chewy and delicious (just a wee bit of scientific ish blither 😛 ). I LOVE that you used this on your feet, that’s kind of hilarious! I just might have to try that lol.
I used candy cane mica and it came out nice and shiny
OOoh, that sounds really pretty—what colour is “candy cane”? I’m imagining something sort of turquoise-ish, with hints of red.
It’s actually just like baby pink, mixed with the brown balm it came out kind of burgundy:)
OOoh lovely 🙂 Sounds like that mica would be great in some lip gloss as well!
Hi Marie. I’d like to make this recipe but have a question. Can I use fancy molasses instead of blackstrap? And I only have a vanilla essential oil, shoud I put 6 drops or just 3 and leave out the rest? Thanks
Hi Iryna! You should be able to use fancy molasses instead, but it does have a higher sugar content, so you may want to consider starting with less than the listed amount and working your way up to ensure the final product isn’t sticky. As for the essential oils, just add until you like the scent, and it’s strong enough for you 🙂
Hi Marie,
Just wondering where you buy your liquid carmine dye…
Thanks!
Saffire Blue 🙂
Does this turn solid enough to put in lip balm containers, or does it stay soft, the way it looks in the photo? Thanks!
It hardens a little but still stays fairly soft, so tubes are out, sadly. It’s kind of a necessary evil as you cannot emulsify the mixture until it’s at room temperature. Lip balms that are hard enough for tubes at room temperature are entirely too hard to stir/whisk at room temp, so in order to get the molasses into this, it needs to be soft enough to whisk at room temperature. I plan on experimenting with some other, slower setting waxes in the future to see if I can get around this, but for now, any lip balms that have some water bits emulsified into them aren’t going to be tube compatible.
Thanks!
🙂
I have coconut oil, castor oil, rice bran oil and beeswax. I would prefer to not have to order anything and use what I’ve got. Will these ingredients produce a nice lip balm?
Ah, telltale soaping ingredients 😉 I find I much prefer lip balms that include a brittle oil (like cocoa or kokum butter), but you can make a pretty good lip balm with 1 part beeswax and 3–4 parts liquid oil. Be careful rice bran doesn’t go rancid on you, and be aware that castor oil will make a very shiny lip balm 🙂
Just made this today and it is lovely and long lasting! Thanks for the recipe
Awesome, thanks for sharing 🙂 Enjoy your soft lips!
I love this recipe but… I don’t have glycerine, is this a must or can I substitute with something else? What does the glycerine do for the product?
Hi Alicia! You definitely need the glycerin, it is what emulsifies the molasses into the lip balm and adds awesome moisturizing properties 🙂
How does it look? Does it show up on lips with a color?
It has a slight ruddy brown/red tint 🙂
can ground ginger be substituted for the ginger EO?
Hi Robin! I really wouldn’t recommend that, it would be all gritty and yucky on your lips.
Are there different types of iron oxide? Like is there a cosmetic grade one or any iron oxide could work?
Yes; you MUST use cosmetic grade lest you expose yourself to high levels of lead, arsenic, and other heavy metals and impurities.
Yes—you MUST use cosmetic grade lest you expose yourself to impurities and unregulated levels of heavy metals. Do not buy iron oxides at the craft store!