How should I store my henna?

[MoonLover]

I'm such a lucky girl

I was just given a KILO of henna powder straight from Morocco. It's just sitting in a bag but I'm wondering if there's a better way to keep it? It's going to take me awhile to use it up and I'm not sure if it can go rancid since it's all dry.

I've seen freezing powder is bad and freezing powder is good so which is it?

[Anje]

I freeze my powder and it works great. The only caveat is that it has to be henna powder. Freezing indigo or buxus will make them rather useless for hair-dyeing.

ETA: If it's in one big package, consider dividing it up into little zipper sandwich baggies full. That way you aren't freeze-thawing your whole batch when you want some.

[MoonLover]

oooo yes you're right about the freezing and thawing. I'll have to buy some baggies.


Thanks Anje!

[Heartwillfollow]

use the freezer bags and put it in the shipping box it came in, into my chest freezers. Still getting a good dye release from the batch I purchased begining of 2010

[MoonLover]

Good to hear that it's almost two years and it still has good dye release.

I have no shipping box though, a family member just brought from Morocco in a bag. Maybe I will baggy them up and put in a large tupperware.

[CorinaS]

This may sound like a silly question but, when you say you freeze the henna, do you mean actually in the freezer or in the refrigerator?

[Gulbahar]

I've always kept my henna powder at room temperature and see no difference in colour outcome.

[Pierre]

I put it in the freezer. Since it's a dry powder, that doesn't actually freeze it, but does keep it from going bad.

[AreWild]

I store my dry powder and mixed henna in the freezer. I second the recommendation to portion it into smaller bags though. I left mine in the original packages (little foil bags in small boxes) and am still getting great results even though it's a 2008 crop.

Does anyone know if light makes any difference for long term storage? I assumed that it does, and that's why my henna came in foil bags instead of plain plastic. Obviously, the inside of a freezer is pretty dark most of the time anyway, but to get the longest life out of a whole kilo of henna it might be a good idea to portion it into single serving bags, put all those in a black trash bag to block light, then put that in the freezer. It couldn't hurt anyway.

[Anje]

This may sound like a silly question but, when you say you freeze the henna, do you mean actually in the freezer or in the refrigerator?

I put it in the freezer too. It's below 0C.