According to Heather Hanks, a nutritionist with Life Insurance Star, it's important to ensure your smoothies contain antioxidants from fruits and veggies. Blackberries and blueberries top the list of antioxidant-rich berries, but you can mix fruity flavors depending on your mood. These antioxidants will help reduce inflammation and free radical damage, which contributes to skin aging, wrinkles and dark spots.
Not only are fruits great for antioxidants, but they also contain vitamin C. "Vitamin C is required for collagen synthesis to help your body naturally produce more collagen on its own. This is important because collagen naturally decreases with age," Heather says.
The most abundant protein in your body, collagen plays a major role in strengthening skin, and may benefit elasticity and hydration too. In good news for anyone wishing they could turn back the clock, there are things you can do to naturally increase the collagen production in your skin!
For an easy skin-boosting smoothie recipe, try the following:
- 1 cup unsweetened coconut or almond milk (you can also use purified water)
- 1 cup fresh spinach
- 1/2 avocado (can also use a frozen banana)
- 1 cup frozen berries
- 1 teaspoon turmeric and fresh squeezed lemon juice
- 1 scoop grass-fed collagen powder
- 1-2 teaspoons coconut oil
- Pinch of sea salt
Overall, including more fruits and veggies in your diet is one of the best ways to maintain tighter, younger-looking skin. But because many of us don't consume the daily recommended allowance of fruits owing to our busy schedules, smoothies like the above recipe are a quick (and yummy) fix.
Remember, you can add other foods with anti-aging properties like Greek yogurt to get even more benefits. The best way to get into a good habit of making smoothies is to try out different recipes and determine which ingredients work best for you and your skin needs.
As another example, we recommend you try this blueberry anti-aging smoothie, which helps fight wrinkles. Happy experimenting!