The Best and Worst Foods For Your Skin

Scott: If you, speaking of diet, if you could list some of the best things, best foods for our skin, what would you put up there on that list?

Dr. Jeanette Jacknin: Well, first, pure water. Would be, we need a lot of water and a lot of times we think we're hungry but we're really just thirsty. Six to eight glasses of pure water a day and without all the added chemicals and toxins. And the second thing I would say would be Omega-3 fatty acids. They are very plentiful in cold water fish, salmon. Some people might not like salmon but there are other fish that have high in Omega-3 fatty acids.

And even though it's a fat it's a good fat. It's anti-inflammatory and it helps out skin have the right amount of moisture. And you should have a diet high in Omega-3 fatty acids as opposed to Omega-6. You're supposed to have six to one, ideally now what scientists now think, a six to one ratio. Omega-3 to Omega-6. And in this country because of all, most people eat, not everyone, but it's so easy to eat those good-tasting foods.

We actually have a diet of about 15 to 1 of the Omega-6s to the Omega-3. And that's a very inflammatory diet. And inflammation is the root cause, we think at this point, of aging of the skin, the cells, our whole body, a lot of the immune problems, cancer, heart disease. A lot of this comes from inflammation. And we hate to, we'd much rather blame our parents than not eat that good-tasting food with the fats that are not as good for you. 

Scott: So list a couple of those that are really bad for us.

Dr. Jeanette Jacknin: Margarine has a trans. And then just the processed foods that have a lot of margarine and preservatives. Regular vegetable oils instead of, olive oil is great or whole flax seed oil is wonderful. Coconut oil is supposed to also help with lowering blood sugar and diabetes. 

And so those three are very good. Olive oil, and the cold-pressed flax oil and coconut oil. And if you have eczema or psoriasis, the evening primrose oil is excellent. And some other cold-pressed oils can be very good. But definitely not the margarine or Crisco or any of that.