Are Red Foods Really Better Than Green?

It's important to emphasize that you can't go wrong by eating any fruit or vegetable. Whatever you choose, you'll get amazing vitamins, nutrients, and minerals. I hate to weigh the benefits of healthy foods because I love them all equally — they're my babies — but research has shown that some red munchies dominate when it comes to antioxidants, even though it doesn't always have to be the case.

Red foods like guava, peppers, tomato products, strawberries, papaya, apricot or watermelon are very high in cartenoids — beta-carotene, beta-cryptoxanthin, and lutein — which all act as antioxidants when ingested in our bodies. Many epidemiological studies have shown that taking lycophene rich nutrition can lower the risk of cancer, especially prostate cancer.

Reds AND Greens — It's Not A Competition

Red and green grapes, red and green cabbage, red and green apples … Why are we given more than one kind of almost anything? It's simple. We are given more because they don't offer the same benefits. They have different nutrients, give different health benefits, and often even taste differently.

For example, red cabbage is loaded with extra nutrients like anthocyanins that can't be found in its green version. Anthocyanins — the antioxidants that red cabbage gets its color from — are flavonoids with proven health benefits. They are able to battle cancer and improve memory. They also contribute to weight-loss by assisting body to metabolize fat.

As in all things in life, we have exceptions here too. Although in most cases red color means more antioxidants, it's not always this way. Green apples have been proven to be healthier than their red counterparts. Same as it goes for taste, nutrient density of green and red apples is not the same.

Avocado is rich in cartenoids like neoxanthin, lutein, chrysanthemaxanthin, has large amounts of monounsaturated fatty acid, as well as vitamins C and E, some unusual phytosterols including campsterol, beta-sitosterol and stigmasterol, and anti-infammatory components including phytosterols and cartenoids. All these major carotenoids can also be found in tomatoes, but not as nearly much as in avocados.

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Research conducted in Arkansas and published in the American College of Nutrition has shown that antioxidants from kiwifruit are absorbed by the body better than antioxidants from any other fruit. Researchers tested blood samples from seven women volunteers after eating 300 grams of kiwifruit per day. They took the blood before the women ate, and also 1.5, 3 hours and 4.5 hours after. They found that antioxidant intake score of kiwifruit was whooping 12.5, compared to 4.2 and 1.7 for grapes and strawberries. So, eating kiwis helps in absorption and better antioxidant metabolism. Also, Vitamin C in kiwifruit eliminates free-radicals responsible for inflammations and cancer.

Food Combinations — Food Synergy Concept

Food synergy — a lesser known nutrition concept by researcher David R. Jacobs — is a premise that eating specific food combinations maximizes health benefits of each specific food. He found that combining specific foods can increase absorption of antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, fiber — all the basics of good nutrition, and essential for good health.

While fruit and vegetables offer amazing health benefits on their own, pairing with other foods with supplemental nutrients optimizes their benefits. Not only these complementary foods help to fight of illnesses like diabetes, heart conditions or cancer, but they also taste great when combined together.

Food synergy is just a new name for a very old concept: importance of eating variety of healthy foods like fruit, vegetables, whole grains, and healthy fats like nuts and olives. Even though research is yet to show best food combinations, everyone is free to try different variations. It is stated that what tastes good together, is beneficial together too.

Foods That Work Well Together

Journal of Nutrition published a study conducted on rats with prostate tumors. The tumors grew less in those rats fed by combination of broccoli and tomatoes, when compared to rats fed by only one of those vegetables, and cancer-fighting substances isolated from broccoli and tomatoes. Conclusion: Vegetables are helpful and healthy, but combination of broccoli and tomato is better that medications and tomato or broccoli alone.

Similar study was conducted at the Ohio State University. They found that avocado combined with salsa (or any form of tomato) helped to absorb four times more of the antioxidant called lycopene. These antioxidants are known as cartenoids, and they give tomato its red color. Adding healthy fat from avocado made the cartenoid absorbable a lot more than usual.

Leafy greens go well with olive oil. Nitrites in greens help to lower blood pressure, and combined with fatty acids from olive oil — which is great in cleaning the heart — work well against strokes, heart attacks, and every other heart condition. People often consume low-fat dressings on their salads, which according to food synergy concept is a very bad thing to do, because healthy fats in olive oil help to absorb nutrients and protective phytochemicals from the greens better. Mediterraneans are considered to be the best example of food synergy and among healthiest group of nations in the world, probably due to their 'unusual' food combinations, a lot of tomatoes, green vegetables and healthy fats like olives and natural olive oils.

Rosemary works amazingly well with fried and barbecued meat. Heated oil can cause carcinogens (potentially cancerous chemicals) to form on your meat. Rosemary's strong natural antioxidants are able to stop these cancer-causing chemicals from forming. There are more food combinations proven to bring out the best from one another and do miracles for your health, like combination of fish and garlic, black pepper and turmeric, apples and grapes, spinach sprinkled with lemon and many others that are yet to be tested.

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Every single piece of fruit and each vegetable is special. They all have something they are good at; none is completely better than others. There are numerous fruits and veggies to choose from, and they all bring something special to the table. We just have to pick the most beneficial combinations.