WHAT IS THIS ABOUT, AGAIN? There’s a full explanation here; in short, I wanted to do a Personal Top Ten Beauty Products of All Time, but found the list sneaking up to Top Twenty; then it fell short at Eighteen, which is like, what is Eighteen, so I decided that Sweet Sixteen was the way to go.

It’s good to be queen.

Ahem. Here is number — hang on — lucky number Thirteen, ladies and ladies.

I hadn’t the first notion why almond is such a big feature in many beauty products. What did we do before Google? I duly typed in my query > why is almond used in beauty products > and… well, hmmm. I guess there is such a thing as TMI.

Thanks to Spa Playground, I now know that

Almond oil is similar in composition to the oil baby’s excrete to keep their skin and hair healthy. This composition is beneficial to protecting and conditioning your skin no matter your age. By helping the skin stay healthy it promotes a youthful skin complexion.

Don’t try to cut corners, people, I beg you. Don’t rub babies* all over yourself. I first read that as ‘the oil that babies excrete’, and: yikes.

L’Occitane explain their incorporation of the versatile natural ingredient with dignity, and there’s a lovely little video of the life of the almond, from which I didn’t learn much about the nitty gritty of the nut, only about how much I would really like to live in the South of France.

I wasn’t sure I was into the scent at all, myself, and then I received the Provençal brand’s Almond Delicious Paste and Almond Milk Concentrate. I have to say, I was immediately taken with the glass jars. I know I’ve complained about such packaging design decisions in the recent past, but in this case, I don’t know, I was all about the glass jars.

The thing about the glass jars was that it made the product seem substantial from first grasp, but I wondered about exactly how much mileage I was going to get out of these. Heavy they were, but they also seemed small.

Small, but mighty, and that’s the thing with items of beauty enhancement that seem to be all to ready to break your bank: their quality is such that you needn’t use a tonne when you’re scrubbing or lotion-ing or whatever. In the case of the Paste, and of the Milk Concentrate, which is the body lotion, both lasted me a good long while.

And both made me smell like marzipan, which is a good thing. It’s the reason I like vanilla-based potions and lotions as well. Who doesn’t like baked goods? Almond is also a key ingredient in marzipan, as you may know, and while it may not be to everyone’s taste, its fans are rather vehement, and I count myself among them.

I save this for special occasions, when I want to be seductive yet yummy. Works every time.

Almond Delicious Paste: €36.95/£26/$34
Almond Milk Concentrate: €41.95/£33/$40

*Speaking of, please find here some very creepy marzipan babies. <Which, when I clicked through, have been proven not to be made of marzipan, but hey, it’s Monday, go waste some time following in my net-steps.