First, I lined my worktop with an old towel and laid a sheet of parchment paper on top. Then you place your cloth on top of the parchment paper. Make sure, your paper is much larger than your wrap, as the wax will melt and tries to run off the parchment paper.
Then I sprinkled some beeswax pellets, pine resin and jojoba oil on top of the cloth. Now my pine resin was in half inch size pieces, so I placed some in a ziplock bag, covered with another ziplock bag and hammered it away. The problem was, that the resin is sharp, so it pierced the bags and some of it stuck on my cutting board. Luckily I used an old board, so I just tossed it away after.
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| old beeswax wraps ready to be re-waxed |
Then you layer a second piece of parchment paper on top of the cloth, and iron so, that the resin and wax melt (make sure you don't get any wax on your iron!!)
Problem with this method was, that some spots had more resin than others, and also the jojoba oil was not distributed evenly. I also used too much wax.
So this time, I wanted to try the oven method, with pre-melted wax.
Here is the recipe:
0.5 oz pine resin
1.25 oz beeswax
1 tbsp jojoba oil
I actually doubled the recipe, and was able to re-wax 8 old wraps and do 7 new ones with that amount. I wish I would have done even a bigger batch, as apparently reheating the mixture will be much faster, as the pine resin is mixed evenly with the beeswax and jojoba oil.
I placed some pine resin into a stainless steel can (wide enough to fit a paint brush in) and placed it into a double boiler (water bath) on the stovetop. It took over an hour to melt the pine resin!!
Once your resin is melted, you can add the beeswax pellets and jojoba oil. The beeswax melts in about 5-10 minutes.
Heat your oven to 300ºF (150ºC) and line it with parchment paper (use an old cookie tray, or make sure your tray is fully covered).Place the wrap on the parchment paper and use a paint brush to spread the melted wax mixture on the wrap. You don't have to get a 100% coverage, as you will put this into the oven for 2-3 minutes, and the wax will absorb to the fabric.
Once you remove your wrap from the oven, you can reapply wax if there are uncovered spots, and return it back to oven. Once you have full coverage, you can almost immediately remove it from the cookie tray and lift the wrap on a clean parchment paper away from the stove heat. The wax will harden in few seconds.
Do not use wraps with meat, specially raw, as you cannot wash them with warm water. Use cool water and mild dish soap, if needed and hang them to dry.
The wraps will last approximately 6 months, depending on the usage.
TIP:
cut your fabric using pinking sheers, as the zigzag will prevent the fabric from fraying.
here is a video tutorial
(if you go to my youtube channel, you can also find this video in Finnish)
