Kitchen Hoodoo

There are many, many items that can be found in your local grocery store that you can use for your magickal workings. This is especially useful during the winter months when wildcrafting is not possible or practical, as well as throughout the year when you need something in a pinch.

      

If you are just starting out, an good way to build up your inventory of herbs and supplies is to take a list with you each time you go to the grocery store and purchase a couple of items off of the list. This way, it won’t break the bank and your supply will steadily grow.

Following is a list of some things you can get at your local grocery store that can be used in rootwork.

The uses listed next to the various items are by no means exhaustive. Refer to the tables in Chapter 5

of the Voodoo Hoodoo Spellbook  for more ideas.

1. ALUM – Enhances talismans and amulets, power booster

2. ALLSPICE - An ingredient for all good luck charms, gambling mojos and money gris gris; is said to increase business and prosperity.

3. AMMONIA - Used in cleansing baths and floor washes. Only a tablespoon or so is needed as too much ammonia can have the opposite effect.

4. BASIL – Love, protection, happiness, peace, money.

5. BAY LEAVES – Protection, health, success, wisdom, repels evil.

6. BLACK PEPPER – Revenge, cause pain in enemies, prevents unwanted people from visiting your home when sprinkled outside the front door.

7. CANDLES – You can find plain household candles to fragrance candles and 7 day glass encased saints candles to use in any number of works.

8. CAYENNE PEPPER – Hot foot, drive away ingredient; also used to heat things up and speed up works.

9. CINNAMON – A staple in all love and money drawing spells, sweeps and baths; heats things up.

10. CLOVES – Used in money drawing and friend drawing oils and spells

COW TONGUE – Stop gossip spells; the main ingredient in the infamous cow tongue spell where the tongue is slit longwise down to the bottom but not all the way through, special herbs and a name paper is placed inside and the tongue is either sewn shut or pinned closed with numerous straight pins and needles.

     12. FLOWERS – Common offering to the spirits and saints; usually placed on altars. Different flowers have different qualities.

13. HONEY – Used in sweetener spells and works when you want to someone to speak nicely of you, or used in love spells. A popular honey jar spell consists of placing a name paper inside a jar of honey and burning a red candle on top of the jar.

14 KOSHER SALT – Said to be a good substitute for blessed salt and used in floor sprinkles and cleansing baths.

15 MASON JARS – Great for storing roots herbs, and mixtures, perfect for jar spells of all kinds.

16 MINT - Believed to be good for protection, repelling enemies, uncrossing, increasing money and finances. Add to mojo bags or fix green candles with the powdered herb.

17 NUTMEG – Believed to bring good luck and fortune to those who play games of chance. The famous fixed nutmeg consisted of boring a hole in the nutmeg and filling with liquid mercury. A more current version fills the hole with some sort of money drawing herb and is then sealed with wax. The nutmeg is anointed with Fast Luck oil and then wrapped in a dollar bill. The whole thing is then tied with red string and kept as a fast luck amulet.

18 OREGANO - Reported to keep away the law and any meddling, troublesome people.

19 PAPER BAGS – Excellent for drying herbs and disposing of spell remains. Simply place fresh herbs into a paper bag and close. Leave for a few days and the herb will be dried and ready for use or storage.

20 PARRAFIN – making jack balls. Herbs are mixed in with melted paraffin and rolled into a ball. The ball is then wrapped tightly with red string and tied off. A long piece of string is left so that it can be used as a pendulum. Rootworkers have been known to name their jack balls as they believe they come to life.

21 POPPY SEED - Used for court case spells to cause confusion and make others “act a fool” in important decisions.

22 PUMPKINS – Hollowed out and used for container spells.

23 ROSEMARY – Said to empower women, provide protection; bring luck in family matters.

24 SALT - Used in cleansings and protection floor sweeps and baths.

25 SWEETENERS – White, brown, confectioner’s sugar, honey, Karo syrup, maple syrup, molasses and all other sweeteners like are used to sweeten people to your cause, be it love, a promotion, or quelling conflicts and unpleasant disagreements. Some old timers would use light and white sweeteners when working with White folks and brown sweeteners when working with people of color.

26 THYME – For peace of mind; used to increase and protect money.

27 VINEGAR – Used to sour things, used in bottle and container spells.


Excerpt from the course Foundations in Southern Rootwork 1 offered by Crossroads University.


Copyright 2013 Denise Alvarado All rights reserved worldwide.

The History of the Fleur de Lys

 

If you ever wondered where Catholicism and candles came from in New Orleans Voodoo, the following should enlighten you.

 

Edict of the King: 

On the subject of the Policy regarding the Islands of French America

March 1685

Recorded at the sovereign Council of Saint Domingue, 6 May 1687.

Louis, by the grace of God, King of France and Navarre: to all those here present and to those to come, GREETINGS. In that we must also care for all people that Divine Providence has put under our tutelage, we have agreed to have the reports of the officers we have sent to our American islands studied in our presence. These reports inform us of their need for our authority and our justice in order to maintain the discipline of the Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic Faith in the islands. Our authority is also required to settle issues dealing with the condition and quality of the slaves in said islands. We desire to settle these issues and inform them that, even though they reside infinitely far from our normal abode, we are always present for them, not only through the reach of our power but also by the promptness of our help toward their needs. For these reasons, and on the advice of our council and of our certain knowledge, absolute power and royal authority, we have declared, ruled, and ordered, and declare, rule, and order, that the following pleases us: 

Article I. We desire and we expect that the Edict of 23 April 1615 of the late King, our most honored lord and father who remains glorious in our memory, be executed in our islands. This accomplished, we enjoin all of our officers to chase from our islands all the Jews who have established residence there. As with all declared enemies of Christianity, we command them to be gone within three months of the day of issuance of the present [order], at the risk of confiscation of their persons and their goods. 

Article II. All slaves that shall be in our islands shall be baptized and instructed in the Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic Faith. We enjoin the inhabitants who shall purchase newly-arrived Negroes to inform the Governor and Intendant of said islands of this fact within no more that eight days, or risk being fined an arbitrary amount. They shall give the necessary orders to have them instructed and baptized within a suitable amount of time. 

Article III. We forbid any religion other than the Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic Faith from being practiced in public. We desire that offenders be punished as rebels disobedient of our orders. We forbid any gathering to that end, which we declare to be conventicle, illegal, and seditious, and subject to the same punishment as would be applicable to the masters who permit it or accept it from their slaves.

Read the whole Code Noir (Louisiana Black Code) at Crossroads University.

Copyright 2013 Denise Alvarado, All rights reserved worldwide.

Spiritual Artist Against Spiritual Slavery (SASS)