Homemade Cold Cream

[His Own]

Homemade Cold Cream
Someone on another thread requested that I put up my cold cream recipe, so here it is:
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Here is my recipe for old-fashioned Homemade Cold Cream. I ran into the idea of using cold cream on another board. Some of the ladies there absolutely swore that it was the very best thing they had ever found for skin cleansing, even some who had oily skin and acne. They mostly liked Pond's cold cream, and as it's not expensive, I decided to try some.

WOW! My very sensitive, fairly dry skin LOVED it! It works on much the same principle as the OCM, but for me it works much better than OCM ever did. Because of my usual reaction to anything with fragrance, I tried, in vain, to find reasonably priced fragrance-free cold cream. Then I did some research, and found quite a few recipes for making one's own homemade cold cream

I tried numerous cold cream recipes, and here is (my altered version of) one of them, my favorite of the recipes by far. It is the most accurate because the beeswax is measured by weight rather than by volume. It is also (happily!) the easiest to make.

HOMEMADE COLD CREAM

1/4 teaspoon borax
1/4 cup distilled water
1/2 cup mineral oil, or another oil that is liquid at room temperature (Almond is nice)
1/2 ounce (by weight) grated beeswax**(see below)

Dissolve the borax in the water in a (one cup) glass measuring cup. Set aside.

Dump together the oil and beeswax in a larger (2-cup) glass measuring cup.

Heat the oil/beeswax mix in a microwave until the beeswax is melted in and the mixture is clear.

Heat the borax/water mix in a microwave for a minute - almost to boiling.

Slowly pour the borax/water mixture into the oil/beeswax mixture, using a stick blender to mix as you pour. Now beat well with the stick blender until the mix is glossy white and thickened up some.

Pour the (hot) cold cream into an 8-ounce jar with a lid.

Let it cool to room temperature.

Done!

NOTE: If you don't have a stick blender you can beat the cold cream with a whisk or in a regular blender, but the cleanup will be much more difficult. By using glass measuring cups and a stick blender you will be able to simply wipe most of the excess off with paper towels, then wash in hot soapy water. Cleaning plastic measuring cups, and a whisk or (worse yet) a blender of this wax-containing product is difficult and a pain in the neck. Since I make this a lot now I bought a cheap stick blender from Wal-Mart for about $10. It was well worth it.

I hope this helps someone in her quest for clear and happy skin.

**Edited to add: For those who do not have the means to weigh the wax, just a little over two tablespoons is what you want to use.

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[levelek]

Thanks so much for posting this!

[chloeishere]

Thanks for posting this on TBB too-- the other board is down and I was worried I wouldn't be able to find a recipe, and I've been out for about a week-- I desperately needed to make more!

[justgreen]

Originally Posted by chloeishere

Thanks for posting this on TBB too-- the other board is down and I was worried I wouldn't be able to find a recipe, and I've been out for about a week-- I desperately needed to make more!

Nice 'eye' there girl!

[Libbylou]

Thanks for the recipe. My skin has always been sort of dry but now that I am old it is even dryer. I use olive oil soap 1X day but that is getting to drying with winter coming. I think I might have to give this a try.
Is there a store that sells beeswax or is that an online item only?
How do you store this cream? And the shelf life?

[CaityBear]

Originally Posted by Libbylou

Thanks for the recipe. My skin has always been sort of dry but now that I am old it is even dryer. I use olive oil soap 1X day but that is getting to drying with winter coming. I think I might have to give this a try.
Is there a store that sells beeswax or is that an online item only?
How do you store this cream? And the shelf life?

If you know of anybody in your area who has bees and sells honey, you may be able to get beeswax from them. I get mine from my aunt and uncle who have bees. But otherwise I don't know if you can find it in stores. At least I have never seen it around here.

As for shelf life, I don't know what is recommended but I've had a container of cold cream that I made last year (hah, yeah, last year around Christmas time) and I was supposed to give it to somebody but then they didn't want it so it sat around and it's still perfectly fine. I store mine in old body butter containers. Any sort of container would work fine.

I think you'll love the cold cream. I find it absolutely amazing for dry skin! Even using it as a lotion for your body. For moisture, my favourite way to use it is lather on face, sit, wipe off with a tissue then use a hot cloth to just wipe over my face gently and that way leaves a lot of the moisture there rather than if I washed it off.