Your Happy Hour - Naturally Nourished

Episode Date: March 1, 2025

Welcome back to Your Happy Hour with Friday Feels!New month, new theme and we’re unpacking what it means to be naturally nourished! This week, we chatted to Charlene Jordaan, founder of HorTEAculture - a luxury tea brand promoting personal health, holistic living and the empowerment of neurodivergent individuals in the workplace. Charlene shares the importance of nutrition, her motivation in following an unique career journey, her discoveries in the science of glycan technology and her joy in embracing the challenges of entrepreneurship.What’s your taste in tea? And what does being nourished look like to you? Friday Feels is all about having those honest conversations, the power of community for personal growth and taking those actionable steps towards being our authentic selves.Thanks for tuning in! Keep it raw and real out there xYHH is produced by swartkat.co - captured via riverside.fm & shared via rss.com.

It's the Friday feels and we're back with your first sip of the weekend. You're now tuned in to this week's episode of your happy hour. I'm your host Nicole Carmine and it's amazing to have you here joining me this week as we uncover the truths about being a human and a working professional. What are you up to this Friday? Well whatever it is, this moment is just for you. It is almost the month of March and it's upon us whether you're in the southern hemisphere starting to cool down slightly from the summer vibes or in the northern hemisphere feeling the winter chills subsiding maybe a teensy bit as spring starts to peek at us from the horizon.

It's always an interesting time of the year in March to take a beat and think about how we've maybe steamrolled into yet another season of life and of this year. And so this month we decided to unpack a topic that really looks at how we are looking after ourselves and what it means to be a healthy human and what it means to be a healthy working professional, because we can't do

any of those things if we don't stay nourished and so the month's theme is naturally nourished and I feel like we're definitely seeing an era of greater emphasis on natural living, breathing, working, moving through the world in a different way and I wonder for everyone listening, what does being naturally nourished look like to you? Now to help us kickstart this theme, I am delighted to welcome a guest who's very passionate about nourishment, and not just of the body,

but of the soul and the community. So a very special topic to me as well, as I am a tea lover and a believer in healing ourselves through natural means. If I think back, the last time I was at a doctor was in 2019, and I haven't really taken any pills for about five, six years. I've really only changed what and how I consume things mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually. And actually natural herbal tea has been such a big part of this journey. So a

very very big welcome to you Charlene Jordaan, a fellow South African. You're building wonderful things in the world with your new brand Hort Tea Culture and you're someone with years of experience in tea blending, but also a whole lot of other things in your journey, which we can unpack. So a very big welcome to the Friday Feels Podcast. It's really, really great to have you here today. Thank you very, very much.

Really appreciate it. So tell us a little bit about what you're doing. I know you've walked quite a journey and our topic Naturally Nourished hits home for you. I know that Horty Culture is more than just a tea company to you. I know it's a platform for empowerment and that you are doing things in a very special way, but I know you can tell us a little bit more about that. Just give me a little bit of a sense of where you've come from and tell everyone about your journey and what this topic means to you.

Well, naturally nourished, you know, raising a neurodivergent child, when I was sort of in the throes of it when she was little and she was diagnosed with SPD and two three years later with high functioning autism I took stock of okay what is impacting her life how can I make it better and literally it was a case of if you focus on nutrition the symptoms become less and the child copes better and that has always been the focus of looking at that and I've sort of taken that and brought it into horticulture because yes you can help them to a certain degree but especially in South Africa from a society point there are obstacles that you have to overcome you have to overcome the obstacles of schooling them because the schooling system does not cater for everybody that

fits onto the spectrum. So you deal with that but once you've gone through that now you have to employ them. Now it becomes another problem that you have to focus. So when we started Vulticulture it was literally taking all of that information and that knowledge and bringing it into how do we do this? How do we start this? So from a product perspective apart from the fact that I love the the culture the history everything that goes with tea You have the health benefits that that sort of slot into that your way was to your honey bush teas all have massive

health your webus tea, your honeybush teas all have massive health benefits. Even black tea, you know, any tea that comes from the Camellia sinensis plant has benefits. If you look at the caffeine and you compare it to what is in coffee, there's less caffeine in tea than what there is in coffee. So all of that comes in. But we started horticulture with the neurodivergent person in mind. So we focus on giving preference to somebody who fits onto the spectrum when it comes to employment because if I look at my daughter Madison she's high functioning autistic has an IQ way above the average person but she can't do math to save a life. That is

where the lower intellect sits and it's an obstacle and then if you think about it logically and you say to yourself like if we manufacture, we manufacture by hand, everything is done by hand. Does she really need math to run a production line for me? No she doesn't. She just needs to understand the steps that go into from We blend we package right down to we have an end product and she can run a production line for me quite successfully So taking all of that. It's giving those people a sense of purpose a sense of accomplishment in producing a luxury brand

So yeah, it's it's very close to home. Oh man, you've walked quite a journey and I absolutely love the trigger for how you've stepped into entrepreneurship in this way because we speak to a lot of people and everyone have their own motivations and reasons and inspirations. And I just think it's really special

that you've been able to incorporate all of this in this way. And you're touching on a subject that's quite something I've been thinking about a lot in my life. The schooling system is not for everybody. The way that things are set up, it's a very specific societal mold.

And it does not necessarily cater to the creative individual in each of us which can come out in different ways. So I think it's really incredible to be able to open that up as a topic and talk to people about that in the world in a very practical way like you are doing, showing people how incredible we all are in our own rights, in our own way of being. And so, T, how did you stumble into the world of T? What was your motivation for that?

In my career, I have a, shall I say, I had a habit of getting into industries that I knew nothing about. I've done this a couple of times in my working career and it was literally through a friend that worked for this one specific tea brand and they were looking at, they wanted a product manager, they wanted a brand ambassador and yeah, I decided, okay, well, you know,

now the industry will just learn it as we go along and I got involved and made the marvelous discovery Yeah, I decided, okay, well, you know, now the industry will just learn it as we go along. And I got involved and made the marvelous discovery that we, especially in South Africa, know very, very little about tea. How it's grown, where it comes from, and things like that. And then I also realized that it's not just in South Africa, but a lot of parts of the world know very little about the history that is attached to tea growing and that and I just fell in love with the industry and the history and how it's grown and where it

comes from and the possibilities that tea actually gives you to create a product. You know, so yeah, it's a very, very interesting industry. I mean today about 38 countries in the world grow tea, but I would say if you look at who are the biggest tea growers in the world, China, India and Kenya, who thought sub-saharan Africa would fall in that category and some of the world's best teas are grown in sub-saharan Africa. So it's not like olden days, okay it only comes from China, that's where it originated and it goes back thousands of years. The history, yeah, it's just, it's

an amazing industry once you get into the nitty-gritty of it and the possibilities and when it comes to tea blending, just sitting there and I like playing scientists, so okay, what can I do with this? What if I add that? What will happen if I do this? You know, it sort of speaks to the creative part of me, you me, because I like creative, I like making things with my hand, I draw, I paint, I do all those things. To actually create a product that is consumable and cover the health part of it, that is good. It makes you feel good when you walk away at the end of the day. Of course, I love that. I'm intrigued because I'm looking at you and I've read your background a little bit and

you've gone from banking and to mining into organizational kind of development stuff and skills development. You've dabbled in what am I missing? I feel like you've done so much and you've also actually done quite a bit of chemistry behind what you are doing in the health and wellness space and coaching. So yeah, how did you, do you feel like a lot of what you've done has kind of blended into where you are now or you know, has it been kind of like you say each industry and then you kind of pick up from you and go?

No, I think it's a mishmash. They do fit together because, yes, the mining industry gave me the information on, okay, how is energy generated? Where does it come from? That type of scenario. Banking, how does the banking system work? From there, I did retail. So how does that retail space work? You know, then I

got involved in credit risk management and under getting to understand that because I don't have a financial background that helped me tremendously in understanding how a company's finances work, you know, so and from there moving on, you know, the health and wellness but came in with with medicine and I got into why if I change certain things in her diet or I add certain things in her diet does she cope better and then I got into the glycan technology and what does the body need? What do the cells need? Why do they need it and things like that? And if you look at medical research with that is concerned I would say 85 if not more percent of illnesses health

challenges that people face today come from the lack of glycans in the diet that they consume and that's all because of how food is grown how it's processed what is added to it but we can't go out and change how they farming and that's all because of how food is grown, how it's processed, what is added to it, but we can't go out and change how they're farming and how they genetically modify certain things. I mean somebody has to feed everybody on earth so I understand they solve the problem there, but on the flip side of that a massive problem has been created and that is why you end up with three other, when I looked at the stats last, three out of five children are diagnosed with ADHD.

One out of five children have some sort of autism going on. And less than 10, less than eight out of 10 people end up with some form of cancer. And it's all got to do with the lack or the breakdown of cell to cell communication in the body because of the lack of the glycan nutrients. So you feed the body the glycan nutrients, you enhance the cell to cell communication and things get better. And it's just taking that and educating people on that. And I could school medicine in mainstream normal conventional schooling when she went to primary school.

Whereas, if I didn't do that and didn't supplement the glycans that she was consuming in her food, she would have had to go to a special school. And in South Africa, the question that you ask yourself is at what cost? Because special schooling is frightfully expensive and yes I homeschooled her through high school because she cannot focus on more than one subject at a time so I had to find a solution for that for that single subject focus and yes I found that in an American curriculum and yeah you know like I said, she's 21, she holds down a job,

but I can also see the minute, her whole equilibrium goes out of sync with, hang on a minute, she's not taking the supplements that she should to help her focus and function better. Look, she'll always be autistic, but you know, and that technology, I mean, I do it in partnership with an American company, but that technology, the glycan technology sort of aided, if I look back at where are we from a scientific point where that is concerned in 2022, the Nobel Peace Prize for

Chemistry was awarded to a scientist, Caroline Bartolin by tosy for using glycan technology to target deliver cancer treatment. They call it click biochemistry. So it's the same thing, you know, if you focus on what the body needs, what the cells need, you improve everything that happens. Condition might not go away completely, but the symptoms are less. Like if I look at Madison, she copes better, she functions better, and I don't have this she's overwhelmed and she can't focus and she can't hold down a job, whereas without it where would we be? So I allotted that and it's educating

people out there who have neurodivergent children that there is a solution, there is a easy way to help the child without going down the road of pharmaceuticals because that's one big thing that I had a big issue with when she was little is I don't want to feed her pharmaceuticals because in the long run that has repercussions. So yeah you know so I help people, well I hope I do, in educating them with regards to what do they eat, why do they eat it you know and maybe try this one, maybe not that one and see what the what the result is. I feel like everything that you are saying is like resonating through my body because you touched on the concept of energy and mining and I think

everything that you're talking about is very much about energy. It's about how we're vibrating as humans, our cells are vibrating all the time, how are we nourishing them? And I think, and this is why we're talking about this today, about naturally nourish, because I also have a big issue with pharma, and what hints me not taking any tablets for such a long time now. And I feel like there's such fear inducement around that, whereas when you come from a natural sense, when you come from grounded herbs that are blended beautifully with love and tea and other things like that, your body will just function better because you are nourishing it from something that is natural, something that's not processed and created. So firstly, I want to say you're a very brave woman, and I just admire your determination

and passion, and it's just such an honor for us to be able to share in this journey that you've walked today. So thank you for sharing that with us, and thank you for bringing such light to the world and what you do. I think more and more and more we need to be naturally living like this. And so obviously, I mean, you've touched on this a little bit, but like 10 years ago, you obviously didn't see yourself necessarily doing what you're doing today. But how do you feel about what's coming for the next year and, you know, what's forward

for HortiCulture? What do you have in mind? Well, with HortiCulture, it is literally just the focus is at the moment is getting the brand out there and I'm hoping that in a year's time, no I'm not hoping, I know in a year's time it will have found its place in the market and people will love the brand as much as Celeste and I do. We work on literally how can we give the best products. That's why our teas are loose leaf teas. When you bag in a tea bag you can't see what is in that tea

bag because they grind it, they mill it and then they bag it. I want my customers, my tea drinkers to be able to decant it into a saucer or the lid of the tin and say okay that's Roybos, that's the petals that makes it look pretty. This is the fruit that is in there. I want you to be able to identify each and every ingredient and I go we go out and we buy the best ingredients that we could possibly get and our Roybos, our honeybush is organic. Our black tea is the third best black tea in the world. So it's going out there and saying we're looking at the nourishment, the natural,

the best that I can possibly give you for your money when we put the product together. So we don't cut corners. I don't. If I can't find something I'll rather shelve it until I can find exactly what I'm looking for. You know, so it's yeah. And like I say, I hope in a year's time, the Houttegarte will be known for that and the brand will be out there and part of everybody's household. Yeah, absolutely. And I, you know, when you know it, then you can feel it, you can see it, then it can be in the world. And so we love that.

And as Friday Feels, we're all about being natural humans, making sure that we're good, balanced working professionals. So we'd love to help you along the journey as much as we can and see how we can maybe, maybe there's a Friday Feels bling somewhere in the mix of things. Give me the idea and I promise you I'll put it together. So for a lot of people listening who are working professionals and we do somehow attract a lot of entrepreneurs to this podcast, what has been the most interesting part of this journey of creating this company? What's been challenging for you and you know

what have you learned? The interesting part is literally what can I create with raw materials. You know you end up, you start off with a basic idea and then as you progress I end up with them but okay but what if I try this? What will happen if I do that? I think that the most challenging part and we had to redo it a couple of times was our packaging that was the most challenging part I mean we as two women we look at it from a female point point of view and we didn't at the beginning take men into consideration. And then somebody passed a comment and go,

oops, okay, we have to relook at this and we had to literally redo the packaging a good couple of times. I think that was the most challenging part of it. And then we took a decision that all our ingredients, our packaging, everything will come from South Africa for now. Black tea that was a challenge because black tea no longer is well no correction it

is grown in South Africa but to actually interact with the tea estates that they are here there's only two left that is a big challenge so we took the decision we will buy from a local importer so only our black tea is imported. It's not physically grown here otherwise all the ingredients, the packaging, the tins, everything is homegrown to support the local economy, to support the local businesses as well. But yeah, I think the most challenging was getting that packaging together and creating something that packaging together and creating something that will stand out and be exceptional and be valued when a customer buys it because the tin is unique it becomes like a collector's piece and then we decided that we will do refill packaging so once you've got your tin you can buy a refill to fill

that tin with because the tins are really, they are exceptional. Branding is such an important part of the process. I've seen this often and it's not an easy part. I think it's one of the most challenging humps in the entrepreneurial journey and company creation journey. But once you have that feeling, like you look at it and you feel it and you touch it and you know this is it, you can't walk back from that. So it's great to hear that you guys have found your feel, your look and feel and touch around it. And so obviously you've walked quite a hard journey in a lot of respects and you embracing this new journey and I'm curious what has been your nourishment and what's kind of been filling your cup so to speak along the way you know maybe

it's been advice or you know someone said something you'll read something what what have you carried with you as and as your motivation my motivation I think comes way before I even looked at, let's do the tea company. It comes with something I've carried with me through a very long portion of my working career and when I just started out working and things like that and worked for standard in the banking industry, somebody one day said to me that there's no such thing as a stupid question. And thinking back on it, how often do you get people in

a working environment or any environment for that matter that don't ask the questions because they feel that the question is silly or irrelevant, but you don't know what you don't know unless you ask the question. And I've always, always, always, and maybe that's why I got involved with industries that I knew nothing about is I always had that with me and I asked the questions. I made it my business to understand how this industry works and what it comprises of by asking questions. Because I might think it's a silly question but you asking the question it's not silly to you because you don't know the answer to it otherwise you

wouldn't ask. So I think that has always been what I carry through and when I look at Horti culture bringing that in and building this brand and taking it out there and the response that we've had that is just it makes me very happy. We've had phenomenal feedback on the product and that's the nervous part when you start as an entrepreneur and you take out you take a product to market what is the reaction going to be. So yeah that's that's what I take home every day and what makes me sleep well. I love that. Thank you for sharing that.

And, you know, yeah, it's true. I think that I sometimes feel that too. You know, I sometimes feel like, hey, I should not ask this question and I feel silly. But most people have that question on their hearts, whatever it might be. And it's really, I think, part of being a human that we're here to ask questions and find answers and deep dive into things and explore, because otherwise life gets quite boring. And I'm really glad to hear that you've had that feedback, that you've been able to cultivate that experience with people.

And that's really what life is about. I think when we tackle these entrepreneurial journeys, we do sometimes feel like, oh, are we doing the right thing? And is this going to resonate with people? But when you have that moment when someone gives you that feedback, it is confirmation. And we hope you do keep going. So please do not stop on your journey. I want to take this quick moment to also say to everyone else listening out there, we wonder what are you feeling? What is your question? What is your question about being naturally nourished, about natural

living, about cultivating some culture of groundedness in how you are consuming in the world? We want to know all your feels, so please let us know on the socials. We love reading all your messages. And also on this I just want to give a quick shout out and say thank you so much to our co-nourisher, our co-adventurer along this journey which is riversidefm and rss.com for making this possible. Thank you for giving us the space to cultivate great conversations like this. We wouldn't be able to record, produce and share all of it without you. Anyone who's keen to create some cool content and make it easy, please check them out and

they've given us some wonderful discounts for our audience and community. Feel free to DM us at fridayfields.co on Instagram and Facebook and we'll send that discount code to you. And then I want to do something quickly and I think it's very much on the topic. We do something called the shout out, Charlene, where every week we find places, spaces and people that have the feels that really give us a good feeling. And today's shout out from me goes to a place in Paris called La Cyclerie, let me say this properly, basically translated the Recyclerie.

And it's an amazing space in Paris. It's located in a former train station and it's now become like this living space. It's just really doing such an amazing job at raising public awareness of eco-responsible values, doing it in a fun and positive way. And I had some coffee there with a friend the other day and I just got these good vibes

and felt like I just wanted to go back there and spend time. So thank you so much guys for bringing the feels, for doing such great stuff out there in the world. And then I feel like this is a good segue into a section that we always do, talking about gratitude, talking about nourishment. We like to share our gems. We like to talk about the things that we've learned maybe in this week, the things that maybe were hard or great.

So I'll start and you're welcome to share if you want to. I've got a lot of creative projects on the go. It's been a little bit heavy to try and get to all of them and I've been very tired. But I've just had this beautiful shift of light recently, which feels like it's been years of stuff that's kind of come off me. So I'm so grateful for that. And I'm really excited because I'm working on a book that I'm publishing very soon, hopefully the end of this month.

And yeah, I'm just really excited to get this launch going. I feel a lot of gratitude for the book just having dropped into my mind about two years ago now. It's been quite a journey. But yeah, so just feeling a lot of lightness and gratitude for that this week. But how about you? What has been your gem of the week? My gem of the week actually flows over from last week and we got a project going for one of the Boutique Hotels locally here in Johannesburg and it's getting that packaging together for them where

we're literally creating a bespoke blend specifically for the boutique atal and once the packaging has been approved and that going into production for this boutique atal so i think that's been my gem is sitting again and once again going around the let's create packaging wheel and putting ideas together and sitting with Celeste and saying okay well maybe if, maybe if we do this, I don't quite like that color because it does this, you know, that type of thing. That's my jam. I'm looking very, very forward to actually ending up with a completed product for South Agraha House. Oh, that sounds amazing. Please share it with us.

And we'd love to share it with everyone once it's out there. And I'm quite curious if you're looking to expand beyond the South African and African horizon or have already done so. Absolutely. When we started Horticulture, I did not look at only the South African market. I looked at who drinks tea. So we have had tea going to Nigeria already, a customer bought and if Sateg Raha, once we get the packaging and things and that done, I really really hope that the tea goes to France. But yes, it is definitely definitely on the cards to do this internationally. There's a lot of tea drinkers out there that I know will absolutely love our product.

Well, I'm in France, so please do send it this way. I would love to get some Horticulture Tins in my collection in my kitchen and it'd be an honor. So keep us posted on that and it's really an exciting journey. And you know, I feel like so much more of what you mentioning I want to delve into all the the chemistry and the and the natural stuff around it But maybe maybe that called for a second episode quite soon. So I did have one more question for you however, and that is What is in your stack? So the stack is our reading list

It's a space where we'd like to recommend books or quotes or things that you've been read or want to read. Do you have something in your stack that you can recommend to everyone out there? I am a, I won't say I'm a devoted reader, but I go through spurs where I will read a number of books and I tend to pick something that is shall we say completely off the mark that takes me out of the world of reality and literally deposits me in fairyland if I can put it you like that so I like reading novels mystical novels and you know Dungeons and Dragons and soldiers and lords and all of that because it does not deal

with everyday life and the challenges of everyday life you know with raising medicine and facing those challenges and working and building a brand and all of that I got to a point in life where I said you know what time out on that one I need to invent something in my head here. So I like going down that road. The last series I read was a books by Sarah J Maas and you know what her books and her novels and the people involved and the courts involved and I really enjoyed that. So if you're somebody who needs time out and literally just disengages, wants to disengage with life, try them. They are interesting and involved and there's lots of action and so yeah.

I love fantasy and for exactly the same reason I can completely resonate with that. Is there a specific title that you enjoyed most of her books? There's five books in the series and it starts off with the Court of Fawns and Roses and the books follow on that but yes that's where the story starts and the characters you get introduced to some of the characters in the series and the books just carry one or three other. It tells the stories of basically every character, what happens and from their viewpoint and things like that. But it is mystical. Yes, there are humans involved, but they play small, small, small roles. Most of them have wings and things like that and powers and magic and so it is it's a good read all

her books or in that series it's really really it was a good read for me and and like I say it gave me the opportunity to disengage from everyday life reality and intro world that is completely mystical and just gave my brain that reset bit you you know, that little time to reset and okay fine tomorrow we'll deal with this again type of scenario. Yeah. Oh no, I totally understand and I read one of my favorite series is the Mistborn trilogy. I don't know if you've read it but highly recommend to people as well and yeah fantasy has got this beautiful way. I kind of believe imagination is reality and fantasy is also a reality in a different space and time perhaps.

And so it's quite nice to kind of travel, you know, through different spaces and go find yourself in a place where the hardships of being human, I think, are not so much upon you. So I think movies do the same for us, which is why we all love getting so engrossed into that world. So thank you so much for recommending that. I'm definitely going to be adding that to my stack as well. And yeah and just so for everyone else listening out there who maybe wants some more book recommendations or want to learn more about tea, where can they reach you? What's the best place to connect with you? On our social media

pages we've got Facebook, we've got Instagram going and yes on the website all the contact details are there, there's an email address, pop me a mail, my cell phone number also appears on the website if you want to send me a WhatsApp by all means. Yeah and we can connect and chat and you know a lot of our teas and it's gonna come up in the blog on there on the web page you can convert into iced tea without it being a major mission. If you want to do that give me a shout and I'll happily share how to do it. That sounds fantastic very much ready for summer summer feelings. Yeah the limited edition Christmas blend that we created was literally focused on that.

I wanted a dual purpose. I wanted you to be able to enjoy it hot, but also because we have hot summers and hot Christmases, I wanted my customers to be able to create iced tea out of it, like I say, without it being a major commotion. And the blend worked perfectly. So yeah. I'm coming to South Africa soon, so I'd love to meet you in person and come have some tea. Absolutely.

Some afternoon tea would be really great. And I look forward to having some cold tea as I leave Chile, Paris. So, but thank you so much for coming and sharing a little bit of your journey. I know it's really just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak, and for being so open and honest about everything. And you've just got such a beautiful natural light about you, which we're privileged to share in the world.

So thank you for bringing us tea and natural living. And I'm really excited to see where everything goes for you with Horti culture. Thank you very very much and really appreciate it. If you haven't just yet follow Friday Feels on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and LinkedIn. You can share with us all your feels this week by tagging us at fridayfeels.co and you can also find the website at that handle. And now as you ease into this weekend take a moment celebrate who you've become, what you've overcome and what is yet to come as you do the crazy and cool things that you do come as you do the crazy and cool things that you do as the authentic you. You know the truth about life and work is that it's hard but the beauty is this global working experience that you're in

while we are in it together. So keep connecting, empowering and inspiring this week and of course keep it raw and real until next time.