I thought I’d continue my pumpkin spice spree with this delightful Pumpkin Spice Lip Balm. Not only does it smell of pie and leave your lips smooth and glossy, but it also contains real pumpkin oil, which gives it a wonderful mandarin hue.
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Pumpkin seed oil is cold pressed from the seeds of the very pumpkin that inspires this lip balm. High in zinc, protein and carotenoids, I’ve heard it called “skin food”. Zinc and protein help the skin repair and heal, and carotenoids help with an overall healthy glow. Pumpkin seed oil also has a rather nice nutty smell that complements the pumpkin spice scent blend beautifully.
A gentle blend of cinnamon, clove, and benzoin essential oils add a fall-inspired spice hit to the lip balm. It’s fairly subtle, but I really don’t recommend increasing the amount of essential oils until you’ve tried it this way first. Cinnamon is a rather stimulating essential oil, and too much can be irritating. I tested this lip balm on myself and a handful of girlfriends and they all liked the wee tingle this lip balm gave them, but if you’ve got super-sensitive lips this is definitely something to be aware of.
So, whether you’re in need of a Thanksgiving hostess gift or you’re just completely hooked on pumpkin spice and need something to tide you over between lattés and spice bread, this lovely lip balm is just the thing 🙂
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Pumpkin Spice Lip Balm
8g | 0.28oz beeswax (USA / Canada)
10g | 0.35oz virgin coconut oil
6g | 0.21oz cocoa butter (USA / Canada)
16g | 0.56oz pumpkin seed oil
2g | 0.07oz Vitamin E MT-50 (USA / Canada)
4 drops cinnamon bark essential oil
2 drops clove bud essential oil
2 blobs benzoin essential oil2020 update: Given the irritation potential for this essential oil blend, I’d recommend using a pumpkin spice flavour oil (NOT fragrance oil) rather than the essential oil blend. Please refer to supplier documentation for maximum usage rates for the particular flavour oil you’re using when used in leave-on products; 0.1–0.2% should be more than enough to adequately scent the product.
Weigh the beeswax, coconut oil, cocoa butter (USA / Canada), pumpkin oil, and Vitamin E MT-50 (USA / Canada) into a heat resistant glass measuring cup. Place the measuring up in a small, shallow pot of barely simmering water to melt everything together.
Once melted (that’ll take about ten minutes), remove the oil mixture from the heat and stir in the essential oils using a flexible silicone spatula. Quickly pour the melted mixture into lip balm tubes and let set up before labelling (I use these cute labels) and using.
This recipe will fill eight or nine 4.5g (0.16oz) lip balm tubes.
If you don’t have pumpkin oil you can use sweet almond oil (USA / Canada), apricot kernel oil, or any other carrier oil that absorbs at an average speed and doesn’t have an overwhelming scent or flavour. Read this post for more information on making carrier oil substitutions!
Ha, I can’t believe u sent me exactly what was next on my menu! I make lip balm! I really like all you posts, thanks for sending them 🙂
Thanks for reading, Sheila!
This is beyond perfect timing! I was going to make 4 types of lip balms today as favours for the baby shower this Saturday, and I was going to just adapt your “Cranberry Lip Balm” and make it more pumpkiny/less minty by adding cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg EOs to the clove/cardamom. I may still add a touch of mica or colour for fun 🙂 Is there a reason that I SHOULDN’T use nutmeg and ginger EOs in addition to the cinnamon and clove? Usually they’re both in pumpkin spice blends.
Awesome! Happy baby shower 🙂 I only left them out in an attempt to keep both the ingredients list and the potential irritation factor down. Both cinnamon and ginger can be quite stimulating EOs, so do be careful there 🙂
Good to know! I added a drop of each anyway. While I can’t use any of these essential oils while pregnant apparently, my Mom said there wasn’t much tingle so I think it was a good balance 🙂 They were the first type to be gone, btw! I also made “lemon cream”, “chocolate orange” and “mint chocolate”. The chocolate ones were slightly less popular, probably because the dark brown colour may have made people think their lips would turn brown 😉
Awesome! Sounds like everything was a hit—wish I could have been there 🙂
Oh, this sounds lovely!! If I’m out of benzoin, do you suppose I could infuse my pumpkin seed oil with a vanilla bean?
Hi Laura! Go for it and let me know how it works out 🙂 Sounds delicious!
I am so delighted I found your blog! You have so many wonderful recipes I want to try out, and this one sounds super yummy, so I think I’ll start here. Thank you for all of your experimentation and your willingness to share 🙂
Thanks, Beverly! Have fun 🙂
What would you recommend to substitute in for the pumpkin seed oil? I would love to make it this weekend and do not have that on hand. However I do have olive, sunflower seed, apricot kernel, grapeseed, camellia seed, hemp seed and avocodo (seems a bit nutty to me now that I actually write it down!). Would you recommend one of them as a replacement?
I almost didn’t see it either, but the substitution suggestions are at the bottom of the recipe 🙂
“If you don’t have pumpkin oil you can use sweet almond oil, apricot kernel oil, or any other carrier oil that absorbs at an average speed and doesn’t have an overwhelming scent or flavour.”
Luckily I had pumpkin seed oil on hand though!
Thank you!! I should have paid closer attention 😉
🙂
Thanks, Sarah!
If you don’t have pumpkin oil you can use sweet almond oil, apricot kernel oil, or any other carrier oil that absorbs at an average speed and doesn’t have an overwhelming scent or flavour. 🙂
Wow, wow and wow. You are my favorite blogger Marie. I substituted hemp seed oil after my research. I also added 1/16 tsp of flash copper mica. It came out the perfect shade of pumpkin. I can’t wait to share this with all my friends here on Cape Cod!
Thanks so much, Rachel! I’m so thrilled you’re loving the lip balm 🙂 Happy pumpkin spice season!
So glad its fall, pumpkin spice is my favorite scent/flavor and I can finally get my fix!
Woo! Enjoy your spiced fix!
This sounds amazing!! PLUS you have inspired me… I *just* got some cardamom EO, so now I’m thinking maybe I will use this recipe as a guide for a “chai latte” lip balm!
Lovely!
Love the color! Sounds yummy too
😀 Thanks!
Am I right in assuming that the ‘cinnamon’ used is cinnamon leaf instead of cinnamon bark (which smells amazing but unfortunately isn’t skin safe)?
Hi Helen! My research into cinnamon bark essential oil revealed a lack of consensus on it. Some sites say not to use it on the skin, some say to go right ahead, and some advise caution. I did my own experiments and decided to go with the caution route. That is why this recipe uses a very low concentration of the EO and advises against increasing the concentration. I also included a note about it being potentially irritating to those with sensitive skin. You are, of course, welcome to leave it out if you would like.
Dear Marie,
Thank you again for the inspiration, as the weather in Austria is getting colder I was also planning on making lip balm. How come your balm is not dark-green from the pumpkin oil? The variety we have here is really dark.
yours, larimame
Hi Larimare! My pumpkin oil is orange (you can see it in the photos). I suspect this may be because it is cosmetic grade, not food grade, but I’m not certain.
Larimare,
I encountered the same problem–the pumpkin oil I got was dark green and would make my balms green. I had my heart set on that festive orange-ish colour from Marie’s photos but the pumpkin oil is pretty much the whole recipe so i didn’t want to leave it out entirely. Instead I scaled back the pumpkin oil to 10grams instead of 16, for the remaining 6g I used almond oil (one of the light coloured oils Marie recommended) to just try and dilute the green colour a bit. Worked okay, but it still was nowhere near orange.
I’m not a big fan of adding colourants but this was an autumn emergency–two drops of liquid carmine added when I added the E.Os (I would imagine any of the liquid reds from saffire blue would do it as well) and I had a dark orangey red lip balm that was so so season appropriate. The colour screams fall. Not one single trace of green. My only advice is that you add the carmine liquid very sparingly, just a drop or so, then stir and assess if you want to go more red to achieve your orange. Keep in mind that it will get more opaque as it sets up. Seasons greetings!
Great tip/fix, thanks so much Jade!
Something else you could do is use a different orange oil, like seabuckthorn or buriti, along with the lighter almond oil 🙂 That might be a better alternative for vegans.
OMG. I Just finally found organic canned pumpkin, they are seriously out in my town lol. So had to wait to go to work haha. So I made these and the soap same day. And I of course tried the balm out right away, I don’t think there’s a moment it’s NOT on my lips 🙂 now to IMpatiently wait for soap to cure. Lol. Slightly off topic Does it need to cure longer due to pumpkin in it? Thanks 🙂 and also.. My lip balm came out a tannish green but heck, it’s pumpkin enough for me! Reminds me of the seeds 🙂 and smells sooo good, I rubbed a bit on my hands n behind my ears, hehe. Thanks soo much for this recipe! I’m gonna try and save some balms for my trip “back home” and give em as early Xmas pressies 🙂 can’t wait for your next post! Take care 🙂
I’m so thrilled you’re loving the lip balm 🙂 Yay pumpkin spice!
I aged my soap for the typical 3–4 weeks and that seems to be just fine, but it is very dry here. All the same, unless your pumpkin was very soupy I think you should be fine with the same aging time 🙂
Ok thanks 🙂 did it seem softer thank normal soaps after popping out of mold at all? I just let it dry a bit longer before cutting, shoot I gotta go home anyway to cut it!! I’m out of my house for the weekend for work, And dropped my lip balm in the rainy gutters of Seattle.. Yeah not gonna pick it up… Lol. But, I debated it…I am heartbroken. That’s how much I love it! I may just run back home for another one.You make some amazing things Chica! And give great advice too 😀
I don’t think it did, but then again, that was a while ago now 😛 I don’t remember thinking “oh geez, should have given this another 12 hours…”, so that’s promising, haha. I look forward to hearing how those bars turn out!
Marie, I don’t have any of the EOs right now. Is there a way to infuse the oils with spices like you do with coffee in the mocha lip balm? Thanks!
Hi Eyrie! You can definitely try it, but in my experience the scent experience really isn’t that close. You will probably get more of a nutty, ambiguous scent than a specific pumpkin spice experience.
Just wondering what you mean by two blobs of benzoin essential oil? I’m very excited to make this for holiday gift giving!
Hi Cindy! If you’ve worked with Benzoin EO you’ll know it’s very thick and tends to “blob” rather than “drop”, so that’s what I’m talking about 🙂
I’d love to make this, where can i buy the products to make these? I’m a totally newbie here i hope that’s ok to ask!
Hi Cora! If you scroll up to the big box above the comments I’ve linked to all my suppliers there 🙂
I thought this would be great. Turned out nasty. Didn’t taste anything like pumpkin spice. I bought expensive organic pumpkin seed oil and it was dark brown in color which gave my balm a brown color. Why is yours yellow? Ick
Hi Karen! Did you buy food grade pumpkin oil? I ask because food grade oils are generally processed and treated differently for cosmetic grade oils to make the flavour really stand out, which we don’t really want here so the essential oils can shine.
Could you use real spices like cinnamon, etc instead of the essential oils?
No—they won’t dissolve and you’ll be left with a horrible, gritty tube of lip balm. It’ll feel like it has sand in it—yuck! Read this for more info 🙂
I made a similar version of this for the Christmas Market I am coordinating for Autism. I actually used the pumpkin spice clubhouse seasoning in addition to the clove bud (I added nutmeg too – I love nutmeg) I am lucky to get my beeswax from an Apiary so the end product is a very nice speckled looking lip balm with the propolis and the pumpkin spice seasoning. Its heavenly. Try cocoa powder, instant coffee and peppermint essential oil – candy cane hot chocolate OMNOMNOM
if you dissolve it in your coconut oil and a little bit of vegetable shortening
How lovely! Do you not find it gritty, though? None of things things dissolve in anything (other than the instant coffee, which is water soluble), and the spices especially are quite large grain—I have made scrubs this way. Or do you strain the mixture? I’m just trying to figure out how this works since you’re obviously very fond of the results 🙂