Chocolate helps your skin stay young - but lentils will make you look older

Think the secret to radiant skin is avoiding fry-ups, chocolate and alcohol? According to a new book, you are in for a big shock.

Dermatologist Dr Stefanie Williams's Future Proof Your Skin claims certain fatty foods and chocolate can be beneficial to your looks - while lentils and brown rice are no-no's. Even tequila may not be as bad as you think. 

While these suggestions may fly in the face of received wisdom about skincare, Dr Williams is an expert in her field - and every point in her book is backed by recent medical research. 

Here, we reveal the very surprising secrets to eating your way to youthful skin . . .  

AVOID SUGAR AND HONEY   

Sugars such as glucose and fructose (found in fruit) react with the collagen in our skin in a process called glycation. 

This makes it brittle and accelerates ageing: one study has found that people with higher blood-sugar levels tend to look older than those with lower blood-sugar levels. Eating sugar also causes the release of the hormone insulin, a key ageing hormone. So the less sugar we eat, the better. 

Don't make the mistake of thinking natural sweeteners like honey or agave syrup are better for you than sugar - they also cause glycation. 

You also shouldn't gorge on sugary fruits (tropical fruits are very bad) or fruit juice.  

DITCH BROWN RICE

Most people believe a diet rich in grains is good for health, particularly wholegrains such as brown rice and porridge. 

But starch, the carbohydrate in grains, is simply long strings of sugar molecules that our body breaks down to use as fuel. Most starches are broken down at a slower rate than sugar, but eating them will still make our skin and body age prematurely. 

White or brown rice is high in carbohydrates, so it is not a good base for a meal - and that rule applies to pasta and bread, too. 

Instead of rice, use grated raw cauliflower, briefly fried in olive oil. 

STEER CLEAR OF LENTILS 

Lentils have a super-healthy reputation but, like grains, they are high in carbohydrates and also contain natural toxins. 

Dr Williams doesn't object to lentils - nor to beans and peas, which are similar - as much as she does to sugar and grains, but there are better and more nutritious carbs to eat instead, such as vegetables, sweet potatoes, yams and squash.

 

THE PERILS OF PARSNIPS

You should eat a large variety of vegetables of different colours, as all contain different antioxidants, which are great for your health.

In general, the darker green the vegetables, the better, so Dr Williams highly recommends broccoli and kale as they are full of natural plant chemicals that have been shown to be beneficial to the skin. However, don't eat too many starchy root vegetables, such as parsnips and turnips, as they can raise your blood sugar faster than table sugar. 

Boiling rather than roasting them helps to some extent, as they take longer to break down in your body, slowing the release of sugar.  

 

EAT MORE FAT

One of the crucial things we need to eat is fat. Fear not, this won't make you gain weight - according to the latest studies, it is carbohydrates that make us fat and age our skin. Conversely, fats make up a vital part of the cell walls throughout our body. 

Studies have shown eating more fat makes our skin more elastic and less wrinkly. 

 

SATURATED FATS, TOO

Monounsaturated fats such as olive oil and macadamia nut oil are known to be good for us, but we are urged to shun saturated fats.  

Yet these are a crucial to our diet. Are they bad for heart health? No. Scientists recently found 'there is no significant evidence for concluding dietary saturated fat is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease'. 

Dr Williams is a big fan of coconut fat, which contains more than 90 per cent saturated fatty acids. Nor is butter, also rich in saturated fat, as bad as is often thought. 

Sugar has been linked to a much greater risk of cardiovascular disease than saturated fat. She is not saying gorge on dripping, but don't stress about saturated fat.

CHOLESTEROL IS KEY

Our bodies need cholesterol to make hormones like oestrogen and testosterone, as well as vitamin D. 

Cholesterol is a vital component of our skin, too. Only a small part of the cholesterol in our blood comes from food - our body makes the majority itself. 

And it is only a certain type of cholesterol in our blood, called 'small, dense LDL' that is the problem - and that's driven up by carb-rich meals. So don't fret about foods that are high in cholesterol, and enjoy eggs.

 

SKIP MEALS

No doubt your mother encouraged you to keep regular meal-times. 

But our ancestors ate whenever food was available, which wasn't as predictable as now. Our genes haven't changed much since. 

Irregular meal times keep your body guessing when food is going to arrive. This makes your body repair cells rather than madly make new ones. 

 

DON'T BE A COW!

We are sometimes advised to graze on up to eight small meals a day to keep sugar levels steady. But doing that will keep sugar levels high all day, which makes our skin and body age faster. 

To keep blood sugar and insulin levels low, avoid grazing like a cow. 

 

STARVE TWICE A WEEK

Occasional fasting is the best-kept anti-ageing secret. The way Dr Williams finds most practical is to fast for 24 hours twice each week. It makes your body more sensitive to insulin levels. 

It also makes you produce more human growth hormone, stimulating collagen synthesis in skin. 

 

CUT OUT SWEETENERS

Zero calorie artificial sweeteners can trick our brain into thinking sugar has been consumed, so your body produces insulin when none is needed. When this happens, insulin removes glucose from the blood, leaving you with low blood sugar, which leads to cravings for more sugar or other carbs.

Artificial sweeteners have also been linked to diabetes. 

 

TEQUILAS ALL ROUND! 

If you want to treat yourself to an occasional alcoholic drink, Dr Williams recommends a dry red wine because it's low in sugar and contains the anti-ageing 'miracle' compound resveratrol. 

If you need something stronger, a high-quality tequila (mixed with a little lime and water) is better than sugary cocktails because it has less impact on your blood sugar level. But alcohol should, of course, be kept to a minimum.

 

MILK IS A NO-NO

Milk raises our insulin level much more than expected looking at its sugar content. So use unsweetened almond or coconut milk instead. 

Fermented dairy products, such as yogurt or cheese, are less of a problem, but make sure to eat full-fat versions. 

 

BLUEBERRIES FOR BREKKIE

For Dr Williams, one of the trickiest adjustments to make when she began to 'Future Proof' her diet was breakfast. She says she can't stomach something savoury such as fish with steamed vegetables for breakfast. But she likes scrambled eggs with blueberries. 

Blueberries are low in sugar and make the eggs less savoury, but be sure to add them at the very end, otherwise they become all mushy. 

 

AND YOU CAN EAT CHOCs! 

No, you can't get away with eating cheap, sugary milk chocolate bars, but high-quality unsweetened cocoa is high in antioxidants called cocoa flavanols, which can be good for our skin. 

One study has shown regular consumption of chocolate rich in flavanols can protect our skin from harmful UV rays.

Source: Dailymail.co.uk