What's happening to your ingredients during the month of March?

The shea nuts will soon start falling off the trees, as they are gathered from the ground between April and August in Ghana, Africa.

Coconuts are being produced every month on the coconut palm tree (approximately one bunch, or 5 to 15 coconuts, each month).

Here in California, the warm weather is bringing the bees out of hibernation. Recently, my husband had to quickly roll up the windows of his car at an intersection when a swarm buzzed by!

The buds on our peach tree will soon be attracting the bees to our backyard:



 Photo credit: Jonathan Harris, Jr (age 12)

This article was written by Sarah MaHannah, owner of Glow SkinCare Boutique in Redding, "where the focus is on using only organic and non-toxic products"

By now, everyone has heard that it’s in one’s best interest to eat as organically as possible and to avoid toxic cleaning products in the home to reduce the risk of illness and disease.  But what about the personal care products you use each day?  Are you reading those product labels as carefully as food labels, and if so, do you really know what those ingredients are or what they do?

The average person uses nine cosmetic products each day, from lotions and soaps to deodorant, shampoo, conditioner, skincare, makeup, hairspray and perfume-with roughly 120 chemicals spread among them.

But whether you hardly use anything or if you’re a product junkie like me, chances are you’re putting something on your body.  Our skin is our body’s largest organ and chemicals absorbed into the skin can definitely affect us.   A one-time use of a small amount of a certain chemical may not do noticeable harm, but the cumulative effect of using harmful ingredients over months and years can really have a negative impact on our bodies and our health.

Here are 12 ingredients to avoid, courtesy of The National Geographic’s Green Guide:

1. Antibacterials–Overuse of antibacterials can prevent them from effectively fighting disease-causing germs like E. coli and Salmonella enterica. Triclosan, widely used in soaps, toothpastes and deodorants, has been detected in breast milk, and one recent study found that it interferes with testosterone activity in cells. Numerous studies have found that washing with regular soap and warm water is just as effective at killing germs.

2. Coal Tar–Coal tar is a known human carcinogen used as an active ingredient in dandruff shampoos and anti-itch creams. Coal-tar-based dyes such as FD&C Blue 1, used in toothpastes, and FD&C Green 3, used in mouthwash, have been found to be carcinogenic in animal studies when injected under skin.

3. Diethanolamine (DEA)–DEA is a possible hormone disruptor, has shown limited evidence of carcinogenicity and depletes the body of choline needed for fetal brain development. DEA can also show up as a contaminant in products containing related chemicals, such as cocamide DEA.

4. 1,4-Dioxane–1,4-Dioxane is a known animal carcinogen and a possible human carcinogen that can appear as a contaminant in products containing sodium laureth sulfate and ingredients that include the terms “PEG,” “-xynol,” “ceteareth,” “oleth” and most other ethoxylated “eth” ingredients. The FDA monitors products for the contaminant but has not yet recommended an exposure limit. Manufacturers can remove dioxane through a process called vacuum stripping, but a small amount usually remains. A 2007 survey by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics found that most children’s bath products contain 10 parts per million or less, but an earlier 2001 survey by the FDA found levels in excess of 85 parts per million.

5. Formaldehyde–Formaldehyde has a long list of adverse health effects, including immune-system toxicity, respiratory irritation and cancer in humans. Yet it still turns up in baby bath soap, nail polish, eyelash adhesive and hair dyes as a contaminant or break-down product of diazolidinyl urea, imidazolidinyl urea and quaternium compounds.

6. Fragrance–The catchall term “fragrance” may mask phthalates, which act as endocrine disruptors and may cause obesity and reproductive and developmental harm. Avoid phthalates by selecting essential-oil fragrances instead.

7. Lead and mercury–Neurotoxic lead may appear in products as a naturally occurring contaminant of hydrated silica, one of the ingredients in toothpaste, and lead acetate is found in some brands of men’s hair dye. Brain-damaging mercury, found in the preservative thimerosol, is used in some mascaras.

8. Nanoparticles–Nanoparticles, which may penetrate the skin and damage brain cells, are appearing in an increasing number of cosmetics and sunscreens. Most problematic are zinc oxide and titanium dioxide nanoparticles, used in sunscreens to make them transparent. When possible, look for sunscreens containing particles of these ingredients larger than 100 nanometers. You’ll most likely need to call companies to confirm sizes, but a few manufacturers have started advertising their lack of nanoparticle-sized ingredients on labels.

9. Parabens–(methyl-, ethyl-, propyl-, butyl-, isobutyl-) Parabens, which have weak estrogenic effects, are common preservatives that appear in a wide array of toiletries. A study found that butyl paraben damaged sperm formation in the testes of mice, and a relative, sodium methylparaben, is banned in cosmetics by the E.U. Parabens break down in the body into p-hydroxybenzoic acid, which has estrogenic activity in human breast-cancer cell cultures.

10. Petroleum Distillates–Possible human carcinogens, petroleum distillates are prohibited or restricted for use in cosmetics in the E.U. but are found in several U.S. brands of mascara, foot-odor powder and other products. Look out for the terms “petroleum” or “liquid paraffin.”

11. P-Phenylenediamine–Commonly found in hair dyes, this chemical can damage the nervous system, cause lung irritation and cause severe allergic reactions. It’s also listed as 1,4-Benzenediamine, p-Phenyldiamine and 4-Phenylenediamine.

12. Hydroquinone–Found in skin lighteners and facial moisturizers, hydroquinone is neurotoxic and allergenic, and there’s limited evidence that it may cause cancer in lab animals. It may also appear as an impurity not listed on ingredients labels.

So start reading those labels, and be aware that brands that advertise themselves as “natura,l” “botanical,” and even “organic” have been known to include some of these.  If you see any of the listed ingredients, toss it — your body and health is at stake!  If you’re not sure, go to http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/index.php, and you can search for a specific product, ingredient or company.  Kind of brings a whole new meaning to drop-dead gorgeous, doesn’t it?

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Renee's comments: MadeOn Hard Lotion is proud to have a hazard rating of "0" in the Environmental Working Group's database of cosmetics.

Every now and then I get a question about my ingredients that I don't have an answer to, especially the shea butter. One woman asked about the way it's processed, since she was concerned about the shea's purity. Another woman asked about fair trade in Africa.

I was happy to find that my supplier has the answers I need. They partner with a woman who started Naasakle Limited, the only company located in Accra, Ghana that produces shea butter by traditional methods, "improving the lives of the women who grow, harvest, trade, process and market African shea nuts and shea butter."  Here are a few more facts from my shea butter supplier:

• Shea nuts that have fallen from the tree are hand collected
• The nuts are cracked and boiled to release the fat
• The fat solidifies and becomes crude (or unrefined) shea butter

What I find fascinating is that as I craft my hard lotion bars to ship out, I'm holding the very shea butter from a shea nut that another woman 7500 miles away gathered and processed near the shores of Ghana.



In the spirit of an earlier blog, He Really Knew His Product, I'm continuing my coconut research and today I find out how coconut oil is extracted from the coconut.

I wanted to know what part of the coconut the oil comes from; I assumed it was the meat. So I checked out Wikipedia.

The answer is yes on the meat (also called the kernel). There are two ways it's extracted, a wet process and a dry process. In the wet process, the coconut is shredded, mixed with water, and then pressed to extract the oil. It's actually an oil/water mixture, so they separate it naturally and the oil is skimmed off. That's the traditional method although other methods can be used to separate the oil from the water.  For the dry method, the coconut kernel is shredded, dried in an oven, put in a press and the oil is then expelled. (Direct Micro Expelling, Kokonut Pacific Pty Ltd, accessed April, 2008)

If you're interested in really getting to the core of coconut production, Tropical Traditions has a fantastic article: http://www.tropicaltraditions.com/what_is_virgin_coconut_oil.htm

Because I'm a big fan of Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions, I've adapted our family's diet over the years to replace some of the more popular cooking oils with coconut oil. I use both Nutiva, and Tropical Traditions (Tropical Traditions sells an expeller pressed coconut oil for those who don't care for the flavor and scent of coconut oil but still want to the nutritional benefits).

The photo below (in the public domain) depicts a traditional bullock-powered coconut oil mill. Dried coconuts are crushed and oil is squeezed out.



You can answer just about any of the three and more or less be correct, but I'll start with the definite answer:

1. If I were a botanist, I would answer “fruit” because coconuts are classified as a drupe, and a drupe is a fruit (to be more clear, a drupe is a fruit with a hard stone covering a seed, like a peach).

2. A grocery shopper might call it a seed since it's the seed that you see in the produce department after the outer layers are removed.

3. A word smith might call it a nut, and he wouldn't be too far off either. “Nut” is in coconut, yes, and a nut is a one-seeded fruit, yes, but a coconut is not a true nut. A true nut does not open at maturity to release its seed. Instead, it's digested by animals or opened as a result of decay. Because of that stringent definition, pistachios aren't even true nuts. (Now there's a bit of trivia you can share with your co-workers, but I wouldn't argue the point too far or they may create their own definition of who the true nut is).

There you go – feel free to explore in more depth or check my resources by clicking the links above.

Next: how do they get the coconut oil out of the coconut?