How to nourish our skin healthily when preparing our food

Nina Marin, Ayurveda lecturer, Cluj -Napoca

Dry skin

The age-old Ayurvedic tradition teaches us that after the passage of youth and advancement towards old age, regardless of the constitutional type that characterizes us, one of the three fundamental factors of health or disease (dosha) namely vata-dosha. As a result of this, the general quality of dry land (ruksha-guna), including the body. The skin will immediately show this general quality (guna) by the dry feeling that occurs, the loss of skin elasticity and the appearance of wrinkles. In particular, human beings who have a constitutional type characterised by the predominance of vata-dosha will be confronted with this disharmonious manifestation which, in their case, will be very strong and rapid.

Knowing all these aspects, we realize that it is not good to we neglect nourishing our body's skin, because by the time we notice the effects, it will already be quite late. But how can we nourish our skin with healthy and effective products?

Feeding our skin with what we eat

We can start from the idea known very well in Ayurveda of putting on the skin only what we can eat, because we nourish ourselves through the skin as we nourish ourselves with the mouth.

When we prepare our "food for mouth", we canwe also give the skin "to eat".

Herbal macerate

For example, we need at least two litres of water every day to maintain good health. From Ayurvedic tradition we have learned that water can be enriched with nutrients found in plants with healing virtues, impregnating it witha simultaneously and subtly with the corresponding energies of those plants, if we soak those plants in water for several hours. We can thus nourish our body if we drink these macerates of beneficial plants. But we can also pour these valuable liquids on our body, on our skin. So we can wet our whole body or just our face as often as possible with macerates of chamomile, sangziana, neem, marigold or other plants we choose to macerate. Thus, what we put into the body, we also put on it.

Avocado and lemon

And the examples can go on and on, and they can be as diverse as our food recipes are creative. When we make an avocado lemon paste, after peeling the avocado fruit, we can put what is left on the peel on our face and neck. We can spread the lemon juice on our hands, all the way up. Some of the avocado fruit or even the avocado-lemon paste can be spread on the hair as a hair mask.

Aloe gel

When we prepare a drink in the blender with aloe vera gel, after cutting the aloe vera leaf, we can use the aloe and we've extracted the gel, we can put the rest of the gel that's left on the leaves on our face and so, while we're preparing the food, we're also nourishing our skin.

Fruit and vegetables

We can do the same when we make fruit or vegetable salads, massage the skin of our face, neck and chest with slices of vegetables or fruit. Just think how good we will feel when we rub our face and feel the intoxicating aroma of fragrant fruits such as strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, peaches, pears, mangoes, oranges, watermelon and cantaloupe. Or when summer cools and soothes our face by putting the juice from cucumbers or courgettes on our skin. And how good our skin will feel if we nourish it with the juice of a fragrant tomato. We'll find that, in addition to the delight of the olfactory sense, our skin will be nourished, moisturised, becoming velvety, supple and healthy.

Cereal water

When we want to boil our cereals, when we rinse them, we can keep the water with which we-we washed and wet our face and body with it. We can even soak the rice grains for a while longer and wash our face with the water. We will see that this traditional Eastern method is very effective. The skin will be nourished and moisturised.

Cold pressed oil

Coconut oil, renowned in many countries for its beneficial action on skin and hair, can be put immediately on the face or applied to the hair when we prepare a dessert to which we have added coconut oil. Cold-pressed sesame, sunflower or olive oil, which we often use when preparing salads and other dishes, is absorbed very quickly, even much more quickly, by our skin and hair.

Vinegar

Likewise, vinegar made from apples or other fruits or grains, which-Adding it to salads or sauces can also be very good for nourishing hair and eliminating dandruff, if we pour vinegar diluted with water on the hair, which-we leave it to work for 30 minutes. After drying the hair the smell of vinegar will disappear.

Rose water

When we prepare our almond milk with honey and rose water, we can delight our facial skin with rose water and cool and soothe our eyes if we apply it to our eyelids.

These are just a few ideas for nourishing the skin and hair and even the whole body, which we do right in the time it takes to prepare food. Everyone will be able to be inspired to use the right ingredients and will not forget to use them, because they will associate the ordinary act of daily nourishment and food preparation with the simultaneous nourishment of the outside of the body, which is the skin, considered in Ayurveda the second line of defence of the being.