Funding for Lucky Chow has been provided by (intense modern music) (heart beating) (elegant music) - Centuries before makeup blogs and glossy fashion magazines, Asians were inventing the beauty business.

Chinese women starting wearing lipstick as early as 5,000 BC and grinding rice to use as foundation as early as 770 BC.

Japanese entertainers have been painting their faces white for generations, and while each culture has its own ideals of physical beauty, the similarities across time and continents are surprising.

I didn't know I needed this until I just saw it, but yes, I definitely need a lip sleeping mask with canola honey.

From jade rolling to face paint to the ingestion of collagen, it's become clear to me that many of the skincare practices that have become popular in the West are deeply rooted in Asian traditions.

(upbeat music) (sizzling) (chopping) (acoustic music) Similar to traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurveda is an ancient Indian practice of medicine and wellness that has evolved over thousands of years and is practiced to this day.

Divya's Kitchen is New York City's only fully Ayurvedic vegetarian kitchen.

Divya originally turned to Ayurveda because of her own health problems, and when it helped her, she devoted her life to sharing the practice with others.

You might be familiar with Ayurveda's influence in areas like yoga, meditation, and massage, but Divya's going to show me how it can also affect skin and beauty.

Hi, Divya!

It's so nice to meet you.

- Welcome, Danielle!

- Tell me how you started this kitchen.

- Yeah.

Divya's Kitchen is an Ayurvedic vegetarian restaurant and we opened it two years ago.

It started with our cooking school, Bhagavat Life.

During the class, we'll have cooked several dishes, and everybody would enjoy it, and they would ask us, wow, this feels amazing and tastes so great.

Where can I eat like this?

I would just say, well, here!

(both laugh) There is no place like that, really, that follows the principles of Ayurveda, so, my husband and I, we decided to open the first Ayurvedic vegetarian restaurant in New York City.

I came to Ayurveda through my own struggles with health.

I lived in India for five years and Ayurveda is the local medicine there.

The doctor would always not just give me some herbs, he would always give me a list of foods to favor or avoid to help me get better faster.

- Well, you're glowing.

You look so beautiful.

I mean, how does Ayurveda play into beauty?

- One of the goals of Ayurveda is to help us achieve and maintain balance on physical, mental, emotional, spiritual levels.

It teaches us how to determine what's the best diet for you, what's the best exercise that will help us be the best versions of ourselves.

When we're healthy, we also feel happy, so, that's the real beauty, when we exude this happiness and the openness of the heart.

- I can't wait to get into your kitchen, because I'd love to see how this philosophy translates into inner and outer beauty.

- Yes, let's go.

(laughs) Come on in.

- Okay!

(laughs) (calm acoustic music) - All right, Divya, what are we making today?

- So, we're going to make a great dish for your skin.

This is broccoli rabe.

I think it's a fantastic green, very bitter.

We're going to top it with salted beets and garnish it with saffron almond.

- How is this particularly good for beautifying your skin?

- Broccoli rabe is very bitter.

Anything that's bitter is fantastic for tonifying and cleansing the liver and the blood.

If the blood and the liver are clean, our skin will be clean and glowing.

As a cooking oil, we're going to use ghee.

This is a liquid gold.

(laughs) Ghee is fantastic for moisturizing the skin on the inside.

Spices in Ayurveda are used not only for flavor.

Spices have tremendous medicinal properties.

We're going to add a little bit of turmeric.

Turmeric is one of the best things for your skin.

Of course, it's rich in antioxidants and antiinflammatory, but the Sanskrit word for turmeric is haridra, and the literal translation of haridra is that which is good for your complexion.

(laughs) - Really?

(laughs) - Yes!

(laughs) - Smells delicious, heavenly.

- Smells really good, yeah.

We're going to cook broccoli rabe.

- Yes.

- It's also cooling, has a cooling effect on the body.

So, we're going to add a little bit of slivered ginger to brown it.

Let's add a little bit of chili.

Ground fennel, another cooling spice, fantastic for digestion.

- Delicious.

Can I help you stir that up?

- Yeah, go for it!

Kitchari is the most famous Ayurvedic dish.

It's a stew with lentils, grains, and vegetables all together.

- It really does look like just a perfect bowl of rice porridge.

- Yes.

- Why do you think that there's such a trend towards Ayurvedic beauty these days?

- It's natural.

If it's done properly, it's all natural.

The Ayurvedic principle for skincare is if you don't put it in your mouth, don't put it on your skin.

- [Danielle] Looks beautiful.

I can't wait to taste this.

(peaceful music) - I want to show you a very special recipe that I love.

It's a turmeric facial mask.

When we cooked our broccoli rabe, we used turmeric for cooking.

Turmeric has a clearing effect on the skin when you ingest it and when you apply it topically.

You're going to use half a teaspoon of turmeric.

The base is flour.

- Okay.

- So, we're going to use oat flour.

It's very good for dry skin, in the winter, especially.

Now, we're going to add two teaspoons of olive oil, and now, we're going to add a little bit of yogurt.

So, this is my freshly made yogurt that I made yesterday, and now, you just make it into a paste.

- This looks like peanut butter for my toast.

- Oh, yes?

(laughs) - But I'm looking forward to putting it on my face instead.

(laughs) - I mean, honestly, you can put a little bit of lemon juice to it and it becomes a salad dressing.

(Danielle laughs) - What are the results that I can expect from this mask?

- So, first of all, it's very nourishing for the skin, so, you feel that your skin becomes very smooth, and soothed, and plump, and a lot more elastic.

- It just feels so nourishing and smells heavenly.

- Yes, and it's things from your kitchen.

It's just so easy to make.

- Now that I have glowing skin, I think I'm ready to nourish and beautify from the inside out.

(laughs) - Yes, let's go!

I'm hungry, too.

(laughs) - Okay!

I think our skin looks better without the makeup.

With the turmeric masks, it feels so gentle and moisturized.

- It feels very smooth.

This is the broccoli rabe and the beets with saffron almonds, and this is the big pot of kitchari that you stirred.

- Yes.

- This is our kitchari dish.

- This is so delicious.

I wanna have this every day for breakfast.

I've learned so much from you today, really.

Thank you so much.

I learned, you know, how you have to nourish the body from inside out in order to maintain that beautiful skin and glow, so, thank you so much for this.

- Thank you!

It's been such a pleasure to be with you.

I'm a big fan.

- Oh, well, it goes both ways.

- [Divya] Thank you.

(acoustic music) - If you haven't heard of K-beauty, you just might be living under a rock, or at least without broadband.

This Asian beauty trend originating in South Korea has gone global.

I've always believed that food is so much more than just sustenance, and K-beauty's emphasis on using food items both inside and out is what caught my interest.

I met up with K-beauty expert Charlotte Cho in Seoul for a unique shopping experience.

Since 1957, Skinfood has been selling food-based beauty products to Korean consumers and touts itself as the first cosmetic brand to root itself in food.

With a slogan like you are what you eat, I had to sample both the skin products and the snacks to explore the concept that beauty is much more than skin deep.

I feel like I'm at a farmer's market where I'm just, like, squeezing every cherry and picking all the lettuces.

- Yeah, it's amazing.

- [Danielle] Food is beauty.

- You're in the beauty mecca.

There's everything from peach toners to royal honey emulsion, caviar.

- This is a night cream?

So thick.

Oh, it smells amazing.

There's so much of an emphasis on using food for beauty in Korea.

I mean, I see it everywhere.

When did this trend start?

- It's always been about natural ingredients, so, it was just a natural fusion, something that you would actually normally ingest that will help benefit your skin.

Yuja, Yuja's a huge, like, a very popular fruit in Asia.

It's grown in East Asia.

It helps with brightening the skin.

(upbeat music) Hey, guys, it's Charlotte, and thank you for joining me for the Soko Glam May Curation Update.

- [Danielle] I found out all about Korean skincare really through Soko Glam.

I think your timing was so spot-on.

- I started Soko Glam five years ago with my husband.

We were really fascinated about the whole beauty industry in Korea.

People were so focused on skin, innovative ingredients, and I saw so many different categories in Korea that did not exist in the US, such as essences, sheet masks, and snail mucin used as an ingredient, and then, I wanted to share this with the US, and it just erupted.

People were so fascinated in the US, as well, just as I was obsessed.

(laughs) (upbeat music) - [Danielle] Well, I can't stop staring at your skin.

Like, it is literally glowing.

- In Korea, there's this obsession with the multi-step skincare routine, so, that's using an oil-based cleanser, a water-based cleanser, then toner, essence, sheet mask, serums, eye creams, and moisturizer, and I think that's what's so interesting about Korean beauty.

There are people in Korea willing to take the time and money to really invest in taking care of their skin first before makeup.

(light electronic music) - A lot of the packaging, even, it looks like food products.

- Definitely, look at this.

This is their royal honey sugared topping mask.

You basically mix your black sugar scrub with the honey topping, almost like you're putting together, like, some dessert.

- This is crazy.

This looks like little yogurt packages or something, but this is actually a tomato soup sleeping pack.

- You put on as a last step in your skincare routine, and then, you will let it just soak in as you sleep, while your skin repairs itself.

- Really?

These are jam masks?

I would love to have this in my refrigerator at home.

- [Charlotte] But someone might accidentally eat it.

(laughs) How does your skin feel?

- It feels so nice.

- Smells just like strawberries.

- It does, it really does.

- So, what's really cool about this store is that they have this cafe where you could eat all these yummy foods and drinks that features ingredients that you see in the skincare products.

- Like, I've noticed that in Korea, women are more concerned with maintaining their skin rather than covering up bad skin with makeup.

- Yes, so, they really wanna get to the root of the condition.

The most important part of the beauty routine for Korean women is skincare.

It all starts with skin.

- Is this skincare ritual something that, you know, your grandmother's grandmother did, as well, or is it really new?

- I think it developed over the years, but skincare is definitely ingrained at a very, very young age.

You go to Korean bathhouses and you'll see that young children are being, or their entire bodies are being exfoliated, and so, at a young age, they grow up knowing that that's normal.

- That's fascinating.

So, after potty training comes facial cleansing treatments.

(Charlotte laughs) (upbeat music) Yuja everything, yuja lemonade, yuja chiffon cake, yuja bagels with yuja butter.

(Charlotte laughs) And then, yuja serums and toners downstairs.

- Yes.

- It's great.

I didn't think I'd come all the way from New York to have a bagel, but as long it's gonna brighten my skin, I'll try it.

While I was in Seoul, Charlotte wouldn't let me just eat a bagel and pronounce my skin glowing.

She took me to meet her friend Joan Kim for a more traditional Korean meal with skin-beautifying benefits.

Joan is a Korean-American living in Seoul full-time, and since her move, she's become a staple in the K-beauty scene, and with more than half a million YouTube subscribers, she must be onto something.

(low energetic music) - The meal that we're gonna eat today is kind of like anju.

It's like a snack that you eat with drinks.

- Eat while you drink.

- Oh, really?

So, the drinking is the main feature, and then the food is just secondary.

- It's, yeah, yeah.

- Okay.

(laughs) Well, I think we need to celebrate three Californians in Seoul.

- [All] Geonbae!

(light acoustic music) - This is jokbal, which is pig trotters braised and steamed, and then simmered.

It's like, a long process to make this.

I like it because it is really filling, greasy, good to eat while you drink, and they say it's good for your skin.

That's what my grandma at least told me.

- The use of collagen, the main component of connective tissue in humans and other mammals, is a wellness trend that has taken off in the US over the past few years.

From supplements to skin cream, collagen can be taken in many forms and it's said to reverse skin aging, reduce cellulite, and improve digestive health.

I mean, I really grew up with that philosophy, as well, from my parents, that ingesting collagen is good for your health, good for recovery after childbirth, and it's really good for hair and skin growth.

- A lot of skincare products have collagen in them, right?

- Yes.

Yeah, so, that, you put that on topically.

- [Joan] Oh, okay.

- This, yeah, you're consuming.

- [Joan] You're consuming this, okay.

(calm acoustic music) - Makgeolli is served in more like a bowl.

You're familiar with receiving the drinks with two hands.

- I'm familiar with drinking.

- Yeah?

(laughs) Actually, this is a drink that farmers used to drink.

It's almost like a bootleg type of liquor.

Poor people drank this, but now it's more trendy.

Cheers!

- [Danielle] Cheers!

- [Charlotte] Geonbae!

- Geonbae!

- [Charlotte] You got it.

(Danielle hums) - Good, right?

- Yes!

I had read that people drink a lot of fermented rice wine as a skincare product.

Is that what gives it its health benefits, the fermentation process, or?

- Well, rice is really good for your skin.

A lot of Korean skincare products are formulated with rice, right?

- Yep.

- And those actually helped my acne scars the most when I first moved to Korea.

- So, what is the Korean drinking culture like?

- It's always about eating and drinking, and you go to several different places, like barhopping, so, throughout the night, you'll go to four different places, easily.

It'll just be like izakaya style one location, another location, you'll have pig trotters, and another location, you're just constantly eating and drinking.

(low energetic music) - I love how chewy it is.

What I miss in a lot of Western food is the texture of the food.

Asian foods, we love to eat the coagulous parts of the animal.

- Right, and you could see how much fat there is, sort of collagen.

It's, like, almost half of the actual piece of meat.

(upbeat acoustic music) My husband always says, like, he loves how Korean food can be like an explosion of different flavors.

I feel like, in America, it's like, you have this one cream pasta and you're gonna have that same flavor again and again, but in Korea, the food is more select if you're gonna try something that's a little bit sweet and then a little bit sour, and you're just having this, like, explosion in your mouth.

Do you wanna try the soju?

- Sure!

Thank you.

(laughs) - [All] Geonbae!

- This is my favorite day-after-drinking soup.

(laughs) - There's a lot of dishes that are designed to help your hangover.

- And this is one of them.

- Yeah.

- That seems to just say it all about Korean culture.

- [Joan] Yeah.

- The nightlife and drinking culture is pretty intense.

(laughs) - Is it really an all-night, never-stop city?

- Yeah, the city that never lets you sleep.

(laughs) - That never lets you sleep, I love that.

(upbeat electronic music) (peaceful music) Like collagen, ginseng is ubiquitous in many Asian cultures.

Korean red ginseng takes six years to grow and is found only in Korea.

Although I've spent my life consuming ginseng in tea with food or as medicine, I've never applied it topically, so, I headed to Spa G in Seoul, a spa that specializes in just that.

Thank you for having me to Spa G. I've been a fan of drinking ginseng, but I've never experienced it in a spa form.

Can you tell me a bit more about Spa G?

- [Danielle] From the extensive spa menu of facials, foot rubs, and steam baths, I decided to get the red ginseng body scrub.

It promises to slow down aging, lower stress, and enhance energy.

- [Danielle] And how does ginseng help a body heal during the spa process?

(upbeat music) - With the growing popularity of Asian beauty trends in the US, many Asia-based brands have opened outposts stateside.

Innisfree is the number one beauty brand in Korea, and it recently opened its first US location right here in New York City.

They might barhop in Seoul, but today, I'm beauty-hopping in New York.

I love the store already.

It's right across from the farmer's market, so, it's like getting some fresh greens and then coming in here and getting more vegetables for your skin.

All the products here are made from natural ingredients from Jeju Island, which is this tiny little place right off the coast of Korea, so, it's amazing that they brought all of these products, such as seaweed and soybean, green tea, and barley to New York.

When this store opened in New York, there were literally lines, hundreds of people, that wrapped around Union Square.

This is what I've heard so much about and I really wanted to come and try it out, because it's like cooking.

Literally, you create your own mask using these little packets of ingredients.

Tangerines are clearing, walnut shells for exfoliation, of course, and who knew?

Mugwort for calm.

It's perfect to mix into my own creamy base or a clay base whenever I wanna use really fresh ingredients on my skin.

(light upbeat music) Birchbox started as a monthly subscription beauty box in 2010, and now has a brick-and-mortar location in downtown Manhattan.

With more than a million subscribers in the US and four million customers worldwide, who better to tell me about the growth of Asian beauty trends and why Americans have adopted them so enthusiastically?

- We're at the Birchbox SoHo store on West Broadway in New York City, and this is our showroom and playroom.

You can buy the products that we sample in our monthly box.

There's been this push to go back to a more natural face, and I think K-beauty is a huge part of skincare now.

Going back to the ingredients' story is really crucial for a lot of the K-beauty brands that are coming here.

In the US, I think it's more of this crunchy, from the farm to the face kind of movement, and in Korea, it's more about the narrative of, like, this is a special product that you can only find in this one part of Korea, and we based the whole line about that.

(bright electronic music) There's been this embrace of Asian ingredients and Asian culture as the world becomes more open, and then, K-beauty is part of that, too.

- And there are categories like that sheet mask area that would have never existed.

- [Jamie] Five years ago!

- [Danielle] Yeah!

- [Jamie] All of these huge US brands are now launching sheet masks, and the technology really originated in Korea.

- You know, I've also seen a bunch of products I've never seen before, and this seems to be not Korean, but Chinese, right?

- Yeah.

There's kind of a myth around Asian ingredients in the US, 'cause we're not familiar with it, but I look at Korean women's skin and I say, well, I want that.

- Blue lotus seed.

- Yeah.

- I love that.

And then, another trend I saw, vitamins, ingesting products for beauty.

- The rise of supplements is definitely happening.

We always are looking for that quick fix.

Can I drink something and get thinner?

Can I drink something and have better skin?

And in Korea and in wider Asia, I think, everyone knows it's like, you're dedicated to your routine, and that's something we can totally learn from Korean women.

They start with that routine when they, like, learn how to brush their teeth.

There's been this buzz in the Internet world about Korean skincare, so, you see honey skin and glass skin, and Korean women have such beautiful skin.

I was, like, very flattered when I went to Korea and someone complimented my skin.

I was like, yes!

(Danielle laughs) I finally made it!

(laughs) Like, I'm doing my job right.

This has been so much fun.

I could talk about this all day, so, thank you for coming in and talking about K-beauty.

- I'm gonna do some shopping before I leave for sure.

(laughs) - Yeah.

(light music) - [Danielle] While Birchbox offers all types of Asian beauty products, Soko Glam has a more specific focus.

Founded in 2012 by Charlotte Cho and her husband, it's become the go-to online marketplace for K-beauty products for people who don't live in Korea, and after the whirlwind tour she gave me in Seoul, I'm excited to get some skincare secrets from her here in New York.

- Soko Glam started in 2012, and I saw this, like, rapid love for Korean beauty just spreading throughout the US.

- You're doing so much for the Korean beauty industry, because you're bringing it and explaining it to a non-Korean audience, so.

- Yes.

Yeah, 70% of Soko Glam customers are non-Asian, and I think it's cool to share that Korean culture of good skincare.

- [Danielle] How did you get the idea to start Soko Glam?

- [Charlotte] You know, it was really just a passion project.

I lived in Korea for five years.

I really, really loved Korean skincare.

It changed my skin, and then, I would talk about it with my friends living in the US and they would ask me, can you please get me this and that, and it just kind of snowballed into what Soko Glam is today.

- You've really articulated the steps here.

Can you walk me through?

- Yeah, yeah!

Step one is cleansing.

You could use a oil cleanser to break down any makeup, and also, there's a water-based cleanser to remove any dirt and impurities.

Step two is all about exfoliating.

So, exfoliating really helps clear any dead skin cells.

It leads to brighter skin.

Step three is to treat, so, if you have blackheads or if you have dark spots, there's vitamin C serums for that, and then behind you is the sheet mask wall, and that will help you with any skin concerns you have.

Brightening, acne, if you need hydration, it's all here, and lastly, moisturize to really help lock in that hydration.

- [Danielle] What's really striking about Soko Glam versus, say, all the other cosmetic brands out there is your focus on skincare versus cosmetics.

- Skincare, it really is a philosophy.

It does make you more confident when you have brighter, cleaner, healthier skin, and I think as more and more people are interested in health and wellness, this category's only gonna grow.

- [Danielle] In Asia or the United States, it seems the desire for everything to be more natural is widespread and constantly growing.

Whether it's a beauty product that goes onto your skin or into your body, what could be more natural than something that grows in the ground with the help of dirt, water, and sun?

The farm-to-table movement has expanded to farm-to-skin, and while people all over Asia might have learned their skincare routines at an early age, Americans seem to be following closely in their footsteps.

(upbeat music) Funding for Lucky Chow has been provided by (intense modern music) (heart beating) (upbeat music) To learn more about Lucky Chow, visit luckyrice.com.

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