Grower • Shipper • Exporter Pleasing strawberry lovers since 1986 | |
charm, Spinach Deemed Most Powerful Antioxidant FoodsBy Denise MannJuly 14,1997 Adding strawberries to your breakfast cereal and eating a spinach salad for lunch may help you fight cancer, heart disease and other ills, new findings suggest. That's because strawberries and spinach have as much ability to counteract damaging oxygen-free radicals in the body as a large dose of vitamin C, according to researchers with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). In a study of eight elderly women, special drinks made from strawberry or spinach extracts each boosted the women's antioxidant capacity by 20 percent. That's as much as taking 1,250 milligrams of vitamin C, reported Ronald L. Prior of the USDA's Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University in Boston. Vitamin C and other antioxidants protect the body by gobbling up the oxygen-free radicals that damage cells and are believed to promote cancer, heart disease and aging. In an earlier laboratory study, the researchers found that strawberries and spinach had the highest antioxidant capacity of 40 common fruits and vegetables. The new study was designed to determine whether eating these foods would actually translate into greater antioxidant capacity in the human body. Not commercially available, the strawberry and spinach drinks were the equivalent of about 8 to 10 ounces of the fruit or vegetable. "That is about the amount of spinach found in one bag or about one pint of strawberries," said researcher Neal Lischner. "Both spinach and strawberries are nutrient-dense foods, so it makes sense that they would top the list of fruits and vegetables" containing antioxidants, said Felicia Busch, a registered dietitian and spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association in Chicago. "The easiest way to get spinach into your diet is to stop buying
iceberg lettuce, and use spinach or other dark green leafy vegetables in salads,"
Busch said. Spinach and strawberries are also good sources of folic acid--a
B vitamin that is needed for cell growth. "Strawberries are actually real
good on top of spinach," she added. |