Soothing Coffee Hand Scrub

This soothing coffee hand scrub is a perfect way to rejuvenate and moisturize tired gardener hands.

If you’re anything like me, your gardening hands have taken a beating. Spring, summer and even fall are big gardening times. And now that we have a micro flower farm, even more so. Most days, fresh garden soil is fully under my fingernails, sowing seeds, staking pinching, and also family time: throwing frisbees, building sand castles at the beach, and riding bike. My hands get thoroughly used, and beautifully so, so sometimes they need a little TLC. This soothing coffee hand scrub is just the thing to add a little spa in my day. And with the amazing smell of coffee, this little scrub brings a beautiful aroma to my senses. It’s sort of perfect.

This recipe is also in a DIY collaboration with Megan of Simply Rooted Farmhouse. Stay tuned at the bottom of this post for her recipe!

Coffee for the skin

Coffee makes a wonderful skin care treatment, for many reasons. It’s touted as being anti-inflammatory, calming (I love its delicious aroma!), and provides B3 too. The massage of the hands with coffee grinds also helps promote healthy circulation.

How to use soothing coffee scrub

This coffee scrub is made with really simple ingredients and offers an exfoliating nature to dry skin, plus the benefit of moisturizer from the carrier oil. For these reasons, I primarily use it for the hands, but you can easily use it for elbows, feet, legs, and more. The coffee does leave a little bit of stain on your hands, so be sure to wash it off well with running water. For this reason, I use medium grit coffee grounds instead of fine.

• If you’re interested in the moisturizing effect, simply rinse and pat dry. You’ll have an instant oil barrier that makes your hands silky smooth. 
• If you’re only interested in the exfoliating effect, you can afterwards rinse with a little soap and water to wash off the oil.

Also, due to the hard nature of coffee granules, the scrub tends to be a bit abrasive so I would not use it on the face.

Spruce It Up

Since it’s summer time, you can add some peppermint essential oil to add a cooling effect. In the winter time, feel free to add 1 tsp ground cinnamon and 2 drops nutmeg essential oil, which also makes it more warming. This is a template recipe that can easily adjust to your needs.

Carrier Oils and Essential Oils

For this recipe, I love using a neutral oil such as organic grapeseed oil or fractionated coconut oil, but there are so many others that are wonderful. Choose organic when possible. Consider organic rosehip oil, organic tamanu oil, organic sesame oil, organic sweet almond oil among others. If you’ll use it quickly, you can also use olive oil (in my experience it goes rancid quickly).

Please only use essential oils that are pure and have a positive reputation. Essential oils in general are not regulated and can contain synthetics, chemicals and fillers. It’s important to only get 100% pure, therapeutic essential oils.

Soothing Coffee Hand Scrub Recipe

1/2 cup ground organic coffee (since this is going on the skin, you’ll want to use organic)

1/3 cup any liquid carrier oil of your choice (almond, grapeseed, fractionated coconut, olive, etc.)

3 drops peppermint essential oil

• Combine ingredients in a jar until it looks like wet sand. 
• Add 1 tsp to your hand and using a gentle motion, massage hands together. 
• Gently rinse under warm running water until all the coffee residue has come off. Pat dry. 
• If you’re interested in the moisturizing effect, simply rinse and pat dry. You’ll have an instant oil barrier that makes your hands silky smooth. 
• If you’re only interested in the exfoliating effect, you can afterwards rinse with a little soap and water to wash off the oil. 
• Due to the fragility of the carrier oil, use this scrub within 3 months.

DIY Collaboration

As I mentioned before, this post is written as a collaboration with fellow blogger Megan, of Simply Rooted Farmhouse. I love her blog in every way, as she posts about gardening, DIY skin care, delicious from-scratch recipes, and homemade home. Basically, I wish she lived closer to me, as I know we’d be the best of friends! Check out her site here.

The recipe she’s contributing is a pink Himalayan salt and sugar scrub, found here. It looks divine, plus she also uses freshly harvested mint from her garden! How incredible is that?

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