J' Accuse Lush. Once upon a time ago a shower gel was a shower gel and simply washed whilst perhaps smelling nice. Nowadays its an invigorating, moisturising, exfoliating intoxicating experience all wrapped up so it look good enough to eat. Even good old Radox whose herbal gels have been around for donkey's years have jumped on the bandwagon with their smoothie range of shower gels. There's four heavenly sounding varieties to choose from in the range. Tropical Tranquility with coconut, almond and myrrh and Island Indulgence a very fruity papaya and passion fruit both sound delectable but I tend to opt for the one called Soul Soother to calm my my nerves after a manic day at work.

SMOOTH YOUR TROUBLES AWAY

Soul Soother is a lovely rich creamy shower gel containing chamomile, black currants and cranberry seeds. It comers in a 200 ml wedge shaped tube with a flip top lid at the bottom. One moan I have about this product is I wish it came in a larger size. I always seem to go through this like nobodies business. I don't think a bottle of this lasts longer than two weeks. Whilst not being ridiculously expensive I only tend to buy Radox Soul Soother when it is on special offer, as its normal price of around about £2.50 is just that little bit expensive for an every day shower gel especially when it goes so quickly. I think I paid about £1.30 for this bottle in Tescos a couple of weeks ago.

VERY BERRY

I never think of this gel as a smoothie but more of a berry flavourd yoghurt. I know this sounds a bit weird and disgusting but it really does with its delicate pearly pink colour and the little specks that are the cranberry seeds. The scent is very enticing , as soon as I flip the lid back I get a whiff of succulent sweat berries. Strangely enough for a chamomile and blackcurrant gel it reminds me more of a raspberry yoghurt!! The chamomile is very faint and in the background and the black currants must be mingling in with the cranberry seeds to give such an intoxicating scent. However if you smell it for longer the black currant becomes slightly more evident.

The chamomile is an ideal base due to its herbal proprieties. Chamomile has two very useful properties. Firstly it is known as an enhancer for blond hair. I've not noticed the effect this shower gel has on my naturally blond body hair. I'd love to think it gives me pubic highlights!!. Second ally and more importantly for this gel its well known for its relaxing and calming proprieties, hence its use in herbal teas. I assume the cranberry seeds are there as a light exfoliant.

HUBBLE BUBBLE

The bottle is easy enough to squeeze to get just enough of the pink gel onto either your hand, sponge or net shower puff. Its not a bad consistency at all. It's not runny so you don't lose half of it down the plughole nor is it too sticky at all. It is best used with a net puff where it fluffs up to a lovely cloud of soft small but dense berry scented bubbles. The one problem of using a puff is that often the cranberry pips seem to remain on it and not on my body. This is no great loss, as they seem a bit soft to be a particularly effective exfoliant. I think I prefer almonds or sea salt if I want to have a decent scrub.

The gel rinses fairly well with little residue leaving my skin, clean, fairly soft and smooth and with a hint of the lovely berry scent . It seems more apparent on some parts of my body than others. This seems to totally disappear within an hour of showering. Was my soul soothed. I would say yes , as the lovely berry scent gently massages my senses. I'm sure the chamomile plays it part. As well.

This is a shower gel I love using due to its wonderful scent. However due to the size of the bottle and the cost of it especially full price this tends to to be a treat for me when I fancy a bit of shower TLC.