Last weekend, I had the opportunity to visit Dr. Anneth Singh, one of our local distillers here in the Philippines. She’s the premier distiller of Bamboo Hydrolats here in our country.
I went there with no one else but my bestie in the world of aromatherapy, fellow Certified Aromatherapist Lou Caballero. It was a 3-hour ride from our place–considering the holiday traffic! But it’s just about 30-45mins away from the north of Metro Manila.
Dr. Anneth showed us how she distills her bamboo hydrolats and toured us in her farm. Lou and I never knew there’s so much varieties of bamboo that exists! There’s blue bamboo, gold bamboo, black bamboo, buddha bamboo, and a whole lot more. Both Lou and I tried to absorbs and watched everything in awe. Dr. Anneth and her husband Robert were such gracious hosts answering to all our questions about distillation.
A lot of Dr. Anneth’s “collection” are imported varieties of Bamboo, sourced from Taiwan, Japan, Java, South America, and etc. Below is one of our favorites. This one’s a bamboo variety from Japan called Shiroshima bamboo (Hibanobambusa tranquillans).
After the farm tour, Dr. Anneth led us back to the distillation station, an open-air gazebo-like space in her farm where this beautiful copper still from Portugal nests. She had prepped her still for a fresh distillation of 4-Liter bamboo hydrolat yield. She was so generous, answering all our questions about distillation. What’s amazing for me is that it takes 4L of plant material to produce 4L of hydrosol.
It was a 2-hour immersive experience, thanks to Dr. Anneth and Sir Robert. Of course, I’m eternally grateful to Lou for working this out. We constantly talk about our plans for Alliance of the Philippine Aromatherapists, and in one of our lengthy chitchat sessions, I told her about this local bamboo distiller I heard from no other than the Hydrolat Queen herself, Ann Harman.
And with that, Lou and her brother Pedro was able to locate Dr. Anneth and was even able to book a farm tour like this! 🙂 So, yes, this very memorable experience is all because of Lou and her very resourceful brother Pedro, who were also with us during the tour. 🙂
I’m trying my best to finish editing my vlog for this visit. But it sure is worth the wait. It’s a long video but it’s super worth it. In the meantime, I just received my Christmas gift from Mr. Couchwasabi–my very own copper still! ? ? ?
I was honestly taken aback when I opened the box as I was expecting a bigger unit! This one’s 5L. But I figured, the bigger the still, the most plant material I’d need and I certainly don’t have that much of plant material in my garden so I guess this tiny distillation unit would do. ?
I’ll keep you guys updated on my distillation journey. ‘Til my next post!
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