I haven't felt this particular frisson of excitement since I wrote about a home-made body scrub I whipped up more than two years ago. :-) That sometimes we find the best beauty products in our very own kitchen is a truth my subconscious mind is well aware of, but my conscious brain does need a reminder every now and then.

You know how it is in winter: dry, flaky skin, your body itches the more you scratch it (there was absolutely no innuendo intended here), and you oftentimes wish you could just be like a snake and shed it... The cold, the absolute lack of humidity in the air, the heating: none of these are particularly beneficial to your skin. So what do you do then? Yeah, you slather your epidermis* with body lotion after you get out of the shower, except when you don't/won't, because despite the fact that you've been heating the bathroom for hours, it still feels more like a Nordic Viking's idea of hell than a proper bathroom.

* I totally ran out of options here... I mean I can't say "skin" five times in a paragraph, now can I? Even if English is more forgiving about it than Hungarian.

Finally you just get fed up, and decide to raid your kitchen in the hopes of finding some remedy to your skin's atrocious condition. You get creative and you concoct the perfect solution to your predicament.

Voilà. Binary Star Studios present Izar's Inexpensive and Invigorating Body Scrub that, despite being just a simple body scrub, will put an end to all your skin troubles at once.

• Take a (clean!) vessel of any kind. It can be a simple cup or, if you wish to make a bigger batch at a time and store the leftovers for future use, a glass jar.
  
  
• Fill your cup with sugar and add a spoonful of olive oil. Mix the two until the oil coats the the sugar thoroughly.
  
  
• Add a teaspoonful of ground coffee and a teaspoonful of cinnamon powder. Mix well with the sugar. (I used my Dad's precious Arabica blend, but what he doesn't know won't get me in trouble, right? :-D)
  
  
• Add a drop of sweet-orange essential oil or, if you're lucky like me and are in the possession of Alverde's Blood Orange and Maracuja Body Oil, then add a teaspoonful of that.
  
  
• Now take some time and mix the whole thing as thoroughly as you can. When you deem your body scrub to be ready, just march into your bathroom, take a shower and then go over your whole body with this deliciously scented scrub, then rinse.
  
  
• When you're done, marvel at your brand new skin that doesn't itch, isn't dry and flaky, smells like a confectionery and is smooth and conditioned thanks to the oils in the scrub.
  

If you don't really like the scent of coffee, you can leave it out or use less, but I really do encourage you to use it as it adds some extra, non-melting scrubby bits to the mix. Then again, because the sugar is coated in oil, it melts much-much slower than it would otherwise.

Keep in mind though that this stuff is not for the faint of heart: it does have a very intense smell and is pretty rough on your body, but it does wonders to skin that's been tortured by winter weather. You can store it in an airtight jar in your fridge, just make sure you don't contaminate it:

Don't scoop it out with your wet hands! Water will make the sugar melt, not to mention provide a great breeding ground for germs. Use a small spoon for that purpose, one you can even store in the jar if you want.

Well, that's it! Of course, you can get creative too and come up with all sorts of variations for this: you can change the base and use something more gentle, like ground almonds or walnuts, or you can add different spices to the mix, or leave everything as it is, except use less coffee and add some cocoa-powder. Just try not to use anything that has water in it: you really don't want to end up with a jarful of totally useless sugar syrup, now do you? ;-)

Good luck, and if you have your own home-made wonder-products, do share them with us!  

After having so much success with olive oil, I decided to use it on my body too. I concocted a delicious body scrub made up of ingredients that anyone may find in their kitchen.

Sweet And Rich Body Scrub:

- 4 spoonfuls of sugar

- 4 spoonfuls of extra virgin olive oil

- 1 teaspoonful of honey

- 1 teaspoonful of cocoa powder (just to make it even more yummy)

Mix the ingredients in a bowl and apply after showering.

Actually, what I did was put the ingredients into the bowl, take it into the bathroom with me, and just before using it, I mixed the ingredients with my hand 'cause I didn't have a plastic spoon at home, and I didn't want to use a metal one.

This is a really effective scrub, as it has one of Nature's the most beneficial oils in it, and also contains honey, which hydrates the skin, and sugar, which is an excellent polisher. Come to think of it, the added cocoa powder is not just there for the fun: cocoa poweder is said to have a very good effect on skin, it contains vitamins and minerals which are essential for a healthy complexion.

Have fun scrubbing!