season 2, episode 7 - distilling gratitude & sustainability with benil zamora
our guest for episode 7 is benil zamora! by day, benil is a qa and compliance professional in the food, hemp and cannabis industry who makes sure everything follows the rules in their operations to produce high quality product. in life, she's co-owner of abode manitoba - a local business that handcrafts small batch essential oils and hydrosols from locally grown or respectfully wild harvested material. they steam distill them at their farm with copper stills. they are passionate and committed to actively promote and make small batch production of essential oils and hydrosols accessible, to continue to support sustainably and ethically produced wellness products. you can find her online at abodemanitoba.com and on instagram @abodemanitoba.
each season we read a new book about witchcraft practices around the world with the #snortandcacklebookclub, with a book review by ash and the occasional guest helping us close out the season. this season's #snortandcacklebookclub read is "orishas, goddesses, and voodoo queens" by lilith dorsey.
take the fibre witch quiz at ashalberg.com/quiz. follow us on instagram @snortandcackle and be sure to subscribe via your favourite podcasting app so you don't miss an episode!
seasons 1-3 of snort & cackle are generously supported by the manitoba arts council.
transcript
ash alberg: [Upbeat music plays.] Hello, and welcome to the Snort and Cackle podcast. I'm your host, Ash Alberg. I'm a queer fibre witch and hedgewitch. And each week I interview a fellow boss witch to discuss how everyday magic helps them make their life and the wider world, a better place.
Expect serious discussions about intersections of privilege and oppression, big C versus small C capitalism, rituals, sustainability, astrology, ancestral work, and a whole lot of snorts and cackles. Each season, we read a new book about witchcraft practices around the world with the #SnortAndCackleBookClub with a book review by me and the occasional guest helping us close out the season. Our book this season is Orishas, Goddesses, and Voodoo Queens by Lilith Dorsey.
Whether you're an aspiring boss witch looking to start your knitwear design business, a plant witch looking to play more with your local naturally dyed color palette or a knit witch wondering just what the hell is a natural yarn and how do you use it in your favorite patterns, we've got the solution for you.
Take the free fiber witch quiz at ashalberg.com/quiz and find out which self-paced online program will help you take your dreams into reality. Visit ashalberg.com/quiz [upbeat music fades out] and then join fellow fiber witches in the Creative Coven Community at ashalberg.com/creative-coven-community for 24/7 access to Ash’s favorite resources, monthly zoom knit nights, and more. [End of intro.]
I am here today with Benil, and Benil is by day a QA and compliance professional in the food, hemp, and cannabis industry who makes sure that everything follows the rules in their operations to produce high quality product, which then lends itself very nicely to being in life co-owner of Abode Manitoba, which is a local business that handcrafts small batch essential oils and hydrosols from locally grown or respectfully wild harvested material.
Abode steam distills them at their firm with their copper stills. They're passionate and committed to actively promoting and making small batch production of essential oils and hydrosols accessible to continue to support sustainably and ethically produced wellness products. Hi, Benil.
benil zamora: Hi! Wow! That sounded … [audio distortion.]
ash alberg: [Laughs.] I tripped over a couple of words, but I think we're good. And Willow, of course, is going to come and help right now. That's super helpful, thank you. Get your schnoz away from the microphone. All right. [Laughs.] How are you?
benil zamora: Pretty good. I missed the snow storm. So I'm happy about that.
ash alberg: [Laughs.] Yes.
benil zamora: Especially now that it's sunny here.
ash alberg: I am … shush! [Laughs.]
People are going to, speaking of snow though, are going to want to listen in to this episode because there will be a code that you are providing very nicely for folks who are listening. And that code will be good for a daily or weekly rental for an eight liter still. And I'm just going to say that if folks are looking for really wonderful and unique holiday gifts, this would be the thing.
So make sure that you listen in because this episode will be coming out, I believe … I'm looking at my calendar. I think the beginning of December, like the very beginning of December. So you'll have time to do your rental and get the distillation done and then gift those things in time for most of the winter holidays.
Not all of them, but yeah.
benil zamora: Yeah. Pretty excited. I hope we provide the opportunity for people to do some magic and some potion-making in their own kitchen. So the still is, has everything to it. All they just have to do is put it on their stove, plug it in their closet and put plant material. Away you go.
ash alberg: That’s so cool. Oh my god. I'm so excited.
This is, and so we met earlier this summer when I had the opportunity to take a workshop with you. And that was amazing. This is pure magic and the copper stills just make it like extra pretty. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: True.
ash alberg: Yeah, it's very fun. Why don't you tell us a bit about … we're going to get into it, but I'm also just super curious about like, how did you and your partner get into doing this, ‘cause like copper stills and distilling essential oils and hydrosols, which are the aromatic waters from this distillation process, how did you get into all of that?
benil zamora: It began two years ago out of pure curiosity and I was like Googling it like forever and ever. [Ash laughs.] And I could say another forever. [Ash snorts.] Obviously I always loved plants and the smells and essential oils in general. That's always been there, but two years ago I was like, oh, we really want to try making something.
And it was just, it's just expensive. Like they're expensive to purchase. And sometimes we just want yay much. And I don't want to spend this much amount of money. And it's like, after Googling and just kept on seeing copper stills, we found a little two liter one from the Ukraine and pressed him on it.
And that was the beginning of this great curious, curiosity, turned experiment turned small business. And I remember asking for the first couple of months, I was like, everything I could get my hands on. I was just putting it in the still and asking Anil, my daughter, and Edwin and Greg, “What do you think? What's the smell? Do you like it, is it good, is it bad, whatever?”
And they just put up with it, and they liked the smell of the house, so it was great. And then it just went from there, from the two liter still, Greg was like, “Ah, let’s try bigger!” and bigger, and then we just learned more and realized don't know much and we wanted to learn more. Then two years later, we grew last year. It worked well. Then now we have the big 200 liter still in a variety of different sizes now.
ash alberg: That is amazing. And like for folks who are, if you're thinking of like a visual reference, the two liter still, it would be along the lines of a kettle on the stove.
benil zamora: Yes, it was perfect … in my kitchen has like, the hood above it. It fits, it fits fine.
ash alberg: Yeah. Nice. And then imagine something that is literally a hundred times that size, which to be fair, like this is the wild thing about essential oils and when people are purchasing essential oils and they don't understand the process of the distillation, also keeping in mind that not actually everything can be distilled using the steam and water methods, that just the like sheer amount of material that you need, like plant material you need in order to do the distillation.
If you were trying to distill lemon balm essential oil, which anybody who is in the herbalist field, generally random people aren't just like casually purchasing that, but that's because the places like, doTERRA and Young Living and these other MLMs that are just like selling things willy nilly and also not teaching their people what are the safety considerations of these like highly concentrated, volatile oils.
They don't sell it because it is just so expensive and that's because, your two liter still on the stove, you're going to get zero oil. Like you need your 200 liter still in order to get any sort of semi reasonable quantity. But even with that, like you can make beautiful hydrosols …
benil zamora: Yes, you could make … Yes, absolutely.
ash alberg: But yeah, the, to get the oils, you need just so much material, which then when we think about the sustainability and the ethical harvesting and just crops and all of that, and if you're foraging it, like how much are you removing from the environment?
Like it's a lot and same with rose and yeah, there's these really beautiful and evocative scents, but they're extremely resource intensive. And that's, a thing that doTERRA is not necessarily going to be mentioning on their Pinterest graphics that they send out.
benil zamora: Or also like we've realized that sometimes they do make synthetic aromas in it.
ash alberg: That's wild! I had no idea. That's gross!
Not gross, there are certain scents that is actually a lot better to be getting synthetically just in terms of the amount of resources that go into it. But I … like, if I'm buying, I'm putting in quotation marks, pure essential oil, and it's not actually pure essential oil, like what the fuck?
benil zamora: It's not … it's pure in the essence that it's, the smell, but it's not pure in the essence that the pure essential oil.
ash alberg: That is wild!
benil zamora: So it's semantics, but that's labeling. And again, I'm from the compliance realm. That's part of what I make sure people don't do. But they only make synthetic.
So it's the same aroma. You can't detect it when it gets tested because it's, it's just synthesized. But it's not pure and nobody knows.
ash alberg: That's wild. Because also, again as an herbalist, the reasons that I am using, like when I'm dealing with aroma therapy, that's one use. But if I'm adding essential oils into an herbal mixture, like there's a reason I'm doing it.
And I'm not talking about like soaps. Again, that's generally you're doing it for the aroma therapy, which has its own absolutely beneficial, all of that. Like the science behind aroma therapy is fascinating, but if I'm adding something to a salve or I'm adding something to … lemon balm is really good for things like cold sores. Like I, it needs to be the actual lemon balm, not a synthetic, because then it's defeating the purpose of adding it to this medicinal mixture.
And also potentially the synthetics are going to cause like counteractions to whatever it is you're trying to accomplish.
benil zamora: It basically, it’s safe and it's pure and … It's not pure. Maybe it's what, 80%, 60% then that's really just, and the rest is synthetics, then you only have 60% of what you thought was 100%.
ash alberg: Wooowww. That is wild. I am learning all the things
benil zamora: And I'm not, and we're not talking about diluting it with a carrier oil. This, you can dilute it with MCT, coconut oil or whatever, whichever you choose, which is fine because it helps the other properties.
But they do make synthetics. That's why when you buy a really cheap oil and it says 100% pure, you have to think about that because it's like, mmm, it's either they planted an insane amount of material, like insane.
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: Or it’s 50% synthetic.
ash alberg: That's wild. I think it also, like when we think about over-harvested and sacred plants as well, like for example, palo santo essential oil is extremely hard to find. And that's there's a reason for that.
And so if you can find, like a. if you can find it and nobody else is carrying it, like that's one kind of warning sign, but then also if you can find it and it also is like quite affordable, that's … that would be another warning sign, where it's either synthetic and/or the way that this has been processed is extremely unethical in probably every possible way.
benil zamora: Every possible way. And it's almost an irony and a contradiction. That's where I think it's a contradiction now where it's supposed to be for wellness …
ash alberg: Yes, totally.
benil zamora: … but it's impacting the environment and where we live in and everything else in a way that we don't talk about, are not aware of. So I think there’s irony to that. When that, when we became … again, the more we dug into it, it was like, “Whaaaat?”
So the more we really became passionate about small batch distillation, or maybe not the height, maybe just the hydrosols. Maybe just the, not the oils, like all about stuff like that.
ash alberg: Yeah. Oh, that's so cool. Okay. So I guess in theory, we should get into the questions, but I also, at some point definitely want to dig into talking about your experience with, you guys are testing out different things to be growing on your land which is here in in Canada.
And even just in terms of the different types of lavenders that will actually overwinter in our climate, which is, there's a limited amount of that. [Benil laughs.]
But then like you’re from a tropical country. And so for you, like the scents that are evocative of home are entirely different plants. And so how … what is that experience for you in terms of what do you identify as being comforting scents? ‘Cause I find that again, like aroma therapy and memory is a really interesting thing.
And then also like how can people go about, if they want to be purchasing scents from different places or thinking about oh, this is this scent, where should I be sourcing it from ethically? What's been your process for figuring all of that out? At some point, I will ask you that. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: [Laughs.] Alright, sounds good.
ash alberg: But I guess let's dig into it officially, so tell us a bit about you and what you do. Yeah.
benil zamora: [Giggles.] By day?
ash alberg: Yeah. I think you like your day job is …
benil zamora: [Giggles.] In general?
ash alberg: Yeah, both! Like your day job actually is like the ideal thing for overlapping with the, with Abode, because yeah, I would want somebody who was a compliance officer whose literal job is to make sure that the shit is being done properly to then be in charge. [Benil giggles.]
benil zamora: Follow the rules, man! Like this isn't cool.
So by day, I am a quality assurance and compliance professional, where I go into food facilities or manufacturing facilities for food, hemp, and cannabis. Whether for cannabis, whether they're growing or purchasing, like into the edibles or into the vape pens and whatnot, and just make sure they follow the different standards, the different regulatory frameworks of Canada.
And then if they're exporting, whatever company they're exporting to and write all the standard operating procedures. Sounds so boring, I know. It's …
ash alberg: I think it could get really nerdy and fun though. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: I'm falling asleep at myself right now. [Ash snorts and cackles.]
ash alberg: Everybody's behaved. But I feel like that's the thing, right? It's 98% of the time hopefully like people are doing it properly and so it is boring. And then the 2% where they're not, it's “oh shit.”
benil zamora: Oh shit. There's big “oh, shits,” like $10 million worth of shit. So basically I, I create all these programs and SOPs to make sure everybody follows the rules to make sure at the end of the day, I released the batch and say, yes, nobody's going to die from this.
ash alberg: [Cackles and snorts.] Again, this is why we're really glad that you are in charge …
benil zamora: This is, that's what I do.
ash alberg: … of essential oils and hydrosols that are being put onto and into our bodies. [Snorts.]
benil zamora: That's what I do in my life for my career. And then of course, part of that work is telling people, “Hey guys …” and that's not necessarily the fun part. But that is the role it's like, “Hey guys, and we unfortunately cannot do this. And this has to be reworked.” I tell the bosses that, “No, I'm sorry, I can't approve this. This needs to be destroyed.”
So that's my day job. And then, but really everything else is all about the whole … the essential oil part became a business. At beginning it was like, whoa, what about this or what about that? And then when Greg got more and more into the scales and how it could look and all that, the beauty of the copper, the rivets versus the … there was all these different technical things. That's not really my space there.
But when we got more into that and we said, oh … we only really became passionate about it because sustainability is something we're both passionate about and trying to reduce our impact to the environment. So when we realized how we just smelled it and how much we can go with it, we just really started exploring different avenues, how to make it work.
So before we said, “Let's plant some lavender” and my initial thought was like, oh, I want to have a lavender farm and all of these purple lavender and I frolic in my white dress and basket [Ash cackles.] Like that's my dream.
ash alberg: The dream.
benil zamora: Have that Instagram photo. And then when I realized that, holy it's so unsustainable. And holy, is it hard to grow lavender in Manitoba.
ash alberg: [Laughs.] Also like the combo of those two things. [Snorts.]
benil zamora: It just won’t work. You can grow, but it's not that easy. We said, okay, then maybe we should just move towards what's common things here. What are things that are commonly people can plant here in Manitoba and go into more into the small batch. And then we explored getting partner cultivators, partner growers, even smaller, out in the country, their backyards are big.
Backyards, even people who have like bigger backyards and plant patches of lemon balm and peppermint. And so I've been talking to people, small scale producers and people with big backyards. And that's what we want to do, just to get more people. We get their plant material and we distill.
And what we want to incorporate is we … in our world, we have a traceability, a lot code number. In our world, we would like to have the same idea where people know where this plant material came from for this essential oil. And like this was grown by so-and-so. It's, “OK, cool!” So it's where things are, what you put in your body and you're putting in your potions and all that stuff.
ash alberg: I love that.
benil zamora: So yeah, so that's where we're heading. And then other opportunities came up where there's some potential talks in community groups in the Philippines where they can grow, which is segueing to the other questions you were asking me. [Ash laughs.] Where they could grow, and we must probably, would just put some stills out there and everything would just be, that community would take care of that part.
So everything's still locally grown. Yes, it would have to travel across the ocean. So I guess we'll have to balance that. But everything's still sustainably grown and all that stuff and distilled where it was grown and it gives us opportunity for communities out there.
ash alberg: And the other thing that I … it's always, it becomes this like challenging and very nuanced conversation around like shop small versus shop local. And I feel like at the heart of shop local, ultimately the two key things are supporting small scale community and then also knowing where shit is coming from and being able to actually trace that.
And as long as you are accomplishing that, then realistically we are in a very globalized society. And even in terms of like, you and I know this, we can have all of our ingredients sourced locally, but like the glass bottles that we're using for our stuff are like … who knows where they're manufactured, like they are not made locally.
And it would be a lovely idea to just someday have a really special, like very tiny batch, but like sustainably and realistically, that's just not a thing. So it’s, “Here's your glass bottle. You can reuse it the next time.” Like for folks that are local having eventually some situation of being able to come and do a refill, like that's a cool concept. But to be like, absolutely every single part of it needs to be local to you, it's just not realistic because also just the logistics and the manufacturing capabilities of any individual location is not the easiest and also doesn't always make sense, right?
Like it would not make sense to try and be growing eucalyptus on a wide scale in Manitoba. But if we were like, hey, we know these folks that can grow eucalyptus where they are and it's really easy, here's a still, distill it where you are. Which I think is also a super smart way that you guys are figuring out, what are the logistics of how do you work with folks who are literally like on the other side of the world to be able to make sure that the quality of the product still remains as high as possible.
Like to have them growing certain plants and then to ship that plant material all the way over here to then do the distillation, like the quality would be a degraded. Chances are that something would end up ruined. Like probably you'd have quite a bit of spoilage just because of how much time it takes and not being able to control every single climate aspect all the way along the chain.
So yeah, it, to me, it seems really smart that the … you're working around it by making sure that okay, you guys can do the distillation on your end, and then we will get the finished product from you.
benil zamora: Not to mention it … ‘cause when we did the math, it's like, it's way … because the conversion of plant material oil is 10%, 20%.
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: So if they ship us, like 100 kilograms of plant material and we pay, we have to obviously pay for the shipping across the ocean. It's cheaper for us to ship five stills up there and do the process there …
ash alberg: Oh my god. Yeah.
benil zamora: … because you'll only get 10% of oil from that which is … So it's easier for us to just ship.
And again, the quality and the whole duration of it to go across the ocean, it's easier for us to fly home. See my parents, my mom,
ash alberg: Yeah. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: Put it in our carry on, these oils, talk to the community and bring the oils back.
ash alberg: Yes. Yeah, that makes so much more sense. It like accomplishes so many things, including being like, “Hi mom, how are you?”
benil zamora: I mean, we’re here, you know? And it's all in one, and it's all in one trip versus putting it on the barge and all that. It's … the amount of oil we would get would be a hundred mil.
ash alberg: Yeah. Which again, like when we're talking about sustainability, it does not necessarily … like it's not as sustainable to be shipping that much and the carbon footprint associated with shipping that quantity of things. Which is, it's another thing that people don't necessarily think about when, like, when we're looking at supply chains. I think a big part of the problem is that very few companies and definitely not industries as a whole … nobody's that open about their full supply chain.
And so once, when you have these like very small batch folks who are like, yep, here's how everything happens. Then you realize holy shit, this is huge, but at least they're being transparent about it. Which also means that honestly, their chains are probably a lot tinier because they can actually trace where everything is coming from.
benil zamora: Right. Right. And again, I guess for me, it's the same thing as food. I want to know what I eat. Like, I would want to know the products I use for my wellness.
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: It's the same thing. Like I, it's no different, right?
ash alberg: Yeah, totally. ‘Cause you're putting it, you're putting it on your body and your skin is your biggest organ.
benil zamora: On your body.
ash alberg: So this is actually this is like a sticking point that I find, I get really annoyed with the essential oil MLMs for like many reasons. But one of the things that pisses me off the most is the lack of education for their sellers, as far as the safety of essential oils, because essential oils, like they're really fucking potent.
And like you need, depending on the health and the literal size of a body which is why generally things are split between like adults and children, because children are just such smaller bodies. But also when you're dealing with somebody who is immunocompromised or folks who are older, like the … or yeah, the amount of distillation that you need to do percentage wise changes.
And so, you're putting a bigger percentage of carrier oil in to some recipe based on who's going to be the person who is having this on their body. And yet regularly we see like recipes on Pinterest of “Here, look, I put this in my coffee” and I'm like, you don't consume that!
Do you know of any essential oils that are actually safe to consume, like to be taking into your body as opposed to being applied to the skin?
benil zamora: Anything I buy … I don't really have one in a long time, but before when I used to buy commercially, I never really ingested it. Just because I didn’t, I personally just never knew where it came from. Like I know the store, but I don't know where it came from.
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: So for our oil I obviously know what we did, and so I tried it. I am not advocating to everyone to ingest our oils. I am not. [Ash cackles.] That’s the disclaimer right there.
But because I know what we did to it … But I would do say though, when we see like people would just spreading and lathering all those oils on them, sometimes I wonder too, like maybe they, it, because it's not as potent. Like when we produce ours … ‘cause it's just not as fresh. It's not as high quality. It's …
ash alberg: So yeah, you're not going to have the same … ‘cause there's certain oils where they actually will say make sure that you dilute this. That was the word I meant dilute, not distill.
benil zamora: Yes. Dilute it. Yeah, yeah.
ash alberg: But make sure that you dilute this because it will irritate your skin. But there's a number of others where they don't say that.
And then there's ones, like all of the citrus are, I think it's photosynthesize is the word. And if you're putting citrus oils into recipes that are then going to be applied to skin that is exposed to the sun, it actually heightens your chance or your risk of UV damage. So you don't want to put like a lemon or an orange into a face.
But there's all of these like complexities and layers of knowledge that I think it's not generally provided to the average consumer of essential oils.
benil zamora: Right. And I do think it should be. [Both laugh.] Because like say I had, I have friends back in the day when they bought some commercially available, and they directly put it in their bath. Of course, we love doing that.
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: It was not good. Itchy allergy and all that stuff. And I was like why did you put in direct? Like how many drops? And they said, they said 8 to 10 or … and I was like, no, don’t do that! [Laughs.]
But again, it boils down to the right dilution and what really is in that oil.
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: Because you don't. And from what we do is, we noticed like when our, depending on the time of harvest, sometimes the … the smell is so much more potent.
ash alberg: Riiight.
benil zamora: It's, we have a big difference.
Like this year we experienced it, what if we pushed back on harvesting? Versus last year we did it like more into batches. And there is a difference in the smell. And I do believe there is a difference in the potency.
Next year we want to do … so this year is all about quantitative data. And next year I was telling Greg, I really actually want it to be, do actual testing to have the actual that … it's so nerdy! But I feel like there's no information out there that can help us understand it. And it's all about getting again, my line of work all is about science-based risk assessment, right?
How to assess a risk based on these facts. And right now, with essential oils, there's nothing. We ask around, “How much was the first? Like how much plant material do we need here?” I was like, I dunno, just stuff it all in, you know? I was like counting it like this.
And then we realized, okay, you do need different. Making our notes, so now we know about 100 grams of lavender would produce about five to eight mil. Like we have a sense, we have categorized low yielders, medium yielders, high yielders. Like lemon balm, low yielders. Like I always say never lemon balm as your first thing to distill, because you will be very disappointed. [Ash cackles.]
The smell would be great, but you will not get oil. So, things like that. And we want to get more information because it's all about being informed and it's for our wellness. So that's what we want to really promote.
ash alberg: Yeah. Yeah. And then on the other side of it, what I also love is that you guys make a point of also selling the hydrosols, which are the aromatic waters that are the results of the steam distillation. And so they are all of the same aroma therapy benefits and also actually a lot more accessible price-wise and also in terms of who can use it, because it's not nearly as potent as the essential oil.
With water-based products, I know like it gets more complicated in terms of shelf life. So does that end up factoring in for you guys? How do you mitigate all of those weird waters?
benil zamora: Yes, because it is water-based, because it is water-based, again, there's no real studies out there about the shelf life. So, if you read the literature is from anywhere from 6 months to 18 months. Like, we don't produce that much that lasted until 18 months. The longest we have lasted is 6 months.
And, then, so that's what we abide for. We do store our stuff in a cold area. Now we bought a big fridge and we put our hydrosols in there. But I do suggest that if it's just hydrosols that you're producing or using, make sure it's not more than 6 months, because … and then if you open it and then you see weird stuff …
ash alberg: Yes. Yeah. It's like a weird little like white squiggly things.
benil zamora: White squiggly stuff, or sometimes there might be like … there'd be … you'll know if you open that it does not look right. [Ash cackles.]
You will know. Toss it, even if it smells good.
ash alberg: So in that situation, would you be … like, I've definitely heard of folks who will use it to water their plants at that stage. Could you potentially be like pouring that into a bath or is that not a good idea? It's …
benil zamora: I would not pour it in a bath or use it on your body or …
ash alberg: So nothing to do with the body at all or in the …
benil zamora: Not at all. I would just pour it in your plants, ‘cause that's just like squiggly stuff, but I wouldn't put it, I wouldn't put it on your body. That's, I won't recommend that. And then I know down the road, we tested our water, so we're pretty confident in our, in what we produce, but I know down the road, we want to be a little bit more sophisticated.
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: And get like a system to actually … our own basic, in our own system for the water and things like that.
But again, that's what, as we grow and stuff like that, but we're not that big that even our hydrosols, they don't even last. Longest lasted 6 months. And that was not the best smelling ones. [Both laugh.] And then if you put it in spritzers though, and you make some vodka or alcohol …
ash alberg: Oh, yeah, yeah.
benil zamora: … that extends the shelf life.
ash alberg: That makes sense.
benil zamora: So that's why, I guess, more people, if you see that when they do, they … Not a lot of people really sell the hydrosols, but they sell spritzers.
ash alberg: Okay. This makes it like … room sprays and things like that.
benil zamora: Room sprays or face masks or whatever you want. Face sprays, misters. And it's, you get the same smell and again, you can either use 70, or you can make hand sanitizers from that. I did that too one time.
But if you mix it with any type of alcohol base …
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: … then it will extend the shelf life.
ash alberg: That makes sense.
benil zamora: So hydrosols is quite funny ‘cause every time I said that before they were like, what?! Nobody really knew what hydrosols were and then someone was trying to explain, and all the question would be, “What do you do with it?”
ash alberg: Majority of what you end up with.
benil zamora: Yes, absolutely. You would get … it will be 90% hydrosols and maybe 10, 10% essential oil. That's why obviously essential oil is a more expensive and hydrosols are cheaper, but the uses are actually quite tremendous.
Like it's becoming more popular in like soaps and … because you still have to mix water. Any recipe you need to mix water and oil, just use the hydrosol.
ash alberg: I totally like, I was thinking earlier today, I was like, oh, I should start prepping, making my soap loaves for Christmas so that they're like cured in time. And I did not even think about using that in my … so if you were to use that in like with, if you're doing cold process soap and you're adding lye, is that going to fuck with the scent potentially?
benil zamora: I don't know. I think maybe depending on the scent.
ash alberg: I'll experiment and report back.
benil zamora: Experiment. Let us know. Maybe we can hook you up with some scents that you can experiment with.
ash alberg: That would be cool! That would be very fun. Okay. This is going to be …
benil zamora: Yeah. Yeah.
The hydrosols have lots because it still has oil in it. And again, if you follow our Instagram, there's this picture where they have to pipe it out the oil levers and you see Greg's hand just like this. [Laughs.]
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: Don't let that fall!
ash alberg: Yes. It's so precious. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: Nooo! So he pipe itself the oil, but you can't get everything out of the oil at the start when it happen. And even when it's stripped essential oil just goes into the hydrosol. So there is essential oil in it.
ash alberg: Ahh, this makes sense.
benil zamora: So …
ash alberg: Cool.
benil zamora: Yeah. I've also used actually straight hydrosols in my diffuser.
ash alberg: Oh my god, that's a smart idea. I'm learning all the tricks.
benil zamora: Some diffusers, different types of fusers, but some diffusers, “put water and add eight, whatever drops,” then just put the hydrosol.
ash alberg: That's so smart. Oh my god. This is a great idea. Learning all the thing. All the tips and tricks for folks.
So how, how did you get into all of the essential oils to begin with and also what's your personal experience been with ritual throughout your life?
benil zamora: How do I get … I guess how did I got into it, it's capturing the memories of the scents, just bringing it back to whatever time, wherever place and, or puts you in a different space.
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: So it's more, a bit really the scent. Like I grew up at a college town in the Philippines, tropical country, it’s at the foot of a volcano. So our … it's all forest and flowers and beautiful scents and whatnot.
Like this picture of me that’s totally me like wandering around. And as far as … that's how I, that's how I grew up with.
ash alberg: Amazing.
benil zamora: And it was a very mystical place. Everything surrounded, like there was … so it's a college town, so there was lots of scientists and academia. [Ash laughs.] My entire family's professors and all that stuff.
But at the same time, at the same time, there were so many what we call albularyos.
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: so the albularyos are the folk healers or the plant doctors. The plant … male or female. And growing up, I would visit them because they were so intriguing, like they have these plants and do stuff and, they do all of this stuff and I thought it was just so cool.
I was pulled back a bit because of our religious background and upbringing. So growing up, it was like a little bit of imbalance there, but that always intrigued me. So I guess that was the path. And then I guess, I keep on thinking about when you ask that question before, I think in that form or whatever, I was like, “When did it start?”
And I always messed around with plants. My parents were both in plants, in the science of it and the abularyos in our hometown. Then I started farming. I did a CSA when I was in Canada, it was all about plants. So just all melded.
And now when we realized that the first time, I did the first run and I did the Christmas tree we had. And then if it's, I just saved the pine needles and I’m going to stuff this in the still. And it smelled exactly like Christmas. And it brought back our memories for that Christmas.
ash alberg: This is why I am completely unwilling to get a non-real Christmas tree, ‘cause I have, I need … like last year because of the pandemic, people are assholes. So all the people who normally go away for Christmas were like, we can't do that so we'll just buy five Christmas trees for our house. Fuck you.
So like by December 3rd, there were literally no trees in Winnipeg or outside of Winnipeg to go and get, which was awful. And so I didn't have a Christmas tree for Christmas and it literally fucked with my whole concept of the season because I didn't have that scent filling my home. Like normally I have a tree in early December and keep it for Yule season and then I harvest as most of it for my dye pots.
Same thing to like, be able to use that later, before then the trunk goes to the compost. But yeah, it like completely fucked up my entire Christmas season in Yule season ‘cause I didn't have that very familiar scent that just to me always evokes Christmas time.
benil zamora: And that's exactly it. And that's how everything melded. And when we did all the distillation, we felt like it was memories in a bottle. We called it “memories in a bottle” and it would just bring us to a certain place or put us to a certain space or be in a really good memory, memory scene.
And we'd like to continue doing that.
ash alberg: Cute. I love it. I love the fact that you had, so I'm going to say it wrong because I always say it wrong. I will. Ah-bul-yar-ee-ohs? Ah-boo-lar-ee-oh?
benil zamora: Ah-buhl-ar-ee-yo.
ash alberg: Ah-buhl-ar-ee-yo.
benil zamora: Yeah, that’s it!
ash alberg: Okay, great. I’m going to say it wrong the next time too. [Snorts.] I like, I find them, I find them just so fascinating, ‘cause I'm also just I'm totally, I'm like, absolutely they are the ones who are smart.
If you piss off a duende, obviously you need to go and find them because they're going to be the ones that get the curse off of you! Like, otherwise you're fucked.
benil zamora: Hundred percent. When you go, where they're at that mountain, and this mountain is known to be Mary Makiling Mountain, and if you piss her off, I'm telling you, you are never leaving that mountain. [Ash cackles.] Like I just, you do not mess with this.
ash alberg: It's true. But I, what I love so much about Filipino like folklore slash … I always am like, the folklore is the real history, but whatever.
benil zamora: Yes.
ash alberg: But what I find so interesting is like Philippines, similar to Polish, like both are very Catholic countries and also have managed to like, hold onto these like very strong beliefs all the way through now, despite the fact that they're like suuuper Catholic and the whole … that would be all just like demon devil bullshit as far as the church is concerned.
And yet the people are like, yes, a hundred percent. And also, we're just going to make sure that we like do this offering and we just don't step off the path. [Chuckles.]
benil zamora: Yes, Or we have, when we go into the forest and, you have to say, “mano po, mano mano po” and just be respectful and say, it's … I did this actually when Greg and I were hiking and it was in this forest, and I was just going say, “mano po, mano mano po.”
And I was doing it out in Ontario. [Chuckles.] It's like no, we have to make sure … it's like coming into someone's house. You don't just barge into someone's house. You respectfully go into their house and say, heyy, OK we’ve passed, thank you, right? It's the same thing. And when I do the hikes and even like the curious being in me, it's … we look at plants, especially for wild harvest.
And he's like, “Ooh, I wonder if we can we can try this?” So I always liked that and Greg has his plant ID and we try to figure out what it is. And we always ask first, is it okay? And it may sound weird to people, but for us it's the respect. And I think there's so much interconnection regarding that, which I can't explain.
But even when I see the oils coming out, it's weird, but it makes us very happy and grateful that we see the … they say the essential oils are the essences of the plant, and it just makes us feel so very grateful that we have this opportunity to grab this, right? And have this and share it. And
So it's almost … Ohh. And it's weird, it's like, when he, when we did the distillation, we're chilling and it's nice at night, you have the fire going and then starts dripping. And it takes 10, 20 minutes to actually start dripping. And it's like drip, it's not [makes a heavy sound.] It's a process. So it's a process of patience and gratitude and …
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: … and thankfulness.
And again, it's the whole process for us. And we hope people can enjoy that same thing by renting our stills now.
ash alberg: Yes, this is a great moment for folks, if you're listening … [Laugh-snorts.] We have a code for you. Which obviously is for like local folks. If somebody is in … we've got listeners all over. So obviously if you're not within pick up and drop off, just …
benil zamora: Manitoba.
ash alberg: Okay. But like we've got like a slight … if you're a …
[Both talking at the same time.]
Yeah, like an easy-ish drive by Canadian standards, which also … I, it was funny, I was talking to a friend recently and I was like, yeah, one of my best friends is like my doppelganger. She's in Edmonton, it's like a 16ish hour drive. And she was like, if I drove 16 hours from where I am, I would be in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. [Laugh-snorts.] Canadian distances …
[Both talking at the same time.]
Like that's half of the distance it would take me to get to Toronto, which is technically one province over. So …
benil zamora: Exactly. Yeah so, that is why we thought about renting out some stills, people who want to, or don't have the space, right? And it's not just … again, there's more to it than just putting the still on the stove. Like we had to figure out the hoses and, oh my gosh, I have no idea what happened there. That's out of my power.
Greg did all of that. And the different types of flame and the heat and all that. And for me, I was just going to pour water in and away you go, but no, it's not. But you have to do the setup. But anyway, our still rental is the full package. You just literally just put it in your closet or you can do re-circ water, which is part of the pump, which is part of the package, if you want to, and do your own thing and experience the magic of it.
ash alberg: That's, yeah. And the other thing is that these stills are quite expensive and also they don't come from around here.
benil zamora: They don't come from around! [Ash laughs.] That is not local, unfortunately. But we were able to meet some … and they're all handmade. They're handmade by local to the country artisans there, and they're beautifully made, really beautifully made.
But we've tried two different types and we figured out for DIYers, kitchen, one type is better. If you want to do more, and you have a little backyard, or a shop or a garage there's bigger stills you can do. 200 liters might be too big for some people to tackle.
ash alberg: [Laughs.] For the average person. [Both talking at the same time.] Like when you’re like, let me grow 300 plant tomato plants, and then you're like drowning in tomatoes. You're like, why did I think this was a good idea? [Laughs.]
benil zamora: Exactly. You may, people may not want, but everybody's welcome to visit and come see it. But just think about this, a 200 liter still is called a boiler. It's big enough to fit a six-year-old. We have a really comfortable bath. It’s that big.
ash alberg: Wow! Oh my god.
benil zamora: [Giggles.] So we've thought of ideas about, what if we create a sauna, a hot tub, right?
ash alberg: Oh my god. That would be a great idea! It would smell wonderful.
benil zamora: I know, create like an experience! While you're distilling, the water comes down and it's warm and it's nice and warm.
ash alber g: You could literally make like a steam sauna, just like pipe it into the steam. I'm totally … you should do that. And then rent out experiences. Make your own little spa. I would come.
benil zamora: At one point we saw the spa and we were like, oh, we should totally do this!
ash alberg: Oh my goodness.
benil zamora: That’s kind of what we had an idea, because it's that big, that 200 liter is that big.
ash alberg: That is intense. It also makes me just imagine all of the local, really fancy spas. Like Thermea, I'm like, they need to be sponsoring you guys. And then the whole space of like wholesale work there of like them purchasing oils from you guys. I’m just planning all these things for you. [Cackles.]
benil zamora: Bring it, bring it. That's awesome. [Ash laughs.]
ash alberg: Okay. So we chatted about how ritual played into your your life before slash your personal life. And then I think we've also tied it in quite nicely about how that goes for work with you.
Oh! If people want to rent the still, so the eight liter still package, if you want to do a daily or a weekly rental than listeners, you can use the code PEPPERMINT and you'll get a discount on your rental. And again, this episode is going to come out the very first week of December, highly recommend jumping on this because making these oils and hydrosols for the holiday season as gifts will just like, you will become the fanciest person at Christmas gatherings. Everyone's going to be just like jealous of you.
And the one thing that's super cool is that you guys use a lot of compost from your local, I think, grocery store, is it? Or the co-op maybe? So you guys like, because obviously citrus is a really popular one.
benil zamora: Much to their dismay, of my family. [Ash laughs.] [Audio distortion.]
ash alberg: They just eat that many oranges.
benil zamora: Yeah. Keep the peels! Just keep them.
ash alberg: That's so smart. I love that. It's like when people bring me their onion skins, I'm like, I don't actually need this many, but thank you. [Laughs.]
Onions for everybody. But yeah the peels also are great because they are high oil content, comparatively. And so using what would otherwise be just compost to get these scents that we have really easy access to at the grocery store, but are not at all local, right? Nobody's growing a lemon tree successfully in Winnipeg in a way where they're going to get that many lemons off of it.
But yeah, like thinking outside the box in terms of you don't just need to grow it, it can also be, what are the things around you? And like we said earlier about the Christmas tree, or if you are trimming your cedar branches and using those in the still … [audio distortion.]
benil zamora: Your pine trees, or spruces that can all be distilled.
ash alberg: Oh, delightful. So what what's your favorite thing to distill?
benil zamora: I actually maybe like orange because it just doesn't produce as much. And our family doesn't really like me to buying boxes and boxes when they're on sale. [Ash laughs.] And that's the other cool thing. Like you could get the ones that are on sale …
ash alberg: Yes.
benil zamora: … that are otherwise most probably going to be thrown away if they're not bought at a certain time, like I don't … Greg and I do flash foods and then, they it's so cool ‘cause it's like just things that you have to eat in within a certain period of time. We just eat it, but it's so cheaper.
Otherwise it'll be thrown away so it's food wastage. But it doesn't have to be the super refreshest oranges or whatnot, just even stuff, and peel them, get those peels, mush them up and put them in the still.
And it’s like, it's amazing. At least we put another use to it instead of just putting it out there. And then you put it in the compost, but you still can get it, but you can still get the essential oils from that. Then we have even those geraniums that you get, so you got some really decent hydrosol from there, right?
Otherwise that would have been put somewhere else.
ash alberg: It just would've gone in the compost because.
benil zamora: It would’ve gone through the compost.
ash alberg: It like, I had access to literally an institution in the city. Their geraniums that they just like plant because they're pretty. And then, it's fall and so they rip up all their annuals. Although geraniums, I have a geranium plant that has survived five winters so far and refuses to die.
And I'm very impressed with it and I love it. But yeah, like it was a lot of geraniums and I didn't realize how much I was going to be getting from them. And I looked at it and I was like, there's no way I will make that much hedge witch lip balm. It's just not gonna happen.
benil zamora: It’s not gonna happen!
ash alberg: But then, the other thing is, you guys got great hydrosol out of it, but very minimal oil content because the plants were, it was the full plant that was uprooted. And so … which again, it was just going to go into the compost. The plant is not, we're not just talking about the flowers. The flowers are usually what folks are distilling because that's where the majority of the oil is being distilled from.
But when you think about like how many flowers are being, are blooming off of this whatever plant, like you just need so much plant material. I think that was … like, you guys took three gigantic garbage bags of geranium and distilled how much out of that?
benil zamora: I can’t remember, maybe two liters, maybe two liters. I'll have to check on the spreadsheet, but …
ash alberg: And that's the hydrosol, right? That's not oil.
benil zamora: There is no oil. There was like, maybe a point. It was some minimal oil. So we just mixed it into the hydrosol. But yeah, but it was, it smelled amazing.
ash alberg: Yeah, totally.
benil zamora: That was amazing. But again, but again, otherwise it would have gone waste, but the first time I ran it, I ran out geranium, there was full blooms. And that's where we're learning, oh, if it's X number of blooms, it's, you get so and so forth.
But you can get oil from say peppermint. Even if it's just the leaves, you can get good oil, decent oil. It's a very encouraging plant material to work with because you can get decent oil. It doesn't have to be in bloom.
Same as lavender. The flowers, as well as the leaves. I think there's a different smell to the lavender leaves. I feel like it's grainy, but Greg doesn't think it. So, it might just be me.
ash alberg: Like a little more herbacious.
benil zamora: I feel a little bit more herbacious versus the floral lavender.
ash alberg: Yeah. Yeah.
benil zamora: But it’s still lavender, it's still from the same plant.
ash alberg: And when you think of like, when you think of a lavender plant and its like tiny little flower boom on the top, and then there's a long, woody stalk.
benil zamora: So many leaves!
ash alberg: This, yeah, just, it doesn't make sense sustainability-wise to only be harvesting these like really minuscule parts of a plant, which like, you're taking the life force out of a plant.
And again, with these commercial ones, they're generally not being particularly careful about like, how are they harvesting or is it … like they'll just harvest the whole plant and then use a small amount of it. And so it's okay, you just use so many resources to grow all those plants and then discarded the vast majority of it without using it.
And like what's, that's not respectful to the plant, I don't think.
benil zamora: That's it, the respect. And we've been trying to explore what type of other material that would, other good compost that we can distill and how we can access this and stuff like that. It's among the avenues we're trying to think about and put together.
And then this summer, we had some chats … when I say we it's Greg had some chats with the conservation and we were looking into potentially trying out some invasive species, which they want, obviously it's invasive, it's ecologically impacting. They want it, they're removing it. They want it gone.
ash alberg: So to you use that then.
benil zamora: Do use, try to see, oh, that's … then there was two ones that they suggested. So it's this, it's there's discussions going on, but I know an apothecary here out in Ontario and she actually switched to just doing all invasive species from essential oils
ash alberg: That's so smart.
benil zamora: And she wild foraged everything. Like it is, I was like, that is so cool. And she's helping it, low impact, obviously ecologically impact and making it, it's still really good material. It's just invasive and the parks just doesn't want it.
ash alberg: Yeah. Yeah.
benil zamora: The [Audio distortion] don't want it.
And she gets a lot of oil from it. And I like, that is so cool. And we started exploring, been exploring that avenue, ‘cause there's these permits and whatnot that needs to happen.
ash alberg: Of course. You're like, ah yes. All of the permits that I happen to have on my computer anyway. [Joking.] [Laughs.]
benil zamora: I may have to add another folder here.
All of these permits have to happen for us to do that, but there's much interest of, to further explore, from both parties to further explore that. ‘Cause they're the ones actually who suggested to us, you know, what we could potentially try because they want to get rid of these two species.
And then of course I started Googling. [Laughs.]
ash alberg: Yeah. What are their uses? What's it going to smell? ‘Cause that's also the other thing, right? Like you don't necessarily want to distill everything, that's … I'm just imagining the person who's, “I'm going to do some durian” and everybody being like, noooo!
benil zamora: Durian! [Laughs.] Exactly. Or maybe we'll do, I don't know. Maybe we’ll try it, but who knows?
ash alberg: You let me know how that goes.
[Both talking at the same time.]
benil zamora: You're going to be a hard no for you.
ash alberg: Although people say that valerian root … No. Is it? Yeah. Valerian root people say smells like stinky socks and I actually really like the smell. [Laugh-snorts.] I'm like, this smells really comforting.
benil zamora: You can put that as the label, “stinky socks essential oil.”
ash alberg: That's true. That would b …
benil zamora: That would sell really well. That’d be a hit. That'd be such a hit.
ash alberg: Valerian root grows really well here. So it'd be easy for us to do. [Laughs.] Oh man.
benil zamora: But yeah. So if we could further explore other plant material to make it more respectful again, like essential oils that are respectful, that's a thing. That's where we want to see Abode growing.
ash alberg: Cool. What's something that you wish you'd been told about magic and ritual and witchcraft when you were younger? Actually, let me split that into two questions because I actually want to know, what were you told about witchcraft when you were younger slash like how has that kind of positioned back home?
benil zamora: You cannot do it.
ash alberg: And so do the abularyos …
benil zamora: It's that simple.
ash alberg: Ah-boo-lar-yee-oh.
benil zamora: Ah-buhl-ar-ee-yo.
ash alberg: Abularyo. God damn. It's easier to say than I want to make it in my head. Do they consider themselves witches of a type or is it like …
benil zamora: Yes.
ash alberg: Okay.
benil zamora: So it's a plant witch doctor, but it's, I guess plant witch doctor, folk healer what you’d call herbalist, right? It's all the local indigenous things and they know everything about it, but at the same time, there's like the spirits and right, all the smudging and the smokes and the energies and all that stuff.
Oh, it's so intriguing and all the … it's funny because we have so many superstitions growing up. So many and we follow them. Not necessarily my parents, like my parents at the beginning, but then we became very the religious background there. So it was like, no, we have to turn away on the pagans, turn our back towards the pagans.
And I don't mean offense to that, but …
ash alberg: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got ya.
benil zamora: [Laughs.] And you just can’t. You can't do it.
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: And it’s like, “What?!” So I would sneak out or whatever and still practice or still go up to the mountain and I'm doing my like manu-manu po or talk to the spirit, talk to those duendes and talk to Maria Makiling and tell my friends, don't go there. She's there. There's some real stories that we experienced a bit, some encounters with the magic and the, all that stuff.
And that's what they were, we were told growing up. So I guess becoming an adult and so engrossed, that there's part of me think that it's not good. But then that curiosity part, and, moving to the States, just it's fine. It's cool. I'm my own person now at this point [Laughs.]
ash alberg: Yes. Yeah. They're like, okay. Benil’s just going to do, just going to do things.
benil zamora: I do you, you do me deal. But I wish I would have, if I could go back home sooner, I would definitely visit them. Find more abularyos, try to learn, try to talk about, talk to them. Cause they are, in my memory is they are very helpful.
ash alberg: Right.
benil zamora: They're not like, “this is secret.” They want to impart the traditions and the knowledge.
And I remember they were very so eccentric, they're always eccentric and just so warm and talk a lot and just, I felt like there was always an immense amount of knowledge I could learn whether just by looking or smelling or observing. And if I could have that opportunity now I'm older, go back home and learn and bring this and meld all that together or find some, whatever's indigenous in our country in that specific area, ask abularyos what …
ash alberg: Yesss.
benil zamora: Because there’s so many other herbs that I don't know about it.
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: That has a lot of medical properties or some magic potions and all that. And that's what, I would love to do that if given the opportunity.
ash alberg: That would be so cool. And it's also, it gets really interesting right? Where it's like, because there's this like the … which we see across a lot of cultures, there becomes almost like a dismissiveness at this point in time between like secularists who are just like, “Magic doesn't exist.” And then the religious folks who are like, “Magic can’t exist! But also here's our version of magic, but that's the wrong magic.” And we're also not going to call it magic, whatever. [Laughs.]
It ends up when you're trying to find resources, it can be really tricky. Like I have, I, because I'm a nerd that I like to find herbalism books from various areas. And I like, looking up books, also like English language books on medicinal plants and herbalism from the Philippines. There's not very many English language books, which is reasonable. It's not English. It's Tagalog.
But when you read them, like, I have this one book and it's fucking wild because the intro, it's written by a Filipino scientist who, he, like he was born and raised in the Philippines and then moved to Western Europe and he's writing the intro for it and the language that he uses for … because he like, he went home, he researched all these plants and then came back to, I think he was living in France.
And then just like trying to arrange getting plants sent to him and what are their uses and who did he talk to back home, and the language that he uses is just so fucking rude. And I'm like, these are, really you, it's not even … you were like born to Filipino parents, but have no experience of the country itself!
Like you're born and raised there. And the language you're using is just it, like it's, it's very denigrating and just poo-pooing the knowledge that folks have. And I'm like why the fuck are you writing this book if you don't actually believe in …? If you're going to put quotations around all of the medical use that these plants have been used for, because you don't believe that's legitimate because it hasn't been confirmed by Western science methods then why bother writing the book? There's, why are you the person who has been …
benil zamora: If you think it's hocus pocus, then don't write about the book.
ash alberg: Exactly. But yeah.
benil zamora: But that's the really contradicting part that I find is that because Western medicine or the Western culture didn't give it stamp of approval and didn't go through big pharma …
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: It's not real. But then again, if you look at again, because I'm in labeling and compliance, if you look at the nitty gritty of the labels and formulations, it is based on that exact herb that they synthesize, that they take from whatever country.
ash alberg: Yes, totally. It's like willow bark is literally, it's nature's aspirin because they literally used to distill until aspirin became fully synthesized, like aspirin was derived from willow bark. And so you can still use willow bark as a form of aspirin, aka an analgesic. Like it's, it's fascinating.
And yet then we also run into the same issue that we were talking about at the beginning of where labels don't necessarily mean anything because big pharma and capitalism have allowed corporations in particular … it's all, it's never the little people. Like those are the ones that are going to get slapped with this, like this and that different lawsuit and shit.
But like the big corporations can be like, ah, yes. “Made in this country.” And literally all it means is that like the final label was slapped on in whatever country. And you have no fucking clue where the rest of it came from. But just, and like the different differences in each country in terms of what they consider to be like an adequate amount of labeling.
Like when I go to the States, which I don't know when the fuck I'm going to have to go to the States again. But like I, when I did go to the States, I was like, I need to be vegan and/or only consuming like farm-to-table meat, because there are laws around what is allowed in commercial meat and the way that they like do their labels, you have no fucking clue what's gone into it, even if it's certified organic.
And so it’s, okay. Whereas in Canada, I'm like, okay, I might have my feels about the farming practices and the factory practices and the slaughtering practices. But also if I can't afford to be purchasing a thing from one of my friends and I go to the grocery store and I get whatever, I'm not necessarily worried that there's like a shit ton of weird hormones that have been added to it.
benil zamora: Yeah. Yep. So they agree.
And that's what's, that's what's the irony and contradictions. Which goes back, just know what you're putting into and onto your body. I think that's the biggest thing.
Like even those certifications again, because I'm in that world is I realized some of them are just stamp pads, and document review and stuff like that. It’s like really, you’re not going to like, come here and check us out?
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: No, just give us a document. If it looks good, okay. So stuff like that. And in our little business, we don't want that. We want to be able to get knowledge and be … keep people informed.
Like even in my post, I think I pleaded that maybe … there was one it's … I don't know. I didn't say it was a fail. It didn't work too great.
ash alberg: Yeah. [Snorts.]
benil zamora: We waited way too long to harvest that, and when Greg and I were talking about it, when he was like, should we still continue? ‘Cause we, we planted, like we broadcasted quite … I wouldn't say we have a big place, but a good chunk.
And instead he was like if we like some, the smell of hay and dustiness maybe? [Ash laughs.] We will tell people that, no, we don't. That's what happened. Sorry, we don't have this right now and do it, just for the transparency so people know what you're buying from us. Or promote … again, if you only want a little bit, if you're happy with about two mil, three mil of oil, which if you made your own is very potent is … rent our stills! [Laughs.]
ash alberg: Yeah.
And I think that's part of it too, right? Is that like for most folks they don't actually need that much. And so it actually like it, it's nice to be able to just make as much as you need each time and then you have it and you use it within the amount of time where it stays fresh, which is lovely.
And then when you need to make more, then you make more.
benil zamora: Yes.
ash alberg: So for folks who want to, it is exponentially easier to just buy or rent from you guys’ stills. And certainly, if you haven't tried it out and you don't know how … I feel like everybody that I know who tries it out just gets like completely hooked, like I'm totally hooked.
But if somebody was like, I don't really know. And maybe they're like in the States or in Mexico or in like Germany or something and is listening, where have you guys found to be sourcing stills from … been the most successful?
benil zamora: So we've sourced our stills actually from Ukraine and from Portugal.
ash alberg: Okay.
benil zamora: We do, we've been talking, because people have been asking us, oh, we want our own stills. So we do, we've been talking about we, we could potentially, because the shipping takes forever …
ash alberg: Right.
benil zamora: And it's expensive to ship. Obviously it would be cheaper if …
ash alberg: To do a batch of things.
benil zamora: A bigger batch order. And so because you have these good relationships with these two companies, they're willing to put a big batch together and we can facilitate that if people really want to have their own stills.
Again, because there's different sizes and types. I do suggest for someone to try it out first, figure out what's best for your space and what you really want, what you want to get out of it. And maybe you realize it's so much work and patient and I don't want to wait for all this time.
ash alberg: Yes. [Snort-laughs.] Then they can just buy the finished oils from you. This is my thing with natural dyeing too. I'm just like, if you don't like making a mess and this is annoying and you need like a precise, exact result every single time, don't fucking do this. Just get somebody who already does this, buy from them. Buy the finished product from them.
Makes your life a lot easier.
benil zamora: You can also buy the oil from us, but we do sell stills. We will be selling stills. If you really want to have your own still.
ash alberg: Cool. I'm just going to get everybody like hooked on this and everybody's just going to be distilling delicious things all over their houses.
benil zamora: That would be so crazy. And we've been again, we're also, we actually had, after the workshop we did in the summer, there has been quite some interest in and questions, if we could, we can hold them workshops again and everything. And we absolutely can.
‘Cause we have, we added our stills actually. I can't remember how many, six or four, something like that. I have to look at my spreadsheet, but we have, I have like stills now the same size, 8 liters in 14 liters that we can bring to like workshops and everybody can have their own still. So we are also very open to doing that as long as obviously there's at least four still. We can't do a one in one, just rent our own stills if you just wanted one.
But if you want people want to do like an event, why not? When somebody actually is, wanted for her like a party event that she wants to do, and she wants to have some stills at the back and …
ash alberg: I would a hundred percent be that person. [Laughs.] Like whenever people are planning like bachelorette and shit like that, I'm like, this sounds awful, but can we use it as an excuse to just go and make these …
benil zamora: Go and get these stills. But yeah, but we do that too. And then you just have the hands on experience, get the material, get the oil, and you got the experience. So there's different options and we just really want to promote more knowledge and experience and exposure to it and try out small batch distillation and get hooked some shape or form. [Chuckles.]
ash alberg: What's, we just talked about what's next for you, but what's like your next big goal with Abode?
benil zamora: So we want to really get more partner grows for next year. Just because again, we … it's always the question how small is small, and how big becomes too big?
ash alberg: Yes. Yeah. A hundred percent cognizantly aware of that particular tension point right now.
benil zamora: So we were, it was like, is 200 liters too big? So I was like maybe not ‘cause when we wild harvest, we like chop things off the, when you trim your trees and stuff, that's a lot of material right there. So anyway, we want to get more plant partner cultivators who would be interested in planting stuff.
Anywhere from something really peppermint. Just like peppermint. Come on, peppermint’ll just go, right? Anything from there to lavender, your little adventures and stuff like that with the lavender …
ash alberg: I have a slightly greener thumb. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: You have a slightly greener thumb. Or from our partner grows next season, we've had some talks already with a couple locals, but for us, the more the merrier.
And then we would talk about it, we'll be very transparent with you and stuff like that. And then also we want to explore further avenues of whether it’s invasive species in terms of plant materials or the food waste aspect.
ash alberg: Yeah.
benil zamora: So we did some cold calls with some local businesses who are bars, smoothie bars.
ash alberg: Yes! Oh my god. It's like the best that … I'm like, go, if you're looking for … same with the dyes. I'm like, your personal consumption of onions and avocados is honestly not nearly as good as going to the smoothie bar and getting stuff from them from one day. Or the soup kitchen, like the places where they just plow through it and then they have a bucket by the end of the day and that's just compost for them.
So it's yeah, it's so much easier.
benil zamora: So that's, I think that's where we would explore. That's where we're exploring further these days. It's not because we don't want to grow. We just don't … again, how big is too big? But at the same time, obviously we want to increase production, but we don't foresee us, you know planting acreages and acreages of things.
It's just not, it's not going to happen. Those are the two things that we would want to further explore. And just again, more awareness. It's still small and we're still relatively new, so if people would start talking about Abode, that would be great. And again, we are trying, we're very open to feedback too.
Like we're trying to really embrace the whole sustainability, like the bottles we offer bottle return program, you get a 10% discount for the next order. We're hoping we can partner up with some local business where they can be the, they can deposit the … either refill it or deposit the bottles there and you pick it up.
And then also the labels, like the label is actually, I was very, it's … even if it's a little bit more work, we’re very like, no, I really don't want the whole adhesive thingy. Like I just don’t.
ash alberg: Yeah. You guys make really cool labels!
benil zamora: And it's not like I'm going to do a thousand bottle production. Like we're not, right? So all that, the packaging you want to work on it where it's really more mindful and not excessive, but still pretty, right?
ash alberg: Yes. Yeah.
benil zamora: Because it pains me to see how much packaging has to happen for a retail product to make it look pretty so the customer would buy it.
ash alberg: Yes. Yeah.
benil zamora: And whether we want to admit it or not …
ash alberg: It's a hundred percent. It's all, don't buy a book based on its cover, a hundred percent that is what people do. Like unless it's your favorite author, you're gonna buy … even with my own salves and things like it, I'm really happy with them. People love my shit and they're sold really well.
And there are also places where I'm like, I'm not even gonna suggest, offer them to you because I see the other things on your shelves and it's just not going to work, like …
benil zamora: Yeah, it is not, it's not going to happen. No. So we want to still make it be pretty, but not oh my gosh, it's just so unnecessary. It's just not us.
We're really trying to work on that. Again, and like you said at the beginning, if we can source bottles locally, that would be amazing, but that's just not going to happen. If we make our own bottles, that's not going to happen.
ash alberg: No, that would be the most expens-- . Can you imagine? I feel like that would be like the one time that you guys got enough lemon balm oil, then you also … it's just like, this bottle costs a hundred dollars and it's five milliliters and this is why.
benil zamora: This is why! But yeah. We hope that we can work on that, but we're … and again, we're pretty fixed about the labels and trying not to do any adhesive. Again, we do have to use a bit, but trying to reduce as much as possible.
ash alberg: Totally. Yeah. And I think I cut you off before you actually mentioned what you guys do, but you guys do a beeswax layer on paper, right? That's …
benil zamora: Yeah, so the paper is actually recycled, and it's printed on. And I actually discovered it was called algae ink. Oh my gosh. Don't even … New world for me, but we're not using that yet. I just found that. So we put it on and then we waterproof it because obviously we're working with essential oils.
We waterproof it with beeswax.
ash alberg: Cool.
benil zamora: And because I love origami, I figured out a way to just put it inside the bottle with no adhesives.
ash alberg: So smart.
benil zamora: So the, our 2 mil is not going to happen ‘cause there's no way my fingers are that small.
ash alberg: Oh my god. Like just trying to make this teeny tiny little bottom on it. Like no, your fingers …
benil zamora: That's not going to happen, FYI, everybody. [Both laugh, Ash snorts.] But for the bigger bottles, definitely.
ash alberg: It’s just an incentive for people to buy the bigger bottles.
benil zamora: Buy the beer bottles. These are only for testers. Imagine Greg's forceps trying to put these 2 mil bottles.
ash alberg: I can see that happening though. That's the problem. [Laughs.] He’d be like, let me just try, this is not efficient.
benil zamora: So it's not going to happen in the 2 mil bottles. The bigger bottles for sure. Again, as much as we can do, that's all we can really commit to.
ash alberg: Cool. Ah! This has been absolutely delightful. Thank you so much for this episode. And again, listeners use code PEPPERMINT for your daily or weekly rental of an 8 liter still and all of the things that you need, and then be the person that everybody else is jealous of when it comes to holiday gift giving slash be the coolest secret Santa person in the office.
This is just my little plug. [Laughs.]
benil zamora: Thanks Ash!
ash alberg: Thanks so much, Benil. This has been great.
[Upbeat music plays.] You can find full episode recordings and transcripts at snortandcackle.com. Just click on podcast in the main menu. Follow Snort and Cackle on Instagram @snortandcackle and join our seasonal book club with @SnortandCackleBookClub. Don't forget to subscribe and review the podcast by your favorite podcasting platform.
Editing provided by Noah Gilroy, recording and mixing by Ash Alberg, music by Yesable.