Image via Seafood for the Future

>> Come learn the secrets of experienced gardeners to grow your best garden yet! David King, with about 50 years of experience, will take you through the things you need to do to get your home vegetable garden started this year. Dress warm – and bring a cup if you want hot coffee or hot tea! The class takes place this Sat., Jan. 7 from 10 am – noon at the Venice Learning Garden (at Venice High School), located on Walgrove Avenue and Venice Blvd., Los Angeles. Park and enter on Walgrove Ave. Cost: $25.

>> The US Green Building Council-LA Chapter (USGBC-LA) and A Sustainable Kitchen present Everything You Want to Know about Sustainable Seafood but Did Not Know Who to Ask. This class will provide cooking lessons, Q&A and sustainability issues, and expert panel on environmental impacts of land and sea seafood farming practices and more. Class takes place this Sat., Jan. 7 from 3-5 pm at Surfas Test Kitchen, 8777 W. Washington Blvd., Culver City. Cost: $25 for USGBC-LA members, $40 for the general public. Cost of the class goes to support USGBC-LA.

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Wish you could get your eco-facial — in nature’s outdoors? Venice’s Abbot Kinney district isn’t exactly a lush jungle or overgrown forest, but it now has a new green oasis where you can escape from the urban stress and get pretty while enjoying the ocean breeze.

Just stop by The Odacite Garden Spa, a new pop-up pamper spot at The Detox Market, Abbot Kinney’s pop-up-store turned permanent eco-friendly boutique shop. Located in a breezy curtained structure in a peaceful courtyard behind the store, the garden spa offers all-natural facials using the pure, potent beauty products from Odacite. “The idea was to integrate the spa experience with Nature in a natural and eco-friendly setting,” says Romain Gaillard, founder of The Detox Market.

Each treatment at this spa promised to include “healing energy work” — which piqued my curiosity, so I stopped by to try out a facial for review. Sure enough, the facial started with the friendly aesthetician asking me to to pick a flower from a card showing six blooms — then sprayed a corresponding Lotus Wei energy mist above me, letting the scent waft down — to start off the treatment on the right emotional note. As you know, I’m not convinced of the power of floral essences — but the spray certainly added a nice sweet scent to the treatment!

I needed a facial pretty badly, since four days spent in over-air conditioned spaces at the BlogHer conference hadn’t done my skin any favors. The aesthetician said she’d customize my facial to clear away the dullness, then started by giving my face a deep cleanse and soothing massage. This facial massage, I have to say, was my favorite part of the hour. In addition to energizing and rejuvenating my skin, it was decadently relaxing.

After this came the unique, customized part of the treatment — Each facial at this spa includes a fresh skin infusion, adapted to your skin’s needs and freshly whipped up by the aesthetician. For my AC-dulled skin, that meant a Pumpkin Peel Infusion — a fruit acid peel that smelled like delicious pumpkin pie! I could feel the powerful treatment work as soon as the aesthetician smoothed it on; my skin started getting warm and tingly!

Then came a second skin infusion — The Rose Calming Gel-Gommage, an astringent and regenerative treatment that soothed my post-peel skin. And while both these infusions did their work, the aesthetician treated my neck, hands, and feet to gentle massages. After all that healing relaxation, the facial ended with a nice final moisturizing treatment.

The result? My skin definitely got its glow back, with the dead skin cleansed and peeled away.

The one thing I missed at The Odacite Garden Spa was the pore-opening and relaxing steam treatment common to many facials. This outdoor spot doesn’t have a steam machine — or running water, from what I could tell by the aesthetician lugging around a giant bowl of water before my facial — so there was no steam treatment to open my pores for an extraction or a steamed towel for my face while the skin infusions did their work. [Update, 8/23/11: Romain tells me that the spa does indeed have a steam machine; why the aesthetician didn't use it remains a mystery.]

Still, the spot boasts a breezy outdoor setting, customized eco-friendly skin infusions, and a lot of fantastic hands-on massage treatment. Want to try a treatment? A facial will run you between $68 for a half-hour Quick Fresh and Clean Facial to $138 for an Ultimate Skin Rejuvenation and Lifting Facial. Book your appointment now, because The Odacite Garden Spa is a temporary pop-up spot that’s only open until Oct. 21.

The Odacite Garden Spa at The Detox Market. 1524 Abbot Kinney Blvd., Venice. 310.909.7277. 9 am to 7 pm daily.

Earlier:
>> Premium Skin Care by Diana: Eco-friendly facials meet hi-tech treatments
>> Purity Organic Spa: Eco-luxe facials with a personal green touch
>> Raksa: Unique organic facials meet reflexology and ayurveda

Photos courtesy of The Detox Market

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If you strolled by 50 kids in down dog on Venice Beach one Sunday, you’ve seen Natural Leaders Camp for Kids in action:

How would you like to start your Sunday morning with a gourmet organic breakfast, followed by yoga on the beach, a challenging team workout, and an inspiring lesson on nutrition and sustainability? No, this isn’t an expensive wellness retreat. It’s a free program called Natural Leaders Camp for Kids, which brings L.A.’s inner city kids out to Venice Beach for days filled with healthy fun, delicious food, and eco-education.

The event also feature art, music and live DJs — all the things Jon Nash, cofounder of Natural Leaders Camp for Kids, says he was interested in when he was growing up as one of three children in a low-income, single-parent household in Compton. While the nonprofit camp encourages a diverse mix of kids from all social and economic backgrounds, Nash says that for the most underpriviledged kids, the program can help instill a sense that they can take control of their futures.

Read the rest on p. 13 of Whole Life Times‘ October/November issue — free online (PDF version here). And for the PR people reading this — Note that while this article is about a kid-related event, I really wrote it for Whole Life Times, not green LA girl. Please don’t take this as an invitation to pitch me kids’ stuff — I’m still not interested. Thanks!

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If you live in the city, you could probably use a detox right now — from the traffic, the smog, the pollution, the overwork. Stop by The Detox Market, a temporary pop-up shop in Venice that’s showcasing the purest, hard-to-find green products to help you relax and detox this season.

Tea drinkers can relax with a cup of Detox from Kusmi Tea, while chocolate lovers can nibble on samples of Taza Chocolate — made with stone-ground, organic cacao and just a few other pure, organic ingredients. (more…)

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Junk food habits are tough to break — especially if you’ve got warm fuzzy childhood memories associated with them. If you call yourself a healthy locavore — but sneak the occasional corn syrup and hydrogenated oil tainted Snickers bar, I’ve got a solution for you: Rawsheed‘s new raw chocolate bar — Sneaky.

Devotees of SunPower Natural Cafe regularly dine on Rawsheed’s culinary creations — like the Raw Supreme Pizza I love. Though Rawsheed left SunPower Cafe about a year ago, he’s been keeping busy “cooking” up new raw creations — like raw versions of your favorite chocolate bars from childhood.

Instead of Snickers, there’s Sneaky — an raw chocolate-and-almond concoction with a hint of vanilla. Love Hershey’s kisses? Try Herosheys, a chocolate delicacy with a minty kick.

Almond Joy fans can enjoy Almond More, a two-layer bar with a rich, white bottom of raw coconut and cacao butter. And for peanut butter fans, there’s Reasons, a healthier version of Reeses made with a smooth blend of peanut butter and chocolate.

Compared to the originals, Rawsheed’s chocolates are richer, purer, healthier indulgences. All the chocolate treats are raw and vegan — except Reasons with its roasted peanut butter. All are also sweetened just with dates and date syrup — except the white portion of Almond More. Rawsheed used raw turbinado sugar there to keep the layer white.

I got to try these delicious choco snacks earlier this week — and marveled at how a combination of just a few pure vegan ingredients could combine to make such decadent treats. Rawsheed (below) is still working on tweaking the molds of his chocolates to make them look more like the originals; he also plans to create an all-raw version of Reasons as well as carob versions of each treat. In a few months, Rawsheed hopes his chocolates will be in Whole Foods stores.

But you don’t have to wait that long to try out the raw chocolate bars! Look for Rawsheed’s booth at the Veggie Pride Parade LA 2010, happening tomorrow, Sat., Oct. 30, from 11 am to 4 pm at The Victorian, 2640 Main St., Santa Monica and surrounding streets. Rawsheed himself unfortunately won’t be there — but his chocolates will, along with raw pizzas and vegan mac and cheese!

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