Edible Skincare: Fresh Tomato Skin Cleanser

Here is a new recipe for you that I found on Green Planet

Tis the season of the tomato: Plump, juicy sacs, in a myriad of ripening red and orange hues, are melting off their vines ready to be crunched, savored, and simmered. But you can also share summer's rich bounty with your skin, as well as your bellies. Packed with complexion-nourishing antioxidants (such as Lycopene), potassium, magnesium, and Vitamins A and C, the luscious fruit also contains natural acids that slough off dead cells, shrink pores, and tone skin.

Here's a recipe for a homemade tomato skin cleanser, excerpted from Anti-Wrinkle Treatments for Perfect Skin, by Pierre Jean Cousin (2001, Storey Books), that is especially effective on oily skin. Just be sure to test the inside of your arm with a dab of the mixture first to make sure you don't have an allergic reaction.Ingredients

• 1 medium very ripe tomato
• Plain yogurt (the lactic acid and probiotics in the yogurt add gentle cleansing and nourishing benefits)

1. Process the tomato in a food processor or blender. Strain it through some cheesecloth or a clean piece of muslin into a bowl and discard the pulp. Add an equal amount of yogurt to the juice and store in a covered container or bottle in the refrigerator.

2. Apply to the face and neck, using cotton pads or a soft cloth, once or twice a day. Leave on for 10 minutes, then rinse with water and pat dry.

This formula will keep for 2 days or so in the fridge.

Quick variation:

Smash one good-sized cherry tomato with the back of a spoon or wring it in a clean cloth to extract the juice. Mix juice with an equal amount of yogurt and use immediately. This is good for one treatment.

By Jasmin Malik Chua

Read more...

How Many Chemicals Are You Wearing?

Found on WebMD Blog - Wednesday, January 20, 2010 by Janelle Sorensen

A recent study in the UK found that the average woman wears over 500 chemicals on her body every day. Similar to the US, women douse themselves daily with perfume, moisturizer, lotion, and a wide variety of cosmetics that altogether contain hundreds of chemicals. Most of the women were completely oblivious to the number of chemicals they were putting on. Do you know how many you wear?

Take a moment to figure it out. Look at the labels of all of the products you use and count how many ingredients are listed. Then, add them all together.

Shampoo and conditioner = _______

Lotions and moisturizers = _______

Perfume or cologne = _______

Cosmetics = _______

Hair styling products = _______

Deodorant = _________

Other = ________

TOTAL = _______

Surprised? Most people are. But, don't take this number at face value. Here are some important points to consider:

Some of the ingredients may be present in several of your products, so your total number may not reflect the actual number of different chemicals you're exposed to.

"Fragrance" is considered a trade secret. So, manufacturers can use a wide variety of chemicals (sometimes over one hundred) to make up their signature scent, but they don't have to list them in the ingredients. Given this fact, the total number of chemicals you're wearing may be much larger than what you think it is.

All of the chemicals in personal care products are not bad, but there are a significant amount of commonly used ingredients that are especially risky to your health. Avoid products that contain: "parabens" (Methyl-, ethyl-, propyl- and butyl-parabens), coal tar colors (FD&C Blue 1, Green 3, Yellow 5 & 6; D&C Red 33), Diethanolamine (cocamide DEA, TEA and MEA are related ingredients that can be contaminated with DEA), Nonoxynol or nonylphenol ethoxylate, phthalates (can be listed as DEHP, DHP, or DBP5 or hidden in "fragrance"), DMDM hydantoin, triclosan, sodum lauryl and laureth sulfates, toluene, formaldehyde, PEGs, and anything with "glycol" or "methyl." Learn more about these chemicals and find safer products in the Environmental Working Group's Buying Guide and print a Healthy Shopping Pocket Guide, so you always have the information on hand.

It's hard to eliminate everything on this list, especially if you can't afford all the certified organic products. I've been trying to cut back and substitute in simpler, safer products for years, but I'm still wearing over 100 chemicals after my daily regimen (though, many of those chemicals are natural and only a couple of products I use contain anything listed above). I'm not perfect. I try to focus on switching what I can, using fewer products in general, using less of what I use, and even trying to make my own.

What's your regimen like? Are you willing to share how many chemicals you're wearing everyday?

Read more...

Thyme Oil Can Inhibit COX2 and Suppress Inflammation

ScienceDaily (Jan. 14, 2010) — For those who do not drink, researchers have found that six essential oils -from thyme, clove, rose, eucalyptus, fennel and bergamot -- can suppress the inflammatory COX-2 enzyme, in a manner similar to resveratrol, the chemical linked with the health benefits of red wine. They also identified that the chemical carvacrol was primarily responsible for this suppressive activity.

These findings, appearing in the January issue of Journal of Lipid Research, provide more understanding of the health benefits of many botanical oils and provide a new avenue for anti-inflammatory drugs.

Essential oils from plants have long been a component of home remedies, and even today are used for their aromatherapy, analgesic (e.g. cough drops), or antibacterial properties. Of course, the exact way they work is not completely understood. However, Hiroyasu Inoue and colleagues in Japan believed that many essential oils might target COX-2 much like compounds in wine and tea.

So, they screened a wide range of commercially available oils and identified six (thyme, clove, rose, eucalyptus, fennel and bergamot) that reduced COX-2 expression in cells by at least 25%. Of these, thyme oil proved the most active, reducing COX-2 levels by almost 75%.

When Inoue and colleagues analyzed thyme oil, they found that the major component -carvacrol- was the primary active agent; in fact when they use pure carvacrol extracts in their tests COX-2 levels decreased by over 80%.

Read more...