The Nutrients Your Skin Needs Now

Eat It or Wear It?

Wondering whether it's more effective to follow a gorgeous-skin diet or apply nutrient-rich products? Experts agree that you need both (and all these foods protect your health in other important ways), but a cream may offer a quicker fix. "You're generally going to get a higher concentration of a nutrient's properties by applying it directly to your skin," explains David McDaniel, MD, an assistant professor of clinical dermatology and plastic surgery at Eastern Virginia Medical School. Here, five to try:

1. For Selenium Burt's Bees Rich and Repairing Cocoa Butter & Macadamia Nut Body Butter, $12.99, CVS stores
2. For Vitamin C Bliss Triple Oxygen Instant Energizing Mask, $52, blissworld.com
3. For Flavonoids Shea Terra Organics Dark Chocolate Cocoa Bean Shea Sugar Scrub, $25, sheaterraorganics.com
4. For Polyphenols Davi Women's Vine Fresh SPF30 Lotion, $48.50, bergdorfgoodman.com
5. For Ellagic Acid Red Water 24 Hour Balancing Face Cream with pomegranate extract, $30, europeanbeautycollection.com

Originally published in FITNESS magazine, January 2007.