Jelly Belly Balm

During a conference, I visited an exhibitor's booth that was handing out Jelly Belly candies in small kidney shaped tins.  The candies were stale and very hard to chew so they had plenty to distribute to attendees.  I picked up three of the tins and wish I had gotten more.  The tins are so cute and they close very tightly so they're great for holding small items.

After watching an episode of "Simply Beautiful", a cable program than "explores the world of natural beauty and fashion", I decided to use one of my kidney bean shaped tins to hold an all natural, home made lip and cheek balm.  On the show, the hostess uses three simple ingredients to make a product that adds color and moisture without chemical additives (click here for her recipe Beet Red Kiss).

With insightful advice from a friend's daughter, I was able to make a vegan version of the lip balm by replacing the recommended beeswax with edible shea butter.  She also noted soy wax could be considered as an alternative to beeswax. 

Here are the ingredients

• Two capsules of beet root (look for this in the vitamin and supplement section)
• One tablespoon of shea butter
• One half teaspoon of cocoa butter

Begin by melting the shea butter and the cocoa butter in a double boiler or very carefully in the microwave (when it melts, the oils become very hot and can splatter).  Break open the beet root capsules and sprinkle over the oils.  Stir to combine then pour slowly into a vessel.

Meant to note the need to thoroughly clean whatever container you are reusing to hold your balm.  I washed my tin with soap and warm water then dried thoroughly.

Leave the container until the butters have cooled and become solid.  I added four capsules of beet root to get a deeper color.  This created a grainy effect because all of the powder did not dissolve.