One of the major benefits of using shea butter is that it acts as the base ingredient for many DIY beauty recipes for example, homemade lotion, deodorant, lip balm, foot cream and more.
But because shea butter has a somewhat hard consistency, before using it in these homemade beauty recipes, it’s melted down to liquid form first. To melt it down, there are several ways used:
- Resting the shea butter jar (or a bowl containing the shea butter) in a large bowl containing hot water
- Placing the shea butter under direct sunlight or even leaving it in your car – at the end of the day it’ll be fully melted down to liquid form!
- The double boiler method – Buy a double boiler here. Or, set it up yourself at home by just placing a heatproof bowl containing the shea butter to fit over a pot with a couple inches water. It’s heated over a low flame until the steam emitted from the boiling water slowly melts the shea butter
- Popping the shea butter in the microwave for a few seconds
Does Heating Shea Butter Ruin it?
But can’t heating shea butter ruin it? Heat is known to destroy nutrients in many organic substances, including shea butter as well as cause them to oxidize and get rancid faster. So is heating really necessary and can’t it destroy the nutrients in shea butter and make its healing qualities less effective?
Heating does ruin shea butter BUT if you do it the right way, then your shea butter will be completely unaffected! The way you heat and melt your shea butter really matters: make sure not to overheat it to smoking point and never let it boil.
How to Heat Shea Butter the Right Way
The best way to heat shea butter is by using the double boiler method. Refrain from heating shea butter in a pan over the stove top because this can easily get it overheated. Since shea butter is a plant butter that requires very little heat to melt it down to liquid form, the double boiler method creates the gentlest of heat to gradually but effectively melt it as compared to the other methods we have seen above.
Do I Have to Heat My Shea Butter?
If you’re shea butter is fresh and soft (that you can easily spoon it), there’s totally no need to melt it down before use. I often always forego the melting step when formulating my homemade shea butter recipes because of having fresh and soft shea butter available. Also, if you’re working with Shea Butter Nilotica which naturally has a very soft consistency, there’s NO need at all to melt it down for use in DIY preparations.
Shea Butter as a Cooking Fat
In Africa, shea butter is actually used as a cooking fat or vegetable oil, just like you would use olive oil for sautéing veggies or canola oil for deep frying chicken. It’s a stable oil that’s actually very nutritious with its wide range of nutrients including vitamin A (beta carotene), vitamin E, healthy fatty acids, etc. While using it to cook, shea butter is subjected to heat but still retains its nutritious qualities. So if you’re using shea butter for cooking, don’t worry about its nutrients getting destroyed.
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