Emerald Herbal Hair Oil for Deep Scalp Care

For Aishoo, her mother, & especially her thatha, with much gratitude.

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This hair oil is just the best of so many things. Bunches of herbs from the garden. A process of grinding them that results in almost dung-like patties–beloved, to us–which turn the hair oil a luminous emerald green. The connection to a thatha [grandfather], from whom I learned this method. His granddaughter’s generosity and open sharing that brought me to this recipe in the first place. All courtesy social media, which makes family out of strangers, at the best of times. In a neoliberal world full of proprietary boundaries and lurkers awaiting the next piece of information about green-anything and traditional-anything-else to turn into a commercial product with no sense of irony, there are also such human connections that return you so plainly and open-heartedly to old ways, family recipes on the verge of being lost, and the traditional backyard garden which was for so long a source of such plenty. This post pays homage to the richness and warmth of such exchanges.

Gopalachari thatha’s voice recording listed several ingredients. What struck me was how familiar these were; many once were commonplace in the kitchen gardens I grew up around–wild, weedy, wonderful, and above all practical: there were invariably curry leaves for cooking, jasmine for prayer, nandiyarvattam [crepe jasmine] also for prayer but then for eyes and making kanmai [kajal, roughly translated as collyrium, though that’s not the same thing], henna for hair, murungai [drumstick, Moringa olifera] and neem for health, sandalwood for funeral pyres, tulsi for the soul. Or variations thereof. These were gardens not designed exactly but they had their own logic, which saw you though life in all its aspects, embracing all, shirking none. The path to self-care in life and death was through the garden. To this day, I see women in the local fisher-communities tending to small, terrace gardens and planting these very things in whatever space there is. When there’s none but a tiny sliver of road you can claim as your own, what gets planted? Malli, maruthani, tulasi: jasmine, henna, holy basil. The utility of plants was not just for eating but for nurturing, dreaming, and praying; the aspirations of life itself were central to our own home-grown garden design. Plants chosen were the clues to the kind of life we wanted to live, and the commonest mould was a truly beautiful one.

What herbs and spices make this hair oil?

Here is Gopalachari thatha’s list:

• Maruthani [Henna, Lawsonia inermis]
• Vepallai [Neem, Azadirachta indica]
• Kaurvapillai [Curry leaves, Murraya koenigii]
• Kuppaimeni [Indian nettle, Acalypha indica]
• Poolaan kizhangu [White Turmeric, Curcuma Zedoaria]
• Vendayam [Fenugreek, Trigonella foenum-graecum]

What is the value of each of these ingredients for hair care?

Here is the ingredient list again, followed by explanations and images.

• Maruthani/மருதாணி [Henna, Lawsonia inermis]. Maruthani needs almost no introduction as a colorant, but its value for hair care far exceeds that. Promotes scalp health, therefore helps strengthen and invigorate hair growth. Helps maintain oil balances; keeps hair soft. Often used as part of a hair pack or conditioner. Also said to protect hair from the harsh sun and dust.

• Vepallai/வேப்பிலை [Neem, Azadirachta indica]. Also needs no introduction as an anti-fungal and anti-bacterial agent. Keeps scalps healthy and dandruff-free. Also prevents lice infestations.
• Karivepillai/கறிவேப்பிலை [Curry leaves, Murraya koenigii]. Introduce micro-nutrients (vitamins, minerals, some amino acids) which increase hair growth, strengthen follicles and moisturize the scalp. Help to remove dead follicles.

• Kuppaimeni/குப்பைமேனி [Indian nettle, Acalypha indica]. Also known as poonamayaki.

This is a common weed that grows wild and is easy to identify both from leaf structure and its distinctive, catkin-like inflorescences [flowers clustered/whorled around an axis], with cup-shaped involucres [bracts] like little funnels around minute blossoms.

It is used widely for skin care. Leaf pastes or pre-made infused oils are applied to burns, boils, small cuts and insect-bites to promote healing, and for skin health generally. Dry leaves under bed sheets are said to help prevent or control bedsores. I had chicken pox as a child, and among the leaves that regularly lined my bed as the pocky rash broke were neem—and kuppaimeni. They are a classic skin-care pair. This was old Vellore, and one local wizened mooligai mami was hired to come bathe me with mysterious pastes, which I realize now must have included all such things as cool the body and heal the skin.

Aside from skin care, kuppaimeni’s uses are many, both topical and internal. With oil and salt, leaf pastes are applied for relief from rheumatoid arthritis. As either as a leaf paste or infused oil, kuppaimeni is said to provide headache relief. Taken internally, it is known to siddha medicine to help control internal bleeding (a household use being as a leaf-juice naasiyam for nose bleeds]. It’s also used to treat respiratory issues–as an expectorant.

• Poolaan kizhangu/பூலாங்கிழங்கு [White Turmeric, Curcuma Zedoaria]. Also known as kichili kizhangu.

This wonderfully fragrant cousin of both kasturi manjal [Curcuma aromatica] and regular turmeric [Curcuma longa] is frequently paired with either or both and kuppaimeni to treat sarmanoyi or skin diseases generally. Indeed, it these two ingredients could well be added both to my mother-in-law’s face powder and to bath powders for better skin health.

The funny thing is, kuppaimeni leaves are used with kasturi manjal and poolaan kizhangu [both aromatic turmeric varieties] to inhibit unwanted hair growth: each has a cosmetic value. At the same time, both are also used for hair care and dandruff control, drawing on their skin/scalp nurturing virtues. Your scalp is skin, too, and needs as much care as you’d give your face–maybe more, because its recesses are harder to reach. Kuppaimeni and poolaan kizhangu do the work of cleaning, exfoliation or as you like to call that sort of deep scalp penetrating work. If you’ve ever felt that hair falls more when you give yourself an oil massage, it’s likely a weeding effect, and the hair eventually grows back stronger, healthier, happier. So, in combination with shikai and/or arappu, kuppaimeni and poolaan kizhangu could also go into a robust hair-wash powder, their main value being for scalp cleaning (though poolaan kizhangu also adds a wonderful fragrance).

• Vendayam/வெந்தயம் [Fenugreek, Trigonella foenum-graecum]. Prevents dandruff, restores vitamins and minerals, and prevents hair breakage. Also cooling, generally.

Note how each of the above ingredients has a particular value in promoting skin and scalp health. Were I to derive a conclusion from the logic of combining these specific herbs and fenugreek, it would have to what the marketers would call a “deep scalp treatment.” Gopalachari thatha’s instuctions are to use a sesame oil-based treatment once a week, and a coconut oil-based daily use application. With that, he says, an oil like this will “reduce hair fall, keep hair black, and make it grow well”–all of which, indeed, comes from nurturing your scalp as much as anything else.

What’s the the process for making this hair oil?

While many other hair oil recipes [such as my own previous nourishing herbal hair oil] will call for an immersion of fresh ingredients in hot oil, thatha’s method makes use of dried ingredients. Essentially, you’re combining all ingredients with only enough water, grinding or pounding them into a rough paste, and forming these into vadais or patties.

The vadais get shade dried, so it’s best to make this in the summer months and not during monsoons or rainy times. Then they can be stored or gifted, almost the herbal equivalent of மாட்டு வறட்டி or cow dung-based fuel cakes–which are everything to love and nothing to giggle about, for they have their own place in our food, body care, and indeed religious and spiritual systems.

When I made my hair oil, I was short on maruthani, so I added it separately to the base of the vadais I had already made and dried them once more–hence the layered effect you see in the images.

The last little bit left became a kutti vadai that rather looks like he’s sticking out a tongue and being quite cheeky. Reminds me of a perhaps equally cheeky bit of nonsense verse my own Appa used to sing to us from time to time: நாக்கு நீட்டாதே பாக்கு போடாதே, கேட்டான் கேட்டான் கோளத்தில போயி குட்டி போடாதே/ naakku neetade, paakku podade, kuttan-kuttan kolathila poyi kutti podade. I take that to roughly mean: Don’t stick out your tongue, don’t eat (spit?) betel, and don’t make babies in ponds–lost in translation really, but you see what I mean when I say ‘nonsense verse.’

Now you can dress these dried varattis up with a ribbon and give them to friends as a hair oil herbal pack, because they should store reasonably well for a few weeks at least, and the next step is just to immerse them in hot oil and let the whole thing steep for several days longer.

I made only the coconut hair oil, and the magic of it all was in this last step–seeing the oil go from a pale straw yellow to a vibrant emerald green, as though all the green goodness of the herbs that went into this were now all shining through.

Hence the name of this oil in the title of this post: it was a மரகத மூலிகை முடி எண்ணெய்/ maragatha herbal hair oil, where “maragatham” is emerald in Tamil, shining the way a bunch of emeralds would around a woman’s neck or from the edges of her earlobes.

The oil darkened further over the next days, but emerald it stayed in the light.

Full instructions and rough proportions to use are given below. Make this, use it regularly, and thank Aishwarya and her thatha for your lustrous hair later. I know I do.