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If any or all of my explanations, illustrations, and candid analogies remain unclear to you, I’m not too surprised. Percolation is difficult to put in words; but I tried. You might want to reread the final point I made in the beginning of this chapter on this page. But certainly persevere; take the challenge—inevitably glorious success awaits you. It could be worse; you could be trying to toilet train a thirsty puppy. So practice packing, and pouring, and dripping by using inexpensive powdered Fennel seed or like material and relatively inexpensive 80-proof vodka. Powdered seeds pack easier than most leaf or flower material, which tend to be a little spongier when packed, and many roots, which tend to contain a relatively large amount of albumen and are, therefore, a little more difficult to begin with. Better yet, find a bulk Chai tea blend (like the one discussed in Chapter Twenty-Two for making a Chai syrup), and use plain water as the menstruum. Percolation is a method commonly used in pharmacy to make aqueous infusions. This will give you good practice having little financial risk and will render a delicious Chai tea beverage with which to celebrate your successes, or toast the lessons of your mishaps. Pure water is more difficult to flow through a packed cone than pure alcohol or alcohol/water mixtures; so once you successfully percolate using pure water, you can flow and drip any menstruum thereafter. Obviously, hold off on percolating ultra-precious Black Cohosh, or Goldenseal, etc. (or using relatively expensive high-alcoholic menstruums) until you’ve got the process mastered.

A final indication as to how successfully you exhausted the plant material, thereby rendering a full-bodied extract, is reflected by the taste of the last drops of the percolate. If these final drops have merely a faint flavor, you can assume that you extracted nearly all the constituents from the plant material. If these drops are, however, highly flavorful, there is probably a major portion of the constituents still remaining in the marc. Do something different next time. Pack the cone a little more firmly to slow down the flow of solvent and extend the extraction time, or use a finer powder for this particular plant, or slow down the drip rate by keeping the cap tighter. Enjoy the challenge! Be fortified by your failures; celebrate your success.

DOSAGE

Dosage varies according to type of herb(s) used and the size, age, and condition of the individual. Refer to the suggested adult dosages found at the end of Chapter Twelve, “Tinkering by Maceration.” Also see the “Dosage” section in Chapter Twenty-Five for calculating dosages for children.

HERBS ON THE “35 HERBS AND A FUNGUS” LIST

THAT ARE WELL PREPARED BY PERCOLATION

To help determine a good menstruum formula, refer to the suggested range of percent of absolute alcohol for dried plant tinctures found at the end of Chapter Twelve, “Tincturing by Maceration.”

Fennel, Nettle, and Peppermint These are inexpensive and abundant—good practice plants for developing your percolation dexterity.

Blackberry This is usually better used as an astringent infusion or decoction, however.

Black Cohosh

Burdock

Cayenne

Crampbark

Dandelion

Echinacea This is best used as a fresh plant tincture, but if you are using very recently dried root it can be well percolated.

Fennel

Ginger

Ginkgo

Goldenseal

Siberian Ginseng It is difficult to find reliable, authentic dried herb; for this reason, it is probably better to buy a reputable imported extract.

Uva Ursi This is usually better used as a cold infused tea.

Valerian

Vitex

Willow This is usually better used as a tea.

Yarrow It is a little tricky to render this plant into a uniform powder.

Yellow Dock

The history of the human race abounds in grapes and finds humanity romping merrily through the history of wine. Arabian physicians, as well as Hippocrates, Galen, and Pliny, heartily acclaimed the medicinal virtues of wine, and modern medical science is heard singing its