Last Friday we had friends over for dinner. Real foodie friends who love wine, love France and with whom we can have the most interesting of conversations. I made a simple six course French style dinner, we played old records and drank a little too much wine. Before we realized it, the clock said it was 3:30 AM — a very good sign, but boy did I (we!) pay for it the next day! No Saturday lunch at a nice restaurant, no wine. Only rest, rest, more rest and some green juice thrown in for good measure.

dinner
The main was duck confit, new potatoes with whole pink garlic and parsley and my favorite tomato salad.

I take comfort in knowing I’m pretty much a saint most of the time. Well, if you don’t count the fact that I do enjoy wine and refuse to believe it’s bad for me, in moderation. And to me, moderation usually involves a glass of wine with dinner, unless I’m detoxing my liver — like I am now. The same goes for sugar. If I want to bake a rich dessert once in a while or add sugar to my one cappuccino on Saturday, I do!
I started eating a mostly organic diet about four months ago, and recently, I turned it up a notch by making the switch to organic makeup, toiletries and household products. Luckily, I found a great company called BioAmable here in the Netherlands (PS: not a soul paid me to say this) that offers a huge line of organic/natural/green products. Ordering from them is always a joy. Everything is described in detail, and I get the coolest samples and even a handwritten thank-you card with each order. Fabulous service!

BioAmable
This time I ordered neem shampoo. Neem leaves are wonderful natural medicine for hair and skin. I also ordered Benecos blush, a Benecos lip color and two natural deodorants.
Benecos
Benecos is a German line of organic beauty products. These are my first two: The blush, in Sassy Salmon, is a very pretty brownish pink (you can’t see that too well in the photo, unfortunately!). The lip color is Rusty Rose and applies like a dream! So rich and hydrating!
IMG_6999
The deodorant is from Crystal Spring. It contains aloe vera and does not have aluminium chlorohydrate, alcohol, parabens or fragrance. I haven’t tested it yet, but I love the idea of an all natural deodorant.
BioAmable
The sample was the Kale Detox face wash by Pacifica and a brightening serum by PHB Ethical Beauty. I recently tried the PHB mineral powder and it’s a beautiful product — although the color is a bit too dark for me. I’m taking it to France though, where hopefully, the sun EXISTS!!

I know, what the heck is all of this beauty talk doing on the blog of a France loving food blogger?!?! Well, I suppose I just wanted to share my new passion for organic beauty products with you, one that blossomed from a new passion for organic food.

Ekoplaza
Here’s some of our weekly food shop, purchased at Ekoplaza, which I suppose is like the Dutch version of Whole Foods. We don’t eat much meat during the week and our main sources of dairy come from kefir, skyr and goat milk yogurt.
Chia Breakfast
Here’s a great product I recently started adding to our breakfast. You’re supposed to make it like you would oatmeal, but I simply add a few spoons over our dairy, fruit, chia and nut mix every morning.

And because I know you want a recipe, I am going to share a cookie recipe I recently came across thanks to Dr. Josh Axe. If you haven’t heard of him, go check out his website — fantatstic source of information about health! The recipe was posted on his Facebook page and comes from the Food Matters blog. Imagine making a cookie with only four ingredients and no sugar or butter! I must admit I was a bit concerned about the taste, but they’re really nice! I will be adding some dark chocolate next time, or perhaps some dried apple and cinnamon. I didn’t make 8-10 cookies like the recipe says though, but six large ones. You can find the recipe here.

cookies
Bananas, peanut butter, oats and raisins! That’s all you need to make these chewy, yummy cookies! My teen is going to be very happy when she comes home from school.

Leave a Reply