Add These 3 Powerful Food Combinations to Your Diet

Food is fuel for your body, and just like other forms of fuel sometimes how you take it in can be just as critical as what you’re taking to begin with. It’s well documented that essential nutrients like vitamins and minerals are better received through whole, natural foods than overly processed supplements. There’s nothing wrong with taking a vitamin supplement per se, but our bodies aren’t well equipped to absorb nutrients from man made sources. Research in the field of vitamin absorption suggests that the body receives and incorporates nutrients from food more efficiently than from other sources. Excess vitamins ingested, often in the form of a compressed pill, are simply excreted from the body. This phenomenon explains the dark and pungent urination experienced by many vitamin users.

But why is it that our bodies do so much better with food? What’s the biological process that explains this condition?

To understand how nutrients work in the body, it’s important to understand that human metabolic processes don’t keep a checklist of vitamins and minerals. You can’t simply fill up columns A, B and C to achieve optimal health. Most nutrients work in tandem with dozens of other chemical factors. When you receive vitamins and minerals from a compressed pill, those nutrients don’t always arrive in the combinations and ratios that your body prefers. The result is an excess of several nutrients that your body simply cannot handle.

As is often the case, nature and evolution are already several steps ahead of the supplement industry. Whole foods provide the right combinations and ratios of key nutrients for maximum absorption. If you want to give your diet a vitamin and mineral boost, skip the multivitamin. These three food combinations provide the nutrients your body needs for optimal health in a package your body is designed to receive.

Broccoli and tomatoes

The Italians have the right of it on this super food combination. It’s well documented that tomatoes contain the prostate cancer fighting nutrient lycopene. Many men take lycopene supplements on a regular basis to protect against this common malignancy and support virility through middle age. A recent study in rats, however, found that prostate tumors grew at a much slower rate in subjects that consumed whole broccoli in tandem with whole tomatoes. This increase was compared to rats eating just broccoli, just tomatoes, and just artificial lycopene supplements. The reason for the disparity is the synergistic effect of the lycopene in the fresh tomatoes working alongside the antioxidants present in broccoli.

Green tea and fresh lemons

Green tea is perhaps the oldest super food known to man. In ancient China, the green tea plant was credited with focusing the mind and supporting longevity. Today, food scientists have a much more nuanced understanding of how green tea works to protect cells and support holistic health. The tea plant contains powerful antioxidants called catechins that fight cancer and protect against the cellular death that causes premature aging. These catechins are released from the leaf when boiled as in tea. But these incredible compounds are difficult for your body to absorb on their own. Research conducted at Purdue University suggests that adding a little fresh squeezed lemon to your green tea could raise catechin absorption rates from 10% to 80%. The citric acid in the lemon decreases the pH in your small and large intestines, creating a better environment for the alkali-averse catechins.

Garlic and fish

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States. One of the key risk factors for heart disease is bodily inflammation. Cardiac experts now believe that inflammation anywhere in the body increases a person’s risk of developing serious heart and metabolic complications. Fight back against inflammation by adding a regular serving of garlic and fish to your diet. Garlic is a well-known anti-inflammatory, when cooked with fish however it’s true power is unleashed. The omega 3 fatty acids in the fish help reduce bad cholesterol, while the garlic circulates throughout your bloodstream, attacking inflammation at its source.

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