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Hmm, the thing that really bothers me about most alchemy systems out there is they rarely use authentic alchemical ingredients. The most obvious thing to replace the 'cards', in this case, would be a philosopher's stone. If you haven't played Darklands, an old RPG based in medieval Germany, I much recommend it...
Anyway, the stone... You might make it upgradable through short bursts of 'insight', while still keeping away from adding to a skill system. The way I'm thinking of it, the philosopher's stone represents the alchemist's affinity for his ingredients; It's extremely cheap to produce if you know how, but it's useless if you haven't used it for a long time, and gained some intimate knowledge of each stone's intricacies.
The way you learn a stone is pure experimentation, and that's where you could make things more or less expensive for the player, and where the risk might be; Too strong of an acid, and you might ruin your stone, at least until you figure out a way to neutralize it.
Just a few ideas.
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