Hi all,

a friend of mine was telling me how he had used the herbal percolator to great effect with caapi and chaliponga, but he tried it with some hawaiian chacruna recently and it has not gone well. he took 500g of chacruna, ground it up in a blender, then split it equally between 4 percolators and poured 15 litres of near boiling water acidified using ascorbic acid through each percolator. The resulting 60 litres was reduced down over many hours to around 200 ml. He decided to stop reducing at this point because the liquid had become very dark and treacle-like. He put it into a bottle and left in the fridge for a few days. when he came to inspect it today, it was completely solid and wouldn't even come out of the bottle at room temperature.

So, my friend would like to ask if anyone else has had a similar experience, if anyone understands why this has happened, if there is any way to recover the solid goo in the bottle so that it is useable, and whether it can be done successfully in the percolator. If not, then what is the best method for making a tea from chacruna?

He will be very grateful for any replies.

Thanks