What are Carrier Oils?
Essential Oils are known to be very potent and concentrated compounds. Therefore, before applying essentials on your body carrier oils must be used to slow down the rate at which the essential oil is being absorbed into your body. This prevents burns and unwanted skin reactions as the carrier oil dilutes the essential oil.
Essential oils are hydrophobic ( meaning they do not like water) but they are lipophilic (fat loving). Making them insoluble in water but soluble in fixed oils, alcohols and dissolve in fatty materials (ie. grease).
Because of this using fixed oils to dilute the essential oils in is a great idea, as oils are a type of fat.
Examples of Carrier Oils:
- Olive oil (my favourite)
- Jojoba oil (love to use this for DIY deep conditioners along with some avocado)
- Almond oil
- Grapeseed oil
- Coconut oil
- Avocado oil
As you can see they are mostly vegetable oils that we not only use for beauty but for cooking and baking too.
Carrier oils come from the seeds/ nuts of a plant which have gone through the process of cold pressing. It is an interesting process we have blogged on before on our ‘How are essential oils made?’ post
This was a short little post but I hope it was helpful!
