The Benefits of Sage

The Benefits of Sage

This versatile plant has up to 2.8% volatile oils comprising various condensed tannins, flavonoids, and oestrogenic substances. In fact, it's healing properties have been known dating back to antiquity. In fact, its Latin name, Salvia officinalis, with the "Salvia" specifically, means "to save." In centuries past, it was thought to render men immortal.

In ancient times the sage extract was so prized, the Chinese traded with the Dutch three times the amount of their best tea in exchange for European sage herb. So, what are its benefits?

Its oestrogenic properties render it useful for treating hot flushes endemic to menopause

It is a wonderful remedy when taken as a hot infusion for colds.

Sage herb is a digestive stimulant inducing the expulsion of gas from the stomach and intestines.

Sage extract has the remarkable ability to stop sweating.

According to Sage herb improves brain function, including memory. Alzheimer's disease, for example, is accompanied by an increase of AChE activity leading to depletion of cholinergic and noncholinergic neurons of the brain. Sage inhibits AChE activity. Perhaps there is a reason why one who is wise is a "sage" and one who uses sage.

It has robust anti-inflammatory qualities helping rheumatoid arthritis sufferers.

Sage helps a debilitated nervous system.

When sage tea or sage extract is combined with cider vinegar, it has been found helpful as a gargle for sore throats, tonsillitis, and even laryngitis. It's even used as a mouthwash showing its antibacterial capabilities by helping infected gums, mouth ulcers, and cold sores.

In summary, sage has been shown in clinical studies to have antibacterial, antifungal, and antiviral effects -- no wonder ancients like the Romans, Greeks, Arabs, and Mediterraneans thought it capable of promoting immortality.

Sage Extract Precautions

Don't use sage herb extract for more than a week at a time. After taking a few days interruption, you can begin taking it again. NOTE: Medical practitioners warn pregnant women should not take the sage herb as a medicinal agent (small trace amounts in culinary dishes has small amounts to be harmless).

Nursing women as well as sage has the reputation of actually stanching the flow of breast milk. If you have any questions, at all as to its safety, we advise you to consult with your physician.

Tips on Choosing Sage Herb Supplements

1. Seek only standardized sage extract. Standardized extracts have the highest potency of active ingredients, where the herb's benefits are derived.

2. The supplements should be produced at pharmaceutical standard GMP registered facilities. Facilities that are GMP registered comply with the most rigid standards so as to minimize the possibility of contaminants. Nutritional supplements are not regulated by FDA and as such fraud is rampant with many so-called supplements containing contaminants with 1 in 5 not having the ingredients as proclaimed on the label!

3. Ensure the supplement manufacturer has a Certificate of Analysis (COA) on file for review by you the customer thus confirming the potency of the herbal ingredients listed on the label.

Recommended Sage Extract Supplement

After much research, we came across a company that meets these requirement, offering GMP compliant products. They are based in New Zealand, which has one of the strictest regulatory requirements for dietary supplement manufacturing in the world. In fact, their standards exceed the FDA's regulatory requirements. Their flagship multivitamin supplement for women product which contains sage herb extract, is scientifically formulated containing vitamins, minerals, trace and specialty minerals, and nutrient-rich enzymes.

This product is a one-of-a-kind nutraceutical engineered exclusively for women. This vitamin supplement for women (there is a men's version as well as a unisex version) has vital nutrients necessary for good woman's health; the sage herb is a powerful medicinal qualities needed by every women today. Incidentally, we've been taking this supplement for more than a year now and can attest to its benefits.

I've experience greater energy, better sleep, increased cognitive functions, and overall better health.

Making Your Own Tinctures & Extracts

 Making Your Own Tinctures and Extracts 

You can make liquid extracts using just water....that's what a tea is.  However, the water will go bad in a short time.  The best thing to use is a mixture of water and grain alcohol - cheap Vodka.  80 proof or 40% alcohol means that it is 60% pure water and 40% grain alcohol.   Alcohol helps to extract some of the compounds which are harder to get out with water.  Also, if you prefer, apple cider vinegar can be used as well instead of alcohol.


Tincture should be made on a new moon (when its dark).  Take fresh herbs, place in blender, cover herbs completely with vodka.  Turn on the blender, blend about 1 minute or until it's completely blended.  This is called a full-spectrum tincture.  The smell and taste are fullbodied.  The fresh tincture is potent.  You can take it when it is freshly blended, and it is very good.  But you should put this in a jar, place in a pantry or other dark place, take it out each day and shake it, place it back in the pantry.  Do this for fourteen days.  At the end of fourteen days, take it out, strain out the herb, and what you have is an aged tincture which will last indefinitely, preserved by the alcohol.  There are those who prefer to leave the herb in and not strain it out.  If you do, that's great, but you won't be able to keep it in a dropper bottle in your purse unless you strain some of it.


The number one emergency herb to have on hand is cayenne.  That's right, hot peppers.   Hotter means more phytochemical, which means more medicinal effect.  So always get the hottest peppers you can find.  See this chart which rates the heat units of each pepper.  You want at least 100,000 (or 100K) heat units.


Remove stems from peppers.  Put whole peppers into blender, and cover with vodka.  Blend on high for one minute, or until thoroughly blended.  It will be a kind of thick, soupy mix.  You can eat this by spoonfuls right from the blender, it should make you feel warm, energetic, and have a sense of well-being.  You can save it like this and eat some whenever you want.  However, you should strain at least some of it and put it in those dark glass dropper bottles.  Keep a bottle in your pocket, purse, car glove compartment, home medicine chest, your office desk, any place you spend a lot of time.  You can also allow whole or chopped peppers to dry out on your kitchen cabinet and grind them to powder.

Therapeutic Benefits:


Stops bleeding (internal or external), Heart Attack, Stroke, Shock.  Revives, relieves fainting, dizziness, weakness and confusion.


For hemorrhage after childbirth, squirt 15-20 dropperfuls directly into the vagina.  The bleeding will stop in seconds.


For newborns with respiratory failure, use several drops tincture diluted half and half with water right on their tongues.


Congestive heart failure, drink 1 heaping tablespoon powder in a glass of warm water.


Heart attack, start at 5 dropperfuls.  Begin at 2 dropperfuls if the person is unconscious, then add more as response begins.  A dropperful is approximately 30 drops.  Testimonials have been received in which people who have been clinically dead, turning blue, whose hearts had stopped, were given this tincture from 1 to 12 dropperfuls, and their heart restarted and they recovered.


Wounds, you can pack them with the powder, or wash the wound with tincture, bleeding should stop in seconds.


Internal maintenance dose for tincture:  start with 5 drops in water or juice 3 times daily.  Go up to as many dropperfuls as you like.


Internal maintenance dose for powder:  start with 1/8 teaspoon 3 times daily, and go up if needed to many teaspoons per day.


These fresh tinctures are much stronger and more helpful than any you can buy commercially.  


Many people do not believe herbs work, because they have tried what's available at the store, and nothing has happened.  They don't work for two reasons:  1)  They don't use a large enough dose and 2) commercially made products are usualy so weak that you could drink a whole bottle with no results.


Making them yourself assures they are fresh and potent.

Make Your Own Tinctures

Have your herbs and take them too - Make your own tinctures

by Paul Fassa

The effort to restrict supplements has begun in a failing economy. One has to be creative to offset or avoid these increasing efforts to deprive us of supplements and natural medicines. One solution is to make and store our own herbal tinctures and extracts. It's actually quite easy.

If herbs become too difficult to purchase, it doesn't take much soil to grow your own.

Tincture Extract Advantages

The initial investment involves buying one or more large jars and one or two ounce dropper bottles. Then you can buy a pound of herbs on line for the same price as a one ounce tincture off the shelf. Just make sure you select herbs that are organic and not irradiated.

Preparing teas and decoctions are daily or almost daily enterprises. A tincture will last for a much, much longer time. Once the tincture is ready, you can tap into it daily with a dropper full or two. Enjoying the herbal wonders daily for a year or so after a twenty to thirty dollar investment means you can enjoy the benefits of herbal extracts for pennies a day.

A Basic Formula

One recipe uses vodka, which is a combination of pure water (hopefully) and ethyl alcohol (aka, ethanol and grain alcohol, the type that is drinkable). The alcohol that can kill with a couple of sips is isopropyl or rubbing alcohol.

If you want to ensure purity, you can buy grain alcohol and distilled water separately then mix them. The word "proof" alongside a number indicates twice the percentage of alcohol. In other words, 80 proof vodka is 40% alcohol with 60% water, which many consider the ideal ratio for tinctures.

Others prefer 50/50, which means the vodka needs to be 100 proof. Pure grain alcohol is 200 proof. A little of that in a punch bowl goes a long way! So you can use the most common ratio of 60% water by volume with 40% ethanol (ethyl or grain alcohol), or simply go 50/50 with the two liquids.

Use a large glass jar with a screw on cap, like a mason jar. Pour in the dried herbs up to one-third or almost half the container. The bulkier the herbs, the more should go into the jar. Then take your vodka or alcohol/water solution and pour it to almost the top, allowing some space to swoosh the solution by gently shaking the capped jar.

Though many say two weeks seasoning is sufficient, this author was instructed by a naturopath/herbalist to season for 30 days. Either way, the jar should season in a cool, dark space and be shaken gently each day during its seasoning cycle. After seasoning, you can filter out the herbs and put the liquid into another glass container, or simply leave it and siphon off a bit at a time.

You can use one or two ounce glass bottles with glass eyedroppers for taking the tincture. This way the mother jar can be kept off to the side in a dark space, with or without the herbs. One or two full droppers full daily are recommended for most. It usually takes two dropper squeezes to make one full dropper since it's impossible to get a full dropper full in one draw. You can simply squirt it directly into your mouth or under your tongue, or mix it with water or tea.

Those, who need to avoid alcohol completely, should place the tincture into a cup of hot water and let is sit until cool enough to drink. This helps evaporate some of the alcohol content away.