How to Make Oxymel: Ratios, Herbs and a 2,500-Year History

What oxymel is

The word is Greek: oxys means sour, meli honey. Oxymel is nothing more than a mixture of vinegar and honey, usually steeped with herbs, roots or spices. The principle is simple and clever. Vinegar draws aroma and plant compounds out of the herbs, much as alcohol does in a tincture, only more gently. Honey makes the vinegar drinkable, and together with the acid it preserves. The result is a sweet-sour syrup that you take by the teaspoon, stir into warm water, or pour over a salad. Anyone who does not want to use alcohol, for a child over one year, for religious reasons or because they live sober, finds in oxymel the classic alternative to a herbal tincture.

A very old preparation: from Hippocrates to sekanjabin

Oxymel counts among the oldest documented medicinal preparations in Europe. The Hippocratic treatise Regimen in Acute Diseases, from the 5th or 4th century BC, discusses it at length: as a drink for feverish patients that quenches thirst and eases coughing up phlegm, with precise notes on when it should be more sour and when more sweet. Dioscorides and Galen listed it in their pharmacologies, and through Arabic and Persian medicine it traveled further. In Persia it became sekanjabin, from words for vinegar and honey, still drunk in Iran today: simmered with mint, diluted with cold water, often with grated cucumber, or served as a dip for crisp lettuce leaves. The modern Persian version is usually made with sugar instead of honey.

In medieval and early modern Europe, oxymel was a fixture of the apothecary. Next to simple oxymel, oxymel simplex, there were preparations with medicinal plants, the best known being Oxymel Scillae, made with squill, which stayed in pharmacopoeias as a cough remedy into the 20th century. Then oxymel vanished from pharmacies, and a few years ago it came back through herbal kitchens and plant workshops.

The American cousins: shrubs, switchel and fire cider

If oxymel sounds unfamiliar, its relatives may not. Colonial and early American households preserved fruit as shrubs, drinking vinegars made by steeping berries in vinegar and sweetening the result, then diluting it with cold water; the shrub has had a second life on craft cocktail menus for more than a decade. Farmers in New England and beyond drank switchel, or haymaker's punch, during the harvest: water sharpened with vinegar and sweetened with molasses, maple syrup or honey, often with ginger. Neither is quite oxymel, but all three rest on the same idea: acid and sweetness together make something both refreshing and keepable.

The closest modern relative is fire cider, a vinegar tonic with horseradish, garlic, onion, ginger and hot pepper, sweetened with honey, which the Vermont-based herbalist Rosemary Gladstar popularized from the 1970s on. The name itself went through a years-long trademark dispute in the herbal community before it returned to common use, and today countless home herbalists make a batch every fall. Fire cider is, in effect, a pungent oxymel.

The basic recipe

There are two ways to make it. In the separate method, the herbs first steep in vinegar alone and the honey goes in at the end, so you can adjust the sweetness exactly. In the combined method, everything goes into the jar together; it is more convenient, and the honey itself helps extract. I usually work separately.

1. Prepare the jar. A clean mason jar, half-pint to pint (8 to 16 fl oz), rinsed hot and dried. Line a metal lid with parchment paper, because acid attacks bare metal, or use a plastic lid.
2. Add the herbs. Chop fresh herbs coarsely and fill the jar loosely to about two-thirds; dried herbs only to about one-third, since they swell.
3. Pour in the vinegar. Raw, unfiltered apple cider vinegar with at least 5 percent acidity, until every piece of plant is well covered. Anything poking out can mold.
4. Let it steep. Two to four weeks in a cool, dark place. Shake daily for the first days and check that everything stays covered.
5. Strain and sweeten. Strain through cheesecloth, press the herbs well, then stir in honey, without heating it, so it stays raw. Taste, bottle, and label with the contents and date.

The ratio: how sour, how sweet?

There is no binding rule, and the sources never agreed. Hippocrates already distinguished between a more sour and a sweeter oxymel. In today's herbal books you will find everything from equal parts vinegar and honey to one part vinegar to three parts honey. My suggestion to start: 1 part vinegar to 1 part honey, then more honey to taste. The more honey, the milder and longer-keeping, but also the sweeter; the more vinegar, the brighter the flavor and the harder it is on teeth and stomach.

Three ratios compared (vinegar to honey)

Ratio	Character	Best for
1 : 1	Bright, clearly sour	Salad dressing, a glass of water
1 : 2	Balanced	The all-rounder
1 : 3	Mild and syrupy	Straight off the spoon

Which herbs work

Almost any culinary or medicinal herb can be made into an oxymel. Aromatic plants with a strong flavor work best, because vinegar and honey bring plenty of flavor of their own. The table shows the classics and what tradition associates with them, as lore, not as a promise of effect.

Herbs for oxymel

Plant	Part	Flavor	Traditionally associated with
Thyme	Leaf and stem	Spicy, warm	Coughs, the airways
Rosemary	Needles	Resinous, strong	Circulation, alertness, memory
Sage	Leaves	Bitter-herbal	Throat and mouth
Mint	Leaves	Cool, fresh	Digestion, summer drink (sekanjabin)
Elder	Flowers	Floral	Cold season, sweating out a chill
Garlic, ginger	Clove, root	Hot	Warming, the fire-cider direction
Lemon balm	Leaves	Lemony, mild	Calm, "heart's comfort"

For the plants themselves, see our portrait of rosemary; what you can grow yourself is in the witch's garden, and how to pick and dry them without losing the aroma is in when to harvest and dry herbs. One warning that applies to every herbal preparation: only gather what you can identify with certainty. Wild plants of the carrot family, such as poison hemlock and water hemlock, which grow along American roadsides and creeks, as well as lily of the valley and monkshood, have no place in any jar.

Three combinations I come back to every year. For the cold months: thyme, a little sage and two cloves of garlic, steeped in cider vinegar and finished at 1:2 with a dark wildflower honey. For summer: a big handful of spearmint in white wine vinegar, finished at 1:3 with a light clover honey, which is as close as a Western kitchen gets to sekanjabin; serve it over ice with grated cucumber. For a fall evening: rosemary with a strip of orange peel and a slice of fresh ginger, 1:2, stirred into hot water after dinner. In each case, taste the vinegar before the honey goes in. If the herb has not come through after three weeks, give it another week rather than adding more honey to cover the gap.

Oxymel in herbal magic: sweet and sour

In folk magic, honey and vinegar stand at opposite ends. Honey sweetens: it is the base of the honey-jar spells meant to "sweeten" a person or a situation, several of which are in our spell jar recipes. Vinegar drives away: it belongs to banishing and protective work, to vinegar bottles and cleansing washes. In oxymel both come together. Many kitchen witches use exactly that as an image. An oxymel becomes a drink for transitions, for times when you want to let something old go and welcome something new. You start it deliberately on a new moon or at the turn of autumn, say each herb's name as it goes into the jar, and take a spoonful in warm water every morning as a small ritual of beginning. That is not magic that forces anything, but a form that gives everyday life attention, and that may be what herb work does best. More recipes in the same spirit are in kitchen witchery explained.

What we do not promise

We do not claim that oxymel cures infections, strengthens the immune system, lowers blood sugar or replaces medication. That individual herbs such as thyme are recognized in herbal medicine for coughs does not turn a kitchen oxymel into a medicine with a tested dose. Honey must not be given to babies under 12 months because of the risk of infant botulism; the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics are clear on that. And anyone with diabetes, a sensitive stomach or acid reflux, or anyone taking medication, should talk to a doctor or pharmacist before making oxymel a daily habit.

In practice: how to handle it

1. Start with one herb. Thyme or rosemary, 1:1 or 1:2, three weeks. Only once you know the taste should you start blending.
2. Everything must be covered. Herbs sticking out of the vinegar mold. Weigh them down with a small glass fermentation weight if needed.
3. No bare metal. Parchment under a metal lid, or a plastic lid.
4. Take it diluted. One or two teaspoons in a glass of warm or cold water. Rinse with plain water afterward and wait before brushing your teeth, since acid softens enamel for a while.
5. Cool, dark, labeled. Well made, oxymel keeps for many months. If it smells musty, shows mold or starts to ferment, throw it out.

Frequently asked questions

What is oxymel?

A sweet-sour preparation of vinegar and honey, usually steeped with herbs. The name comes from Greek, oxys for sour and meli for honey. It is documented as far back as the Hippocratic writings of the 5th and 4th centuries BC.

What is the right ratio of vinegar to honey?

There is no fixed rule. Common ratios run from 1:1 to 1:3, vinegar to honey. Start at 1:1 and add honey to taste; more honey makes it milder and sweeter, more vinegar makes it brighter and harder on teeth.

What vinegar is best for oxymel?

Raw, unfiltered apple cider vinegar with at least 5 percent acidity is the classic choice. Wine vinegar works too but changes the flavor noticeably. Avoid homemade vinegar of unknown strength.

How long does oxymel need to steep?

Two to four weeks in a cool, dark place, shaken daily at first. Then strain and, if you steeped the herbs in vinegar alone, stir in the honey.

How long does oxymel last?

Many months in a cool, dark cupboard, as long as the herbs stayed fully covered while steeping. Throw it out if you see mold, if it ferments or if it smells musty.

Is oxymel safe for children?

For children over 12 months, in small, diluted amounts. Babies under one year must not have honey in any form because of the risk of infant botulism.

Sources and further reading

• Hippocrates, Regimen in Acute Diseases, sections on oxymel and hydromel (Loeb Classical Library, Hippocrates vol. II).
• Pedanius Dioscorides, De materia medica, Book V (wines and vinegar preparations).
• Historic pharmacopoeia monographs for Oxymel simplex and Oxymel Scillae.
• Rosemary Gladstar, Herbal Recipes for Vibrant Health (Storey, 2008), fire cider.
• Michael Dietsch, Shrubs: An Old-Fashioned Drink for Modern Times (Countryman Press, 2014).
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, infant botulism guidance; American Academy of Pediatrics, honey and infants.

The spiritual readings in this piece are tradition, not scientific findings. Nothing here replaces medical, psychological or legal advice. Questions about an order: 28@templeofdesire.com.