Grape Seed Oil - Ingredient Highlight

Okay ladies and gents, who loves a nice glass of wine after a long day? I know I do! Have you ever tried making your own wine before? We have but with cherries instead of grapes, it turned out quite delicious! This week’s topic has me reminiscing over my childhood. I grew up near a vineyard in Oregon and every fall Joseph the owner would have a grape stomping festival. What an experience harvesting the grapes off the vines, and gathering them all up into barrels, then the fun begins... the Polka band starts to play, and people hop barefoot into the vats and start stomping and dancing around releasing the juices from the grapes. Sounds kind of gross I know but it’s a traditional method that has been used for thousands of years and thanks to the ratio of acid, sugar and alcohol during the fermentation process prevents human pathogens from surviving in wine. However, you may think, well, what happens to all the waste from the grapes after the juices have been pressed out? This week’s topic is an abundant byproduct of winemaking...Grape seed Oil. Grape seed oil is pressed (like the name suggests) from the seeds of grapes. It’s important when buying grape seed oil that you opt for one that has been cold-pressed or expeller-pressed because those are not processed with high heat or chemical solvents.

Grape seed oil is high in Vitamin E and Omega-6 fatty acid. Grape seed oil has some amazing benefits for your skin. It’s able to penetrate your skin and absorb quickly so you don’t feel like you’re a greasy mess. It’s also known for helping remove makeup, tighten pores, heal acne and scars, and an obvious one. moisturize your skin. Environmental factors such as pollution, wind and sun as well as free radicals can do a number on drying out our skin and even causing discoloration. Vitamin E in grape seed oil helps to combat, protect and reverse those effects.

Grape seed oil also contains Linolenic Acid and powerful antioxidants which are thought to stimulate hair growth. You can also use grape seed oil as a finishing oil/leave in conditioner for your hair to add moisture, strength and shine without it being overly weighted down or greasy.

We love using grape seed oil in our body oils, facial cleansing oils, and beard oils (just to name a few items) because of these amazing benefits and it contributes to less waste! Taking the discarded remnants from winemaking and turning it into something so versatile and useful (I forgot to mention you can even use it in cooking) It’s a win win! So, next time you open a bottle and have a glass of wine, know that there was little to zero waste in the making process and maybe we were able to use the grape seed oil made from your bottle in some of our amazing products.