Something in my brain doesn’t collate well with paying 10 bucks for a small tin of that fancy scrub stuff that you get, which is full of fake chemicals and fragrances and usually made with salt, which irritates my skin should have I cut or a hangnail. (I have cats, so surface wounds on my skin aren’t uncommon.) Last year, I decided to experiment with my own sugar scrubs, which exfoliate just as well as salt scrubs and don’t rub salt in your wounds, literally.
Making a sugar scrub is incredibly easy. The most basic components are oil, sugar, and a jar to keep it in. Adding scents to your bath scrub–well, as long as you don’t use anything highly perishable (like fresh fruit), the possibilities are endless. I’ve added citrus peel, hardy herbs, dried herbs–I am thinking about doing a chocolate version and seeing how that works out. Maybe chocolate and freshly ground coffee, for some extra exfoliating power. Finely ground nuts also make a great exfoliant.
To make, measure sugar in the jar that you want to use to store the scrub in. I’d probably only fill it about 3/4 of the way, because you don’t want scrub oozing out everywhere! You can mix it in the jar or in a big bowl, but I find using a bowl helps everything get evenly distributed. If you are adding extra ‘dry’ ingredients, like ground coffee or nuts, make sure that the total amount of sugar and dry ingredients comes to about 3/4 of the way up the jar. Remove the sugar and other dry ingredients to a separate bowl.
Add your dry scent ingredients–cocoa powder, dried herbs, citrus zest, whatever your imagination can think of that isn’t highly perishable. Toss it around in the dry ingredients, and then add enough oil to get the moisture content that you like. I like my scrubs slightly on the dry side–I always feel like there is an excess of oil in the commercial ones. If you like yours wetter, use more oil As to what kind of oil you use, that is truly up to you. Some oils are better for the skin than others. Olive oil (doesn’t have to be extra-virgin) is great for the skin; find other oils that are good for the skin here. If you’re looking for an inexpensive oil, peanut oil would be a great choice and is universally good (well, that site says “adequate”–but since we’re not making a remedy mixture, peanut oil would be a good choice) for most skin types. If you have a specific skin care issue you want to address, check out that link for other skin type/oil matches.
Mix and transfer back to your jar–vóilà! Sugar scrub in a reusable jar that cost you a fraction of the price of the chemical-filled stuff you buy at the store, and it’s all-natural! (You could even eat it, but I imagine it wouldn’t taste very good . . .)
