Tag Archives: antioxidants

Everyone tells me to eat my “greens.” Can you explain why they are so important?

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Dark greens, like spinach, kale, collards, and chard, are some of the most mood and energy-enhancing foods on the planet. Calorie for calorie, you get more vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients and fiber than almost any other food. Greens clean arteries, protect brain cells from aging and depression, and improve blood flow to all body parts, thus lowering the risk for heart disease, cancer, vision loss, stroke, dementia, high blood pressure, wrinkling and skin cancer, erectile dysfunction, and loss of libido. They are rich in antioxidants, potassium, B vitamins, vitamin C, magnesium, calcium, zinc, iron, chlorophyll, and a host of phytonutrients from carotenoids to polyphenols and betaine. You honestly can’t get to your optimal vitality without greens.

How much do you need? Aim for at least 2 servings a day of the darkest greens you can find. A serving is 1 cup raw and 1/2 cup cooked. Include spinach or baby greens in salads and sandwiches. Steam them and add to mashed potatoes, lasagna, soups, and stews. Saute them with garlic in olive oil.

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The 12+ Heart Healthy Items no Refrigerator Should Be Without

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Anything in your refrigerator that has fruits or vegetables in it, will lower heart disease. You need 9+ servings of colorful fruits and vegetables every day, which supply fiber to lower cholesterol, vitamins to lower a chemical in the blood called homocysteine, and antioxidants to protect your arteries from damage associated with atherosclerosis. Few topics in nutrition are black and white, but when it comes to produce 1,000s of studies spanning decades of research repeatedly and consistently show that the more produce people consume, the lower their risk for all age-related diseases, including heart disease. Bagged lettuce such as one of the 38 varieties of Dole, carrots – baby or otherwise, and almost any other colorful vegetable you have in your produce bin fits the bill. Since the antioxidants are in the pigment…the more pigment, the more antioxidants, including spinach, sweet potatoes, oranges, bagged romaine lettuce, broccoli, and tomato or V8 juice. Stock produce in different stages of ripeness so they are ready to eat when you are.

That carton of Tropicana orange juice, the carton of Driscoll berries, the jar of minced garlic from Costco, and even the rubber lemon filled with juice are heart healthy options, as is the watermelon loaded with lycopene. You even can keep a carton of eggs on hand (everyone except diabetics can have up to one egg a day). As for cheese, it now surpasses red meat as this country’s #1 source of artery-clogging saturated fat. To reduce this bad fat and still enjoy your favorite recipes, you do your heart well to stock low-fat cheeses, preferably ones with omega-3 fats. Look for butter substitutes with stanols and sterols known to help lower blood cholesterol levels (however, you’ll need to consume 3 Tablespoons daily to get enough stanols to lower cholesterol levels..and the calories can add up).

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What bottled green tea do you recommend?

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None. Make your own. Green tea has antioxidant compounds with fancy names like polyphenols that lower cancer and heart disease risk. These compounds also might lower skin cancer risk and even help you look younger. But, those health-boosting polyphenols don’t make it into bottled teas in appreciable amounts, if at all. What does make it into the bottle is sugar. Many of these teas have the calorie equivalent of a side order of hashbrowns. And, because they are liquid calories, they don’t fill us up, so it is easy to over-consume calories, which means weight gain. Save your money and brew your own green tea at home, where you are assured of getting the greatest concentration of all the antioxidants and polyphenols that research shows are good for us. You’ll also save yourself money that can be used to buy more antioxidant-rich produce!

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Are there any dietary tips for lowering my risk for macular degeneration?

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Long-term exposure to air and light generates little oxygen fragments, called oxidants, that damage the eyes. Choosing a diet rich in the antioxidant nutrients, such as vitamin C, vitamin E, selenium, beta carotene, lutein, and zinc, fortifies the eyes against this damage and helps protect against the development of both cataracts and macular degeneration. People with high levels of these antioxidants are at lowest risk of vision loss later in life.

For example, vitamin C is the antioxidant found in oranges, strawberries, and other fruits and vegetables. The eye naturally stockpiles vitamin C to levels 20 times and higher than those found in the blood. The high concentration of vitamin C in our eyes might be an adaptation that protects against the damaging UV rays in sunlight.

A host of other antioxidant-rich compounds, called phytonutrients, in colorful fruits and vegetables also are sight savers. Lutein is one of them, a phytonutrient in dark green leafy vegetables, such as spinach. When people consume as little as 10 milligrams of lutein daily (the amount found in 1 /2 cup of spinach), their levels of lutein increase in the blood and eyes, and they are less prone to vision loss. If they do develop vision problems, such as macular degeneration, the disease is less likely to progress to advanced stages.

Dietary fat also might play a role in the development of age-related vision loss. Saturated fats in meat and fatty dairy products might increase risk up to 80%, while the healthy fats, especially the omega-3s in fatty fish, possibly lower risk for both cataracts and macular degeneration.

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