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December 2012
 Need ideas for simple, practical gifts that will bring joy and a smile to your friends and family? We have some delightful ideas for those who dread traipsing round the mall for that last-minute Christmas shopping!  This is our last newsletter for the year. Yes, it's nearly over - faster than ever before! Thank you so much for your custom. We hope you've had a fabulous time creating soaps and creams and balms, or maybe just using our pure organic oils on your skin. It's been great chatting with many of you on the phone or by email. We love to hear about what is working well, and we'll do our best to sort out any problems you have. Have a wonderful holiday season, relaxing and refreshing, and our best wishes for a happy and fulfilling New Year. In this issue:
What's new... Organic oils:  Many of you are enjoying our new organic oils, and another one is nearly here: Organic camellia oil. We know it has arrived in New Zealand, and it should be on our doorstep any day. Camellia oil has been treasured in China and Japan for thousands of years, and is rapidly becoming recognised in the western world as a high-quality ingredient in many preparations. Suitable for all skin types, it is mild and healing for inflamed skin. Opening hours over Christmas/New Year: Below we suggest dates for orders that you want to arrive before Christmas - we feel pretty confident that our frantically busy couriers will manage these deadlines.  Auckland City: Order by midnight Wednesday 19th Outer Auckland: Order by midnight Tuesday 18th North Island urban: Order by midnight Tuesday 18th North Island rural delivery: Order by midnight Monday 17th South Island urban: Order by midnight Tuesday 18th South Island rural delivery: Order by midnight Monday 17th (or Sunday night if you are really remote!) With Christmas Day falling during the week, deliveries will be restricted between Christmas and New Year. For those of you who live in Auckland, we will courier orders on Thursday 27 December (so get your orders in by 9am Thursday). But for the rest of the country, we will send your orders after all the public holidays are over. We don't want your lovely products to be sitting around for days in the summer heat! We will get back to normal on Thursday 3 January. A fabulous vegetarian cookbook...  The delighted winner of our competition was Haidee, a vegetarian who "loves it and lives it". "Hey, thanks a bunch - the book arrived this morning & looks amazing! I can't wait to start cooking up a storm, what beautiful salads for summer!" So many of you had compelling reasons why you need a great vegetarian cookbook, we wished we'd had a huge stack to give away! One person (who sadly missed the cut) said, "If I don't win, I'll just have to buy one!" We've found it great value - we are still enthusiastically making meals from its pages. One of many reasons for eating a vegetarian diet is that New Zealand's farming practices continue to slide away from the ideals of our clean, green image. And it's only through consumer pressure (and financial support for the fighters) that everyday animal cruelty will end. Go to our Facebook page to see how you can help. Kits for Christmas presents...  A Go Native kit is a special gift for someone curious about making soap or skincare. All the ingredients, full instructions - success is guaranteed!
 Our soap kits have something for everyone!We have two kinds - Melt & pour, and cold process. They are packed in a stylish black box - except for the mini-kits, which are in a bag. (Above is one of the melt & pour kits.)
Make your own Christmas gifts 
1. If you are in need of a quick gift for friends or workmates, how about buying a 100ml bottle of your favourite oil and five 20ml dropper bottles... and making some labels for them. Currently our most popular oils are organic argan, organic jojoba, and organic rosehip (natural or deodorised) - and using pure, organic oils directly on the skin (body and face) is becoming more and more popular. No labels? If you'd like a couple of blank labels, include a message in the message box when you order oil and/or bottles. 2. Massage oil makes a thoughtful holiday gift. Mixing your own massage blend can be simple. I've been experimenting with all of our most popular oils, and it seems to me that any of them are great for the casual masseur! Jojoba is a classic massage oil, spreading easily, but you can make a blend starting with almond or rosehip or any other lightish oil. And because every oil contains a different mix of fatty acids, adding a bit of this and a bit of that is just about guaranteed to enhance the final product! If you want to, add a few drops of your favourite essential oil or fragrance oil. For something special: include some kawakawa infused oil in your blend. It's great for helping to relieve aches and pains. 3. Here are two recipes we've been asked for from previous newsletters- great for travel, great as a small gift. Mango butter moisturiser bar Keep your skin smooth and satisfied with a mango butter bar – the warmth of your skin is enough to create a fine film of moisturiser. The recipe is so easy: 28g beeswax 30g mango butter 42g safflower oil Melt gently, then if desired, add a few drops of vitamin E and about ¼ teaspoon of your choice of essential oil. Pour into a mould (or two smaller moulds) before it sets. (It can be warmed up again if necessary!) Experimenting: You could make an organic version with organic beeswax, organic shea butter, and your favourite organic oil. Try making it with the beeswax, butter and oil you like best - though you may have to do a bit of adjusting! The great thing about a balm (like this) compared to a cream (containing water) is that you can play with it to get it just right. Wait till it's completely cold, and see what it's like. If it's totally rock-hard, you can re-melt and add a tiny bit more oil - or if it's not hard enough, add a bit more beeswax. Make sure you record exactly what you've done! Shea Butter Bar (Makes a 200g bar) Water phase  :20g water Oil phase: 140g shea butter 32g Emulsifier O Last phase: 4g hydrolysed wheat protein 2g Geogard 221 few drops of essential oil Method: Heat water and oil phases separately until they are 65°C. Combine the two phases and blend. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the last phase ingredients and blend. Pour into 1 or 2 moulds and leave 24 hours to set. To use, just rub the bar over your skin. 4. Simple bugs-away balm  80g olive oil 16g beeswax 4g citronella essential oil Gently melt oil and wax, and add essential oil. Pour into a 100g jar. Citronella keeps mosquitos away if applied every 30 - 60 minutes, because essential oils do evaporate! Lemon Eucalyptus is also used as an insect repellant. If you like its smell, maybe try a combination of the two essential oils.  5. Gardener's soap (a little bit scratchy to help remove the soil) is traditionally coloured mauve/purple, and perfumed with lavender oil - but lemon would be refreshing - yellow mica, lemon oil... Or maybe your mum or auntie or granny would like a rose theme, with a rose mould, rose fragrance oil, a touch of red mica in white soap? I've used hemp seed fibre at one rounded teaspoon per 50g of melt & pour soap, stirred in after the mica and fragrance. Another possibility (a paler colour) is crushed apricot shell. Experimenting: Because many of you have joined us since the last newsletter, and because you're more likely to have some free time over the coming weeks, we've adapted this section from last time. Making creams and making cold-process soap is fascinating in part because there's always an element of uncertainty - a hot day, a shade too much sodium hydroxide, turning your back on a cooling cream for a bit too long - factors like these can sometimes lead to unexpected or undesired outcomes. And at other times, something comes out better than ever before, and you're bemused as you try to figure out why! Writing down every detail as you make something is a really good idea. And once it's ready, add a note about what it's like to use. If you haven't yet got a special notebook, maybe you could suggest it to Santa? Write down the date, ingredients, recipe, steps you follow, and what you observe at each step. This info is vital when you decide to make a thicker or thinner version, or try a different ingredient. Here's a recipe for a simple cream. (The vital ingredients for a simple cream are water, oil, emulsifier and a preservative.) Then there are suggestions for changing the recipe, one step at a time. Simple cream (Makes 200g) Water phase: 150g water Oil phase: 26g almond oil 10g Emulsifier E Last phase: 2g Geogard 221 few drops of essential oil Method: Heat water and oil phases separately until they reach 65°C. Combine the two phases and blend. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the last phase ingredients and blend. Pour into jars. (If you don't have almond oil, you could substitute another light oil such as hemp or maybe rosehip.) Now try the same recipe but with a heavier oil, such as macadamia - great for feeding mature skin. Or try jojoba oil, which contains liquid waxes that help prevent the skin from drying out. Again, take notes at every step. The colour will depend on the oil. If you use our unrefined NZ avocado oil, for example, the cream will be a pale green, whereas organic natural rosehip oil will give a yellow cream. Replacing the oil with a butter gives a cream that's probably too thick for your face, but great for dry calves or dry hands. You may like to try incorporating other liquids. Replace some or all of the water with a hydrosol, or substitute say 5% of a water-based product such as glycerin or a plant extract.  More and more of you have been using our powdered extracts such as alpha-bisabolol and grape seed extract in your products. The grape seed extract is strongly coloured, giving creams a pink colour. See the website for more info. Infused oils are also useful in creams and oil blends. The most popular is calendula infused oil, which is soothing and healing, ideal for damaged skin or in preparations for babies. Now you could start another round of experimentation: using less liquid. (There's more info about ratios on the Recipes page on our website.) You will notice that most of our moisturiser recipes have a combination of oils, maybe with some shea butter or beeswax. So the next step is to try combinations of your favourite oil-phase ingredients. For heavy-duty handcreams, include butter(s) and beeswax. For a face cream, use your favourite oils. Good luck! Suncare oils Some vegetable oils have long been used on skin that's exposed to sun - coconut oil is the classic one. Now that skin cancer is such an issue (due to factors such as the depleted ozone layer) we have to ensure that sunburn just doesn't get a chance - and that's especially important for children. But maybe the pendulum has swung too far. I (Jacqui) have olive skin, so need a reasonable amount of sunshine in order to make Vitamin D. (A very fair person would need a much shorter time.) When I know I'm going to be in the sun for a short time, I use carrier oils traditionally used for sun protection: coconut, sesame, sunflower, etc. I use the best quality organic oils, as I believe they are likely to contain small but significant amounts of nutrients that may be lost when oils are processed or grown with chemical fertilisers. Some people have noticed that their skin is more resilient in the sun when their diet is full of top-quality fresh fruits and vegetables. Worth a try, as it has other benefits! Here's a list of oils that may have a SPF of 2-3: Sesame  Sunflower Avocado Camellia Jojoba Hazelnut Virgin coconut Shea butter And here's a recipe for a before-sun oil that will care for your skin and may help it deal with those UV rays. (But only for consenting adults, and only if you're exposed for a just a short time - cover up as soon as there's any hint of redness or a feeling of heat.) Before-sun oil (adapted from Kolbjorn Borseth's book The Aromantic Guide) 55ml sesame oil 15ml sunflower oil or camellia oil 10g shea butter (gently warmed) or avocado oil 10ml jojoba oil 10ml vitamin E In conclusion  Have a wonderfully restful and refreshing Christmas and New Year. Eat too much, sleep too much, and do all the summery things you've been dreaming of! Kind regards Elinor, Chelsea, & Jacqui
October 2012
In this issue:
What's new... Organic oils:  Wonderful organic oils have just arrived:
We have two new cold-pressed oils: grape seed and apricot kernel. Name the triplets competition winners:  Three sheep mini-kits delighted the winners of our name the lambs competition. We randomly selected five entries, and our panel of judges liked two of them equally - so Kim Whaitiri (Tahi, Rua, Toru) and Mandy Fleener (Chai, Vanilla, Caramel) both received a kit! This entry missed the cut, but we loved it. It's from three sisters who are also triplets: Shorn, Ewegene and Trinity, the "funky good-looking one in a tight leather outfit!" Brilliant!  Chelsea acting in Auckland:Chelsea's acting career is keeping her very busy! After a successful Wellington season, Eigengrau opens in Auckland on 13 November. "From award-winning British playwright Penelope Skinner comes a thrilling new piece of theatre. Eigengrau offers an acutely relevant, hysterically funny insight into 21st century relationships, focusing on four interweaving singles desperately seeking a connection in a city where Facebook can feel like your closest friend. A black comedy through rose-tinted glasses." More info at http://www.facebook.com/events/280850848698902/ Win a fabulous vegetarian cookbook! Revive Cafe in Auckland have just published Revive2, with all the recipes they couldn't fit in the first book! We've been cooking out of the first book since it appeared, and love the salads and hotpots. So... if you missed out last time, here's a second chance to win an inspiring vegetarian cookbook. We will randomly select three entries, and the winner will be chosen by our panel of judges. Just send an email to jacqui@gonative.co.nz with your name and the reason why you think you should be the winner! Entries close at midnight on Sunday 28 October. The winner will be contacted by email.  Christmas is just around the corner... Some of you are busy already making gifts for family, friends and markets. You have inspired me to have a play with melt and pour soap and the Christmas tree mould - for the gold bits, I warmed a tiny bit of melted soap with some gold sparkle mica in an old spoon. Fun!! We have a friend with a large family who has Christmas gifts sorted by November, and says this means she can sail calmly through the frenetic end-of-year rush... sounds nice. A Go Native kit is a special gift for someone curious about making soap or skincare. All the ingredients, full instructions - success is guaranteed! Making palm-free cold-process soap Recently, I’ve been experimenting with recipes that contain no palm oil. Go Native only stocks organic palm oil from sustainable sources but many of our customers don’t want to use any palm oil at all. For the record, palm oil and palm shortening are the same thing. Bakers call it shortening, soapmakers call it oil. For those wanting to avoid palm oil/shortening, be careful to check all the ingredients’ listings of your food, biscuits especially. Anything that says ‘vegetable shortening’ will come from palm. Likewise with your skincare products. Most glycerin is from palm, as is stearic acid. They are just the tip of the iceberg. It’s REALLY hard to avoid. Keep trying though. Anyway, back to Cold Process (CP) soapmaking. I found a recipe but it had too many ingredients. I combined a few, then downscaled it so it would fit one of our loaf moulds and ended up with:  Recipe 1, take 1 500g pomace olive oil 150g RBD coconut oil 50g beeswax 50g cocoa butter I put it through a lye calculator which came up with: 250g water 100g sodium hydroxide (NaOH) I added 20g lemon essential oil and 50g honey as I have a bit of a thing for lemon and honey soap at the moment. The end result was too soft which really surprised me. I had always thought lye calculators were infallible. It was still useable, was actually really nice in fact, but not hard enough for me. Recipe 1, take 2: I tried the same recipe but used 114g sodium hydroxide and ended up with a wonderful hard bar. Here's the recipe: No-palm CP soap with cocoa butter and beeswax 500g pomace olive oil  150g RBD coconut oil 50g beeswax 50g cocoa butter 250g water 114g sodium hydroxide 20g lemon essential oil 50g honey (add to the warm oils so it will melt) Next, I tried another recipe - let’s call it Rapid trace lemon soap! Recipe 2 250g RBD coconut oil  250g pomace olive oil 125g beeswax 125g cocoa butter 250g water 104g sodium hydroxide 20g lemon essential oil This produced a very hard bar but was quite tricky. As soon as I added the lye water, it seized, so I had only just enough time to add the lemon essential oil (no honey) and give it a stir or two before pouring it into the mould. So this one isn’t for the faint-hearted. No animal products Some customers don’t want to use animal products in any shape or form so I wanted to create a recipe with no beeswax. I found one via Google. Recipe 3, take 1: 400g pomace olive oil 190g avocado oil 160g RBD coconut oil Once again, I put it through a lye calculator which came up with: 250g water 108g sodium hydroxide 20g lemon essential oil Nice soap but too soft. Recipe 3, take 2: I increased the sodium hydroxide to 114g and the bar was nice and hard. That was a wee warning to me. Be accurate with measuring. A small difference in sodium hydroxide made all the difference. I used 20g star anise essential oil in this one. Not everyone’s cup of tea but our whole family groans with joy when using an aniseed bar. The final recipe: No-palm CP soap with star anise oil  400g pomace olive oil 190g avocado oil 160g RBD coconut oil 250g water 114g sodium hydroxide 20g star anise essential oil Experimenting: Making creams is serious fun! Designing your own creams and lotions is wonderfully satisfying. But it's like cooking: there are basic principles and skills that you build up with experience. I remember my daughter and friend, aged 5, proudly creating a meal for the family - it was based around oranges, and while edible, was really neither food nor drink! Making successful skincare products means using combinations that work, with oils and liquids in the right proportions. Keeping a record of everything you do is a great idea, so get yourself a special notebook. Write down the date, ingredients, recipe, steps you follow, and what you observe at each step. This info is vital when you decide to make a thicker or thinner version, or try a different ingredient. Here's a recipe for a simple cream. (The vital ingredients for a simple cream are water, oil, emulsifier and a preservative.) Then there are suggestions for changing the recipe, one step at a time. Simple cream (Makes 200g) Water phase 150g water Oil phase 26g almond oil 10g Emulsifier E Last phase 2g Geogard 221 few drops of essential oil Method Heat water and oil phases separately until they reach 65°C. Combine the two phases and blend. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the last phase ingredients and blend. Pour into jars. (If you don't have almond oil, you could substitute another light oil such as hemp or maybe rosehip.)  Now try the same recipe but with a heavier oil, such as macadamia.(note from Jacqui: I've just made it with neem, to make a cream to keep the flies away for my horse... once the flies start biting, I'll let you know how effective it is!) Again, take notes at every step. The colour will depend on the oil. If you use our unrefined NZ avocado oil, for example, the cream will be a pale green, whereas organic natural rosehip oil will give a yellow cream. Next, make the recipe again, but replace the oil with a butter. Once you have tried these, you may like to try using other liquids. Replace some or all of the water with a hydrosol, or substitute a small amount of a water-based product such as glycerin or a plant extract. Now you could start another round of experimentation: using less liquid. (There's more info about ratios on the Recipes page on our website.) You will notice that most of our moisturiser recipes have a combination of oils, maybe with some shea butter or beeswax. So the next step is to try combinations of your favourite oil-phase ingredients. Enjoy! Carbon chemistry and skincare - an introduction Carbon is an extraordinary element. It is a shape-shifter, appearing in guises as different as diamond and charcoal – and this is just in its pure form. The real magic starts as it combines with other elements to create the building blocks of life. No carbon? No life as we know it, for a start. No animals – plants – bacteria – soap – oils… Carbon rings In the early 19th century, when chemistry was really getting into its stride (leaving alchemy behind), it was well known that there were many compounds that contained carbon and hydrogen, and bits of other elements such as oxygen and sulphur. But no one could figure out the structure of these molecules. A common pattern was six carbon atoms and six hydrogen atoms – but according to atomic theory, the ratio of carbon to hydrogen was all wrong - it just didn’t make sense.  Then there is a lovely story about Kekule, one of those scientists in the 1850’s struggling to understand how it all fits together. He wakes from a dream of snakes chasing their tails… and realises something that seems infinitely strange at that time: that in the mysterious compounds, the carbon atoms make a ring. Here (all diagrams from Wikipedia) are four of the ways those rings are represented. Often the carbon atoms that make up the ring don't even get a mention, as in the lower left diagram. Carbon atoms are so crucial that chemists just know they're there at the corners of the hexagon. Carbon chains The other shape favoured by carbon is the chain… short chains, long chains, and chains of chains! Fatty acids are chains of carbon atoms with hydrogen and oxygen atoms attached in particular interesting patterns. It’s the bit on the end that makes these chains behave like very weak  acids. Here are diagrams of some fatty acids – you will probably recognise some names, because they are important in skincare. (Ultra-nourishing macadamia oil, for example, contains about 60% oleic acid, 8% palmitic acid, 5% stearic acid, as well as linoleic acid and linolenic acid.)The molecules with kinks or bends are the unsaturated ones - there are still some spots where hydrogen ions could go. In these models, carbon atoms are pretty much hidden by the grey hydrogen atoms: the red blobs represent oxygen atoms. Triglycerides Vegetable oils are largely made up of triglycerides (tri=three, glycerin you have heard of). Each triglyceride has a backbone of glycerin (a short chain with just three carbon atoms) with three fatty acid chains attached to it. Here is an  ultra-simple diagram of a triglyceride (remember that the whole thing is in three dimensions - and the fatty acids have kinks in them where the double lines are!)Triglycerides are one of the main constituents of the sebum excreted by our skin, but when conditions are harsh, our natural production isn't enough. When we apply moisturisers or pure oils, we are giving our skin a helping hand by replacing the triglycerides. When we make cold-process soap from oil (triglycerides), we break the bonds between the glycerol and the fatty acids by using a strong alkali (the sodium or potassium hydroxide). Then the fatty acids bond with the sodium from the alkali, making glycerol and the dirt-attracting substance we call soap. The glycerol (glycerin) is one of the things that makes handmade soap so skin-friendly, although it is usually removed from commercial soap. Combinations of chains and rings  Many substances used in skincare combine carbon rings and chains - an example is alpha-tocopherol, one form of Vitamin E, a potent antioxidant and a great addition to skincare products. Go Native's natural Vitamin E also contains other tocopherols.  On the left is a recent addition to our stock, bisabolol, or alpha-bisabolol, to be precise, which occurs naturally in some plants, including chamomile. It is a soothing and healing addition to skincare products. While you don't need to be a chemist to make great skincare products, it can be interesting to know about the chemical properties of the ingredients you use, and what happens when you put them together! Here's a recipe that uses these ingredients: bisabolol, Vitamin E and macadamia oil. Organic Lip Shine This oil blend nourishes the lips and gives them a glossy shine. 20ml organic macadamia oil 20ml organic olive oil 30ml organic castor oil 10ml organic jojoba oil 6ml vitamin E, mixed tocopherols 2g alpha-bisabolol 1ml vitamin A palmitate 10 drops of essential oil – you choose Measure all ingredients into a small beaker and stir to blend. Pour into an amber bottle, and from that, fill a 5ml dropper bottle. Put a few drops on a fingertip and apply as often as you like! In conclusion We hope you've been inspired to try making something new. We love adapting recipes and trying new ingredients, because it means we are always extending our skills, and seeing the final result is always fascinating. Things don't always go as expected, but it wouldn't be experimenting if they did! Have fun! Kind regards Elinor, Chelsea, & Jacqui
August 2012 Newsletter
In this issue: 
What's new... New moulds:  New moulds that have arrived since our last newsletter have something for everyone. My favourite is the three-cavity mould with a heart, a round and an oval - it's so difficult to find really nice basic shapes, and these make elegant small soaps. The honeycomb mould and the butterfly on daisies are a good size for gifts - around 80g. Add honey to melt and pour soap for the first, or let loose with the micas for a colour sensation in the second. Our sheep have been flocking out the door. This is a great mould: a charming animal (it looks shorn after you've been using it for a while), good soap shape, and a nice hold-in-the-hand size at 125g. If you like unusual things, the chrysanthemum will appeal. It looks great in bold colours, and getting it out of the mould is a breeze. All of these single moulds are also available as mini kits - a wonderful gift for a crafty person.  Chelsea acting in Auckland: Yet another shameless plug for Chelsea! ‘In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play)’ had rave reviews in Dunedin in July, and Chelsea is now performing in 'N0ughty Girls' at The Basement in Auckland. It's a fun night out! Starts at 7 pm - final night is Saturday 25 August. http://www.iticket.co.nz/events/2012/jul/n0ughty-girls Another emulsifier in stock: Emulsifying wax NF has been used successfully in the personal care and pharmaceutical industries for many years. It's also called Polawax. While it's not the most natural emulsifier, it is of vegetable origin, and is very reliable. Emulsifying wax NF can be used in both skin and hair care systems, producing emulsions with excellent texture and stability. An update on preservatives  for creams and lotions We no longer stock grapefruit seed extract, as according to the American Botanical Council, there is a possibility that much of the grapefruit seed extract available contains synthetic additives. We want to be sure that you are using a safe and effective preservative in all your water-based formulations, and we believe there are better options than grapefruit seed extract. Everyone who has made a water-based cream and left out the preservative is likely to have had an interesting experience: things grow in it! The bacteria, moulds and fungi that are present in all our homes appreciate a warm, damp environment. And some of the things that grow can be harmful to your health. Sometimes a rich cream (with a low water content) containing essential oils will keep quite well as long as it is cool and in a dark jar, but preservation is not guaranteed. And undesirable things could be there in colonies too small to be visible to the naked eye. Just think about how often your finger goes in to the jar of your favourite cream… We are constantly monitoring new developments in the preservative field and, at present, we believe that by far the most reliable preservative for the kinds of products you are making is Geogard 221. It is approved for use in certified organic skincare preparations. See our website for more details. We have introduced a new product, Microcare DB, which has a similar formulation, Ecocert-approved ingredients and a lower price, and has performed well so far. Name the triplets and win a mini-kit to make a sheep soap We have a mini-kit for a charming sheep soap for the winner of our name the lambs competition.Our facebook followers have met the big lamb before – he is Roamer’s lamb, now named Romany. The three little lambs are Latte’s triplets.  To enter, email your three names to jacqui@gonative.co.nz. We will randomly draw five entries, and then choose our favourite from those five. The winner will be notified by email. Entries close at midnight on Friday 31 August. Love lemon? Try litsea cubeba (may chang) oil in the laundry... "... I thought you might like to know another use for May Chang essential oil. I’ve been putting a teaspoon into my washing machine ‘fabric conditioner’ cup. It makes the whole load of washing (usually massage linen) smell wonderful!" Jo Hogan Bella Mama www.bellamama.co.nz Recipe substitution Ever wanted to make something you see on the shop shelves? Here I (Elinor) will go through a recipe substitution using Trilogy Vital Moisturising Cream. Ingredients should be listed in volume order meaning, in this case, that water accounts for the major part of the ingredients. Here is the ingredients listing on the jar.
Remember the big clue: labelling rules require ingredients to be listed in volume order. Now I look for an ingredient which is used at quite a specific percentage. Vitamin E is used at between 1% and 3%. Because this recipe has a preservative, we’ll use Vit E at 1%. Everything below Vit E we’ll give half a gram to, 0.5g or 0.5%, because we are making 100g of cream. So now, ingredients 11 to 17 add up to 4% or 4g. Emulsifier is used at 6% or 6g. So that’s 10%/10g we have used up: 4% + 6%. Glycerin must be quite high, coming just under water. And water is often at least 40% of a recipe. We’ll give water 50%/50g. Glycerin 10%/10g. So now we have accounted for 10%+50%+10% = 70%. 30% to go. We have 6 oils: 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, so let’s give them 5%/5g each. Our tentative recipe is as follows: Go Native Vital Moisturising Cream Water phase 50g water 10g glycerin Oil phase 6g emulsifier O 5g almond oil 5g evening primrose oil 5g jojoba oil 5g rosehip oil 5g marula oil 5g aloe vera leaf oil Last phase 1g Vit E 0.5g carrot oil 0.5g chamomile essential oil 0.5g citrus aurantium amara (bitter orange) flower extract 0.5g rosemary leaf extract 0.5g Geogard 221 0.5g any essential oil (A note about extracts: Use the ones above if you can find them.  Otherwise use any you fancy, or substitute with water.) Method: Heat water and glycerin to 65°C. This is the water phase. At the same time, in a separate pot, heat to 65°C the emulsifier, almond oil, evening primrose oil, jojoba oil, rosehip oil, marula oil, aloe vera oil. This is the oil phase. When both are at 65°C, combine and blend off and on until they start to thicken. Now add the remaining ingredients (the last phase) and blend. Pour into a pot. I like the result! See how it goes for you - and remember to keep notes on exactly what you did. Recipes Two straightforward recipes this time, as well as a luxurious cream. The first recipe is a creamy shea butter bar. It's great when you are travelling - just smooth the bar over your skin. And... another fabulous lip balm, with rich ingredients to protect your lips from winter winds and smooth away dryness. The Elegant Cream is very simple too. Shea Butter Bar (Makes a 200g bar) Water phase 20g water Oil phase 140g shea butter 32g Emulsifier O Last phase 4g hydrolysed wheat protein 2g Geogard 221 few drops of essential oil Method Heat water and oil phases separately until they are 65°C. Combine the two phases and blend. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the last phase ingredients and blend. Pour into 1 or 2 moulds and leave 24 hours to set. To use, just rub the bar over your skin. Vegan Lip Balm (Makes 200g) 40g candelilla wax 36g coconut oil 60g castor oil 60g almond oil 4g vitamin E Melt wax and coconut oil on stovetop. Add the rest of the ingredients, stir to blend and pour into pots. Elegant Cream (Makes 200g) Water phase 150g water 10g glycerin teaspoon allantoin Oil phase 12g conditioner pellets 12g jojoba oil 8g emulsifier O 4g shea butter Last phase 4g hydrolysed wheat protein 2g Geogard 221 few drops essential oil Method Heat water and oil phases separately to 65°C. Combine the two phases and blend. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the last phase ingredients and blend again. Pour into pots. Weight and volume – what’s the difference? Have you ever unpacked an order of oils or glycerin and wondered why a bottle isn’t full? It’s a curious fact that if you weigh out 500g of different liquids, they may all have different volumes. You’ve no doubt experienced oils floating on water – the oil or fat rising to the top of a casserole; the oil sitting on top of the milk when you are making muffins. Oil is lighter than water.  Probably the heaviest liquid that we stock is glycerin. It’s sold internationally by weight – so when you buy 500g of glycerin, there is some space left in the 500ml bottle. A litre of water weighs 1 kilogram or 1000 grams. However, if you measure out a litre of most oils, the weight will be around 900 grams – but oils do vary. Here’s an example. We put three oils in a beaker (castor, avocado and jojoba). They quickly separated into precise layers! Castor, the most translucent and the heaviest, is on the bottom. The green avocado oil floats above it, and the golden jojoba oil, the lightest, sits on top of that. We sell all our oils by volume, so if you’re buying a litre of castor oil, it will weigh 940 grams. A litre of jojoba will weigh 860 grams. Other oils are 900 grams. Remember, the larger the volume you buy, the better the deal. Navigating our website - helpful hints for the inexperienced  Some of you have been wondering how to take things out of your shopping basket - it's all too easy to put them in!Removing things is easy too. Put them in the trash! It's a symbol that's used all through the computer world: a little rubbish bin, or (in American English) a trash can. The one on our checkout page is tiny, but it's there - just to the left of each item in your list. Look at the example. Blue mica? No, not now. Click on the white trash can beside blue mica, and it's gone. Simple. Last time we talked about the advantages of using the Login option from the bar across the top of the page. Having an "account" with us is nothing to do with money - it simply means that the website stores your details so you never have to enter your address etc again. (Your details are safe with us - see here for our privacy policy.)  When you click on Login, you are asked for your username and password. Your username is #Customer.Username#, and if you don't know your password you can request that it is sent to your email account. 
And from our last newsletter, for new people:
Want to order an amount other than the one shown? Just click on the white bar to see the other sizes available for this product.  And on the left, you can click on the name of the product to see background information about it. What does it mean? pH In our next few newsletters, I’d like to look at some chemistry – the ideas behind the chemistry of skincare, and the chemistry of soapmaking. pH These two letters look oddly back-to-front – but you see them often around skincare. It’s an international measure of how acidic or alkaline a solution is, based on how active the hydrogen ions are. (Remember those dangerous acids at school – hydrochloric acid has the formula HCl, where H stands for the potentially devastating hydrogen ions, and Cl is chlorine.) A Danish chemist introduced the scale about a hundred years ago, and it has survived pretty much unchanged. The numbers seem a bit random to the non-mathematician - ‘neutral’ has a value of 7. Pure water at 25°C has a pH of 7. Acids have a pH that’s less than 7 (really really strong hydrochloric acid has a pH of zero, while the hydrochloric acid in our stomach juices has a pH of 2-3). Alkalis have a pH greater than 7. Substances used for cleaning are generally alkaline. pH numbers seem odd because it’s an exponential scale (negative logarithmic, to be more precise) – think of those graphs of how the world’s population has dramatically increased over time, and you’ll get the idea: a number that’s far from 7 (bigger or smaller) indicates an extreme situation!  If you’ve ever been in charge of a swimming pool you will be familiar with measuring pH. Indicator strips make use of plant pigments that change colour when conditions become more acidic or alkaline. I have two sets of indicator strips (measuring from 4.5 to 14) designed to be dipped in liquids. Each strip has three colour patches that can be matched against the standard on the pack. Alkalis Strong general-purpose cleaners for kitchens and bathrooms have quite a high pH. I just measured one straight from the bottle, and it’s around 12. My window cleaner, the last of a batch diluted from concentrate, is very slightly alkaline at 7.5. I thought it might be acidic, as a weak vinegar solution is an old-fashioned window cleaner… (ahh! Still around! Check out www.care2.com/greenliving/10030.html if you are interested in cleaning windows with vinegar.) Acids  Our skin is slightly acidic. I’ve read that the skin around the eyes has a different pH from the rest of the face. Imagine me standing here with a damp indicator strip pressed against my skin – dampened in neutral pure water… I don’t know how skin pH is measured by skincare scientists, but no doubt a research chemist would be appalled at my technique! My dabbling suggests that the surface of my cheek and eyelid skin are within 0.5 of one another – the strips look identical, and indicate a pH of 5.5. Dry skin on my calf and the palm of my hand appears to be more acidic – though I have read that damaged skin loses its acidity and the microbial protection given by this. But one thing’s clear from my strips: my skin isn’t alkaline!Now that you've read this far, I guarantee you'll notice pH all over the place! Next time we will have a look at incredibly beautiful structures of carbon chemistry, and how the ‘fatty acids’ created by living systems differ from the simple mineral acids of school chemistry. Selecting the right oil for the purpose... Meet some more of our vegetable/carrier oils In our last newsletter we introduced one way of talking about cosmetic oils, and how to use this information when combining oils for skincare. Hope you've had a great time creating your own blends! This time we'd like to introduce some more oils for you to experiment with. Remember that ideally you will use a mix of base, middle and top note oils in your creations.
There's more below about pomegranate oil, camellia oil and kiwi seed oil - then some suggestions for using these oils. Pomegranate oil  The pomegranate is an exquisitely coloured ancient fruit with glowing jewel-like seeds. It is so striking that it has been a symbol of abundance, fertility, birth and life for thousands of years. The pomegranate originated in the Middle East, spreading west into Europe and east as far as China. It features in numerous cultures and religions, including Greek myth, the Koran, and the Old Testament. I (Jacqui) love the depictions of pomegranates in medieval and baroque embroideries.  Pomegranate oil has wonderful qualities for skincare. It has an unusual fatty acid profile, being one of the few plant sources of conjugated fatty acids. It contains almost 80% punicic acid, closely related to conjugated linoleic acid which is recognised as having powerful healing properties. Pomegranate oil repairs and revitalises tired skin, improving elasticity. Its anti-inflammatory properties make it a soothing addition to preparations for sensitive skin, eczema and psoriasis, and a useful addition to massage blends, as it can help to ease aching muscles.Use pomegranate oil alone, or incorporate it in skincare recipes. Adding just a little to a formulation can make a difference. Kiwi seed oil  This is one of New Zealand's gifts to the world! Its composition is unusual: it contains about 60% alpha linolenic acid, an Omega 3 essential fatty acid which our bodies can’t synthesise. This valuable oil enables the skin cell membranes to efficiently do their work of absorbing nutrients and eliminating waste, so it helps with tissue repair, and keeps the skin soft and pliable. It’s a great anti-ageing oil, and ideal for sensitive skin. Because it’s quickly absorbed, it’s a very good face oil. Use it as an ingredient in facial serums, eye creams (it is a soft oil), and lip balms. Its high alpha linolenic acid content means it’s also great in hair products – for example, you could substitute kiwi seed oil for say 30 grams of the macadamia oil in our Amazing Hair Mask recipe. Our kiwi seed oil is produced in New Zealand by CO2 extraction, a process which gives an extremely pure oil. Camellia oil Treasured in China and Japan for thousands of years, camellia oil is rapidly becoming recognised in the western world and is an ingredient in many high-quality preparations. It is wonderful for all skin types, and is mild and gentle on easily inflamed skin.It rapidly penetrates to the deepest layers of the skin, making it invaluable in serums. Added to formulations for the face, it helps protect the skin from environmental pollutants. Camellia oil is about 85% oleic acid, an excellent emollient which helps retain skin moisture. The oil has been shown to be exceptionally high in antioxidants, and also contains a number of vitamins and minerals. The camellia tree has been cultivated for a very long time, and the oil is obtained from Camellia oleifera as well as Camellia sinensis or Camellia japonica. Use camellia oil on its own on skin or hair, or add 10-15% to your formulations. You will be delighted with the results. Here are two simple recipes adapted from our website that you can modify by including the oils we’ve been talking about. Baby Balm 15g beeswax 80g organic vegetable oil of your choice (see suggestions below) 5g essential oil Gently melt the beeswax, add the oil and blend. Add the essential oil and blend again. Pour into pots and let set.
 Sunflower Cream 400g water 75g sunflower oil 30g Emulsifier HE20 12g Geogard 221 Put the water, sunflower oil and HE20 in a pot and heat until the HE20 is melted. Blend off and on until thick. Add Geogard 221. Blend.
In conclusion The days are lengthening, the sun is warming up, and soon the miserable months will be behind us. Time to think about preparing for summer - maybe feeding your skin with a blend of organic oils, or creating a cream or a scrub to enliven the limbs. Enjoy the sunshine! Kind regards Elinor, Chelsea, & Jacqui
June 2012
In this issue:
What's new... New cold process soapmaking kits:  We have created five new kits with intriguing ingredients:
Mini melt and pour kits: Our new shell mould needed a kit - so we've made a mini version, which will make three charming shells. The fragrance is palmarosa, which (in my experience) appeals to everyone! Heart of roses is now available as a mini kit, which makes three gorgeous pink soaps.  New moulds: Six new soap moulds are arriving any minute. Meet our new favourite, the sheep. We've made him in goatsmilk white, and in black with white face and feet (irresistible!). On the website soon! Chelsea acting in Dunedin: Another shameless plug for Chelsea! For those of you in and around Dunedin in July, think about having night out at the Fortune Theatre and see Chelsea performing in ‘In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play)’. Argan oil or Moroccan Oil? We have a strange new problem: people are thinking that argan oil and Moroccan Oil are the same thing. But they are quite distinct! Argan oil is a vegetable oil pressed from the crushed fruit of the argan tree, which grows in south-west Morocco. Moroccan Oil is a brand (actually spelled Moroccanoil on the label) with products that contain a variety of ingredients (including some argan oil) and are marketed in New Zealand as hair and body care products. There are other (expensive) products that use 'argan oil' in their name - but it's not clear how much argan oil is in their formulation. A website offering ‘independent’ advice on Moroccan oil, www.moroccanoilingredients.org, offers this information: 'The ingredients that are in Moroccanoil products are cyclopentasiloxane, dimethicone, cyclomethicone, butylphenyl methylpropional, argania spinoza kernel oil, linseed extract, fragrance supplement, Yellow-11, C Red-17, coumarin, benzyl benzoate and alpha-isomethyl ionone.' (We take no responsibility for the accuracy or otherwise of this list!) In this list you’ll see argania spinoza. This is argan oil. Pure, unprocessed argan oil is a very different thing. Argan oil in its natural state is full of nourishment, containing a wide range of vitamins, fatty acids and other ingredients. Our certified organic argan oil is one of our most popular items, with people appreciating its wonderful moisturising properties and the way it soothes and heals inflamed skin, and keeps hair frizz under control. We import our argan oil directly from a Moroccan women’s cooperative, and it has had minimal processing. It is quite different from Moroccan Oil! Be warned! Tell your friends! Go Native organic argan oil is not Moroccan Oil – it is something full of life and liveliness!  The winner of the draw: The Revive vegetarian cookbook, along with the two babassu butter products and rosehip oil balm featured in our last newsletter, went to a thrilled Adrienne Browne. 'The lotions smell great and feel lovely. And the recipes are vegetarian (how did you know?)' The delighted winner of Go Native's 'treasure' in The Natural Parent magazine's treasure hunt was Shannon Neill. Recipe substitution Ever wondered how to make something you see on the shop shelves?
Here I (Elinor) will go through a recipe substitution using Trilogy Everything Balm.
Below is the ingredients' listing on the jar. (I have added the percentages, see below.) 
Labelling rules require ingredients to be listed in volume order, which means that, in this case, beeswax accounts for the major part of the ingredients. Balms are often made with 15% beeswax and 85% oils, so I will give beeswax a 15% volume. Ingredient 7 is vitamin E which used at between 1% and 3%. Let’s give it 3%. So now everything below vitamin E (8, 9, 10) has to be 3% or less. 10 is a bunch of essential oil constituents (from lavender oil so the label says). So we’ll keep it simple and use lavender oil. Fragrance is normally used at 0.5%. I’ve given it 1% for reasons that hopefully will become clear soon! 8 and 9 have to be between 0.5 and 3%. I’ve given them 3% each. Now the main carrier oils, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, are left. All our percentages have to add up to 100, so we have 75 left. Again, keeping it simple, we’ll give them 15% each. I had to give the essential oil 1% to make up the 100%. However, I wouldn’t put 1% in. A few drops are all that’s required for a 100g quantity. So now we have a recipe that will make 100g of, let’s call it, Go Native All-purpose Balm! Go Native All-purpose Balm  15g beeswax 15g marula oil 15g olive oil 15g rosehip oil 15g evening primrose oil 15g jojoba oil 3g vitamin E 3g wheatgerm oil 3g honey few drops lavender essential oil Now you can make it and see how it goes. Remember to keep notes on what you did. ------------------------------------------------------- Recipes Tiger Balm - Go Native style (Makes 100g)  42g olive oil 12g beeswax 11g camphor essential oil 10g menthol crystals 7g cajeput essential oil 6g peppermint essential oil 6g clove bud essential oil 6g cassia essential oil Heat the olive oil and beeswax gently in a pot. When melted, add the menthol crystals and stir until they dissolve. Now add the rest of the essential oils, stir and pour into pots. NB: Don't overheat. Some of these essential oils have a low flashpoint and will 'flash' if they get too hot. It's scary, so please take care. Vanilla Body Butter (Makes 200g) Water Phase 83g Water 3g Glycerin Oil Phase 55g Olive oil 15g Beeswax 10g Almond oil 10g Emulsifier (Emulsifier O) 7g Jojoba oil 5g Argan oil 3g Castor oil 3g Shea butter 3g Cocoa butter Last Phase 2g Preservative (Geogard 221) 6d Vanilla flavouring Method Pour Oil Phase ingredients into a saucepan and gently melt. Take the pan off the heat as soon as the ingredients are melted. In a different saucepan heat the Water Phase ingredients until very small bubbles form. Take the pan off the heat. No more heat is required. Pour the Oil Phase ingredients into the Water Phase ingredients and whisk with a blender until the mixture is thick. Be sure to scrape the sides of the pan to incorporate the mixture there. When it is warm to touch add the Last Phase ingredients and blend until completely mixed. The mixture won’t thicken until it is reasonably cool, just above room temperature, so don’t give up! Spoon into containers. Navigating our website - helpful hints for the inexperienced Last time we mentioned that you can buy oils and ingredients in sizes to suit, whether you are buying some argan oil to put directly on your skin, or making moisturiser to sell at the local market. Many of you are new to our newsletter, so here's how to access different sizes.
Not sure how to order quantities other than the one you can see?
Just click on the white bar to see the other sizes available for this product. And on the left, you can click on the name of the product to see background information about it.  Going to Login before you begin entering an order means that your details are already filled in when you come to check out. Quick and easy.Next time you order, choose Login from the navigation bar to see this window. If it's the first time you've been here, click on create an account under Sign up for free. Then you will see the form on the right - and you can fill in your details (and never have to do it again)!  Enter your email address as your username, then enter your password - twice. Then enter your name and address etc. When entering your details, you can leave some boxes empty. (We've put it here so it will look familiar when you give it a go...) When you get to the bottom, click on the white [Create Account]. Returning? Remember that if you have forgotten your password, you can click on Forgotten your password? and request that it is emailed to you. If you know that you have created a login but it's not working, try your email address if you have one... ...and if all else fails, email me at jacqui@gonative.co.nz! What does it mean? Refining oils and butters from nuts and seeds and plants... In our last newsletter, we looked at ways of extracting oils. This time we'll talk about some of the terms used in processing oils and butters. Raw: Think of eating raw fruit. You bite through the skin into the apple's flesh, or peel back banana skin before munching on the contents. In skincare terms, a raw product has had  minimal processing - just enough to make the part we seek available. Our wildcrafted shea butter is raw. The nuts are collected and crushed in the simplest way. There is no sophisticated processing - and you can see this in the end product. It's made up of a range of oil compounds, not all of them pure white, and there may even be tiny flecks of husk. Some people treasure the complex scent and the variety of the original constituents. Others prefer one of the more standardised shea butters, pure white and without the raw aroma.We also have several virgin oils, including tamanu, coconut, hemp, olive and neem. These have had minimal processing, and all have distinctive aromas and tend to be rich and thick.  Cold pressed, unrefined: These oils are close to raw. Filtering has removed impurities, but they retain their distinctive aromas. We think that our organic argan, cold-pressed organic rosehip, and our New Zealand-grown almond, walnut, hazelnut, and avocado oils are wonderful! Oils from small producers are generally lightly processed - simple filtering is a purely physical process. These oils contain a wide range of compounds in addition to the saturated and unsaturated oils, including small amounts of vitamins or vitamin precursors, as well as antioxidants and compounds with mild antimicrobial action. Refining: Oils produced on a larger scale can be standardised to a predictable product by various methods, including:
Selecting the right oil for the purpose... A way of talking about vegetable/carrier oils When you are making your own skincare products, you want to tailor the ingredients so that what you make is ideal for your needs. But our everyday language is not very effective when it comes to describing the properties of vegetable oils. Here is an introduction to one way of talking about cosmetic oils. I will explain some terms, and then show our twelve top-selling oils in a table to summarise their properties. As often happens in science, everyday words get given precise meanings that are a bit different from our everyday use. It takes a wee while to get used to new terms – yet another shade of meaning for words like ‘long’ and ‘dry’. But these terms give us a new way of thinking about what oil properties we really want in the products we create. Fatty or dry? Very fatty oils are rich in saturated fatty acids. At one extreme, neem oil has 40% saturated fatty acids, while avocado oil has 25% and argan oil around 20%. Almond and apricot kernel oils are about 10% saturated fatty acids. The saturated fatty acids form a protective layer on the skin, retaining moisture and increasing  flexibility.Rosehip oil is towards the dry end of the spectrum, with omega-3 and omega-6 unsaturated fatty acids being more significant. Although dry oils tend to be less soft and smooth, rosehip is an exception. Use it for sensitive and delicate skin when you want to avoid too much fattiness. Borage (pictured) oil also tends to be dry, so combine it with other oils. Thick or thin? The technical word for thickness is viscosity. Neem oil and castor oil (high in omega 9 fatty acids) are viscous, and the skin absorbs them very slowly. Castor oil is not only thick, it’s sticky! Hemp and borage are thin oils, easily absorbed by the skin. Rosehip, jojoba, almond and apricot kernel are also quite thin.  Long or short? Keep this in mind when blending a massage oil. Long oils spread easily across the skin and don’t soak in too quickly, so they provide good lubrication. Most of the oils on our list are long oils: almond, apricot kernel, avocado and rosehip. Jojoba is very long! Hemp oil is short, while borage oil is the only very short oil on our list. Top note / middle note / base note This perfume terminology adapts nicely to vegetable oils, and gives you a way of thinking about oil combinations. Top-note vegetable oils are absorbed within minutes of being applied to the skin. They tend to be dry and thin, and high in omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids. On our list, hemp and borage oils are top-note oils. Middle-note oils such as almond and rosehip take longer to be absorbed. They are high in omega 7 and 9 unsaturated fatty acids. Base note oils stay on the skin for quite a long time. Castor oil is the best example on our list. It’s great to use oils from all three categories when you make a blend or a cream, so you have a wide range of fatty acids, giving a balanced product. However, for skin that is oily, prone to acne or has large pores, keep things light and avoid the base note oils.
Something special about each oil:
Each change of season brings the opportunity to make some new products to care for your skin in changing conditions. We hope you have a great time with your winter creations! Kind regards Elinor, Chelsea, & Jacqui
May 2012
In this issue:
Enter the draw Beautiful, vibrant skin needs nutrition from the inside as well as the outside. Our giveaway package takes care of both!  Revive is a wonderful Auckland vegetarian cafe that has published the best cookbook ever - it's inspiring to look at, and makes it easy to create delicious food simply. Our favourite section has double-page spreads with multiple options for making salads, curries, stir fries, fritters and smoothies. And to nurture the outer person, we have a selection of skincare products made with Go Native ingredients.Everyone who orders from Go Native from today until the end of April goes in the draw to win the Revive cookbook along with the two Babassu butter products and rosehip oil balm featured in our recipes below. What's new... Smaller volumes of products: We have responded to your requests for smaller volumes of our products. It is more economical to buy larger volumes but many options are there for each product. Not sure how to order quantities other than the one you can see? Just click on the white bar to see the other sizes available for this product. And on the left, you can click on the name of the product to see background information about it. Books: We now carry a small range of books to help you with making your skincare products. Making Natural Beauty Products has proved particularly popular and we had to quickly order in more. Stamps: Go Native has its very own personalised 60c stamps. Pretty cute they are too! We have them for sale in the Miscellaneous section. Chelsea acting in Wellington: A shameless plug for Chelsea's play in Wellington. These Are the Skeletons of Us is on at BATS from March 27 to April 5. It's a very funny play about a relationship from the end to the beginning. Well worth a night out. South Island cosmetic classes: Learn how to make simple effective products and the science behind them. Brianne offers maybe the only skincare classes in the South Island. Maximum of 5 people per class. Soapmaking: $150 per person, 3 hours Learn how to make your own real soap and take home your creations. Cosmetics Level One: $190 per person, 3 hours This course covers lotions, creams, cleansers, moisturisers, etc, as well as how to make a basic shampoo and conditioner. Cosmetics Level Two: $260 per person, 3 hours This course teaches more advanced methods. Contact Brianne@ethique.co.nz for more details. Substitution Ever wondered how to make something you see on the shop shelves?
Here I (Elinor) will go through a recipe substitution using Trilogy Rosehip Oil Lip Balm.
Below is the ingredients' listing on the jar. (I have added the percentages, see below.)
On labels, ingredients are required to be listed in volume order - so in this case, castor oil is the major ingredient. A simple balm is made with 15% beeswax and 85% oils. So let’s start with beeswax: we know it will be 15%. Now let's deal with the minor ingredients: 8, 9, 10, 11 are essential oils or components of essential oils. They are usually used at 0.5%, which here will be a few drops. Use any fragrance or essential oil you like here. It’s purely to perfume the balm. The remaining ingredients, 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, are all oils and butters. There is more castor oil than beeswax (higher up the list) so we’ll make that 18%. It’s called Rosehip Oil Lip Balm so we have to assume there’s a lot of rosehip oil. We’ll give rosehip oil 15%. Total ingredients so far: 18+15+15+0.5 = 48.5%. We have to get to 100%. 51.5% to go. We have 4 more oils to incorporate, so let’s give them 13% each but shea butter 12.5% to get us to 100%. Because scales won’t measure in half grams and because our fragrance is only a few drops, we will make the shea butter 13% too. Here is the final recipe. I’ve changed % to grams so it will make 100g. Go Native Rosehip Oil Lip Balm 18g castor oil 15g beeswax 15g rosehip oil 13g jojoba oil 13g carrot oil 13g cocoa butter 13g shea butter a few drops essential/fragrance oil So now you have to make it and see how it goes. It may be a little hard as it has cocoa butter. That will depend on the weather. It may need re-melting and more oil used. Remember to keep notes on what you did. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Recipes Whipped babassu and borage butter Makes 200g, but 400ml in volume 160g babassu butter 38g borage oil 2g chocolate fragrance oil Put all the ingredients in a bowl and whip until it has doubled in volume. It will look like whipped egg whites. Pour into jars. Whipped babassu, cocoa butter and borage Makes 200g, but 400ml in volume 88g babassu butter 68g borage oil 44g cocoa butter, organic natural (smells divine) I don’t put a fragrance in this as it’s a shame to cover up the cocoa butter perfume. Melt the cocoa butter and add the babassu butter and borage oil. Place in fridge until set. Whip until double in volume. Pour into containers. This is truly divine. It’s like a cream but requires no preservative, as there’s no water. It has become my new favourite cream. Oh my gosh, it’s nice. Chest rub (to relieve colds, just in case the weather is catching up with you) Makes 100g 55g olive oil 15g beeswax 11g camphor essential oil 10g menthol crystals 9g eucalyptus blue gum essential oil Melt the olive oil and beeswax. Take off the heat. (Taking off the heat is important as the essential oils have a low flashpoint.) Add the rest and stir until the menthol crystals have dissolved. Pour into a 100g container. What does it mean? Extracting oils and butters from nuts and seeds and plants... You want to care for your skin by using products that you know you can trust. Making your own seems like a great idea… But when you look at the ingredients available on our website, there are all these words used to describe the oils and butters. In each newsletter I (Jacqui) look at some of them. This time:
In the last newsletter we talked about different methods for growing the plants we get our ingredients from.
The next step is extraction. The 64 vegetable (carrier) oils and butters that we stock are extracted in several different ways. Oils vary from the delicate to the robust. Some oils are quite fragile and contain compounds that break down when exposed to air, heat or light, while others remain stable for years. So when extracting the finest quality oils, different methods will suit different oils. Cold-pressed oils – how are they made? Once nuts or seeds are gathered and cleaned, they are crushed in some way that doesn’t raise the temperature above about 40°C. This means that the antioxidants, vitamins and other beneficial compounds remain intact, making cold-pressed oils and butters great for moisturising and nourishing the skin. The extra compounds often give these oils distinctive colour and aroma (and flavour, but that’s not so relevant here). In Europe, oil described as cold pressed will be unrefined, and extracted at temperatures below 50°C. In the USA, however, the term may be used more loosely.  Nuts and seeds vary hugely in hardness (just think of the casings of a macadamia nut and a large walnut - one is rock-hard, while the other can sometimes be crushed by hand). The harder the nut, the more pressure is needed. A friend who visited an argan oil cooperative in Morocco described to me how the women hand squeeze the stone-ground nuts to extract oil for their own use.Many of the tropical butters and oils that we stock are made using traditional cold-process techniques and are obtained directly from cooperatives and local producers, so they represent very good value. Expeller pressed – what’s this?  A traditional machine that is still widely used for extracting oils is the expeller. No extra heat is applied during extraction – just pressure. But very hard nuts will generate quite a bit of heat from friction. Sometimes expeller-pressed oils can get quite hot – and if this happens, they are no longer cold pressed. (There are more sophisticated expellers which cool the crushing mechanism.) So… many expeller-pressed oils qualify as cold pressed, but not all. Expeller pressing leaves some oil behind. In a traditional setting, this doesn’t matter at all, as the pressed cake can be used as animal feed. But in an urban factory, the residue may then be treated with solvents to extract a lower-quality oil.  CO2 extraction – haven’t heard of that!We are familiar with carbon dioxide as a gas, or perhaps as a solid – the weirdly smoking ‘dry ice.’ But at high pressure and a temperature above 31°C, it becomes something even stranger: a ‘supercritical fluid’ which is a very safe and effective solvent for extracting compounds from plant material. This method has been used in the oil industry for over 30 years, but is now being applied in many areas because of its minimal environmental impact. Carbon dioxide is available as an industrial byproduct, and after being used for extraction, it is evaporated from the extracted material and recycled – no residue, no pollution. CO2 extracted oils are of a very high quality and purity. They tend to be quite expensive, but as this process becomes more widely used (from decaffeinating coffee beans to drycleaning) the cost of smaller extraction plants will come down. You may find this method described as SCFE (supercritical fluid extraction) - just make sure that the fluid being used is carbon dioxide. We currently stock just three of these oils, made from sea buckthorn fruit, black currant seed and kiwi seed, all treasure troves of fatty acids and other skin nutrients. There should be many more of these wonderful CO2 extracted oils becoming available in future, both vegetable (carrier) oils and essential oils. Steam distillation of essential oils – as old as the hills  A thousand years ago, Muslim chemists were using steam distillation to extract perfume from rose petals. Today, one of our favourite products is rose hydrosol. Steam distillation is still the main way of creating essential oils and their hydrosols. (Hydrosols are the water-based product of distillation, and generally contain skin-friendly compounds.)  This elegant glass apparatus, marketed by heartmagic.com, shows clearly the components of a steam distiller, though small commercial ones look more like this photo from our home page showing the extraction of our ylang ylang essential oil in Indonesia. The steam passes through the plant material, releasing compounds that move into the condensing tube. The hydrosol condenses first (think of windows on a winter morning) and then the oils, which are collected separately.The magic of steam distillation comes from the way that steam effectively lowers the boiling points of the compounds we desire, so they evaporate at low enough temperatures to retain their aromas and medicinal properties. (Have you ever tried grilling food over a fire of herb twigs? I have – in the hope that some of the aromatic compounds would find their way into the food. They didn’t! Heat alone is not effective!) Solvent extraction We also have to acknowledge that industrial processes have a place in our mass-produced world. Oils that are produced as part of an industrial process are much cheaper than handcrafted oils and butters, and are effective for some purposes. Solvent extraction is widely used for getting a high oil yield from crops such as soybeans and canola.  The most widely used solvent is hexane, which is one of the many hydrocarbons distilled from crude oil (remember the oil refinery distillation tower in Year 10 Science?)Hexane is added to the crushed seed or nut, and the oil dissolves in the solvent. Once it has done its work, the hexane evaporates from the oil, and is collected to be used again. Nearly all of the hexane is removed from the oil. I’ve read that in vegetable oils tested in the USA, hexane levels were almost all under 0.1 mg/kg – that’s 1/50th of a teaspoon per litre of oil. But some people have concerns about these mass-produced oils. People’s tolerance of chemicals varies enormously, and some of us may be affected by the tiniest residues. Others would argue that the hexane leaves an indelible ‘energy footprint’ on these kinds of processed oils, so that they can never provide the same level of nutrition as an organically grown cold- pressed version. In conclusion It’s wonderful that scientific principles discovered long ago are still being used to give us the finest-quality products – and it’s great that modern science has brought the new technology of CO2 extraction, as well as the less life-enhancing but extremely efficient solvent-based methods. Each change of season brings the opportunity to make some new products to care for your skin in changing conditions. We hope you have a great time with your autumn creations! Kind regards Elinor, Chelsea, & Jacqui 
February 2012
In this issue:
Well we all know February means, among other things, Valentine's Day! And whether you love it or hate it, we think you'll all agree that if you're going to be giving or receiving gifts isn't it much nicer for them to have a personal touch? Of course you could go out and buy the power tools or the diamond earrings that the television keeps telling you will make them love you more, but here we believe that a little thought and creativity goes a lot further than spending hundreds of dollars. We have soaps, body butters, essential oils, colours.... The possibilities are endless. So have a look and see if you can't come up with something a little special and one off for the one you love. Lots of love and have fun! xx  Valentine's Day - 14 February Surprise your beloved with something made with your own loving hands! Chelsea has been playing with the Heart of Roses mould and melt-and-pour soap - see her gorgeous creation below. The most astonishing one is made with black mica, lightly brushed with silver mica once it's unmoulded. Black and silver - What would the man in your life think of that?
If you need the basics for making melt and pour soap, click here to check out our kits. Let us know if you'd like a different coloured mica or a different essential oil.
New product: SLSa Sodium lauryl sulfoacetate is a white powder and is a safe, skin-friendly surfactant (foaming agent) for skin and hair. It is mild, made from plants and creates a rich, luxurious lather that effectively removes surface oil, dirt and bacteria, without stripping or drying sensitive skin. (However, in its powder form, it can irritate the throat - so it's a good idea to wear a dust mask when handling it.) It is a versatile foaming additive used in many products: bath bombs, bubble bars, bath salts, etc. This Month's Special: Hemp Oil Heaven! Hemp oil is a versatile oil, great for both skin care and hair care. We have three lots in stock, all with different characteristics. (no longer on special) What makes hemp oil valuable is its effect on skin and hair. Hemp oil easily penetrates the skin, making it softer and healthier, more resilient to the effects of ageing and sunshine. It contains about 3% gamma linoleic acid (also found in evening primrose oil) which makes it useful in products for people with psoriasis, acne and eczema. All three of our oils have the distinctive hemp smell. I think my favourite is the cold-pressed one – it has a lively grassy summery aroma. The organic refined oil is almost colourless and quite light. Our organic natural oil is golden, and a little more viscous. Cold-pressed virgin oil is greeny-gold and a bit thicker. Recipe: Hemp cream with mango butter makes approx 200g oil phase: 30g hemp oil 20g emulsifier O 12g mango butter water phase: 180g water last phase: 4g Geogard 221 few drops essential oil or fragrance oil In two small pots, heat oil phase and water phase ingredients separately to 65degC. Combine the two into one pot and blend with a stick blender until cool. Add the last phase ingredients and blend. Spoon into jars. Recipe: Nail and cuticle food 20ml hemp oil 20ml sesame oil 5ml vitamin E oil Mix together and store in a lightproof jar in a cool place. Apply a little to nails and cuticles whenever you think of it! What does it mean? Wildcrafted - Certified Organic - Spray free You want to care for your skin by using products that you know you can trust. Making your own seems like a great idea… But when you look at the ingredients available on our website, there are all these words that you usually take for granted: cold pressed, organic, unrefined, refined, spray free, … And they come in clumps: organic cold pressed unrefined, or even (spot the difference) organic cold pressed refined. How does this compare with spray free expeller-pressed? How about deodorised? distilled? ultra refined? extra virgin? In each newsletter I (that's me, Jacqui) will look at a few of these. This month: wildcrafted, certified organic, spray free. Wildcrafted is something collected in a traditional way by its traditional collectors, in quantities that are sustainable. In the tropical regions of the world there are still people living close to the land with skills and knowledge that has been handed down for generations. While much so-called development has destroyed the lives of ordinary people, there are some Western aid agencies that have made it possible for women in particular to make a living from traditional activities. Their products are different from the mass-produced versions. For example, along with many of you, we absolutely adore our wildcrafted shea butter. But some people find the aroma just too raw and overpowering.  Our most recent shipment of wild shea butter arrived in the most natural of packaging - here is some of it in the gourd container that was used instead of the Western equivalent - the plastic bucket! Wildcrafted products will not always be the same. We have become so accustomed to factory-style farming that we don’t know what to think when the new batch is a different colour from the old, or has a different smell – reflecting local conditions at the time it was growing, and the way it was handled after harvest. Organic is the way things were grown for thousands of years, until about a hundred years ago the new science of chemistry started coming up with apparently instant fixes for the age-old problems of the gardener and farmer. For example, DDT was good at killing insects (and by reducing the mosquito population, made a big dent in the number of South Pacific malaria cases) – but it also had unexpected effects such as thinning the eggshells of wild birds such as eagles, so their numbers plummeted in the 1950’s, when DDT was used everywhere. Soil fertility has always been an issue. At a working farm museum in Switzerland, I saw the huge effort that used to go into burning bones and crushing them for their precious phosphorus. Now we mine phosphate deposits and make them into quick-fix superphosphate. Organic farmers can only use the untreated phosphate rock, which feeds plants more slowly. One of the underlying ideas of traditional farming was variety. Have you ever been to a farm that has fruit  trees, shelter and fodder trees, a big herb garden, a vegetable garden, chickens, ducks, pigs, cattle, sheep, horses,…?? These magical places still exist, and their diversity is their strength. All those creatures eat different things, and pests have much less chance of taking over. The best examples that I know of are farmed according to the ideas of Dr Rudolf Steiner, a version of organics called Biodynamic farming. (Go Native has some beautiful New Zealand olive oil that is grown biodynamically.) Now ‘certified organic’ seems to be turning into another kind of mass production. There are huge farms in California that grow only one plant – almond trees, for example – and get by because they are expert at juggling and pushing and redefining what goes into the farm.We have two versions of many of our oils: one from conventionally grown plants, and also certified organic oil, processed using organic-friendly practices from organically grown plants. Spray free usually indicates a producer who farms according to organic principles (otherwise they’d need to spray!) but doesn’t wish to go through the rigmarole of certification, which takes time – lots of forms to fill in and records to keep – and money. Sometimes it can take a lot of money. The most amazing avocado producer I’ve come across doesn't certify their produce, yet applies the principles of biodynamics and other stringent organic systems along with some pretty funky ideas based on their observations of avocado trees in the wild - and the end result is wonderful. Our spray-free cold-pressed sweet almond oil, grown in New Zealand, is one of our most popular carrier oils. All the best for 2012 Kind regards Elinor, Chelsea, & Jacqui
December 2011
Hello! Summer's here! Summer's here! (Most of the time. And about time too.) Of course December means that Christmas is fast approaching, which somehow often catches us by surprise and sees us scrambling to get gifts together at the last minute, buying overpriced nick-nacks that you know are going to end up on a dusty shelf somewhere until they're re-gifted (hopefully not back to you) next year. Well, what about this year going back to a time before bath salts and candles in novelty mugs tied up with cellophane and ribbon? When people used to put thought and care into MAKING gifts for their friends and family? Why not mix up a big pot of chocolate body butter or make rose-shaped melt and pour soaps, scented and coloured any way you like? It's so much easier than you may realise and imagine how impressed everyone will be that you've taken the time to create something beautiful, personal AND all natural for them. (And for a fraction of the price that you'd pay in stores.) Or buy them a specialty kit so they can make it themselves, 'teach a man to fish' and all that. Have a squizz and see if anything tickles your fancy. From the team at Go Native, have a wonderful, wonderful Christmas and get outside and soak up some of that glorious sun. x In this newsletter:
Recent arrivals: We have some beautiful new carrier oils which are New Zealand made: walnut oil and hazelnut oil. Hazelnut oil, like macadamia oil, offers some protection from the effects of UV, so is useful in summer skin oil blends. Being a soft, smooth oil, it is good in baby products when blended with less astringent oils. But this astringency makes hazelnut oil good in acne treatment blends (eg 20% hazelnut oil, along with evening primrose oil, safflower oil, and rosehip oil). Walnut oil is easily absorbed by the skin, leaving it soft and supple. It is a good source of omega 3 fatty acids, and the other fatty acids are nicely balanced. Walnut oil helps the skin regenerate, so it is a valuable component of blends for mature skin. Also think of walnut oil when circulation could be better – use on discoloured skin on legs and feet, and for brittle nails. Micas are proving popular with soapmakers. Every time we take the lid off a mica we are blown away by the sheer gorgeousness of it – the rich colour of green or purple, the sheen of silver and gold satin, and the exotic luxury of gold and silver sparkle. We have quite a few glittery places around the factory where bits have escaped! Specials: Our tamanu oil is an amazing price - we source it directly from Madagascar and pass the savings on to you. We still have some refined rosehip oil which is excellent value. Rosehip oil is great for summer skin, alone or in blends. Ideas for Christmas presents: Our new melt and pour soap kits will put a smile on your face. They are ideal for a fun gift, or get one for yourself, so you can make soaps for those people who have everything – your creation will give them a treat every shower time. It’s surprisingly exciting – in a few minutes you can transform a lump of clear soap into several bars of your choice. And if things go wrong, just melt and pour – all over again!
Lip balms are another great idea for gifts – so good you can eat them! Go to the Recipes tab on our website for details on making your own. Two ideas for easy travelling: Mango butter moisturiser bar Keep your skin smooth and satisfied with a mango butter bar – the warmth of your skin is enough to create a fine film of moisturiser. The recipe is so easy:
28g beeswax
30g mango butter 42g safflower oil Melt gently, then if desired, add a few drops of vitamin E and about ¼ teaspoon of your choice of essential oil. Pour into a mould (or two smaller moulds) before it sets. (It can be warmed up again if necessary!) Solid shampoo and conditioner bar kit – no messy bottles when you travel! We love packing our shampoo and conditioner bars – no leakage worries - these bars can even go in your handbag. We have made up a kit so you can make your own to take on holiday. A silicon mould, and two packs of ingredients, one for shampoo and one for conditioner. For each one, just heat the waxes and oils, then add the water-based ingredients. Stir and pour into the moulds – two bars of shampoo, two of conditioner.
July 2011
In this issue:
We hope you're keeping snug and warm and that the cold winter chills and sniffles haven't gotten hold of you! But just in case we've got an all-natural Chest Rub Balm (Vicks vapor rub equivalent) recipe to help keep them at bay. Also a delicious Chocolate Lip Balm recipe for when you have to brave the outside world and can't take your hot cocoa with you! But first here's how to work out how to make your favourite products in your own home for a fraction of the price! Interpreting ingredients' listings It's fun to look at the back of a label and see what the product is made of and see if we can replicate it. Let's look at Burt's Bees Rejuvenating Lip Balm with Acai Berry. The ingredients list is: sunflower oil coconut oil beeswax aroma castor oil lanolin acai oil licorice extract rosemary leaf extract vitamin E soybean oil canola oil limonene linalool Ingredients are always listed in volume order, with the highest first. So we know that sunflower oil has the highest volume and linalool the lowest. When making a balm, 85% of the ingredients are oils and 15% beeswax. So let's make 100g which won't test our maths skills as 1% will equal 1g. Step 1: Go down the list and find beeswax. We know this will be 15% or 15g. Step 2: Now go down to Vit E. This is usually used at 1%, therefore 1g. Everything below Vit E is equal to or less than 1% (1g), so we'll make them 0.5% (0.5g) each, total 2g for those four ingredients. Step 3: We have the six ingredients from aroma to extracts. Extracts are used at anything between 1% and 5%. Let's make them 5g each. I don't know what is meant by 'aroma'. It's too high up the list to be an essential oil and it would have been listed as such if it were. So I'll add it to castor oil and make castor 10g. So these all add up to 30g, making our total now 48g. Step 4: We have sunflower and coconut oils left and 52g to play with. Let's make sunflower 30g and coconut oil 22g. NB: The extracts will have to be oil based. We can't add water to a balm. Limonene & linalool are constituents of essential oils which are impossible to buy so instead use an essential oil. Here's our final balm recipe: 30g sunflower oil 22g coconut oil 15g beeswax 10g castor oil 5g lanolin 5g acai oil 5g licorice root extract 5g rosemary leaf extract 1g Vit E 0.5g soybean oil 0.5g canola oil 0.5g essential oil of choice 0.5g essential oil of choice To put your own stamp on it, substitute another oil or extract for the ones here, but keep to the basic formula of 85g oils/15g beeswax. If your scales only weigh in 2g increments, make it 84g/16g. Email or facebook us any ingredients' listing you want analysed in our next newsletter or on facebook. It would be good to get others' input as well. RECIPES Make your own Vicks-like Chest Rub 71g oil (olive, almond, apricot or peach kernel) 15g beeswax 6g camphor EO 4g menthol crystals 2g eucalyptus blue gum EO 1g cedarwood Virginiana EO 1g nutmeg EO Chocolate lip balm It's divine! I'm always tempted to have it for lunch. 52g coconut oil 20g beeswax 16g natural cocoa butter 10g chocolate (Save the rest for the next batch. Yeah, right!) 1g Vit E 1g chocolate fragrance oil As with all balms, just melt the beeswax and oils gently in a double boiler, then add the essential oils and pour into containers. Can be done in a microwave too. Very important to add the EOs/FOs after heating. They all have flashpoints and it's scary seeing them reach them in a pot or microwave. |
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