Why Does Fermentation Make Only Some Foods Healthier?

Fermentation is a health trend that seems to be here to stay. Kombucha, homemade kimchi and sauerkraut, yogurt and kefir, fermented pickles, and more are experiencing a major revival, and the scientific community is doing lots of research on the impact of fermented foods on the human body.

The results are promising, but there’s still a lot we don’t understand about the tradeoffs of eating fermented foods versus raw, steamed, or roasted vegetables. What we do know is that fermentation dramatically changes the chemical composition of foods — often for the better, but not always.

Because fermentation is so popular right now, many people have some questions when we say that fermented noni (usually found in the form of noni juice) is far less potent than products made from raw unfermented noni pulp. Not all fermented foods are created equal, however, and not all foods react to fermentation in the same way.

We wanted to answer some questions, explain why we never ferment noni fruit, and hopefully convince you of the power of raw noni, just as nature intended us to use it.

What is Fermentation?

If you are committed to finding natural ways to improve your health, you likely have at least a general sense of how fermentation works. To sum it up, fermentation is a natural decomposition process in which microbes convert carbohydrates into alcohol and/or acids.

In nature, fermentation is part of how fruits and vegetables are broken down so their nutrients can be returned to the earth. Wild bacteria and yeasts quickly begin their work once a fruit is damaged in any way (dropping to the ground, skin broken by an insect, or just by being picked).

Some fruits and vegetables are more prone to fermentation that others. Noni fruit begins to ferment within hours of ripening, just 3-4 days after being picked!

In nature, the fermentation process continues until the fruit or vegetable is completely broken down, with the help of molds, yeasts, and a whole host of bacteria. But many animals, including humans, tend to enjoy their fruits or vegetables partially broken down, and intervene in the process.

Animals Love Fermentation

Certain species of primates, birds, and rodents love alcohol, and will deliberately seek out fully or partially-fermented fruits! Lots of species have co-evolved alongside plants that produce a consistent source of alcohol. For many, there are positives and negative aspects of alcohol consumption — as there are for humans.

Humans figured out how to brew beer at least 5000-7000 years ago, around the same time when we learned how to make leavened bread. Indeed, beer might have even come first! Fermentation soon became one of the main ways humans “cook” food.

Most traditional cultures have at least one fermented food that is a staple of the cultural diet — often completely repugnant to outsiders, as in the case of kæstan hákarl (fermented, dried shark meat). More familiar foods include sauerkraut or kimchi (fermented cabbage from Germanic and Korean cultures, respectively), tempeh (fermented soybean curd), kefir (fermented milk).

These foods have their place in a healthy, balanced diet, and are linked to some significant health benefits.

Benefits of Fermented Foods

Countless nutritionists, foodies, and biologists have delved into the possible benefits of including more fermented foods in your diet. Click here for a great article that is pretty comprehensive.

The most commonly-cited benefit is the possibility for the live and active bacterial cultures found in traditionally-fermented foods to take up residence in your digestive tract. There are billions of bacteria in your digestive tract, most of which are necessary for complete digestion and good health.

But in today’s post-Pasteurian world (where most products are now pasteurized for safety), many Americans in particular are suffering from a shortage of these beneficial bacteria, resulting in lots of problems for our guts! Nature loves to fill a vacuum, so this often leads to bad bacteria taking up residence instead.

Many experts believe that including more traditionally-fermented foods (NOT pasteurized versions of them!) could help those good bacteria regain the high ground. The results could be more complete digestion of nutrients, reduced inflammation, and improved quality of life.

Learn the History and the Benefits of Fermented Foods in the original article.

Why Fermented Noni is 14x Less Potent

A great example of this kind of watered-down traditional food is noni juice. As I mentioned above,noni fruit starts to ferment within hours of ripening. This makes it problematic for people who want to sell noni in places where it doesn’t grow naturally.

Most companies solve this problem by actually accelerating the fermentation process, in order to create a stable product which can then be pasteurized, packaged, and shipped around the world. This is how noni juice is made. But fermenting noni fruit is a fairly recent invention, one which strips away most of the beneficial compounds that made it so valuable to traditional Polynesians.

Traditionally, noni was eaten raw, like a ripe plum or tomato, and that’s the tradition we adhere to here at Hawaiian Organic Noni. We spent years developing our slow dehydration process that preserves all the beneficial vitamins, minerals, and enzymes found in the raw noni pulp, in the form of a raw Noni Fruit Leather that is safe and shelf-stable without the need for pasteurization.

Why are we so committed to raw noni pulp? First, because that’s what’s supported by thousands of years of traditional use! Secondly, it’s scientifically proven that our solution is more potent.

We sent samples of our Noni Fruit Leather and a leading brand of noni juice to an independent lab, where they verified that our Noni Fruit Leather is 14x more potent. We believe this is due to the following problems with the process of making noni juice:

• Fermentation: Creates alcohol which destroys 50% of the beneficial compounds and enzymes
• Pasteurization: Heat destroys enzymes, antioxidants, and other beneficial micronutrients
• Dilution: Fermented noni tastes unpleasant, so it’s usually masked with fruit juice or sugar

You can learn more about the problems with noni juice by clicking here, and read about reasons to switch to raw noni here!

Fermentation is complex, and we don’t fully understand how fermented foods work in the body yet. For now, a good rule of thumb is to enjoy fermented foods that have been eaten by traditional societies for thousands of years: sauerkraut, kefir, kimchi, tempeh, etc. But remember that pasteurized versions by no means have the same benefits.

For foods that have always traditionally been eaten raw, like noni, stick with a raw food version such as Hawaiian Organic Noni Fruit Leather!

How to Gear Up Your Beginner’s Organic Garden this Spring

There’s a warmth in the air that’s starting to feel like spring, which means it’s time to start dreaming of seeds, starters, and soil! Whether you’ve gardened before but you want to incorporate some organic techniques into your garden, or if you’re a new gardener who wants to start off right, these tips will help you dream big and follow through!

My wife and I moved to Kauai in 1982, from our organic farm in California. We’ve been organic farmers for over 40 years, and we’ve tried lots of different techniques for keeping our soil, plants, and the land as a whole healthy and productive. We’re happy to share what we’ve learned with you!

Plan Your Beds

Whether you’re digging up your whole backyard to create an epic garden or just starting out with a few pots on your back porch, planning is crucial. You’ll need to consider:

• What kinds of plants you’d like to grow (vegetables, fruits, herbs, flowers, groundcover, etc.) and how well those plants can grow in your USDA Plant Hardiness Zone — also consider organic & heirloom seeds over conventional
• Total yield you want for each plant (this website can help you roughly estimate)
• Timing for starting plants so they can grow in their preferred conditions (will depend on your Zone)
• Whether you’d like to start from seeds or buy starter plants that already have a bit more of a foothold
• Ability to diversify & interplant (plant multiple crops per bed without overcrowding — learn more here)
• Planting in succession (planting another crop over the same place as another that is done for the season)
• Ability and desire to extend your growing season by growing indoors, protecting plants with a greenhouse or other kind of cover, etc.

This is a great time to browse seed catalogues (online and print), stop by a local nursery to get an expert’s insight, or talk to friends who garden to see if you can share seeds or starters!

Learn about Soil Fertility in the original article.

Level 1: Mulching

The easiest way to enrich soil fertility is to imitate the natural process of leaves, wood, and other plant matter building up on the ground, where it covers the soil and essentially composts in place. This process is called mulching, and you can start today by sprinkling some yard waste around the bases of your plants. It will balance out your soil temperature, provide habitat for beneficial microbes & animals, keep in moisture, and, of course, return nutrients to the earth.

Level 2: Compost

It’s time to stop being intimidated by composting! Start by building or buying a bin and adding food scraps, yard waste, newsprint, woodchips, and so on. Then let the bacteria do what they do best — break it down!

There are tons of resources online to help you with the specific logistics of what you should add to your compost, how much to add, how often to turn your compost, and how long to let it cook. On our farm, we’ve found it’s best to turn and water our compost every other day so those bacteria have lots of air and water to do their work.

Level 3: Vermicomposting

Ready for the next level of soil fertility? Time to bring in some living things: worms! Don’t worry though — worms are super low-maintenance. They really only need darkness, dampness, and readily-available dinner in order to be happy.

We love using worms because they’re a natural part of the cycle of decomposition in nature, and organic agriculture is all about finding ways to imitate nature to achieve the results we want. You can read more about that philosophy in this blog post.

Believe it or not, you can buy everything you need to get started online — even worms! But it’s often a better idea to look for local worms at a farmers market — they tend to be better suited to the unique challenges of your area.

Level 4: No Till

Many conventional farmers prepare their beds each season by tilling them, which means digging up the soil and turning it over so it’s easier to work with.

Unfortunately, this can do major damage to your soil in the long run:

• Dries out the soil & releases stored carbon and oxygen
• Gives buried weed seeds a chance to germinate
• Damages microorganisms, worms, & other living things in the soil

We practice a no-till system on our farm. This sometimes means more work, but tilling the soil is a shortcut that farmers use to cope with dry, hard, infertile soil. If your soil has been well cared for, you shouldn’t ever need to till it.

You can learn more about all these soil fertility techniques, and many others, by clicking here.

Watering

In order to preserve water and avoid watering weeds, you might want to consider delivering water directly to your plants by installing a drip system to water them.

These are much more efficient than sprinklers, which allow a lot of water to simply evaporate or be wasted on weeds. Another way to save water is to try mulching, as explained above. Mulching prevents water from evaporating off the soil, which can often reduce the amount you need to water.

Pest Management

Finally, you’ll need to consider how you’ll protect your plants against pests, including weeds, microbes, mammals, and birds that want to either smother, damage, or eat your crops! Many organic farmers use an approach called Integrated Pest Management to prevent and suppress pets rather than eradicate them, using more natural methods.

We consider this to be much more in line with how nature deals with pests: using competition, deterrents, predators, and other techniques to keep populations in balance. Fully explaining the scope of Integrated Pest Management is beyond this post, but you can look for more information coming up in April, when we cover our organic farming practices in some more detail! You can find lots of information online in the meantime!

We hope these techniques have been helpful to you, and we wish you the best of luck in growing your own organic garden!

Let us know about your plans for organic gardening this season! Share your ideas in the comments.

4 Ways to Get a Healthier Gut

Are you struggling with weight loss? Allergies? Upset stomach or digestive issues? You may feel like these symptoms are unrelated or just “part of life,” but that’s your first mistake.

Your second mistake is not paying enough attention to the health of your gut, often the main cause of those annoying daily symptoms.

The Western diet, particularly the high doses of fat and sugar it piles on our plates, has a number of major detrimental effects on the digestive system, specifically your gut and your gut’s bacteria.

You may think it’s gross to talk about your gut, (especially the bacteria in your gut!) but this is a serious subject that Westerners in particular need to discuss more openly. The fact is, you need bacteria in your body, at least 100 trillion in fact, and we’ll show you why.

We’ll also provide you with 4 ways to keep your gut healthy, so you can be proactive against the annoying symptoms of an unhealthy gut!

Why Your Gut Matters

Microbiota, probiotics, prebiotics, lactobacillus...these unfamiliar words can sound like they’re being spouted by a mad scientist. In reality, these are all just fancy names for the good-guy bacteria in your body and the foods that support them. They provide key benefits to improve your quality of your life.

Benefits of Having Enough “Good Bacteria”

• Easier extraction of key nutrients from your food
• Synthesization of vitamins you otherwise could not make
• Help in digestion of proteins
• Reduction of inflammation
• Build-up of a stronger immune system against bad bacteria
• Reduced emotional stress

You need lots of the right kinds of bacteria to get these good benefits. Many researchers believe the good bacteria work by outcompeting bad bacteria in the body which cause problems. The symptoms of deficiency can range from daily annoyance to dangerous health complications:

Effects of Bacteria Deficiency

• Allergies
• Diarrhea
• Inflammation
• Stomach pains and cramps
• Gastrointestinal pains
• Increased risk for parasitic infections
• Struggles with obesity
• Possible insulin resistance
• Irritable Bowel Syndrome
• Increased risk of heart disease

Research suggests that taking care of bacterial strains in your body is a lot harder than, say, taking a Vitamin C supplement. Improving the health of your gut requires committed maintenance, but doing so guarantees a richer life with richer bacteria over time. 

Here are some ideas to help get your gut health back on track!

4 Ways to Maintain Your Gut

High Fiber Fruits and Vegetables.

The easiest way to help the bacteria in your gut is by enjoying a more plant-based diet. Fruits and veggies high in fiber give the bacteria in your digestive tract the tools they need to extract nutrients from the food and build stronger communities, which means a stronger immune system!

It’s especially important to eat your fruits and veggies raw. Learn why this is by clicking here!

Examples of fruits high in fiber include bananas, raspberries, and exotic fruits like guava and noni fruit. Vegetables to increase in your diet include dark leafy greens, carrots, beets, broccoli, and artichokes.

Learn about how Fermented Foods help your gut health here.

Stress Relieving Exercise

Taking care of your gut’s bacteria is not only restricted to your diet. You also need to move your body to keep your gut healthy and allow the bacteria to distribute their benefits to your body!

We aren’t saying you have to join a hard-core pilates class and start running marathons. At-home yoga, a daily walk around the block, and even house cleaning each day can do wonders! If you are looking for a little more exercise, try going for a jog or joining a dance class with friends.

Raw, Organic Noni Fruit Leather

If you’re looking for a simple, daily raw food to add to your diet, which will make a big difference to the health of your gut, try either our Noni Fruit Leather or our Noni Banana Fruit Leather.

Both of these fruit leathers heal your body from the inside out by putting over 165 beneficial compounds to work battling inflammation, nourishing your cells, and yes, improving the health of your digestive tract!

How Noni Helps Your Gut

• Helps reduce chronic & acute pain
• Boosts and regulates immune response
• Anti-parasitic, fights “bad” gut bacteria (including E. coli and Salmonella)
• Reduces inflammation associated with allergies & disease
• Beneficial enzymes support digestion
• Balances blood sugar levels
• Antioxidant defense against free radicals
• High levels of soluble and insoluble fiber
• Natural energy booster encourages you to exercise

If you can commit to these four gut maintenance tips, your whole body will feel better in no time!

How has Noni Fruit Leather improved your quality of life — especially with regards to your digestive system? Let us know in the comments!

How (and Why) Did Noni Make it to Hawaii?

Did you know that many of the plants and animals associated with Hawaii aren’t actually native to the islands at all?

In recent history, the species of plants and animals introduced by white settlers and tourism have brought big changes to the islands’ ecosystems. Some of these changes were positive, but most had a “complicated” impact, if not outright harmful.

In addition, many hundreds of years before that, Hawaii’s first settlers brought a wide variety of species with them from their homes on other islands. These Polynesian settlers travelled the oceans well before humans had discovered a way to accurately track longitude, much less plot a course with GPS!

Today, the Hokulea Polynesian Voyaging Society has set out to prove the effectiveness of these extremely sophisticated navigation techniques. They travel the world in voyaging canoes similar to the ones Polynesian settlers would have used as they set sail in search of their new homes.

This legacy is important to us, as you can read about in this blog post, because the technology of the canoes and the wayfinding arts used to navigate them are directly responsible for the presence of abundant noni trees in the valley on Kauai where our farm is located.

As human beings, we’re still sorting out the ethics of the impact we inevitably have on the natural world. Looking back on those Polynesian settlers and forward at the mission of the Hokulea Voyaging Society makes me hopeful that we can learn how to shape nature to meet our needs without destroying it.

How Noni Trees Spread to Hawaii

Because of their isolated nature, islands tend to develop interesting pockets of unique and native species, while also remaining bare of other species that are common on the mainland. It’s largely up to chance whether birds, wind, or the sea conspire to bring new species to an island. But humans are one of the few species to deliberately colonize the natural world with plants they need for survival.

Many of the Hawaiian Islands’ non-native species arrived along with ancient Polynesian settlers. These settlers set out in canoes for new islands, where they weren’t certain of being able to find culturally and medicinally important plants growing indigenously. So they developed a practice of taking these vital species with them in their canoes.

For that reason, these species become known as canoe plants. They are a rich part of Polynesian and Hawaiian history to this day, and for good reason. Most of the species brought along are extremely useful crops, whether for building structures, providing calories, or preserving good health.

You can read more about canoe plants and their legacy by clicking here, but here are a few essentials:

• Coconut
• Taro
• Breadfruit
• Sugarcane
• Banana
• Bamboo
• Sweet potato
• Noni

Each of the canoe plants was given tremendous significance in Polynesian culture, with certain ways they ought to be used for maximum benefit.

Modern Lessons from Traditional Cultural Practices

The Hokulea Voyaging Society’s mission is to spread the idea that “our natural world is a gift with limits and that we must carefully steward this gift if we are to survive together.” One of the ways they do this is by spreading awareness all around the world about Polynesian culture, and the natural ethic of sustainability that comes along with living on an island.

One of the interesting things about studying traditional cultures is the way good, practical advice gets tied up with laws and spirituality. In Polynesian culture, for example, knowledge was passed down orally askapu, rules for how life ought to be lived to promote maximum health and harmony.

These rules were passed on because they were proven by the test of time and the experimentation of many generations. It only made sense to pass down innovations if they made a measurable impact in quality of life.

It’s amazing how often modern science examines traditional cultural practices, only to find an extremely practical, scientific reason why they’re so effective. Maybe we need to get better at trusting the evidence of what generations upon generations of our ancestors have “proven” to be beneficial.

After all, if these plants were important enough to bring across the ocean in a canoe, might they fill a unique niche in our modern lives too?

Find out why traditional foods and medicines work in our original article!

The Significance of Noni

Noni is somewhat unusual among the canoe plants, as it is neither a great source of calories, nor is it great for building structures. It’s a fruit with an arresting smell and flavor that certainly couldn’t be described as sweet.

So why did so many Polynesian voyaging canoes sail the Pacific laden down with noni tree saplings and seeds? Because the settlers knew they needed noni to prevent illness, treat injuries, and prolong life. There was no substitute, and I maintain that there still is no substitute to this day.

If you’d like to learn more about how noni was discovered and used by Polynesians, check out this blog post.

Noni is a key ingredient of a healthy, energetic, pain-free life. Today, many of noni’s 165+ beneficial compounds are being studied for their application in modern medicine, but none of the extracts have been as effective as pure, raw noni pulp, whether eaten fresh from the tree or dehydrated as Noni Fruit Leather.

Noni is a great example of a plant that was introduced by humans, which has a beneficial overall impact on Hawaiian life, for both humans and the natural world. But only if it’s cultivated and grown responsibly. We take great care with our organic farming practices to ensure that our use of the noni growing abundantly in our valley and orchards is a net gain for the ecosystem, rather than a loss.

Polynesian settlers recognized something very important about the work of being human beings, which I think most of us today could stand to be reminded of. Humans will inevitably change and alter their habitats to suit their needs. But we can do it respectfully, or we can do it destructively.

Join us in our work to unite human beings more closely with the natural world, by shopping from small, local organic farmers and by following the work of awesome organizations like the Hokulea Polynesian Voyaging Society.

In your day-to-day life, how do you maintain balance between the needs of the natural world and your needs as a human being?

How to Keep Your Body Younger Than You Are

How often do you look in the mirror and see someone much older than your actual or mental age? While aging is a natural part of life, the process is infuriating when you aren’t ready! And in our environment full of pollutants, your body ages a lot faster than your ancestors’ did.  

You feel slower than you once were, spots and wrinkles are popping up out of nowhere, and new health concerns are hindering you daily. These small changes add up fast! Be sure you stay on top of aging before aging gets on top of you. So, what can you do to look and feel like your most youthful, energetic self?

While skincare and anti-aging research has come a long way from the technology your ancestors had at their disposal, the innovations you hear of are only innovations for the short term. Most often, they just complicate your simple goal to keep your body youthful in the long run.

Fortunately, there’s a hidden gem that can help keep your body as young as you feel (or would like to feel): pure noni fruit pulp. And with these three simple, organic noni pulp products, you will quickly notice a return of youthful energy, glowing skin, and pain relief, helping you continue to live life to the fullest.

1. Noni Fruit Leather for Energy and Antioxidants

Noni Fruit Leather, with a texture similar to a fruit roll up, is an amazing raw food to include with your morning breakfast.

We’ve talked before about how Noni can replace your morning coffee to give you a more natural energy boost. You can ditch the chemicals and sugars that come with your usual cafe latte and instead take in beneficial enzymes and minerals of the Noni Fruit Leather. This gives you youthful energy without the potential damage of caffeine overdose.

Noni Fruit Leather also surpasses the occasional pomegranate or blueberry with its high levels of antioxidants. Getting enough antioxidants in your diet actually slows down the aging of the skin cells and aids anti-inflammatory agents so you feel ready to take on the day.

Not convinced? See what Noni Fruit Leather does for blood sugar:

"I've been taking Noni Fruit Leather from Hawaiian Organic Noni for two months now, and my sugar levels are gradually going down. I heard about noni from a friend of mine at the hospital I work at. She lost 20 pounds and was able to get off one of her diabetes medications. Once I heard that, I had to give noni a try! I was always very tired, and in only two-and a-half weeks after taking noni, I had more energy and started walking again to get exercise. I'm also happy to report that I lost nine pounds." - Phyllis Kramer, Reading, Pennsylvania

2. Noni Lavender Lotion for Spots and Wrinkles

Working from the outside in, the second simple step to keeping your body youthful is tackling those stubborn spots and wrinkles with Noni Lavender Lotion.

Scientific research proves over and over again that pure noni fruit pulp helps rebuild skin tissue to stop and repair spots from age, liver damage, and sun exposure. This is because of the natural collagen boosters in noni fruit, which regulate the protein in your skin to balance and heal your body.

This natural collagen also helps as a natural yet powerful anti-wrinkle agent to rebuild the cells that broke down to form those wrinkles in the first place.

Other benefits of the noni fruit in your lotion are all the vitamins and minerals, like vitamin C. This helps bring out the best in your body’s skin by clearing away discoloration and brightening your skin tone for a youthful glow when you apply the lotion regularly. We’ve even found the lotion helps erase stretch marks!

Take a look at testimonials like this one for the Noni Lavender Lotion:

"My skin looks 20 years younger! Hi, I live in Hawaii and I first found out about your Noni Lavender Lotion at the Made in Hawaii festival in Honolulu. I've been using it for about eight years now, and I'm 78, and my skin looks like I'm about 58. It's smooth and clear, and all those liver and age spots are all gone. So, I'm really grateful for your products. Thanks a lot and mahalo." —Lopaka Goodlow, Honolulu

3. Noni IcyHeat for Pain Relief

Now, you may know the Hawaiians have been using noni fruit for centuries, crushing the fruit pulp into a mush and applying the fruit to bruises, sprains, and swollen limbs.

With the help of sports trainers at the University of Hawaii for development, our IcyHeat Noni Lotion has the same natural formula as our Noni Lavender Lotion. What makes the IcyHeat formula unique is the added menthol crystals and camphor oil to bring rapid pain relief to stubborn joints.

Daily aches and pains is not something we get used to with aging. Even small, dull aches can hinder your day-to-day routine. With Noni IcyHeat’s natural scopoletin as an anti-inflammatory, you feel real and natural pain relief. Health complications no longer take away from the quality of your life.

Take a look at this example of how Noni IcyHeat helps with the pain of psoriasis:

“Very few people understand the pain and suffering my psoriasis causes but your lotion brings immediate relief and promotes healthy skin growth. Even better is the fact that your product is completely organic a breath of fresh air in the world of chemicals and synthetics we are currently living in. Thank you for creating this product and keep up the good work." —M.L., New York, New York

So clear off your bathroom vanity full of useless “anti-aging” products. When you need to maintain a spring in your step and a glow to your face, you can count on the power of the noni fruit to keep your body more youthful than you thought possible.

Tell us how noni has simplified your anti-aging routine, we love to hear your stories.

Care For Your Body and Get Rid of Stretch Marks

Ever notice odd streaks or stripes on your skin, almost like tiger stripes of discoloration? Most people have at least a few, and some people have lots of stripes on different parts of their body.

These stripes are known as stretch marks. Essentially, they’re scars that form when your skin is stretched and there isn’t enough time for new skin to form and fill in the gaps. Learn more about how scars form and heal by clicking here.

It’s a fairly common and totally harmless occurrence, but they make getting your body beach ready this spring rather daunting!

Stretch marks can have a variety of causes, from pregnancy to puberty to dietary changes, and they’re commonly found on the abdomen, arms, and legs. They may be pinkish, silvery, or dark purple, and the colors may change over time.

Hawaiians have known for centuries that the noni fruit could keep their body youthful by effectively preventing and treating stretch marks. We wanted to share how this healing process works!

How Noni Heals Skin Conditions Like Stretch Marks

Raw noni fruit contains over 165 beneficial compounds, many of which are the building blocks for healthy skin. Ancient Polynesians applied the raw pulp of the noni fruit to their skin to treat a wide variety of ailments, from acne to open wounds.

Taking this idea from the Hawaiians, we have created a raw Noni Lavender Lotion that works wonders on the delicate skin area that is your stretch marks. The formula is entirely organic and toxin-free, making our lotions safer than the hundreds of products that claim stretch mark relief at your drugstore.

Hydration

One of the main benefits of applying Noni Lavender Lotion is the powerful hydration this lotion provides — a major factor in eliminating stretch marks. Moist, taut skin has a much easier time stretching out, which could actually help prevent stretch marks before they appear!

The first ingredient in our Noni Lavender Lotion is, of course, pulp from raw organic noni fruit. In fact, Noni Lavender Lotion is 99.2% raw noni pulp. The second is pure water, then grapefruit seed extract, and finally just a bit of soothing lavender oil.

While our Noni Lotions don’t feel like lotions you buy at the store, that’s because our products are not ladened with waxes, chemicals, and silicones. Those additives might make you feel like you’re caring for your skin, but in the end, they do more harm than good.

The best way to care for skin is with water-based lotions. Our formula allows the noni to be soaked up into the skin to hydrate deep down in the tissue of your stretch marks. You should quickly see improvements in skin quality, texture, and elasticity.

Skin Tightening

It might seem paradoxical to try to eliminate stretch marks by tightening the skin, but in fact, many stretch marks appear when skin has been stretched and then loosened. Restoring supple, taut skin can go a long way toward clearing up stretch marks.

Our Noni Lavender Lotion is able to balance both hydration and skin tightening unlike any other product. Within the natural fruit pulp of noni, the primary ingredient of our lotions, are a variety of compounds that help with skin aging. Selenium, for example, helps preserve the youthful nature of your skin.

This compound is also known to help sooth irritation that is often accompanied by stretch marks and help with the discoloration which makes stretch marks so noticeable. Talk about a win-win!

You can learn about the other skin-tightening benefits of noni by clicking here.

Collagen Growth

Stretch marks form when there isn’t enough collagen to fill in stretched skin, so adding collagen is one of the most effective ways to treat them. There are lots of factors that can decrease collagen, including damage from free radicals. Learn how noni fights free radicals by clicking here.

The noni fruit pulp we use to make our lotions contains high proportions of natural collagen and also stimulates collagen production in the body, thanks to a phytochemical in the anthraquinone group. Use Noni Lavender Lotion daily and your skin will feel smoother and more supple in just a few months.

Exfoliation

Clearing away dead skin cells provides a fresh start for your skin to start healing those stretch marks. But it’s crucial to use an extremely gentle exfoliating agent or risk further damage to the skin. Luckily, yet another benefit of noni is that it functions as a gentle, environmentally-friendly exfoliant!

While you normally would simply apply a thin coat of Noni Lavender Lotion and let it dry, you can also massage a thicker coat of the lotion into your skin to exfoliate. Within seconds, you’ll notice little brown balls forming on the skin as you continue to massage the lotion over your stretch marks. That’s the exfoliated skin gently coming free.

This style of exfoliation is much safer on stretch marks than products containing microbeads, or even natural scrubs made of sugar or salt. Noni soothes rather than irritates an already sensitive area, providing maximal healing.

Best Practices for Best Results

Once or twice a day, simply apply a thin coat of your Noni Lavender Lotion to the area where you have stretch marks. Let the formula dry onto your skin, allowing the essential ingredients to sink into your stretch marks. If you’d like, you may very gently rub the lotion into your skin as a gentle exfoliant.

You can also apply a thicker coat and leave it on to dry as a mask treatment. This will produce quicker healing results. You may also want to try the Instant Noni BioBandage as a mask on particularly stubborn stretch marks.

Make noni a part of your daily routine today, and you should see results by the time you are ready for the beach!

You can learn about the other skin-tightening benefits of noni by clicking here.

How has Noni lotions helped your skin troubles — especially stretch marks? Let us know in the comments!

Inside Noni: The Top 4 Most Beneficial Compounds

In today’s world of highly-processed, nutritionless foods, it’s hard to be sure you’re getting access to the countless micronutrients available from the wide variety foods available to us. Americans in particular are eating more and more calories, while obtaining fewer and fewer nutrients.

Eating a diet of mainly whole, raw foods helps, but even our fruits and vegetables have depleted nutrients due to lost soil fertility, poor agricultural practices, and selective breeding for shelf life rather than nutrition. Organic is better, but even industrially-produced organic foods may be nutritionally lacking.

Luckily, nature provides foods like noni, which act as a broad-based supplement and preventative against the symptoms of our western diets: inflammation, diabetes, excessive free radicals, exhaustion, depression, upset stomach...the list goes on.

The whole noni fruit is so potent because it’s packed with over 165 beneficial compounds, including vitamins, minerals, 17 out of 20 essential amino acids, countless beneficial enzymes, and many others. Here are four of the compounds in noni that have the biggest impact on health, including a few you may not have heard of!

1. Scopoletin

This compound is a phytochemical, which means it’s a biologically active compound in a plant. Scopoletin is found in the roots of plants of the genus Scopolia, including chicory and stinging nettle. But it’s also found in the pulp of raw noni fruit!

Powerful Painkiller

In many studies, scopoletin has made a name for itself as a potent painkiller. One study published in Phytotherapy Research (24[1]:38-42) by researchers from the University Clinic in Hamburg, Germany, reported that noni fruit’s analgesic activity “reduced the pain sensitivity comparably to the central analgesic drug tramadol.” When extracts of noni fruit puree were applied, the “effect was comparable to hydrocortisone.” The best part — noni fruit has no side effects or known toxic level.

The compound responsible was believed to be scopoletin. Scopoletin is a powerful anti-inflammatory, which may contribute to this ability. To top it off, scopoletin is antibacterial and antifungal. Basically, it’s a healing injury’s best friend.

Mood Enhancer

Scopoletin’s painkiller power may be related to another known effect of the phytochemical: mood elevation. This compound binds with serotonin to keep levels elevated. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that regulates mood, sleep, hunger, temperature, and more.

For this reason, scopoletin is being tested as a possible depression treatment. It’s mood-enhancing properties combined with its analgesic (painkilling) powers make Noni a possible quality of life enhancement for people undergoing chemotherapy & radiation treatment.

2. Anthraquinones

Noni also contains a wide variety of anthraquinones. Anthraquinones are a type of phenol produced by some plants. Many phenols, including a number of anthraquinones, have shown evidence of being beneficial for human health.

Some of the anthraquinones in noni are antibacterial agents, able to help protect injuries from infection. Others fight enzymes that break down collagen in the body, which may slow down the aging process. Many anthraquinones also help regulate smooth digestion.

Damnacanthal

The anthraquinone most of interest to noni researchers is called damnacanthal, which likely helps protect plants from UV damage and parasites.

Damnacanthal has been shown to stimulate T cells, which may help fight cancerous and precancerous cells. In particular, it seems to be effective against Lewis lung carcinoma. Go to pubmed.gov and look up “damnacanthal noni” if you want to learn the specifics.

There is also evidence that damnacanthal prevents and kills parasites!

Dietary Fiber: Soluble & Insoluble

Fiber, of both the soluble and insoluble varieties, is critical for good health. Noni has both in abundance, but only if you preserve the raw pulp. Noni juice contains very little fiber, whereas Noni Fruit Leather is a very rich source.

Soluble fiber turns into a gel during digestion by absorbing water. This process slows digestion, ensuring maximal nutritional absorption and good elimination. But soluble fiber is also crucial for regulating weight and blood sugar levels.

Insoluble fiber doesn’t absorb water or break down much during digestion. It remains more or less intact, and this is what makes it so valuable for colon health. It’s especially good at reducing risk of hemmorhoids.

But the fact is, you need both soluble and insoluble fiber for optimum health. Luckily, noni fruit, including Noni Fruit Leather is a great source of both kinds of dietary fiber. But don’t go for the noni juice — that’s missing the pulp with all the good stuff!

Learn about the last beneficial compound in our original article!

Has Noni Fruit Leather improved your health? Tell us your story in the comments! We love hearing how noni changes lives.