Essential Oils are used for fragrancing and flavouring many items in the supermarkets and in our homes. They are used to fragrance cleaning products, food and personal hygiene products. Why not take control and use the wondeful scents and flavours of the Essential Oils you choose yourself in your kitchen.

Baking

• Next time you bake a chocolate cake, use one drop of peppermint oil in your favourite icing recipe to top the cake for a peppermint chocolate treat.
• Use a drop or 2 of orange essential oil in the full icing recipe for a plain cake or even an orange poppy seed cake for some extra flavour.

Desserts

• Add one drop of Ginger CO2 Essential Oil to a cup of cream, and simply dip your favourite berries into it or use it to top a dessert such as pavlova or trifle. I just love ginger!!
• Ginger CO2 refers to the essential oil of ginger that has been extracted by supercritical carbon dioxide, this method gives the ginger a bit more bite and spice than the traditional steam distillation.

One drop does go a long way, and is enough to flavour icings and creams without overpowering the recipe. It can be harmful to ingest large quantities of essential oils in a day and so again, 1 or 2 drops are enough for an entire recipe. Please also ensure you are using pure essential oils and not fragrant oils

Cleaning the Range Hood

Eucalyptus is the oil to have on hand for removing chewing gum from sticky labels from glass jars, and for cleaning the range hood. Liberal amounts of eucalyptus on paper towel will leave your range hood grease free and smelling lovely

Aromatherapist Maria Mitchell

Maria Mitchell is a qualified Aromatherapist and Herbalist whose passion has led her into teaching, and writing about the healing power of Aromatherapy and Energy Healing. You can learn more about Maria here