In the summer of 1989, when I was nine years old, I took a cooking class at famed Washington, D.C. culinary school L’Academie de Cuisine.

Maybe some kids were into it. Maybe some kids got into cooking as a result of the class. But I discovered a very important thing that summer: I was not destined to become a chef.

I really tried. But I was grossed out when we had to handle raw chicken. I failed to properly refrigerate a seafood salad (luckily, my mom, who ate it hours later, was totally fine!). I retained absolutely nothing about what knives to use for cutting up which foods. My limited palate did not expand at all for another 20 years. It wasn’t graded, but let’s just say I kind of flunked out of kid-culinary school.

Cut to my thirties, and I became completely obsessed with clean beauty, as you know, because I write this blog. My interest in food, however, is still quite simple. I mean, I’m human, and I eat it, but my summer at L’Acadamie really never turned into any kind of interest in cooking, advanced nutrition, or proficiency in food beyond the basics. And I certainly never saw the intersection of beauty products and food! How could something I love so much overlap with something about which I felt only “meh”?

I was introduced to The Beauty Chef shortly after the birth of my second child. I was exhausted from lack of sleep, depleted of all kinds of vitamins and minerals, and constantly dehydrated from breastfeeding. Let’s just say that my skin reflected alllll of that. The team at Integrity Botanicals sent me Beauty Chef’s Hydration Inner Beauty Boost and it was nothing short of revelatory. Something I ingested affected my skin?! What was this magic?

I know, I know, I definitely wasn’t paying attention that summer in cooking school. Apparently, the things we eat actually matter! (I’m kidding– don’t worry– I actually have a pretty good functional understanding of nutrition and science!) But when you’re busy and tired and stressed, it’s that much harder to get perfectly complete nutrition, especially nutrition targeted to your skin concerns. I started drinking the Hydration Inner Beauty Boost (which tases like coconut, by the way!) before my daily walks in Prospect Park, pushing my infant in the stroller after dropping my toddler off at preschool. And I seriously noticed a difference!

Shortly after that, my acupuncturist told me I needed more collagen, a protein that holds the whole body together, basically, as the main component of connective tissue. I checked, and, sure enough, The Beauty Chef had a Collagen Inner Beauty Boost, which has ingredients to support and boost collagen in your body. This time, it wasn’t just my skin that got better; my digestion improved, too! (Plus, it tastes like berries, which I truly love).

By this point, I was hooked. I started also using The Beauty Chef’s Glow Advanced Inner Beauty Powder! It has a nice, sweet berry taste, and like all of Beauty Chef’s products, it’s made with whole foods, biofermented ingredients, and contains probiotics, so it’s truly the drink-and-forget-about-it magic I never knew I needed.

I have been thinking about this time in my life a lot recently, because honestly, this part of the pandemic to me feels a lot like having a newborn and a toddler did. My kids are always home and need constant supervision/help. We can’t leave the house much, and when we actually do, it’s such an ordeal (masks, plans about how to safely find a bathroom, avoiding other people!). The whole pandemic reminds me of this time in my life when I was so depleted. And I’m sharing this in case you, too, are feeling depleted, and looking for a way to recharge without, you know, attending French cooking school and learning all about nutrition.

As if they realized we’d all need a little extra boost right about now — and, who are we kidding, they totally get it, because this is a global pandemic and we’re all feeling it–  The Beauty Chef team have recently updated several of their formulas! Three of the Beauty Boosts just got “super-charged” this past Fall, with added ingredients, plus they debuted a new product, the Adaptogen Beauty Boost to the lineup. (Read all the way to the end to find out how you can try the Adaptogen Beauty Boost for free!!) The Adaptogen Boost is what you want if you struggle with fatigue, tired-looking skin, and/or a ruddy complexion. Adaptogens are herbs like ashwagandha and holy basil that help the body adapt to all kinds of stress (physical, emotional, chemical, biological), just as the name suggests. Adaptogenic herbs have been used for centuries in Ayurvedic and Chinese medicine, and this blend also contains The Beauty Chef’s exclusive probiotic strain, Lactobacillus rhamnosus GUT5Y™, which contributes to digestive wellbeing and skin health.

If you have any kind of specific wellness concern, you should look at what The Beauty Chef has to offer (after consulting your doctor, of course!). In the past couple of years the brand has expanded to include something for everyone, from Gut Primer (a powder that supports and promotes a healthy digestive system) to Omega Elixir Inner Beauty Boost (which is vegan! and contains plant-based omega 3, 6, 7 and 9 oils from black cumin seed, chia seed and sea buckthorn fruit) to Well Spray Inner Beauty Support (an herbal, ingestible mouth spray to boost beauty, immunity, and digestion on the go!).

Since the pandemic started, I’ve personally gotten really into the Antioxidant Boost, which has a light strawberry flavor and is great for immunity. The Cleanse Inner Beauty Powder  just got reformulated to be supercharged, too, and the Sleep Inner Beauty Powder will be supercharged by summertime (but before then you can still grab what we have left of the original formula before we sell out). The Sleep Powder is another pandemic-life essential for me, as we know that more and better sleep helps fight off coronaviruses.

Perhaps my favorite thing to do with The Beauty Chef products is, ironically, to make food and drinks with them, just like they [never] taught me at L’Academie d’Cuisine! The Beauty Chef has all sorts of recipes up on their site, with ideas of how to use the products in smoothies, shakes, granola, muesli, etc. But my favorite, by far, is the list of mocktail recipes using their Beauty Boosts!!! I KNOW! It’s the best thing ever. Using some things you probably have at home, like seltzer or juice, and herbs to garnish, you can make gorgeous, healthy, super-fun mocktail drinks!!!

And the most important news: Integrity Botanicals is giving a free 100ml Adaptogen Beauty Boost with any Beauty Chef order, while supplies last, so you can try a mocktail yourself. Use the code: ADAPTOGEN, get your mocktail recipe ready, and prepare to feel amazing from the inside out. You know I’ll be raising my glass and drinking my mocktail with you, so “cheers,” friends, wherever you are. This past year has been a doozy, but it feels good to know we’re all in it together. Here’s to your health!