What is Shea Butter?
To put it simply, Shea Butter is a vegetable fat extracted from the nut of the African Karite tree, also called the Shea tree. Shea Butter, as a beauty product has been traced back to the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra around 50 BC (that’s more than 2000 years ago!), and it is, to this day, the most moisturizing, rich and wonderful cosmetic butter you can find.
You can find two types of shea butter available on the market for use as a cosmetic: Unrefined (or Raw Shea), and Refined or Ultra Refined.
Unrefined or Raw Shea Butter is a butter that has not been processed with any chemicals. It is mechanically extracted and filtered to remove particles from the shea nut that remain in the butter from the first extraction process. By mechanically filtering it the butter then retains all of its vitamins and healing properties.
Where Does it Come From?
Shea trees (Karite Trees) with the botanical name, Vitellaria Paradoxa, grow wild in the so-called “shea belt”, a narrow, horizontal section of fertile soils that stretch from West Africa to East Africa. There are two common species of the shea tree: Vitellaria Paradoxa, typical of Ghana, and Vitellaria Nilotica found in Nigeria and surrounding areas.
Due to the unrest of many countries where shea butter originates, it is sometimes difficult to procure high-quality shea butter. We at Better Shea Butter have worked hard over the years to source grade A, high quality, fair trade shea butter from women co-ops in Ghana.
How is Shea Butter Made?
Extracting this rich butter from the shea nuts is an extensive and laborious process, done according to century-old traditions and, in the case of our butters, made almost exclusively by women in Ghana who do this for a living. This is why shea butter is also referred to as “Women’s Gold” – it provides millions of women in Africa employment and income.
Here are the steps taken to produce unrefined shea butter:
First, the shell of the fruit is cracked to access the center of the nut, the cracked nuts are then washed and left dry so that all the moisture is removed. The nuts are then pounded so that they become small and fine pieces. Next, the small pieces are roasted down to a brown paste, similar to chocolate. Once this has been done, water is added to the brown paste and a long stirring process is started. With this complete the paste is washed with distilled water to purify it. The paste is then heated over fire. As it heats the fat rises to the top and separates from the paste. This fat is then skimmed from the top and is put aside to solidify. Once solidified it is then shea butter as you receive it!
Is Shea Butter Edible?
In some African countries, raw shea butter is used in food preparation just like animal butter or vegetable oil is used in cooking in the West and other countries.
That said, all shea butter that is currently sold in the US and other parts of the world is not for consumption but it is sold as a “skin food”, meaning that you can apply it to your skin and it will feed it vitamins and antioxidants that your skin needs to stay healthy.
We believe that this practice is more out of habit than anything else – it is possible that, given the right testing and pending it meets the FDA standards, shea butter may one day be sold and marketed in non-African countries as a food item.