Decisions, Decisions...

I'm trying to make a decision and it's hard! It's not life changing or anything, just hard.

I'm going to participate in my church's annual craft fair. In the past, I've tried selling wood projects my dad made (lots of looky loos but no sales), diamond art projects I made along with some resin items I made (sold a few but not much), and last year, I made jams, jellies, and salsas (did pretty good business with this one). This year, I decided to do something new. I'm going to make up a bunch of recipes in jars.

What is a recipe in a jar? It is pretty much as the name suggests. The dry ingredients of a recipe are put in a jar, with directions on how to make it and what wet ingredients will need to be added. Unless a tea, coffee mix, or hot cocoa is made, of course. That's pretty much obvious on how to make it.

I'm thinking of making some jar recipe soups, chilis, sides such as red beans and rice, and sweets (breakfast items, baked goods, etc.). I'm also looking at making some tea mixes. I had considered making coffee and hot cocoa recipes, but the fair is in May, so I wasn't sure about that. I may change my mind.

My problem is the tea mixes. I thought it would be good to make a variety of herbal teas. I went out looking for recipes to try and went down a rabbit hole! I found some recipes that looked interesting, until I looked at the ingredients. Some had ingredients I'd never heard of, much less know where to buy. For example, I found a recipe for a multivitamin drink. The ingredients included bancha leaf tea, astragalus root, and yellow dock seeds. What? I've never heard of these! Not to be deterred, I started researching online sites where I could buy them and, wholly moly, the prices for some of these unusual herbs were insane! So, I was thinking that maybe this would NOT be a recipe I'd try right now.

Then I found some herbal tea blends that looked good. Those included ingredients such as calendula petals (apparently, it's part of the marigold family - I had to look it up!) and linden leaves. Never heard of those either, but they were pretty easy to find in the online herbal shops and weren't too bad as far as price goes. These two recipes were ones made in bulk and used 1 to 2 teaspoons per serving. I put them on my possibles list.

One of the big problems I ran into was that a lot of the recipes I found were for single servings and I was looking for something I could put in a jar for multiple servings. After thinking it over for few days, a lightbulb went off. Buy some disposable tea bags and make multiple servings then put those tea bags in the jars! So, I bought some tea bags and a few herbal tea recipe books.

Now I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and reconsidering how many teas I want to make. The main reason is cost. Finding the herbs where they don't cost a ton of money has been interesting. This is my biggest reason behind trying to decide if or what tea recipes I'd like to make. There are so many recipes I want to make that it's getting crazy! I'm looking at recipes to help with digestion, stress, and relaxation mostly. Then I consider how many of each one I should make and then it really gets nuts when I try to figure out how much of each ingredient I'd need. It gets to the point where I feel like my head is going to explode! I start also thinking about allergies and potential interactions with medicines and I really start debating on it all.

I have a fair number of jars to use so that's not a big deal. I probably won't have to buy much in that regard. I feel like it's overwhelming because I start thinking of how MUCH of EVERYTHING I'd possibly need to make for each recipe I'm considering making, along with what I'd charge for each. I've never done this type of thing before, at least not in large amounts. I have done some jar recipes before but usually as gifts for friends and family. I did run it by some friends on Friday potluck at my church and they all thought the idea of jar recipes was a great one.

I'm overthinking all of it. I know I should just take a step back and not think about it too much right now, but it's hard. Since the craft fair is on May 3, I do have time, but I can't wait too long to make a decision because I'd need time to get my ingredients and make everything. I'd also need to make the labels where I'd list the ingredients in the jar along with directions for making that particular recipe. There's so much more that goes into jar recipes than just putting the ingredients in the jar. I want to make signs for my booth, as well. Gaaaaah! I'm losing my mind here! LOL!

Well, I think that's enough rambling. Maybe this will help me work everything out. I might bring it up again with my friends at potluck this Friday. See what recipes interest them and go from there.

God Bless!