Antioxidant
Berry
Someone once said that anything rich, creamy, and delicious
couldn’t be good for you. It would have been better if you
only end up with thunder thighs after a bowl of rich cream,
but there are far more serious health risks you’ll have to
consider when you indulge yourself with such things.
That was then. This is now and it’s perfectly okay to whip
out your spoons, forks, and mats because today is decades in
the making; today is the day you are permitted to salivate.
A recent food Olympics has been conducted and out of the 100
different varieties of foods, vegetables, and nuts, 20 antioxidant
rich foods came out at the top. This list of foods
contained most of the very rich antioxidant foods as ranked
by nutrition scientists at the US Department of Agriculture
(USDA) and reported by the University of Alabama website on
November 1, 2004.
Wild blueberry
was narrowly beaten out by the small red bean, which
captured the red-blue medal. The small red bean was dubbed
the food with the highest concentration of disease-fighting
antioxidant compounds per serving.
Antioxidants are the heroes in an epic struggle against
villain molecules called “free radicals.” Free radicals
do nothing but assault cells, turning them into molecules
like themselves. This actually creates a chain reaction
which could eventually lead to killer diseases such as heart
disease and cancer, and even aging itself.
The Top 20 list of antioxidants published in the Journal of
Agricultural and Food Chemistry shows the ranks of the
capacity of berry foods, fruits, and vegetables to interfere
with or prevent oxidative processes where free radicals are
formed. Ronald L. Prior, a USDA nutritionist and research
chemist based in Little Rock, Ark explains that berry
antioxidants were ranked according to their total
antioxidant capacity. However, they were surprised to find
that besides berry fruits, antioxidants may also come from
the most unexpected foods as well.
Prior and his colleagues used the most advanced technologies
available to tabulate antioxidant levels in more than 100
different types of berry fruits, vegetables, nuts, and
spices. The Top 20 list includes small red beans (dried),
wild blueberry, red kidney beans, pinto beans, blueberry
(cultivated), cranberry, artichokes (cooked), blackberry,
prunes (dried plums), raspberry, strawberry, red delicious
apples, Granny Smith apples, pecans, sweet cherries, black
plums, russet potatoes (cooked), black beans (dried), plums,
and gala apples.
“Even though the small red bean came out on top, berry is
better understood,” Prior says after noting that a berry
devours six of the top 11 blue-red medals.
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