Guide: Homemade Candy Flavoring Oils and Extracts

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Why make your own candy flavoring oil?

Due to many circumstances, such as shipping and storage conditions, ordering flavoring oils online can result in inconsistent flavoring intensity.

Sometimes, the flavors on delivered oils are a lot weaker than anticipated. Shipping tiny glass bottles without damage is somewhat difficult for vendors.

Making your own candy-flavoring oils consistently produces a potent product that goes straight to storage or use. Something about homemade stuff is just plain better.

How to Make Flavoring Oils For Candy

If you want to want to learn how to make candy-flavoring oil,

this step-by-step guide will give you a good place to start.

Cheap, customizable, and clearly tasty?

These 3 C’s are all great reasons to making your own candy flavoring.

You will need a way to perform steam distillation in order to extract the essential oils from the ingredient of choice.

This kit here is a good starting point at just under a couple hundred bucks, though some reviews say the heater is weak so be prepared to buy your own.

Quick tip: Have the water flow of the cooling tube go against the vapor flow

What is candy flavor oil?

Candy flavoring oils are super-concentrated essential oils pulled from the ingredient, usually around its aromatic parts. While flavoring oils and extracts are mentioned together a lot, it is important to remember that a few drops of flavoring oil can replace a teaspoon of extract.

What type of candy is flavoring oil best for?

Flavoring oil is best used for hard candies.

Flavoring oil’s key strength is the ability to withstand high cooking temperatures while retaining flavor intensity. So for processes where you are boiling something, such as hard candies, then candy flavoring oil would be perfect.


What’s the difference between flavoring oil and extract?

Flavoring oils are usually made through steam distillation whereas extracts are made by infusion in a liquid (like alcohol). Extracts are made in a similar manner to making tea where you soak the ingredient.

Steam distillation – A method used to isolate volatile compounds such as essential oils

For comparison of strength, oils are concentrated, and extracts are more “watered down“.

Flavoring oils also need proper equipment compared to extracts which are simple to make.

How long can flavoring oil be stored?

Given that the essential oil is stored properly, meaning in a dark, cool, and airtight container, then it can last from 2 years up to 20 depending on which base ingredient is used. I would treat each oil’s max shelf life as 2 years anyways.

What are some good candy flavoring oils to make?

  • Mint
  • Peppermint
  • Lemon
  • Orange

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