Your skin is your largest organ, and it plays a vital role in protecting you from the outside world as well as helping you retain moisture and storing nutrients your body needs for maintaining health. Every day, your skin protects your internal system from harmful bacteria, UV rays, and other environmental stressors that can cause illness and infections.
What you eat and drink can greatly affect the overall condition and look of your skin. For example, consuming refined sugar can cause skin conditions like eczema or acne. Sugar has also been linked to an increased glycation burden in the body, which leads to accelerated aging of the skin.
To keep your skin feeling great, looking great, and functioning at an optimum level, it needs an array of nutrients: Vitamin E, Vitamin C, Biotin, Omega-3, and collagen.
For each nutrient below, there is a list of foods that are high in these vitamins and minerals to provide you with a starting point as you work to improve your skin health.
Vitamin E
Vitamin E is one of the main vitamins that aids in the regeneration of skin cells, making your skin look and feel healthier. Leafy greens, oils, Atlantic salmon, almonds, steamed sweet potatoes, red bell peppers (raw), avocados, and sunflower seeds are excellent sources of vitamin E.
Vitamin C
This vitamin is rich in antioxidants and helps restore vibrancy and elasticity to your skin. Cooking vitamin C-rich foods causes them to lose nutrients, so it is best to consume vitamin C-rich foods in their raw state to get the most benefit. Guava, grapefruit, oranges, Broccoli, pineapple, cauliflower, strawberries, sweet red peppers (raw), tomato juice, and orange juice are all foods high in vitamin C and taste great eaten raw.
Biotin
Biotin—or vitamin B7—is a complex B vitamin that helps your skin regenerate and heal faster. Biotin is one vitamin that one would rarely be deficient in as most of the foods we eat every day contain more than enough for our needs: avocados, mushrooms, legumes such as beans and peas, bananas, broccoli, and eggs to name a few.
Collagen
Collagen comes from protein and helps reduce wrinkles and keeps your skin hydrated. Collagen is primarily found in animal products such as poultry, eggs, fish, beef, and pork. If your diet leans more towards vegetarian or vegan, your best source of collagen would be to get a collagen supplement or eat foods that are rich in zinc, copper, and vitamin C to give your body the nutrients it needs to make its collagen.
Omega-3 fatty acids
Omega-3 fatty acids are essential fats that play a role in maintaining the integrity of cell membranes, helping to reduce inflammation and keeping your skin hydrated. Salmon, tuna, mackerel, walnuts, flaxseed oil, chia seeds, and hemp seeds are all excellent sources of omega-three fatty acids.
Beverages with these nutrients
Fresh-pressed juices made from a combination of some of the produce listed here are an easy way to consume enough nutrients for keeping beautiful healthy skin.
Smoothies are also a great way to combine produce you like and has the nutrients you need for healthy skin.
Don’t forget to drink plenty of water! Water is always necessary for keeping your skin healthy and hydrated. If you struggle to drink enough water, infuse it with some fresh citrus or other fruits for an appealing flavor.