We know that what we eat directly affects our health. It is what Hippocrates taught his medical students nearly 2,500 years ago. Fast-forward to September this year, and the FrostFrench fashion show in London, where the guru Nishi Joshi launched his new range of Feel Great foods to his celebrity followers. “These foods are fantastic for your health, but they also make you look and feel good,” he says. “It’s a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy — achieve one and the other will follow.” So convinced is Sadie Frost of Joshi’s philosophy that she has lent her name to his Feel Great range. These foods are, thankfully, less about the hair-shirt approach of pumpkin seeds and alfalfa sprouts and more about seductive products, such as the Feel Great Cranberry Muffins. These contain no additives, wheat, dairy or sugar, and, remarkably, they manage to taste nice, too.
Frost and Joshi are not alone: cosmetics companies are starting to recognise the value of nurturing the “look good, feel good” philosophy and are beginning to create edible beauty products as an extension of existing brands. Imagine stocking up on sachets of chocolate drink at the same time as buying a cocoa-based body butter. Well, now you can. The theory behind this seemingly decadent route to beauty lies in harnessing the extraordinary antioxidant quality of chocolate, both through consumption and external application. Sensory Therapy Hot Chocolate has been developed by Estée Lauder Origins and contains antioxidant flavonoids and polyphenols, which work from the inside to zap free radicals, a big factor in ageing skin. In fact, it has double the amount of the supernutrients found in green tea. Furthermore, according to Origins, the copper and iron in cocoa improve circulation, so more oxygen and nutrients can get to — and feed — the skin. Its complement in the body range is Cocoa Therapy Deeply Nourishing Body Butter, which also supplies these beautifying antioxidants from the outside in.
You can probably follow the logic so far, although you may be thinking that it would be just as easy to pop a few antioxidant and mineral supplements from the health-food store. But where’s the feelgood element in that? As Lieve DeClercq, the Origins executive manager of biological research, explains: “Natural food ingredients with an aroma such as chocolate have a high hedonics value that stimulates the limbic part of the brain and promotes feelings of happiness, comfort and security. The body responds physiologically to this stimulus by lifting your mood, which, in turn, reduces muscle tension and stress.” And, as we are all aware, muscle tension and stress are two big skin wrinklers.
If you cannot imagine consuming chocolate as part of your beauty routine, you may feel more at home in a Tokyo department store where Coca-Cola has joined forces with Shiseido, Japan’s best-known cosmetics company, to create a drink, Aroma Works Body Style Water, and a body spray, Body Stylish Mist. Based on the principles of aromatherapy, both contain the same ingredients, but their functions differ, depending on whether they are ingested or applied externally. For example, there are seaweed extracts and caffeine in both. In the drink, the seaweed extracts added to the grapefruit-flavoured water help take the edge off hunger, while the caffeine is said to speed up metabolism. In the body spray, however, the seaweed extracts help give the skin a toned appearance, while the caffeine penetrates it, enters the fat cells and helps them release their fatty content — a real “cosmeceutical” double act if ever there was one. There are no immediate plans for launching here in the UK, but we are ready and waiting.
Horst Rechelbacher, the creator of Aveda who now heads his own company, Intelligent Nutrients (currently available from www.intelligentnutrients.com, and in America), is convinced of the benefits of the beauty industry’s move towards dual-action products that make you look as well as feel good. “We need beauty products that we can both eat and apply to get their full effects,” he says. “I believe that we should not put anything on our bodies that we cannot eat. I feel like a modern-day alchemist, mixing wonderful essential substances into water and chocolate to fulfil these functions.” Also on sale in America (from www.fredsegalbeauty.com) are Borba Skin Balance waters. They come in three varieties: the Clarifying Water is said to help clear breakouts and clogged pores; the Age Defying Water is for softening fine lines and wrinkles; and the Replenishing Water helps keep skin moist.
Meanwhile, you could try Dr Hauschka’s drinkable syrups, which are made from cold-pressed flowers, fruits and spring water. The Delicious Siliceous with pollen syrup has been specifically created to improve dry skin and boost its elasticity, as well as improve brittle hair and nails. It contains the trace mineral silicon, which is certainly capable of such effects.
Elizabeth King, the principal of the Dr Hauschka training school, says: “The skin is a reflection of what’s going on inside. Trouble with digestion, hormone imbalances and emotional stress are usually expressed in the skin through signs of sensitivity, inflammation and congestion. An out-of-balance skin needs both internal and external assistance.”
It is sad but true that, with a celebrity endorsement, a luxurious box and an on-pack message boasting of antioxidant flavonoids and naturally calming aromas, Space NK or the like could probably turn something as simple as an apple into much more than a healthy snack — after all, beauty foods are as much about marketing as substance. If food companies were to wise up, they could easily begin marketing their own brands as beauty foods.
Take Night Time Milk, for example. It is naturally rich in the sleep-inducing hormone melatonin, so a mug before bed can help us get a better night’s kip, and we all know the benefits this has on our skin and our general sense of wellbeing. A small change in name to Beauty-Sleep Milk, and you could imagine it being sold in a designer chrome cooler next to the Lancôme counter.
Or, consider Columbus eggs. Naturally rich in omega-3 oils, these are currently being promoted as beneficial to the heart. But, as the dermatologist Nicholas Perricone, author of The Wrinkle Cure, tells us, omega-3s also have great anti-ageing properties. So, if you suddenly see Columbus Anti-Wrinkle Eggs, remember — you read it here first.
