Ideally plant extracts for antimicrobial and antioxidant tests are prepared in different solvents like distilled water, methanol or aqueous methanol, acetone, chloroform, ethyl acetate and hexane. These solvents have different polarity used to extract polar and non polar phytocontituents.

Dry and pulverised leaves or other parts are first extracted in distilled water or aqueous methanol and filtered through whatman filter paper. Filtrate is evaporated and used for test, however, residue after freeze drying extracted in acetone. Once again filtrate is evaporated for test and residue after freeze drying extracted in chloroform. The extraction process is further repeated with ethyl acetate and hexane, subsequently.

Idea behind using different solvents of decreasing polarity is to screen active/potential phytocontituents on the basis of their ability to dissolve in different solvents. Polar continents dissolve in polar solvents and non polar constituents dissolve in non polar solvents. Both polar and non polar extracts of plant may have antimicrobial activity, however, antioxidant property is widely reported in polar constituents than non polar.

If polarity of a phytocontituent is known then it is easier for purification and identification.

Most of the researches prefer the Soxhlet Extraction and the extraction method depending upon the plant (polar and non polar) Phytoconstituents

If you want both polar and non polar extracts together called hydroethanolic fraction, then you can use certain 50:50 of water:methanol. You can then recover the extracts from the solvent using rotary evaporator or other equivalent equipment