Grocery Grooming: Coconut Oil

*The new feature "Grocery Grooming" will be replacing Garden Review this week. Back to our regularly scheduled programming next week.

As I look at my (ridiculous amount of) skincare items, I have noticed that more and more the items that fill the shelves come from the grocery store. So every other or week or so I will be featuring a grocery store item that I use in my routine.

This week's product is one I have been raving about on Twitter: Coconut oil. Coconut oil is an inexpensive product that can be found in most health food stores and many grocery stores. Interestingly, it is a solid at room temperature (this is due to the high amount of saturated fats). However, it is easily liquified by being run under warm water or applied directly to the skin.

I bought coconut oil months ago to use as a moisturizer. I dream about a grocery grooming exclusive skincare rountine and I was expecting coconut oil to be the answer to all of my prayers. (This is not as true now that I have discovered Garden of Wisdom.) I got a little ambitious one first testing this out and my finicky skin was not happy. I used it as a face wash and a moisturizer morning and night when I first got it. Needless to say, my skin was not having it and it resulted in a few breakouts which caused me to worry I was torturing my skin and so I quit completely. This may explain why I have so many skincare items...

Please excuse the odd picture. This is coconut oil in both a solid and liquid form.

I forgot about the coconut oil until a few months later when my skin was in dire need of hydration. This time, I approached it a little more slowly, first using it only as a moisturizer at night and then increasing my usage. Coconut oil feels great, smells like summer and leaves my skin bright, hydrated and plump. I was so happy with my results that I used it as a hair mask next. I saturated my dry hair with the oil (which takes quite a bit) and slept with a shower cap on it. I had to shampoo twice in the morning, but it gave my moisturized hair and it had released some of the weight of my hair, giving me a natural curl I didn't even know I had. A week later, I could tell that the effects had worn off at my hair was much less manageable. I even gave some to my mom when she had an allergic reaction to some Vietnamese food, resulting in a skin rash.

Coconut oil is often used in cooking. I have not experimented with this much, but I tried it spread on toast and it was surprisingly good. My next experiment will be using coconut oil for weight loss. There is a lot of varying opinions about whether coconut oil is healthy, so you be the judge from your own research, but I have read many accounts of weight loss from a tablespoon of coconut oil every morning so I will be starting that soon. For now, my skin and hair are happy and hydrated.

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