Blog Posts by EcoSalon

Screen shot 2012-03-30 at 12.02.29 PM
By Katherine Butler
Put away your bold blues, greens, and purples of yesteryear (or, last year). This spring, the hottest nail colors are light, pretty neutrals and soft pastels at home in your flower garden. But not to worry - bold metallics and funky patterns are circling the edges of the country club, ready to sharpen out the edges of the season. Here are seven of the sassiest shades of the future, refashioned without many of the harmful chemicals of the past.

priti coronation

Blooming Buds

Natural neutrals are now gracing our fingertips, as pretty and delicate as the buds blooming outside our windows. And what better to crown the pretty princess of color than this sheer shade (Coronation $12.50) from Priti NYC. This non-toxic polish is made without the chemicals commonly found in nail polishes, including toluene, dibutyl phthalate (DHB) and formaldehyde. Ready to replace your old nail polish? Priti NYC also offers a recycling program for your used bottles.



Back To Your Roots

Want to take

By Jessica Marati
Each year, the healthiest and happiest cities in America are named by public agencies, private consultancies, magazines, blogs and now even Foursquare. These lists consider key indicators like fitness, diet and emotional well-being, as well as more concrete factors like number of farmer's markets and ratio of sunny days. In honor of National Nutrition Month, here's a rundown of the best of the best.

San Francisco, California (Top Image) Early adventurers seeking the Fountain of Youth should have stuck flowers in their hair and headed for San Francisco, which was recently named the best city for staying young by the RealAge 2012 Youngest and Oldest Cities report. Certainly San Francisco's top billing on Prevention Magazine's list of America's best walking cities helps. Add a strong emphasis on local and organic food and a low incidence of smoking, and you have the best anti-aging recipe in the country.



Honolulu, Hawaii Honolulu residents are among the country's

By Jessica Marati

Mobile apps are handy for a lot of things: navigating a city, staying on a budget, finding home design inspiration, taking pornographic photos of food. But what about helping you live healthier? These seven healthy eating apps are up to the task. And don't worry: at EcoSalon, we enjoy our food, so no dieting apps allowed.

Foodtree With the tagline "Know More, Eat Better," Foodtree aims to educate consumers about where their food comes from, as well as highlight restaurants and markets with responsible sourcing practices. The app also has a collaborative element: anyone can upload photos and tag them with location and sourcing information.
App available for the iPhone for free.

Locavore Find out what fruits and veggies are in season with the Locavore app, which then directs you to nearby farms and farmers' markets where you can purchase locally-grown produce. On top of that, you can browse recipes incorporating said fruits and veggies for a true farm to table

By Vanessa Barrington

One can barely walk down the street these days without tripping over a DIY sauerkrauter, cheesemaker, home brewer, or pickler. Fermented foods are all the rage, but they're cool for more reasons than fashion. Fermentation is good for the gut, and increases the digestibility of foods; it's a reliable preservation technique; and research shows that it increases the nutrient content in certain foods. The best reason to eat fermented foods though is flavor. The process of fermenting adds layers upon layers of complexity to foods. As an illustration, think about the difference in flavor between milk and cheese, or cabbage and sauerkraut, or grape juice and wine.

Coffee Coffee beans are surrounded by a stubbornly sticky pulp. After picking, they are crushed to loosen the pulp, then fermented. The length and technique of the fermentation process, along with roasting, determines the final flavor of the coffee.

Chocolate is a crucial step in chocolate production,

By Stephanie Rogers

It's three in the afternoon, your energy is flagging and all you want to do is take a nap, but instead you have to sit through a boring meeting. While you could just have a second - or seventh - cup of coffee, you could also have some pumpkin seeds, an apple, a few red bell pepper slices with hummus or a piece of dark chocolate. These 20 foods can help relieve fatigue, sharpen your focus and give you the jolt of energy that you need to avoid falling asleep at your desk.

Leafy Greens Spinach, kale, arugula and chard. Virtually every variety of leafy greens is flavorful, packed with vitamins and minerals, and a low-calorie addition to your meals. Not only do they contain vitamins C and A, which are important for energy levels, they also contain depression-fighting folate.

Nuts Nuts like almonds, walnuts, pecans and cashews contain protein for endurance and coenzyme Q10, a nutrient that helps produce energy inside our cells. This combination makes them an ideal fuel

By Stephanie Rogers

Sadly, there are no magic foods that will simply melt away belly fat when you eat them. Trimming your waistline has more to do with what you don't eat: you've got to cut out refined carbs and sugar, including alcohol, which tends to encourage fat storage in the abdomen. Of course, a few crunches wouldn't hurt, either. But these 20 foods have properties that can aid in the battle of the muffin top, like helping to regulate blood sugar and discouraging fat from accumulating in the first place.

Avocado The biggest key to eliminating belly fat is to avoid unhealthy saturated and trans fats and go for monounsaturated fats instead. Just half of an avocado contains 10 grams of monounsaturated fat, which helps control blood sugar spikes that can direct fat storage to the abdomen.

Whole Grains Whole grains rich in insoluble fiber help you feel full longer, so you won't give in to unhealthy temptations. They also help stabilize your blood sugar. Replace refined carbs like

dryer-sheets

By Sofie Sausser

You've probably heard the tip about putting dryer sheets in your vacuum or bottom of the trash can to keep things smelling fresh. You haven't? Well, it's true. And here are ten additional ways of fluffing up your abode with downy freshness (we always suggest using non-toxic dryer sheets!)

1. Dusting Use dryer sheets to dust blinds, fans or almost any surface. The anti static properties in the sheets will help repel the dust. They are easy to hold and you can dust your laundry room after folding the clothes. Don't forget to dust the TV and reduce static on the screen.

2. Reduce Static Cling Rub on your dress or stockings to keep your dress from riding up. You can also use them on your computer and TV screen. Even rub on your hair to prevent ecstatic flyaways.

3. Pets Rub a sheet on your wet dog to take away the "wet rug" smell after a swim or bath. Towel him or her dry first. You can remove pet hair from your clothes and furniture with them as well.

4. Freshen Gym

Green tea
By Stephanie Rogers.

When trying to lose weight, we tend to fixate on the foods we aren't supposed to eat. We salivate over cheesecake at the coffee shop, eyeball our partners' pizza and dream about cheese, glorious cheese. Instead, shift the focus to the delicious and healthy foods that actually speed up metabolism, aiding in weight loss and preventing the storage of more fat. You might just get so hooked on green tea, yogurt, avocado and hot peppers that you find yourself cheating on your former favorites, not on your diet.

Green tea

If you want to get your metabolism revving, choose green tea over black tea or coffee. Studies have found that green tea is not only packed with flavonoids and antioxidants, it also has thermogenic properties, promoting fat oxidation. That means it helps burn the calories from the food you're eating while you're eating and digesting it.

Apples

That oft-repeated adage about apples and doctors is backed by solid science. Apples are a low-calorie,