Eden's Gate: CBD English Breakfast Tea, and CBD Chamomile Tea

If you’re like us and reach out for a pick-me-up mid-afternoon, then keep reading on. This is when tea is our preferred drink of choice, and at The Amazing Blog, a comforting cuppa is just the ticket. Regular readers will know that we're big fans of all things hemp and CBD, and today, we're introducing to you another of our #amazingfinds with these refreshing and delicious CBD-infused teas from Eden's Gate.  

Eden's Gate is a family-run British business established by Tyler Woodward in 2018. Apart from their own brand, they are also an online store that supplies various CBD brands and products. Fueled by his love for nature and all of its remedies, Tyler launched Eden's Gate sharing his passion for effective and safe CBD products that provide all of nature's benefits without using any synthetic compounds. Tyler told us, "We strive for clarity, whether it's the CBD itself, production methods or the knowledge of our users. We're not hiding anything - transparency is key!" This is where Eden's Gate provides clear and detailed information on all of its products. They are also triple batch tested with lab test certification for each one. In addition, they pride themselves on being ‘from seed to shelf’ and are GMO and cruelty-free, and contain high-quality, broad-spectrum CBD sourced from the most reputable US hemp farms that have organic plants grown without pesticides. Eden's Gate uses CBD that is extracted through super-critical CO2 extraction. In this process, carbon dioxide (CO2) pressure and temperature are manipulated until it's in a liquid-gas form known as ‘super-critical liquid’. The method allows Eden's Gate to safely extract only the purest CBD while leaving behind bi-products such as THC, waxes, and chlorophylls. This resulting CBD is solvent-free, meaning that no extra compounds or chemicals are involved in the extraction process, making this CBD environmentally friendly too!  They are quick to point out that they use their own equipment and oversee every aspect of production without any 3rd party involvement.

We were sent two of Eden's Gate's CBD teas to try, the first being their CBD English Breakfast Tea with 300mg of CBD. Each tea bag contains 20mg of broad-spectrum CBD combined with black tea, resulting in a rich tea with a full-bodied English Breakfast black tea. Eden's Gate uses unbleached tea bags made from cellulose fibres, meaning that they don't contain chemicals like dioxin or microplastics like polypropylene that are harmful to both your body and the environment. Being  broad-spectrum CBD means that it has no detectable THC levels, but does have dozens of the different isolates and terpenes naturally found in the hemp. We imagine that the broad-spectrum CBD here will be a water-soluble CBD distillate (Eden’s Gate, please correct us if we’re wrong!) ideal for infusing into beverages. It also makes use of the "entourage effect", as these compounds help the CBD work better, so you're getting all the goodness of the hemp plant without the THC. The tea leaf becomes black tea and gets its dark colour from a lengthy oxidation and fermentation process. The tea leaves and picked, and then left to dry where they are either rolled and cut and left the oxidise. It’s a process that helps to develop the flavour and aroma changing the colour from green to brown. Let's not forget that black tea itself also has a long list of benefits; it contains antioxidants that decrease the risk of chronic disease, boost heart health, reduce blood pressure, and improve alertness and focus. So when combined together with the CBD it helps to provide reduced stress and anxiety and a whole host of other benefits too. The process of brewing CBD Tea also allows your body to ingest more of the CBD than other forms like drops so that you can get the same intense effects with a smaller dosage. All we did was place a teabag in freshly boiled water, brew for 3-6 minutes and added oat milk. it has a good rich flavour of English Breakfast tea, but it does take a little longer to infuse than a regular black tea, but well worth the wait! What does it taste like? Well, like black tea, but very mild with the slightest hint of fruitiness from the hemp. Delicious and great for keeping away those mid- afternoon blues! It is pricey compared to your everyday cuppa, so we tended to drink this as and when. To purchase the English Breakfast Tea 300mg here at £16.99 for 15 bags.

The second tea we tried was the CBD Chamomile Tea 300mg. Each unbleached tea bag contains chamomile sourced from the Nile River Valley in Egypt, lemon balm, and again 20mg of broad-spectrum CBD, so you're still getting the same complete CBD health benefits as the English Breakfast Tea mentioned above. Chamomile tea is thought to reduce inflammation and menstrual pain, slow down osteoporosis and lower blood sugar. We general drink chamomile tea to help with sleep and relaxation. So what could be better than getting the amplifying relaxation effect when the two are combined here! The chamomile flower is not alone; the lemon balm also has mood-boosting properties and improves cognitive function, turning this into quite a potent mix. Again, recommended brewing between 3-6 minutes like the CBD Black Tea. Since Chamomile tea doesn't become bitter if you leave the teabag in it for too long, we steeped it for up to 6 minutes to fully reap all the benefits and enjoy its sweet floral (no hemp taste) chamomile and lemon-y flavour. It’s the perfect choice for a nighttime cuppa, and sent us swiftly off into the land of nod. To purchase the CBD Chamomile Tea 300mg see here at £16.99 for 15 bags. 

The Soap Loaf Company: Cosmeti-Craft Solid Deodorant Making Kit,

Even in the hustle and bustle of everyday life, at The Amazing Blog, we always try to make time for fun ways to combine our creative and practical skills - showing off our handmade products to friends! This time, we thought we’d try our hand at making a DIY deodorant from one of The Soap Loaf Company’s Cosmetics-Craft enterprising options with their award-winning Solid Deodorant Making Kit.

Founder Natasha Green launched the British Sheffield based brand The Soap Loaf Company  n 2012, offering a wide array of soaps, solid shampoos, bath bombs and bath products. Natasha developed an interest in soap-making and wanted to express her creative side after working for 11 years as a finance broker. She followed her passion and created The Soap Loaf Company to bring to market her own handmade toiletries and cosmetics, which led her to the launch of her workshops. Through The Soap Loaf Company, she began to host soap-making parties for children's groups and organisations. As the parties expanded with new products and ideas, she decided that it was time to attract the adult customer audience. In 2018 Natasha launched a sister brand Cosmeti-Craft, which went on to increase the products and output for workshops and parties for adults. Today, they host regular workshops all over South and West Yorkshire; the participants can follow tutorials to create soaps, bath bombs, moisturisers, shampoo bars, solid perfumes, scrubs, and many more. Cosmeti-Craft also has funded and charity rates for special needs groups, schools, universities, or charities. They tailor each workshop to offer support and resources, allowing each individual to express their creativity and sense of achievement, by creating a unique self-care Cosmetic-Craft product. The positive feedback from these has been overwhelming, Natasha told us that they often have reported how the workshops have helped engage and bring back joy into the participants' lives, boosting both morale and mental health. In addition to helping others, The Soap Loaf Company and its sister brand Cosmeti-Craft are determined to have a positive impact the environment. They focus on offering fully compostable packaging, reusing and recycling all materials from their suppliers, and ordering materials in bulk to reduce shipping frequency and CO2 emissions. They also collect bottle tops for a specialist recycling group, offer paper bags in store for customers, and reward customers with a 20% discount for bringing refillable containers when making further purchases. Recently Cosmetic-Craft has gained the attention of Virgin, Living Social, Uniquely Local, BBC Radio Sheffield, and Channel 5. Natasha herself, can often be found demonstrating the kits on Craft Store Sky Channel 673. All products and kits are organic, vegan and cruelty-free. They recently won a Bronze award in the Global Green Beauty Awards for Most Innovative Green Product with their Solid Deodorant Making Kit (below). We’ve also heard whispers that they’ll be making another announcements about a new award later on in the year…

The Soap Loaf Company kindly sent us their Solid Deodorant Making Kit to try out here; this is where the kit brings the workshop to you! It’s a bit like doing elementary chemistry and such a fun and easy thing to create. This kit gives you one finished solid deodorant, there are four key ingredients, together with two essential oils, and a reusable/ compostable container, and a fool-proof tutorial to follow. We like how they keep it simple; we won’t go into the details of how we made it (rather long-winded). Instead we’ll talk about the ingredients and our finished product.

Interestingly, we thought they’d use beeswax, but no, the kit provides candelilla wax instead, it’s a plant oil that becomes a solid wax once extracted. It's the best out of all alternatives to beeswax as it spreads and absorbs more efficiently and also offers more hydration. The shea butter in the kit also boosts skin moisture and soothes irritated inflamed skin. Did you know that most commercial high street deodorants contain sodium bicarbonate (AKA baking soda)? it’s a cheap surfactant and is used in deodorants to absorbs moisture and destroy odour. However, it can cause irritation and discolouration or staining on the skin. Instead of sodium bicarbonate, The Soap Loaf Company uses kaolin clay and magnesium flakes, as these ingredients are gentle, absorb moisture and control odour without changing the skin tone. Magnesium also has calming effects on the body and promotes cell growth and repair. The last ingredient is the fragrances; there are two different essential oils, we had the peppermint and orange essential oils - but there are many others to chose from. Combining these two (25 drops max is recommended) gives a refreshing aroma plus it offers antibacterial and antifungal properties, with extra bonus that these oils help to elevate the mood! This newly made deodorant does not contain artificial preservatives, palm oil, or chemical foaming agents, and it has a "use by" date of 6 months.

The kit itself also comes with very self-explanatory instructions and advice for creating the deodorant. With the completed mixture you fill the product container up to the top. Then leave it to set for 60 minutes - they suggest putting it in the fridge to speed it up. Any left over can be poured into a tin or heat proof container to use separately. Once set, your deodorant is ready to use - push up from the base and raise the deodorant mixture 1 cm and you’re ready to go! It feels soothing, smells great and best of all it’s been made with your own fair hands! If you fancy creating your own custom deodorant, or perhaps purchasing this kit as a gift. You can purchase the Solid Deodorant Making Kit here for £19.99 (as we did, without the online workshop) or at £29.99 with the online workshop. It’s another of our #amazingfinds and we found making this very relaxing and therapeutic to do. Watch this space as we’ll be trying out another of their kits very soon.

Mix Clean Green: Toilet Mix

At The Amazing Blog, when it comes to cleaning we to love finding eco-friendly and sustainable products. Meet Mix Clean Green, they care about what goes into their products and has super-concentrated waterless formulas. This, in turn, allows for the products to be sold in small containers, reducing the carbon footprint. This is something a little bit different for us to review, and we couldn’t wait to try out this award-winning Toilet Mix - as they’re the only company in the U.K. to produce a water-free, mix at home toilet cleaner!

Mix Clean Green is an innovative company looking to find eco-friendly ways to create sustainable cleaning products. It is a female-run British business, with Kate Deacon at the helm. Kate has children, and they were her inspiration for starting this company. Worried about plastic consumption, climate change and more, Kate wanted to create the most eco-friendly household products that she could. In an interview with MicroBizMag, she noted that “the overwhelming sense of greenwashing that you start to uncover when looking into ingredients in what we think of as eco-products…” This led to her passion for creating a truly eco-friendly and green brand of cleaning products. For those new to the term ‘greenwashing’ it is a concept defined as the “process of conveying a false impression or providing misleading information about how a company’s products are more environmentally sound.” Thus many brands today understand that consumers want green and eco-friendly products, so they create labels that seem like their products are planet-friendly without the ingredients to back them up. Kate found that beyond the ingredients in these greenwashed products, the process in “how they’re made or derived, and the damage they do” is also overlooked. Beyond the plastic-free products, Mix Clean Green has created palm-free, waterless, vegan-friendly, and non-toxic products. Mix’s clean, green and eco-friendly vision has definitely paid off, with the company winning multiple Green Home, Safe Home awards for the Beauty Shortlist Awards in 2021. With their evident passion for the environment and planet, we applaud Mix Clean Green for donating 5% of profits from sales of bottles and jars to Project Seagrass, which is an environmental charity that is devoted to advancing the conservation of seagrass through education, influence, research and action.” 

The Mix Clean Green’s Toilet Mix comes in a reusable tin, which contains the super-concentrate. This brilliant toilet cleaner just needs the addition of water to clean your loo. Mix Clean Green’s Toilet Mix “uses a cutting edge bio-surfactant” to help clean. These bio-surfactants are compounds that are synthesised from plants and microorganisms. These compounds are an excellent alternative to standard cleaning chemicals due to their “high biodegradability, low toxicity, multi-functionality, environmental capability and the availability of resources.” The Toilet Mix contains four simple ingredients of citric acid, bio-surfactant, organic lavender oil and organic lemon oil. This toilet cleaner utilises citric acid, which kills bacteria, mould and mildew while disinfecting and cleaning the surface. It’s also a great addition here because it is a naturally occurring raw material that makes it biodegradable and non-toxic. With these few ingredients, it uses makes it a no-brainer choice to choose over standard house-hold cleaners, like bleach. Bleach has been known to cause health-related problems as well as having negative impacts on the environment. We heard about the Mix Clean Green’s Toilet Mix, as it won the 2021 Beauty Shortlist Award for Best Loo Cleaner! It’s super-easy to use, inside each tin, is a paper funnel (it was a bit crumpled so we did show it in our photo) where we positioned the funnel over our own glass litre bottle filled with lukewarm water, then poured in the entire contents of 50ml tin (BTW you can also dilute it one teaspoon to 100ml). As advised, we left it for 30-60 mins occasionally shaking, before use. We blitzed three loos all in one go - giving them a quick pre-scrub before leaving the Toilet Mix overnight to do its work. The litre bottle of the mix lasted us about two/three weeks with regular use. The result? Well, let’s just say Mrs Hinch would be proud! It’s an impressive cleaner and even smells fragrant to boot. Available in two different container options, the starter tin or the refill zero-waste option. The zero-waste option comes in a “home-compostable pouch with a recyclable paper label.” The starter Toilet Mix in a 50ml tin is available for £6.50 here; or the zero-waste option is available for £3.50 here.  

Sakrid: Superfood Frenzy Organic Face Wash

At The Amazing Blog, we always try to feature skincare products with honest and straightforward ingredients - the ones that we know and trust. Today, we're introducing the clean beauty brand Sakrid, whose mission is “to lovingly remove harmful and questionable ingredients from everyday life” with their award-winning Superfood Frenzy Organic Face Wash.

A fierce supporter of clean beauty, Natalie Elliott is co-founder of Sakrid together with Nick Carlile. It’s a British beauty brand specialising in simple and natural ingredients for skin, body and hair care. As Natalie's mother fought breast cancer, she became aware of the toxic ingredients used within self-care brands. To her amazement, she realised that many harmful chemicals are approved for use in everyday products, so she began on her journey to reduce these ingredients in her, and her family's lives. Subsequently, Natalie went on to launched her own brand Sakrid, creating a skincare with naturally derived alternatives that she describes as ‘clean beauty’. For those not in the know, the clean beauty movement seeks to use ONLY naturally derived ingredients, which are deemed safe and cause no harm to health or wellbeing. This is where Sakrid skincare doesn’t compromise on quality and prides themselves on their handmade, organic, natural, vegan, halal, and cruelty-free products produced in the UK. Along the way, they’ve also learned a lot about packaging, recycling, ingredient sourcing, and supply chains; which is why Sakrid only partners with suppliers that share their philosophy by using only recycled plastics, chemical-free print materials, local providers, and sustainable supply chains. Not ones to settle, they're continually searching for ways to improve what they do for the environment and their communities. 

Sakrid kindly sent us their Superfood Frenzy Organic Face Wash, which recently won a Gold Award in the 2021 Global Green BeautyAwards for Best Vegan Skincare Product. They believe that the most important thing about a facewash is its "ability to deeply cleanse and also to enrich cell renewal to promote a natural, healthy glow," and Sakrid expresses this belief through the potent ingredients that they've added to this cleanser. The organic camellia sinensis (green tea) leaf extract is the first essential ingredient here (see our photo above). Full of antioxidants and anti-inflammatory benefits, it also helps soothe and calm the skin while protecting against collagen degradation and skin discolouration. anti-ageing, plus camellia sinensis aids in skin hydration. Other key ingredients include organic aloe vera for moisturising and calming; it has anti-inflammatory properties and can lighten up scarring because it contains a compound called aloesin. Next, there is kojic acid, which is sourced from different types of fungi. It inhibits the formation of an amino acid that is needed to produce melanin, the protein that creates pigment in our hair, skin, and eyes. Because of this function, kojic acid can also lighten the skin, minimising sun damage, age spots, and scars caused by injuries or acne. It also has antimicrobial and antifungal properties, which can help to prevent bacteria in the skin. That's not all, kojic acid acts as an antioxidant too, counteracting skin-damaging free radicals and helping prevent the ageing of the skin. The last of these key ingredients is vitamin C, which promotes collagen growth and reduces the appearance of ageing. Since it contains antioxidants, vitamin C helps fight against UV light damage, and it can lighten up hyperpigmentation like kojic acid and aloe vera. The stabilisers and preservatives in the face wash are naturally derived (but not organic), allowing the skin to reap the benefits of the ingredients without having its normal function disturbed. To use the face wash, simply dampen the face, massage onto the skin, and then rinse with warm water. We used this morning and night, the gel face wash gently lathers up as it mixes with the water and feels very soothing on the skin. There is a mild zesty scent (probably the neroli plus the grapefruit and orange peel) which leaves the skin feeling fresh and clean. We also like that the tube is made of recycled plastic, which of course can be recycled again. It’s certainly well-named as ‘Superfood’ with the plethora of organic ingredients, not something we often see in a cleanser, plus it’s very well priced at £17.00 for the 150ml tube - we’d recommend this cleanser and it’s another of our #amazingfinds. To purchase the Sakrid Superfood Frenzy Organic Face Wash, see here.

HAVUKA: Spruce Resin Lip Balm, & A Piece of Spruce Resin Soap

Dry and flaky skin is something that no one wants, whether that's our lips, hands or even our scalp. So as we move into autumn, today at The Amazing Blog, we bring you two excellent Finnish skincare products by HAVUKA with their unique ingredient of spruce resin. 

HAVUKA is a family-owned, Finnish natural and artisan skincare. Their unique products utilise the natural resources from the Finnish landscape and Elias Lönnrot's recipes. Elias Lönnrot was a Finnish physician, philologist, and collector of traditional Finnish poetry. A well-known traveller, Lönnrot collected poems and folk stories from across Finland, which resulted in the creation of the Kalevala, one of the most significant works in Finnish literature. During his journeys, Elias discovered the healing powers of the golden and gooey resin from spruce trees, this is not to be confused with the thin, watery spruce sap. Spruce resin has been used in Nordic countries for many centuries to treat skin infections, insect bites, chapped hands, cuts, scrapes, eczema, burns and rashes, to name but a few. HAVUKA continues the path of Elias Lönnrot, and brings natural skincare products all made according to his original recipes, into the modern-day. Havuka wishes to preserve the knowledge that Lönnrot gathered and the recipes he created, so each product tells its origin and story through the eyes of Lönnrot. As a family-owned company HAVUKA has passed on the tradition of producing these natural products for three generations, and Timo Tynys follows in his family's footsteps as the current CEO. Even today, these sustainable spruce resin products are made from mainly locally-sourced botanicals, and are all collected by hand.

The Spruce Resin Lip Balm tells the story of how Elias was able to use spruce resin to create a natural lip balm. By mixing the resin from the spruce tree with fat, he created a 100% natural lip cream to soothe dry and cracked lips. Today each lip balm is hand made in Finland, with 100% natural ingredients. For many years, this natural resin has been used in Nordic folk medicine and therapy. Tree resin, like spruce, is not only helpful in treating dry, cracked skin, it has been proven to heal cuts, rashes, and burns. The spruce resin, in particular, has always been a source of fascination to us, as we love how it contains ‘various antioxidants and flavonoids’ which all work together to create a fantastic antiseptic-like substance. Spruce produces a resin as a natural defence mechanism to protect and heal itself from a wound, or bacteria, fungi, and other harmful microbes. These natural defence principles, can also be applied to skincare, in this case by Havuka, who use it as a key ingredient to help heal and protect the skin. The conditions of the Nordic forests and nature, together with the seasonal variations, northern light and the darkness of autumn and winter, grants spruce resin its healing powers, making it one of nature's potent healing forces. The long and storied history of spruce resin, has led to medical research for wound care here and has further proved itself as an effective natural remedy. This lip balm is made up of four simple ingredients: Finnish spruce picea abies resin, organic beeswax, sodium cocoa butyrate and jojoba oil. The beeswax contains myricin and serine which have antibacterial substances to heal and softens dry and chapped skin. The sodium cocoa butterate is the fatty acid derived from cocoa butter and provides relief to damaged skin; and the jojoba oil is used to hydrate the skin – the perfect ingredient for a lip balm. This Spruce Resin Lip Balm is smooth and creamy to apply with a mild cocoa butter-y taste. As cold weather approaches, we think that with all these simple yet effective ingredients, it’s one to keep handy when you go outside - not only does it taste good, it’s also very shielding. The Spruce Lip Balm was first nominated for Best Lip Cream for the Nordic Natural Beauty Awards in 2020. You can purchase this hydrating natural Spruce Resin Lip Balm at 4g  here for € 12.90.

Next, we have the Piece of Spruce Resin Soap, this was also nominated at the Nordic Natural Beauty Awards in 2020, and we can see why. With its gentle antiseptic qualities, this soap can be used on both the skin and scalp, and is ideal for dry, flaky and sensitive skin. The spruce resin will also soothe the scalp while supporting the ‘normal function of the skin’. This handmade, 100% natural soap contains minimal ingredients and follows Elias' recipe, making it both an eco-friendly and sustainable product, with its plastic- free packaging so there is no need to worry about the impact on the planet. There are only five ingredients here with Finnish spruce picea abies resin (which we have discussed), organic rapeseed oil that has antioxidant properties for the skin and is a rich source of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. These antioxidants help protect the skin from free-radicals and potential environmental factors, like pollution. Sodium olivate is the sodium salt of the fatty acid of olive oil and is commonly used in soaps and as a detergent substance. Along with these, there are also coconut oil and sodium palmate, which are a gentler alternative to harsh cleansers that are typically found in other soaps. The advantage of these is that they have a high content of the monounsaturated fatty acid oleic acid. It is very easy to use, we were sent the 40g soap, which has lasted well. We used it in the shower on the body and scalp, and found that it lathers up but has no fragrance. In regard to using it on hair, we would say that it’s more for treating the scalp and not the hair, as it left our hair a bit tangly and in need of conditioner. We think it would be ideal to use when cold water swimming (as suggested with Saltvattentvalen No:1 ) and with all these natural ingredients you want to use it to be at one with nature following in the steps of Elias Lönnrot. The Piece of Spruce Resin Soap is offered in two different sizes, 40g at € 5.90 or 100g at € 12.90 here; all products are available through HAVUKA's website or if ordering from UK you might want to go to The Artic Pure here. Also look out for our review on their Spruce Resin Balms soon.