Potpourri - A Recipe

Our assignment this week was a simple one. Tina (Yahoo blogsters list) wanted us to blog a recipe. Didn't matter what kind of recipe it was. Could be a craft, culinary, oil, vinegar, soup, soap and so on. We are also talking about making herbal gifts for the holidays at The Essential Herbal Yahoo list so I thought I would kind of kill two topics with one stone and post one of my favorite potpourri recipes. It is very simple and makes as large a batch as you need it to be. It is a good seller in shops and online and looks really pretty in a bowl as you can see by the picture.

Hips N Stix with Gingerbread Boys

Part 1 Salt Dough Gingerbread cookies

1 cup salt

2 cups flour

1 cup water

2 TBS vegetable oil

Mix dry ingredients in a bowl. Add oil and water until well blended. Knead with hands until smooth. Roll out dough (I divide dough into smaller balls to make it easier to roll out) and using a small cookie cutter, cut out as many shapes as you can. You can find trees, gingerbread men, and seasonal cookie cutters at stores like Michaels and Hobby Lobby in the cake decorating area. Into a 250 degree oven for two hours. Check to be sure they are hard all the way through. If the weather is humid it might take more time. Let cool completely.

Part 2 Potpourri Blend

Take several cups of rosehips that are completely dried and blend with several cups of small cinnamon sticks. You can buy cinnamon sticks at the health food store or online in different sizes. For this project they need to be about an inch. Mix the hips and sticks together in a large bowl. Add fragrance oil of choice. For this blend we used Gingerbread which you can find at many of the soap or candle making websites. We used 2 ounces for our blend but we are making a very large batch (10 pounds or more). Gently stir the oil all the way through the hips and sticks. Add your now hard cookies and very, very gently stir then in the blend. This blend can be covered and sit for a few days to finish blending together.

This keeps very well in a covered container. If using a plastic container it will leave a scent in the container. Looks great in a large glass jar too.