Whether we care to admit it or not, we get a sneaky kick from prettying ourselves up. And, even more importantly, the free confidence of feeling beautiful.

But instead of pampering yourself by smearing commercial cosmetics all over your face, you can accentuate your natural beauty using make-up you've made yourself, out of ingredients literally good enough to eat.

Increased interest in organic health and beauty has seen spades of beauty buffs turn to DIY makeup recipes to get their cosmetic fix. Not only is DIY makeup made with organic products, it’s much cheaper to make, and often carries added benefits for your skin and health. It takes your skin just 26 seconds to absorb anything that’s put on it, so why not give it something delicious to munch on?

This easy recipe for homemade eye shadow is quick and can easily be tailored depending on which colour you’re after. After putting together the base, you only need to add whichever colouring agent you’d like and voila—you’re ready to start pampering yourself naturally, with ingredients literally good enough to eat.

Since eye shadow is just a powder base, pigment and powder binder to make the first two ingredients stick together, almost all of these ingredients can be substituted. I’ve made a note where this is the case.

For the base:

1/2 tsp arrowroot powder

1/4 tsp unrefined shea butter

Suggested pigments:

Cocoa powder

Spirulina powder

Dried beetroot powder

Turmeric

Allspice

Step 1: Getting the Right Colour

Put about half a teaspoon of arrowroot powder into a bowl and mix in whichever pigment(s) you’d like into the powder to create the shade you want. I use cocoa powder to go darker, and arrowroot to go lighter. Many people use mica powders for colour, but I prefer to use organic pigments because they’re more natural. Whilst generally considered safe, concerns have been voiced about adverse effects of powdered mica on the eyes and skin.

For this recipe, I used half a teaspoon of tumeric to half a teaspoon of arrowroot powder. Arrowroot powder will make the shade lighter, so add more as you go if you’d like to lighten the shade. I’ve seen this done with cornstarch or even thicker flours before, but I prefer arrowroot for its fineness.

Step 2: Add Butter

Once you’re at the shade you’d like, add around a quarter of a teaspoon of shea butter. If you have a nut allergy, use cocoa butter instead.

I used unrefined shea butter.

Step 3: Mix It Up

The butter will be crumbly and a little bit solid when you first shave it off the block, so cream it slightly against the side of the bowl with the back of a spoon as you mix it in.

Be careful not to cream it too much, otherwise your eyeshadow will become a kind of play-dough esque paste rather that crumbly. Mix it in together until it forms a fine, crumbly powder.