Cathy's Kitchen Table: Quick Organic Peach Cobbler

Thanks Cary Bass!

One of my favorite dessert recipes comes from a small cook book that I received as a wedding gift 40 years ago. The recipes in this book were gathered from the local ladies in my area. Though this book now has well-read, very worn pages, its recipes are well-loved by everyone in my family. The recipe that I would like to share from this unique book is a wonderful peach cobbler.

A cobbler is an old-fashioned, homespun dessert. Cobblers orginate from the early American Colonies. They consist of basic ingredients that you probably already have on your shelves. A cobbler is a great way to take full advantage of fruits that are in season.

Thanks ftchris!

Here at Terressentials we picked blackberries from the beautiful organic flower and vegetable gardens. I made a wonderful blackberry cobbler and it was enjoyed very much by everyone. Peaches are now in season and they also make a great summertime dessert, whether it be for dinner or for breakfast.

This recipe is easy, quick and delicious, yet your family members will think you spent hours preparing this delicious dessert for them. So, before serving, pat your cheeks with flour, rough up your hair a bit and say with a sigh, “It was no trouble at all, enjoy!”

Organic Quick Peach Cobbler

Filling:

3 cups sliced ripe organic peaches

½ cup organic sugar

1 tbsp organic flour

¼ tsp organic cinnamon

Batter:

1 cup organic flour

2 tsp baking powder

¾ cup organic sugar

¼ tsp salt

¾ cup organic milk

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350°.

First, start with the filling by peeling and slicing the peaches in a medium sized bowl. Stir in sugar, flour and cinnamon. Let set while you are preparing the batter.

Sift together flour, baking powder, sugar and salt Add milk to the dry ingredients and mix well. Pour half of the batter into a greased 9x9 baking dish. Next, add your peach filling, stirring once more before pouring on top of the batter. Then pour remaining batter over the peach filling. Sprinkle with sugar and dot with organic butter.

Bake for 35-40 minutes or until golden brown. Serve warm with milk or whipped cream. Voilà!

Just Add Water: An Account from a First-Time Terressentials User

Thanks Pamela Stocks!

I knew what I was in for... well at least I thought I knew. After working at Terressentials for nearly two weeks, I'd been learning how to answer all kinds of questions about our most popular product, the Pure Earth Hair Wash: questions about the hair detox process, which flavors of hair wash are best suited to which types of hair and whether or not it will clog drains (it doesn't just for the record). It was time to take the plunge. Initially I'd decided to wait until my current shampoo had run out, but the curiosity was overwhelming. Besides, after learning about all the toxic chemicals that even so called 'natural' shampoos contain, I was done. Enough is enough!

“So have you decided which one you will try?” one of my co-workers asked as she caught me eying a bottle of Lavender Garden. I love the relaxing scent of lavender, but my hair is already pretty oily, so extra oils probably wouldn't suit me. “Which type do you all use?” I inquired of the women who work at our shop. “I use Fragrance- Free,” “Lemon,” “I actually love the Gentle Gel Body Wash for my hair.” Hmm...it seems like choosing the right hair wash is a pretty personal decision.

Later that night, with 'mint mud' (as my co-workers so lovingly nicknamed it) in hand, I took a shower. As I squeezed the bottle the hair wash came out in a loud SPLAT. Whoa, I snickered to myself. What fun, bathing with mud! No lather... that's okay, I'm not attached to the foamy lather created by synthetic foam boasters in conventional shampoos anyway. But will I be able to spread it all over my head? Flipping my hair over I massaged the clay mixture into my scalp and felt the bentonite clay really scrubbing away dead skin and dirt. My eyes widened and I took a deep breath as the mint oils instantly began to tingle my whole head and open my sinuses. After letting the hair wash absorb into my hair, I rinsed and my hair became so smooth. I was easily able to run my fingers through it while it was wet and I hadn't even used a conditioner— it's amazing! My sinuses were clear, I felt bright-eyed, refreshed and relaxed. Is it possible for a hair wash to be healing? If it's made of certified organic and truly natural ingredients, I think it really is. 

The next few weeks the shower experience continued to astonish me, but when my hair dried it felt...different while the hair wash worked it's detox magic. A couple weeks of patience earned amazing soft, silky and especially strong hair.

If you haven't had a hair wash revelation yet, I suggest you renounce your old shampoo and try one of our four spectacular scents or Fragrance-Free if you're 'scentsitive'. If you're already hooked, tell a friend, combine your orders and save on shipping (purchases over $60 remain at a flat rate of $11.95). Once you go mud, you'll never return to sudz.

Flower Therapy of a Different Kind

 Here is part of the garden in partial bloom one evening.

A visit to Terressentials in Middletown, Maryland will give you a taste of rural Frederick County. If you're coming from the direction of Washington DC or Baltimore, you'll pass through charming downtown Middletown, then travel up and down hills, past grazing cows and working farms. Just when you think you're completely lost in the middle of nowhere, you'll see the big purple mailbox (which we told you to look for, when you called us in confusion) and the Terressentials sign on the hill. You've probably come for our hand-crafted, USDA Certified Organic body care products. Maybe you're curious about where they're actually made (in the “barn” next door to the store), hand-labeled, hand-packed and shipped around the country and the world. 

 Here a team member is cutting flowers to make bouquets with.

You might notice the lovely landscaping outside the front of the store – ornamental grasses, flowering trees and shrubs, potted flowers and plants in an array of colors and shapes. But you probably won't see the extensive herb and flower gardens and fruit tree plantings beside and behind the buildings. Diana and Jim have been working on the grounds here for 17 years, and the results are stunning. 

 

This is what the table used to make the bouquets looks like when we first start.

Diana's love for flowers naturally led to her desire to adorn her stores with their beauty and share them with her customers. For several years now, the Terressentials Middletown staff has been growing flowers from seed, preparing beds and planting seedlings, weeding and watering and, finally, harvesting the bounty. Throughout August we've picked multi-colored bundles of zinnia, yellow and orange marigolds, pastel snapdragons, spiky celosia, bright orange cosmos, and sunny sunflowers, and arranged them into bouquets, accented with interesting grasses, perennial flowers and herbs such as Russian sage. Flower-picking and bouquet-making are a nice departure from the other tasks of our workday. The fresh air and expansive mountain-top views are a welcome change from the close (cozy!) quarters of the production and shipping area. And the unique shapes, colors and scents of the flowers themselves never fail to lift the spirits and bring a sense of peace.

Slowly we use up all of the flowers on the table.

I've been growing vegetables commercially (and organically, of course!) for ten years now. Currently, I work part-time at Terressentials and operate a small market garden during the rest of my waking life. Even though there are never enough hours in the day to get all the plowing, planting, weeding, watering, harvesting, etc. done to keep the vegetable production on track, I always make time to plant a section of flowers. Not for sale – just for me. I eagerly await the first blooms. I enjoy the splashes of color breaking up the lush green of the summer vegetable plants. I love watching the bees, butterflies and hummingbirds industriously visiting each one. I make bouquets every week for each room of my house. My vegetables nourish my body; my flowers are truly food for my soul.

 Here are some of the unused flowers that we make bouquets for our office out of!

You, too, can experience “flower therapy” at Terressentials! Our exquisite USDA certified organic Flower Therapy line of facial care products, made with a complex of beautifying floral and herbal extracts, will nourish your skin. And the unique and colorful flower bouquets at our East Patrick Street store in Frederick will brighten your day and nourish your soul!

Rawmio, Oh Rawmio, Wherefore Art Thou Rawmio?

My new love, Rawmio Almond Chocolate Spread, a decadent handcrafted raw vegan treat that will satisfy your inner most desires with an orgasmic “OH my God! This is delicious!” Anyway, that's the way I felt! My husband was more than a little worried...and rightly so. My first meeting with Rawmio was at Terressentials when I passed by the shelf where they were so brightly displayed, and noticed that they were new, but didn't really have an interest in them, thinking that I'd not really like the combination of almond butter and chocolate. The next week I noticed an opened jar in the back office at the shop. Hmm....I really should give it a chance. So, I tried a spoonful. Mmm, not bad, pretty darn good in fact. I bought a jar of Chocolate Almond Crunch, made with stone-ground organic raw almonds, organic cacao nibs and coconut crystals blended into a smooth dark chocolate spread, innocently not knowing what was in store for me that evening from this smooth dark stranger. That evening, I decided to have a small cup of ice cream. Then I remembered the Rawmio, opened it, stirred it and drizzled a spoonful onto my cold ice cream and went in to watch a movie with my unsuspecting husband. I took a bite of my sweet treat. OH MY GOD! This is so delicious! The smooth liquid spread had formed a kind of hard shell around the cold ice cream. It was a combination of cold, crunchy, sweet, hard...so much going on at once! My husband had a questionable look on his face. One, because I was disrupting the movie and, two, what was really going on here? Who was this sensual stranger that was making me so excited? I tried to hide my excitement but already found myself anticipating our next meeting tomorrow night. Tomorrow night turned into tomorrow afternoon, and we even met one morning. I had a big problem, I admit it! It's a good thing my husband is very understanding and is helping me through this difficult time. He knows he is the love of my life and Rawmio will only be there until they are all sold out at Terressentials.

Experience the adventure of Rawmio at Terressentials! Available in three delicious flavors; Original, Silk, and Crunch. Rawmio Original stone-grinds organic raw almonds, organic cacao nibs, and coconut crystals for a wickedly delicious, smooth dark chocolate spread we know you will devour. Rawmio Silk is a twist on a white chocolate spread made with coconut and cacao butter to give it a 'milky' flavor. Rawmio Crunch is somewhere in the middle with a nice crunch. Imagine a perfectly sweetened milk chocolate spread with bits of almonds. Rawmio uses only the best organic and raw ingredients on the planet. And they proudly support small farms and villages both domestic and beyond. 

They also make delectable chocolate bark bars in many flavors!

 

Rawmio, oh Rawmio, wherefore art thou Rawmio? Rawmio is at Terressentials. Come and add a little excitement to your evening tonight with Rawmio. You won't be disappointed!

Horsin' Around with Hair Wash

Leo is hanging out at his stall here.

So, in Maryland, it has been a kind of rainy summer. This means, in the hills of Frederick County, there was a lot of mud. No, we don't put this mud into the Hair Wash bottles and sell it. But some of our furry friends like mud. Now, furry friends can come in many shapes and sizes. They can be puppies or kittens. But my furry friend is Leo, my horse. And what does Leo love to do with mud? Roll in it. So back around Memorial Day, I decided that Leo needed a bath in order to get all of that dusty build up of dandruff and dirt from the dried mud off of him and out of his coat and mane.

Now Leo is only six years old (for non-horse people, that means he's has the mentality of a ten-year-old) and even for a six-year-old horse he fidgets a lot and is bad at standing still. So on Memorial Day, I got to his stall in the barn, I brushed the newest batch of dried mud off of him, then put on his saddle and bridle. We rode for quite some time. Around and around the ring we went, over poles and through jump standards, with lots of circles and changes of direction in there to tire him out. When both he and I were getting sluggish and a little huffy and puffy, I thought “He should be tired by now. Hopefully he'll stand still as he gets his bath.” So back onto the ground I went, saddle and bridle came off, and I led him into the indoor washing area of the barn. 

 Right now Leo is looking around at what I'm doing with my camera.

Many people know about different horse, pony, and farm animal shampoos. These shampoos can be found at local farm feed stores, tack stores, and even some of the most popular brands can be found in common grocery stores (apparently some people really like how their hair feels when they use horse shampoo, and figure that if it was good enough for their horse it was good enough for them)! Some people also use shampoos and conditioners meant for humans on their horses. My friend regularly uses laundry detergent to wash her horse since it comes in bulk! Instead of going out to buy fancy horse shampoo or even conventional cheap human shampoo, I thought that I'd use some left over Terressentials Pure Earth HairWash instead.

Between July and September 2012 I made the transition away from conventional chemical hair care and completed my hair detox. Once I finished detox, I then started trying different types of Hair Wash to see which one worked best for me. Due to my “Which Hair Wash is best for my hair?” experimental stage of last summer, I had a good amount of eight ounce bottles of Sultry Spice and Lavender Garden Hair Washes left over (I can imagine all of those Lavender loving vloggers on YouTube freaking out right now that I dared to have left over Lavender Hair Wash). Even though we generally recommend using Fragrance-Free products on animals, I had the left over flavored Hair Wash, and Leo had yet to show signs of sensitive skin in any way (horses can have allergic reactions to many things which can cause rashes and hives), so I felt fairly confident that he would not break out in hives from the Hair Wash, especially if I made sure to rinse him really well. So I diluted the Hair Washes a little bit in a small bucket, then got to work with Leo.

Since Leo was being as inquisitive as ever, he wanted to sniff the bucket and my hands before they touched him, and he was really confused at the smell. It smelled kind of like food to him, but not really. And it wasn't solid like most food is. Why would his human be mixing a bucket of not-food-that-smells-like-food right next to him?

After he got a good sniff, I hosed Leo down with lukewarm water and started spreading the diluted mud on his body and massaged it into his coat and mane. Though he had been such a good boy standing still for being hosed, of course now is when he started to fidget. So the rest of the bath happened very quickly and there are no pictures to show for it (I would not want my camera near a thousand pound horse who is bad at standing still, with water being sprayed about). The hardest part of Leo's bath was cleaning the roots of his mane. There was a lot of dandruff there. He liked me cleaning his itchy mane so much that when I was rinsing out the Hair Wash, he decided to shake his head in joy about how nice it felt. So, between his fidgets and him shaking his head, I became as soaked as he did since he wouldn't hold still when I was trying to rinse him.

 

Here is Leo (on right with a net mask on his face to keep the bugs off his eyes) and his buddy Rebel (on left) hanging out.

Overall Leo got very clean from using the Hair Wash (since it's a cleansing bentonite clay as opposed to everyday mud you find in your yard). So I hurried him outside since he had been trying as hard as he could to stand still (he's like an energetic ten-year-old boy that weighs a thousand pounds, remember?), and let him eat some grass as he sundried. Once he was dry, I put him into the field with his buddy, Rebel. And do you know what the first thing he did was? He rolled in dirt. Well, he was happy, and the old dirt wasn't ingrained in his coat anymore. So that's something, right?

Summer Special Series: School Daze Summer Special!

This is it, folks! We can hardly believe we've reached the end of the August – and what a summer it has been! We've done our best to introduce you to many of our different USDA certified organic body care products, and a good number of you have taken us up on our offers for special prices and free products! To mark the end of the August and the beginning of September, we are presenting to you our School Daze Summer Special!

Instead of featuring Terressentials products this time, we thought we'd give you all something that is a little different. May we present to you Decomposition Books?

These cool notebooks come in lots of fun colors and patterns and are made in the USA with 100% post-consumer-waste recycled pages that are manufactured in a mill powered by methane captured from a local landfill. You may be thinking “That's all well and good, but what about the ink? Lots of inks are harmful to the environment when they are being manufactured and used.” No need to worry – the notebooks are printed with soy ink, which contains fewer VOCs (volatile organic compounds) than conventional petroleum-based ink and which also makes it easier to recycle. Are you in love with the Decomposition Books yet? If you aren't, you should be!

So, would you like one? We are willing to give one to you for free if you make a qualifying order of a particular product dollar value (see below). In order to qualify to receive the free Decomposition Book, you must also write a note in your Terressentials Shopping Cart's comments box saying where you heard about this super special. So, simply type “Facebook!” or “Email!” or “Twitter!” or “Newsletter!” in the comments box on your Terressentials web site order page! We will really appreciate this feedback, and typing one of the words above will get you a free Decomposition Book.

To receive a free pocket-sized (4 inch by 6 inch) Decomposition Book, you must make an order of more than $60 product value. This smaller size Decomposition Book is great for stashing in a purse, briefcase, pocket, or car to jot down notes! Some doodles and Tic-Tac-Toe games would also be appropriate!

To receive a full-sized (7.5 inch by 9.75 inch) Decomposition Book, you must make an order of more than $100 product value. This larger notebook will be a great companion for those heading back to school, anyone needing a diary or journal, or for special projects. Decomposition Books stand out from the conventional crowd because they are not only useful, but also fun and environmentally friendly, and made in the USA!

Our School Daze Summer Special is applicable to online orders placed between 12:01 am East Coast U.S. time on Saturday, August 24, 2013 and 11:59 pm East Coast U.S. time on Friday, September 6, 2013.

Our School Daze Summer Special is also applicable to in-store purchases at both the Middletown and Patrick Street Terressentials locations during store hours starting on Saturday, August 24th, and ending on Friday, September 6th. But remember...you must mention the School Daze Summer Special and tell us where you read about our special when you're ready to check out in order to receive a free Decomposition Book.

Ways to make sure you will qualify for the special:*

1) You must write a note in your Shopping Cart's comments box saying where you heard about the special. So simply say “Facebook!” or “Email!” or “Twitter!” or “Newsletter!”

2) Your entire billing name, shipping name, and cardholder's name will be included in your order.

3) Your credit card will not be declined when we try to process your order.

4) You will remember to enter the entirety of your correct shipping address including your apartment number when you place your order.

5) Your order is complete when you place it online (i.e. you will make no changes, additions, or subtractions to your order).

Something to note: When you place your order and get the email confirmation, the free Decomposition Book will not be on the product list. It will be manually added and your receipt will be manually changed when you place the order.

* Qualification is at the discretion of the Terressentials Team.

Combine the School Daze Summer Special

and

Free Shipping Special!

Triple check that your order qualifies for the free shipping special by reading the qualifications at this link.

Summer Special Series: FREE Flower Therapy Body Lotion!

Thanks Bentom Wyemji!

A few decades ago the term "Flower Power" was coined. While those words have lots of connotations, the Terressentials USDA certified organic Flower Therapy Facial Care line truly embodies the true meaning of term.

We combine research into both the traditional Chinese floral beautifying preparations and herbs native to America to creative the most exquisite and healthy, truly natural products that will cleanse and nourish your face, throat, and décolletage. The extracts of herbs and flowers are carefully combined with pure essential oils to help reduce wrinkles and moisturize your face, as well as calm puffy skin. One of the best facts about our Flower Therapy line is that it is not only wonderful for your body, but it also smells heavenly!

We feel that more than just your face should be treated with these exquisite floral combinations, though. So we are offering you a free 2 oz bottle of our USDA certified organic Flower Therapy Body Lotion when you place a qualifying order!

Applicable to online orders placed between 12:01 am East Coast U.S. time on Saturday, August 10, 2013 and 11:59 pm East Coast U.S. time on Friday, August 23, 2013.

Applicable to in-store purchases at both the Middletown and Patrick Street Terressentials locations during store hours starting on Saturday, August 10th, and ending on Friday, August 23rd. 

In order to qualify you must order all of the following specific products as described below:

One 4 oz bottle of Flower Therapy Facial Cleanser

One 4 oz bottle of Flower Therapy Facial Toner

One 1.7 oz bottle of Flower Therapy Facial Lotion 

See our Flower Therapy Facial Care page for more information on all of these genuine USDA certified organic products!

If you order these three items in one single order together, you will receive a FREE 2 oz bottle of Flower Therapy Body Lotion!

Ways to make sure you will qualify for the special:*

1) Your entire billing name, shipping name, and cardholder's name will be included in your order.

2) Your credit card will not be declined when we try to process your order.

3) You will remember to enter the entirety of your correct shipping address including your apartment number when you place your order.

4) Your order is complete when you place it online (i.e. you will make no changes, additions, or subtractions to your order).

Something to note: When you place your order and get the email confirmation, the free 2 oz bottle of Flower Therapy Body Lotion will not be on the product list. It will be manually added and your receipt will be manually changed when you place the order.

* Qualification is at the discretion of the Terressentials Team. 

Combine the FREE Flower Therapy Body Lotion Special

and

Free Shipping Special!

Triple check that your order qualifies for the free shipping special by reading the qualifications at this link.