Get out your spatula and your mixing bowl.. it’s time to cook up some beauty.

So, you say that your skin is dull? Dry? Needs a pick me up? Needs some serious — but gentle! — exfoliation? Don’t run out to the drugstore and shell out $12 just yet. Most likely, you have everything you need for an effective, gentle, natural (not to mention tasty) face and body scrub right in your kitchen.

I have been making this scrub for years, and I use it about once a week. It’s gentle enough to use on your face, but effective enough to use on your entire body. I find that it works especially well on areas you shave and wax, to help exfoliate and cut down on the risk of ingrown hairs. It also works perfectly for step one in an at-home mani/pedi. So scrub away!

This scrub contains three simple ingredients.

• SUGAR: A natural, gentle exfoliant that scrubs skin clean and smooth, and melts away in a hot shower. Sugar produces glycolic acid — a natural alpha hydroxy acid — that is great for your skin.
  
  

• HONEY: Not only does honey help hold the scrub into a pliable paste form, it is a natural antioxidant with anti-microbial properties. It also helps draw moisture into the skin and retain it.
  
  

• MILK: Milk softens the skin and will also help balance the skin’s pH. Goat’s milk is a wonderful, rich additive to any skincare recipe, but your regular ol’ cow’s milk works great too! (That’s what I usually use!)
  

Combine two parts sugar with one part honey and one part milk. Mix well and use immediately. Discard leftovers.

Easy as pie, and almost as tasty! You can make as little or as much as you need. I use teaspoon measurements for a quick, small batch of facial scrub, and just add more if I need to exfoliate all over. And remember, you can experiment with ingredients from around your kitchen to add even more oomph for a custom scrub that’s as tasty as you are.

So go forth and exfoliate, but try not to eat the beauty treatment, okay?