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Skin-Food: Folate in your food & your skincare

Mar Galliti skin care & botanicals

Let's dive into a wonderful new skin-food topic, the folate. Folate is the naturally occuring form of Vitamin B9. The name 'folate' is derived from the Latin word "folium", which means leaf. And leafy vegetables amongst the best source of folate. Below I will talk about two non-leafy natural sources and that just shows how whole foods are a complex form of lots of different nutrients.

The skin has a high demand for folate because of it constant renewal and growth. And folate plays an important role in the metabolizm of healthy skin and in the regeneration of irritated or injured skin. But just like in the case of the carotenoids in my previous skin-food post, we, humans, can not synthetize folate, so it need to be optained from dietary sources.

Skin-Food: Folate in your food & your skincare

Folate in skincare:

To make certain nutrient available for the skin its not enought to add these nutrient to the skincare formula and apply the product on the skin. In the case of folate, it is hydrophilic (attracted to water) while the skin is very lipophilic (attracted to oils). At the same time they can degrade easily after activation.

But all the abowe was taken into consideration with the Ambrosia Honey Mask (& the Limited Editon Ambrosia Honey Mask). In these masks the main ingredient is raw, local lavender honey and folate is one of the most abundant vitamin in honey. To the superpower of the honey I added carefully chosen plant oils, like the organic, extra virgin olive oil, rose hip seed oil, gotu cola macerated in sweet almond oil, and echium oil, they are all helping with their oil loving nature to make other ingredeints be more available to the skin. Also, the Ambosia Honey Mask (and all Mar Galliti masks) is activated by mixing it with water or hydrosol just before application. In this way benefical vitmains, minerals, enzymes, and flavonoids are immediately available for the skin and without degradation.


To celebrate this new skin-food topic I am giving you 24% discount on the Ambosia Honey Mask and the Limited Editon Ambrosia Honey Mask with the code: SKINFOOD2 until 28th February 2025 midnight.

Skin-Food: Ambrosia Honey Mask

Folate in the kitchen:

With these skin-food recipes I want to be as seasonal as possible as well as show you that there are pleanty of different natural sources for the same vitamin, nutrient. So for this still cold, slow winter I chose a rich dessert recipe: my favourite beetroot brownies with an optional white chocolate-beetroot glaze. I love the sweet earthiness of these brownies as it feels very grounding during winter.

Of course, just like other whole foods, beetroot contains many different nutrients including folate, but also, iron, vitamin C, manganese, & potassium.


All photos: Szendeff Lőrinc


Beetroot Brownies with White Chocolate-Beetroot Glaze:

For the Brownies:

500g whole raw beetroot (about 3-4 medium beets)

100g unsalted butter

200g 70% dark chocolate

1 tsp vanilla extract

125g coconut or brown sugar (if you feel it is not sweet enough, you can go up to 250g of sugar, but for me the 125g is the perfect amount)

3 eggs

100g all purpose flour

25g cocoa powder


For the White Chocolate-Beetroot Glaze (optional):

100g white chocolate

2-3 Tbsp beet juice


Top, tail and peel the beetroots, you will need about 400g flesh after peeling. Roughly chop and put into a pan with plenty of water to cover it and cook until tender. (You could also steam it.)

Heat the oven to 180 Celsius. While the beetroot cooks, butter a 20x20 cm baking tray. Roughly chop the chocolate and cut the butter into cubes. Tip the cooked, hot beetroot into a sieve, drain off any excess liquid, then put into a food processor with the chocolate, butter and vanilla. Whizz until the mix is as smooth as you can get it. The chocolate and butter will melt as you do it.

Put the sugar and eggs into a large bowl, then beat using an electric hand whisk until thick, pale and foamy. Spoon the beetroort mixture into the bowl, then use a large spoon to fold it into the whisked eggs. Try to conserve as much air in the mixture as possible. Sift in the flour and cocoa powder, then gently fold these in to make a smooth batter.

Pour into the prepared baking tray and bake for about 25 minutes. Cool completely in the tray, then cut into squares.

For the optional glaze, in a small sauce pan on medium-low heat melt the chopped white chocolate with the beet juice whisking frequently until the mixture is smooth in consistency. Allow to cool and then drizzle over the brownies and serve.

Bon appetit!



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