I have succeeded in getting a nice ruby red colloidal gold with the citrate recipe, and what a sweet taste of victory. Thanks Kephra.
However, I'm determined to experiment more with the herbs also, with tiny batches though. Thanks for your inputs RickinWI, maybe its a good idea to vary pH conditions and see how it affects production. A big hurdle for me seems to be the difficulty in properly assessing the color, since the herb mixes its own color into the solution, so it makes it kinda difficult to know if its a success or not.
RickinWI, I'm interested in using herbs since i believe that there might be great therapeutic potential in mixing mineral and herbal chemistry. Both ancient chinese, ayurvedic and western alchemy and medicine made potions with herbs and gold, as well as other noble elements, although it's difficult to find out exactly what they did, it seems that they were indeed mixing these things. Today, modern nanotechnology are also mixing nanoparticles of gold, silver or platinum, with herbs, or simply herbal substances such as bioactive polyphenols, for various reasons. One is that the nanoparticles can function as a delivery system for the active substance, since many polyphenols have low bioavailibilty and can be metabolized before reaching desired destination such as a tumor for example. Attaching them to nanoparticles can increase their bioavailibilty and increase the odds of getting to the proper tissues in the body. It is also very likely that some herbal substances a very good stabilizers, ginger is supposed to be a much better stabilizer than citrate. In a study I read, they compared ginger reduced with citrate reduced colloidal gold and tested the particles in physiological conditions, i.e. pH 7,4, and found that citrate reduced particles aggregated much more than ginger reduced. So I'm just very curious about mixing the world of plant chemistry with the metal / mineral chemistry, and since it has a long history of use and experimentation, as well as a re-emering interest in modern science, I think its worth diving into.