Beauty foods for beauty from within

Beauty foods for your skin

If you take good care of your skin, your skin will take good care of you. Not only by letting you shine, but also by protecting you. Your skin is an armor against infections and a cushion against wounds. And your skin is a heater and an air conditioner at the same time: your skin keeps your body at the right temperature by insulating and cooling. Finally, the skin also functions as a fifth sense (after sight, hearing, smell and taste): the sense of touch. Did you know that the skin is your largest organ? It weighs on average 3 kilos and takes up about the surface of a single sheet. You have to take good care of such a large and important organ. You can, with these beauty foods.

Red bell pepper: for firm skin

Did you know that one red bell pepper contains no less than one and a half times the recommended daily amount of vitamin C? This means that red peppers are richer in vitamin C than kiwis and oranges. Vitamin C is important for collagen formation. And that is the binding agent, which ensures a firm skin. Eat bell peppers more often, for example straight from the hand (like you eat an apple), in salads or wok dishes. You can also roast them very nicely in the oven or on the barbecue. Although raw food is preferred, because then all the vitamin C is best preserved.

Mixed nuts: care for the skin from the inside out

Mixed nuts are high in vitamin B3 (niacin), which is important for maintaining healthy skin. A 40 gram serving of nuts (two small handfuls) will give you 25 percent of the recommendation. Are you vegetarian or flexitarian? Such a portion is a full-fledged substitute for meat. Don’t overdo it, though, because they are real calorie bombs.

Mussels: for the regenerative capacity of the skin

Eating mussels for your skin? You wouldn’t expect it. Yet these slippery shellfish are a blessing for the skin. They contain about 80 percent of the recommended amount of iodine. This mineral supports the regenerative capacity of your skin. Coincidentally, iodine (from a bottle) is also used on a wound. That way it works as a disinfectant.

Carrot: nourishes the skin from the inside

They say that carrots are good for the eyes, but that certainly also applies to the skin. If you eat a portion of 200 grams of cooked carrots, it provides you with no less than one and a half times the recommended daily amount of vitamin A. Vitamin A is important for the structure and function of the skin. This vitamin is involved in the formation of new horny cells in your epidermis. And these are refreshed every month. Enough work to be done for vitamin A.

Avocado: protects against sunlight

If there’s one thing that encourages wrinkles, it’s sunlight. Unfortunately! But the avocado offers you some protection. Fruit contains hardly any fat, but an avocado is an exception: this fruit consists of no less than one fifth of healthy fats. And avocados also owe their high vitamin E content to that high fat content. This is a vitamin that only occurs in fat. One avocado contains almost half the recommended amount of vitamin E. Vitamin E helps protect your skin against the effects of sunlight. No matter how many avocados you eat, a good sunscreen or day cream with protection factor remains important.

Beauty foods for your hair

On average, there are about 100,000 hairs on your head. Every day you lose 50 to 100. No need to panic, because these are the ‘old’ hairs that you have had for two years. They just make way for new ones. With these beauty foods you help keep your hair in top condition.

Egg: for shiny hair

Eggs are good for your hair. The proteins from the egg keep your appetite and weight in check and are very good for your muscles. But eggs are also the perfect food for your hair. With one egg you get a quarter of the recommended vitamin B8. Vitamin B8 is also called biotin. It is important for normal hair growth and keeps your hair strong and shiny.

Shrimp: to preserve your hair color

What do these crustacean crustaceans have to do with your hair? They contain a lot of copper: about 70 percent of the recommendation per ounce. And copper is important for the pigmentation of your hair. In other words, it helps maintain the color of your hair.

Beauty foods for your nails

Can you keep your nails in good shape by eating a healthy diet? Not much is known about it yet. It used to be thought that vitamin B8 (biotin) was not only good for your hair, but also for your nails. However, according to the European Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (EFSA), this claim is not scientifically substantiated. However, two minerals have been proven to be good for the nails: selenium and zinc. But how it works exactly is not yet clear.

Lentils: selenium

Lentils contain a lot of selenium, a mineral of which our diet contains on average too little. A little extra could therefore help. A 75-gram serving of lentils provides you with more than half the recommendation of selenium. Lentils officially count as a vegetable, but they are also good meat substitutes. In addition, lentils are also good for your nails. How versatile can a food be?

Spinach: zinc

It is often thought that zinc is mainly found in meat, but spinach is also a good source of zinc. A serving of cooked spinach will give you a quarter of the recommendation. That is more than three times as much as the average is in vegetables.