The Secret of Strawberries – The Beauty Berry
Strawberries not just satisfy your taste-buds, they are proven beauty enhancers that can work wonders for your skin. Strawberry extracts are often used in beauty products of leading brands. Apart from consumption, it can be used on your skin as a body scrub, body butter, facial mask, facial scrub or toner to give you a glowing skin.
Some of its benefits for skin are as follows.
1. Excellent Skin Cleanser: Strawberry has great cleansing properties. Strawberry extracts are often used as an ingredient in skin cleansers, face washes, refreshing bubble baths and rejuvenating facemasks as they contain vitamin C, salicylic acid, antioxidants and exfoliants.
Salicylic acid removes dead cells from the face while tightening the pores. Ellagic acid being an antioxidant combats skin damage to maintain its youth and freshness. Thus, strawberries remove impurities and soften the skin as well as soothe allergies and other irritants and provide protection against pollution.
2. Improves Complexion: Strawberry juice has skin lightening properties. It is effective in removing age spots and freckles. You can squeeze the fruit to extract its juice and place it in a small cup. Apply the juice all over your face with a cotton ball and rinse off with lukewarm water after 10 to 15 minutes to get a glowing complexion.
3. Skin Toner: Strawberry can be used as a skin toner. Grind the strawberries to extract the juice. Mix two teaspoons of strawberry juice with 50 ml of rose water and refrigerate it. You can apply it instead of your regular skin toner to achieve wrinkle free, blemish free and younger looking skin. This juice can be stored up to 10 days.
4. Protection from Ultraviolet Radiation:Strawberry contains ellagic acid which, when applied topically protects the skin against the sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays, which are primarily responsible for skin aging.
5. Anti-aging Properties:Vitamin C and other antioxidants present in strawberries prevent damage caused by free radicals to the skin and body. Free radicals occur during the process of transformation of food into energy. Free radicals accelerate the ageing process and vitamin C is effective in blocking the damage caused by free radicals. You can prepare an anti-aging face pack by mixing a teaspoon of honey and 2 teaspoons of milk cream with mashed strawberries. Apply this pack all over your face and neck and leave for 20 minutes. Wash off with clean water and pat dry. Since strawberry has anti-aging properties, this pack can be quite suitable for mature skin by rejuvenating it as well as minimizing pores and lines to give you a younger looking skin.
6. Treatment of Acne:Vitamin C, Alpha Hydroxy Acids (AHAs), salicylic acid and flavonoids in strawberries help in clearing acne and reducing oil. Thus, strawberry is a common ingredient in commercial anti-acne products and moisturizers. Fresh strawberry masks are effective for people with dull, damaged or acne-prone skin. If you are suffering from acne, mash 7 to 8 strawberries and add 1 tablespoon of milk to the mash. Apply this mixture on your face and rinse after 10 to 12 minutes. This strawberry treatment should be done at least twice a week to get rid of acne naturally.
7. Diminishes Under-eye Puffiness:Being astringent in nature strawberries can reduce puffiness and circles beneath the eyes. For this purpose, cut a strawberry into thin slices. Lying in a cool place, put the strawberry slices under your eyes and relax for 10 to 12 minutes. Wash your face with cold water and moisturize it gently.
8. Treatment of Pigmentation:Being rich in ellagic acid, oral ingestion of strawberry extract can cure slight hyper pigmentation caused by UV rays by inhibiting the synthesis of melanin, the chemical that gives the skin its color.
9. Skin Repair:Vitamin C in strawberries enables the body to grow and repair its tissues as it is involved in making collagen, an important protein needed by the skin and other parts of the body and helps heal wounds more quickly. Being water soluble, this vitamin cannot be stored in the body and has to be provided from food sources. A cup of strawberry provides 100% of Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) of vitamin C that plays a vital role in repairing skin damage.
10. Effective Foot Scrub:Strawberries can be effective in giving you soft and crack free feet. You can prepare a strawberry foot scrub by mashing 6 to 8 strawberries and mixing them with few drops of glycerin and grounded oats. Soak your feet in warm water for 10 minutes. After taking them out, scrub gently with this mixture to exfoliate dead cells and rough skin. Wash off with clean cold water and moisturize your feet with any cold cream or foot cream