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I first found out about The Beauty Detox Solution through the writer – Kimberly Snyder’s, blog. I had enjoyed some of her posts and was quite intrigued to find out more about her ‘solution’, especially as a couple of months ago I was feeling a bit ‘meh’ about my appearance.

Kimberly developed much of her nutritional approach from things she picked up while travelling the world. While in Australia she met a holistic nutritionist who helped her over come her muffin top and bad skin and helped her to find her glow. More travelling around Asia and Africa gave her even more knowledge of the affects of diet on the body, skin and hair. On her return to the States she started a small beauty company and became a certified nutritionist. She started her website and blog and started working with private clients, eventually including some celebrities. As well as continuing to work with private clients she now also goes on location on movie sets.

The book is set out with several chapters looking at the fundamental theories behind her approach. She starts by looking at the science behind the diet and argues that this approach is more in line with how we are naturally designed to eat than the Standard American Diet. She goes on to discuss the theories of alkalinity and acidity in the diet, the benefits of raw food, enzymes and minerals, proper food combining and introduces the beauty food circle – 80% fruit and veggies and 20% protein, carbs, starches and fats.

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The Beauty Detox Solution is a high raw, vegan diet (although she does include diary and fish options in some of the plans) very high in fruits, veggies (green veggies in particular) and a small amount of particular alkaline grains (quinoa, oat groats and millet), fats, proteins and starches. All must be eaten in a properly combined way to facilitate the best possible digestion which Kimberly argues will improve the skin, hair and nails and help you to achieve your perfect weight.

Foods should be eaten ‘light to heavy’ both throughout the day and within each meal. She suggests that breakfast should be the smallest meal of the day with each meal getting progressively heavier. Faster digesting foods such as fruit and vegetables should be eaten first followed by carbs or protein (which shouldn’t be eaten together in the same meal).

She offers 3 phases of diet – Blossoming Beauty, Radiant Beauty and True Beauty, each becoming more ‘restrictive’ or depending upon how you chose to view it, ‘focused’  as you progress. Each stage includes a sample one week menu.

The book finishes with a chapter of ‘Beauty Recipes’ including her glowing green smoothie, glowing green juice, several salads, dressings, main meals, smoothies and desserts.

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The book is very similar in terms of its basis as Crazy Sexy Diet, and to some extent The Thrive Diet.

I found the book a very interesting read as I felt that it went into a lot more detail on certain theories like food combining than CSD did. Kimberly’s writing style is also nice and friendly, although she advocates a vegan diet, she is flexible enough to allow some of the phases to include small amounts of animal products. The rest of the plan however, is very rigid and in many ways more so than the 21 day detox in CSD.

Although I enjoyed reading more about food combining and understand the basis behind it, its certainly something I would struggle with long term – I mean what would life be without a peanut butter sandwich or hummus wrap? I think I would also struggle with eating so lightly at breakfast, I almost always wake up with an appetite that a green juice alone would not satisfy.

As I have found with other similar books, the plans suggested don’t seem to accommodate very physically active people (apart from The Thrive Diet of course). There’s no way that the amount of food would sustain me! I would also find the food combining rules difficult to follow post workout as I always like to eat something with both carbs and protein for recovery.

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What I have taken from the book is a much improved understanding of the digestive process, the benefits of eating more raw food and why optimising digestion, and therefore the absorption of vitamins and minerals, is key in promoting beautiful skin and hair. I also really enjoyed the recipes, the glowing green smoothie is very similar to my usual green smoothies and I will definitely be trying to make my own sauerkraut using Kimberly’s Probiotic and Enzyme Salad.  There’s also a lovely sounding recipe for a raw cauliflower soup and a raw pecan pie!

Since buying the book a few months ago my interest in raw food has grown, not as a direct result of just this book, but a lot of general reading alongside my natural cravings. I have to say that my skin is without doubt the best it has ever been. I no longer get hormone related spots and my greasy t zone has really cleared up. Of course that could be due to a number of factors along side eating better, I happen to think its probably a combination of better skincare, diet, exercise and possibly supplementation as I blogged about in this post, that has resulted in that.

Have you read The Beauty Detox Solution? If so what did you think? What are your thoughts on food combining and eating ‘light to heavy’?