Clove Bath Salts: A Simple Recipe and Tub Tips

Spiced bath salts are one of the prettiest things you can make for cozy season, and the best version might never see a bathtub. A jar of clove-scented salts on a shelf smells wonderful. If you do want a bath, there is one thing to get right: how the oil meets the water.

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Oil and water do not mix

Eugenol, the main compound in clove oil, prefers oil to water. PubChem records its water solubility as under 1 mg/ml at about 20 C in one source and 2,460 mg/L at 25 C in another, and describes it as miscible with alcohol and oils. The two figures differ, but they agree in direction. If you sprinkle neat oil on dry salts and tip them in, the oil can sit as droplets or a film on the surface instead of spreading, and neat clove oil is a skin and eye irritant. The fix is to blend the clove oil into a carrier oil first, so it meets your skin as a dilute mixture.

Start with the bowl

If what you want is the scent, scent a bowl of salts and keep it out of the water. The same recipe below works for that, set on a shelf away from children and pets. It is the easy, no-fuss choice, and clove's warm sweetness comes through beautifully.

A jar that looks as good as it smells

Part of the fun of bath salts is how they look. Pale Epsom crystals mixed with coarse sea salt give you a sparkly, snowy jar, and the clove oil tints it with the faintest warm tone you will notice mostly in the scent. Pick a wide-mouthed glass jar so a scoop fits easily, and think about a simple paper tag with the date and the clove percentage. If you are giving a jar away, add a short note about keeping it dry, since a damp scoop turns the whole jar into a brick.

The salts, in grams

This is a formulation worked out from the sources above, at 0.25%, half of the 0.5% topical maximum the Tisserand Institute lists for clove bud oil. Salts and carrier oil come from a grocery or soapmaking supplier.

Ingredient	Grams	Share
Epsom salt	200	63.5%
Coarse sea salt	100	31.7%
Liquid carrier oil	14.2	4.5%
Clove oil	0.8	0.25%

The clove oil is about 0.76 ml by the 1.054 relative density on the Certificate of Analysis we publish for one bud batch, roughly 15 drops at the 20-drops-per-ml rule of thumb, though weighing is better.

Weigh the carrier oil in a small glass jar, add the clove oil and stir until it is a single clear liquid.
Pour that over the Epsom salt in a wide bowl a little at a time, stirring with a spoon, then add the sea salt and mix for a full two minutes, breaking up any dark clumps.
Store in a glass jar with a tight lid, and keep a dry scoop in it. There is no water in the mix, so it needs no preservative while it stays dry.

Making it a seasonal ritual

Spiced salts feel right in the cold months. A bowl on the bathroom shelf, a candle on the windowsill and a towel warming nearby make the room feel like autumn without any fuss. Stir the salts now and then so the scent spreads evenly, and open the lid for a moment whenever you walk past. The aroma will greet you before you have decided on anything else.

Choosing your salts

Epsom salt gives the jar its soft, fine body, and coarse sea salt gives it sparkle and a bit of crunch under the scoop. If you like a chunkier look, shift a little more toward the sea salt. If you like a fluffier, snowier jar, lean on the Epsom. Either way, spread the salts on a tray for a few minutes before you start, so any damp clumps dry out and the oil mixes evenly. You can also mix in a few dried orange peel curls or a cinnamon stick on top for the look of the jar, as long as everything is bone dry.

If it is going in the tub

Use about 60 g per bath, stir the water well with your hand held away from the stream before you get in, and do not add the salts while you are sitting in the water. The carrier oil can make the tub floor slippery, so rinse it afterwards. If anything stings, itches or reddens, get out, rinse and, if it continues, see a physician or dermatologist.

A whole-body soak covers a lot of skin, so we would skip this for children, for anyone with eczema or reactive skin, for freshly shaved skin, and for pregnancy unless your midwife or OB/GYN says otherwise (our pregnancy post gathers what is known). Keep pets out of the room, since an oil film is easy to lick. Our side effects post lists the signs to look for.

Bud or leaf both work, and leaf is not milder, so pick by scent with our bud versus leaf guide. For scenting rooms, our diffuser blends are a good next step. A jar of spiced salts tied with ribbon is a lovely thing to keep on the shelf, or to give away.