The Circulatum Made Easy

1.Ordinary potash is moistened with high-grade etheric wood oil (cedar, cypress and pine).

French turpentine from the painters supply store is probably good, so it is just "wet".

Add as much copaiba balm (also from the painters supply. Its here I want to use the amber oil instead), so that the mass gets a honey like consistency. (Not to thin!)

2. The mass is set to digest at about 40 degrees Celsius.

Cover the flask with metal foil in which you have made pinholes so that evaporation can take place. Use a wooden spatula to stir the mass several times a day.

3. When the mass "toughens up", add balm and oil in equal parts to remoisten.

4. After three to four weeks, the salts will have dissolved completely if one has worked correctly. The mass will be soapy to the touch and looks like dark honey.

5. Pour on high-grade alcohol, about 5-8 times your mass volume. Let it digest for a week or two in a closed vessel, at even heat (40 degrees Celsius) the longer the better.

This is also stirred several times a day.

6. The alcohol is gently distilled of at low heat. This is cohobated seven times and redistilled. Take care that none of the balm goes over with the distillations.

Regulate the heat with great care. Now some of the salts have been volatised, and the circulatum is ready.

It has a stinging smell, and leaves a subtle and penetrating taste on the tongue.

How to use:

Parts of the FRESH plant are added to the circulatum and shaken.

After a short time there will be an oily layer on top of this. This contains the salt and sulphur of the plant.

The faeces will sink to the bottom and are to be discarded.

By careful distillation in water bath, the phlegm of the plant and the circulatum goes over.

The essence remains in the vessel. Now the phlegm can be separated from the circulatum through further distillation.

The circulatum will last forever, to be used again and again, on any plant one likes.

If it weren't for a certain inevitable small loss of alcohol during distillations.

Recipe extracted from Lion and Phoenix by Daniel Hornfischer.

Rubellus Petrinus