The relationship we have with our skin goes beyond looking healthy and feeling smooth. Glowing skin feeds our confidence and nourishes our wellbeing. However, like any relationship, there is give and take and we must feed our skin with the nutrients it needs to thrive. Often times, as we walk through the aisles of the grocery store or perhaps through the booths of the farmer’s market, we don’t imagine what the foods we put into our basket might be doing for our skin. Generally, sticking to whole foods will be at your advantage when it comes to taking good care of your organs. But your skin, the largest organ of the body, reacts particularly well to these five foods: Avocados, blueberries, broccoli, pomegranates and walnuts.
As you’ll soon discover, each of these foods contain wonderful nutrients unique to themselves and hold different healing properties, but they all have one thing in common—they are extremely nutrient rich meaning that they contain high quantities of minerals, vitamins and fats, which in turns leads to glowing skin.
Avocado
Avocados have recently become one of the more popular foods, being praised for all of its benefits, and for good reason. This vibrant green fruit is possibly known best for being an extremely fatty food. Understand, though, that there is such a thing as good fats and we desperately need them. Avocados contain both monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fatty acids. Each of these are amazing and truly needed for good skin health. Monounsaturated fats act to keep the top layer of your skin moisturized through retaining water, which keeps your skin looking vibrant and healthy. The polyunsaturated fatty acids actually help the body absorb nutrients. So, not only will your body be able to absorb the nutrients in an avocado more effectively, but if you eat avocado with other foods, these fatty acids in the avocado will aid in absorbing the nutrients in other foods as well. The list of nutrients and minerals found in an avocado is long (there are nearly 20), including fiber, magnesium, potassium, zinc, vitamin E and numerous B vitamins. These do everything from assisting the body in excreting toxins, to repairing skin cells as well as fighting against free radicals that harm the skin. Not only is this fruit extremely beneficial to glowing skin, but it can also be incredibly tasty. For a fun recipe on how to incorporate avocados into your food choices, visit our blog post, A Tangy Twist on Avocado Toast.
Blueberries
This fun berry is most commonly known for being chock full of antioxidants which protect your body from free radicals. Free radicals are essentially unstable molecules which can contribute to aging and disease. So, consuming these antioxidants will aid in things like protecting against disease and improving skin tone. Due to their anti-inflammatory qualities, these berries will help reduce the onset of wrinkles. Blueberries, like many other berries, also help balance hormones which can play a big role in preventing or reducing acne. Though we might not immediately think about it, blueberries, like the avocado, have an abundance of fiber also. Adding blueberries to your diet can be a relatively painless process (that is, if you’re not already eating them). They can be tossed into a fruit salad, a spinach salad, a smoothie, or just straight into your mouth for a delicious, antioxidant rich snack.
Broccoli
Broccoli is known, first and foremost for being the vegetable that young children try to feed to their dogs. And one of their best features, containing an ample source of vitamin C, is often overshadowed by the orange. However, broccoli actually contains nearly twice the amount of vitamin C than an orange does. Vitamin C is where many turn to when feeling a cold come on because it stimulates your immune system, but it also promotes collagen production. Collagen is the most abundant protein in our bodies, but as we age our bodies begin to produce less of it which is one of the reasons why we begin to see aging in our skin. Collagen helps give structure and elasticity to the skin and since we have broccoli we don’t need to give up on our collagen levels just because our bodies are producing less of it. Broccoli also carries an abundance of vitamin K which aids in the skin healing process helping with dry spots, cuts, inflammation, dark circles and many other skin ailments. While this may not be one of the foods you want to put in your smoothie, it can still be tossed into a salad or eaten raw as a snack. It’s also a great food to roast in the oven!
Walnuts
Though this nut might look a little wrinkly, it can actually help prevent wrinkles due to all of the vitamin B and E in it. Perhaps what the walnut is most capable of however, is moisturizing the skin. Walnuts contain essential omega-3 fatty acids, which in turn, gives you hydrated, glowing skin. Walnuts also help with reducing inflammation, and provide a great source of protein. Walnuts are great in smoothies, tossed into a salad or trail mix making it an easy add to your daily diet.
Pomegranate
This fruit can prove to be a little harder to get at due to its tough peel, but it is well worth the effort. It is incredibly potent with antiviral, antibacterial and antioxidant properties—a true superfood. As we’ve discovered, antioxidants are excellent for fighting off free radicals. But this fruit does not just fight off the bad, it also repairs and smoothes the skin through promoting cell regeneration and collagen production. Pomegranate seeds are perfect for throwing on a salad or even in a bowl of oatmeal.
The simple incorporation of these five foods not only has the power to improve the brightness of our skin, but nourishes the overall health of our body, which in turn increases our confidence through how we look and feel. So as you plan your next meal, or stop at the grocery store, we encourage you to think about the relationship you’re building with your skin and use these five foods to give it what it needs to thrive.