One Common Kitchen Ingredient Can Make Your Hair Ultra Shiny

We all love a good DIY beauty hack — especially one that uses tools and ingredients that may already be lurking in your house. Whether you're making your own rosemary water to promote scalp health or chasing the glass skin trend with a DIY rice face mask, beauty hacks based on kitchen staples are a cheap and convenient way to treat yourself to a little self-care. Still, some DIY beauty ingredients continue to surprise us. For instance, if you're looking for a quick and helpful hair mask, an unexpected answer might already be waiting in your fridge: mayonnaise.

Yes, mayonnaise. Seriously. The idea of using this condiment on your hair might throw you for a loop, but it's actually packed with benefits. Best of all, it fits all our requirements for the ideal at-home beauty trick — easy, inexpensive, and effective. So while the idea of putting mayo in your tresses may sound off-putting at first, consider a few compelling reasons to give this DIY treatment a try.

To mayo, or not to mayo. A mayonnaise hair mask may sound kind of peculiar, but its benefits are the real deal. First and foremost, oil-rich mayonnaise does wonders for making your locks soft, glossy, and hydrated. As board-certified dermatologist Brendan Camp explained to Bustle, "Mayonnaise contains oils, which simulate the body's natural sebum. Sebum coats hair shafts to make them soft and pliant, and also traps in moisture." If you naturally have an oily hair type, maybe you don't need this assistance. But for dry or frizzy tresses, this moisture can be a game-changer.

Mayonnaise is also packed with helpful vitamins and nutrients. The egg yolks that go into mayo offer nourishment from fatty acids and vitamins like A, E, and D. They also instill mayonnaise with helpful peptides that, according to a study in the Journal of Medicinal Food, may promote hair growth.

As a bonus, mayo also contains vinegar, giving it an acidic edge. In the same way that you might use apple cider vinegar as a DIY scalp cleanse, the vinegar in mayonnaise may help balance your scalp's pH for less itching and flaking. In short, mayonnaise is an all-rounder for your hair health, supporting everything from its look and texture to faster growth and a happier scalp. That leaves only one question: How do we transform mayo from a gloopy condiment into a handy hair treatment?

Many DIY beauty hacks require a little bit of mixing, juicing, or boiling to create a usable product. However, making a mayonnaise hair mask literally could not be simpler — it's just mayonnaise, no extra ingredients required.

To use mayonnaise as a hair mask, start by wetting your hair. Then, depending on how long your hair is, apply about a cup of mayo from root to tip. Massage the mayonnaise into your scalp and be sure that all your hair is evenly covered to reap maximum benefits from the mask. If you have thick, tangle-prone hair, consider using a comb to gently distribute the mayo — and don't forget to wash the comb afterward.

Once your hair is liberally covered with the mask, tuck it all into a shower cap and wait for 15-20 minutes. Then rinse the mayonnaise out and wash your hair as normal. If necessary, you can do a quick double-wash to ensure all the residue is gone from your scalp — left behind, it might clog or irritate the hair follicles, so you'll want to be thorough. And that, as they say, is that. You can use this easy-peasy mayonnaise hair mask once a week for super shiny locks. Remember, it's particularly helpful for dry, damaged hair or frizzy, wavy hair types, since the mayo's smoothing properties will help tame floof and flyaways.