Every Ecoista’s Must-Read: Green Beauty Recipes
Could this be all you need for beautiful skin? Photo: PresentingLenoreBlogSpot.com
Papaya, mango, rosemary, lemon. Vanilla, cinnamon, almond, tea. The ingredients in Green Beauty Recipes are enough to make any ecoista’s mouth water. But hold on a sec, there, honey—or sugar, or pumpkin, which are also essentials on author Julie Gabriel’s list. The concoctions laid out on the pages of this much-lauded home-beauty bible are intended to be slathered rather than savored.
Take, for instance, the tasty-sounding Double Apple Toner. With apple juice, honey, cider vinegar and a touch of tea tree oil, it’s a fragrant and effective treatment that’s packed full of bacteria-fighting pectin—perfect for oily, blemished skin. And how about the Good Morning Cleansing Rub? Oatmeal, sweet almond oil, powdered milk and organic brown sugar: It’s like breakfast for your entire body—if breakfast were a really powerful skin-sloughing exfoliant. Julie also offers tons of tips on how and where to source herbs, essential oils and more scientific-sounding natural ingredients like ascorbyl palmitate (a fancy name for vitamin C ester, which is actually kind of fancy-sounding itself).
Okay, so you’re sold on the idea of DIY-eco-beauty. But are you still a little concerned that mixing up your own skin, hair and beauty treatments might be complicated and time-consuming? Well so were we. At first. So we were delighted to discover that most of the recipes—except for the moisturizers—in Julie’s book take less than 10 minutes to mix up. And if you can shake and stir (c’mon, we know you love your cocktails), you possess the exact skill set required to prepare almost all of the recipes in the guide.
So about those moisturizers: Yeah, you’ll need double boilers, kitchen scales and a thermometer to make them. But once you cook a batch, it can be stored, preservative-free, for six to 12 months in a cool, clean spot. And once you get hooked on how well they hydrate and soften your skin—sans synthetic emulsifiers, penetration enhancers and chemical preservatives—not to mention how much money you’ll save on packaged potions, you’ll be fearlessly double-boiling with the best of ’em.
Julie Gabriel’s “Double Apple Toner”
3 oz apple juice
1 tablespoon honey
3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
5 drops tea tree essential oil
Core (but don’t peel) the apple and coarsely chop it. Combine all the ingredients in a blender and blend. Strain through unbleached coffee filter and pour into a glass container. To apply, shake well before use and smooth over face, avoiding eye area. Rinse with cool or tepid water. Store toner for up to one month in a clean, cool place.
Green Beauty Recipes ($16.25)
WEEK OF 5.30.11 FIVE ECOSTILETTO SUBSCRIBERS WILL EACH WIN A $16.25 COPY OF GREEN BEAUTY RECIPES!
Want more? This month, we cover green beauty, health, home and parenting books, plus scored nearly $500 in freebies. Check back next week!
Natasha Garber is a contributor to numerous lifestyle publications, where she covers green events and event planning, sustainable catering and cuisine, and fashion and design trends. A passionate proponent of eco-conscious living, Natasha lives, writes, plays and parents in Los Angeles.
