FRUIT POWERED BEAUTY

Nature’s sweet treat, fruit packs a powerful punch when it comes to helping us stay looking and feeling our best. Stacked with essential vitamins and minerals, eating a range of different colours is a great way to give yourself a daily inside out beauty treat. Here are four things that make fresh fruit a natural beauty hero…  

• VITAMIN A: Helps protect the skin against ageing UV rays; encourages smoother skin and nourishes nails and hair. Find it in… apricots, mangoes, cantaloupe melons

 

• VITAMIN C: A must-have anti-ageing vitamin that boosts collagen production to keep skin looking plump and youthful. Also helps our body to defend itself against disease and speeds up recovery. Find it in… guava, kiwi fruit, berries, citrus fruit

 

• PHYTONUTRIENTS:  These chemical compounds found mainly in plant based foods deliver a host of major beauty and health benefits. There are too many phytonutrients to mention, but the better known players are things like beta-carotenes (found in orange and yellow coloured fruit) and the flavonoids (in cherries, apples and rhubarb). They help protect against the effects of UV and so are powerhouses to prevent anti-ageing

 

• FIBRE: The fibre in fruit helps to keep our digestive system running smooth, helping to expel toxins. Fibre slows down the passage of food through our system so helps manage the rate at which the natural sugars that fruit contains enter the blood stream. The end result is a more stable energy release rather than a rapid high followed by a crash. That’s why fruit is best eaten whole when you can, rather than juiced (though juiced is better than nothing we say)

When it comes to finding ways to incorporate it into our diets, fruit is more versatile than we often think. Pair it with the right partners and it is just as happy in a salad or main course as it is in a dessert. Here are two of our favorite fruit-powered savoury dishes that are perfect for this month…  

1. PEACHES & PROSCIUTTO by refinery29.com

½ cup ricotta

1 cup rocket leaves,

2 peaches sliced into wedges

6 thin slices prosciutto

¼ raw, roughly chopped, skin-on almonds,

preferably Sicilian Aged balsamic vinegar to taste

Olive oil to taste

Maldon salt to taste

 

On a wide platter or plate, place three or four dollops of ricotta throughout. - Arrange the peach slices, leaning as many of them as possible on the mounds of ricotta. - Season each piece with a light sprinkle of maldon salt. - Tear the prosciutto slices into smaller pieces and scatter these torn pieces all over. - Scatter the arugula and almonds on top and drizzle with olive oil and balsamic to finish.  

Visit refinery28.com to see more summer salad ideas and tips on living life to the full        

2. RED ENDIVE, ORANGE & WATERCRESS SALAD by Peony Lim

2 Oranges

6 Small Pink Radishes

1 Red Endive

A salad bag of Watercress

¼ Beetroot (raw not picked or cooked)

Nut Oil

Thick Balsamic (or reduction with sugar)

 

Prepare all the elements first and then ensemble it on a platter. It’s super quick and easy: - Peel and segment the oranges. - Open Endive and trim ends. - Use a potato peeler (or a mandolin) to make super thin slices of radish and then beetroot. - To ensemble begin with the endive, then add the orange segments, then the radish and beetroot (which I like to curl into rolls), and finally the watercress over the top. - Drizzle balsamic reduction (or a super thick balsamic if you can get it) and nut oil over the top.

Visit Peony Lim's beautiful website to see this recipe and more      

(Lead image by kimberleyhasselbrink.com via pinterest)