Nature’s Prescriptions
We all know that we should be eating a bit more healthily, especially if we are watching our weight.
But it always surprises me how little we really know about the importance a nutritious diet has for our health and wellbeing.
Food is the most powerful drug that we have, with many natural foods proving to be as beneficial in tackling certain diseases, conditions and ailments as modern medicine.
Every week, I see new studies showing that what we eat can reduce our risk of developing diseases or help treat existing problems.
Of course, we have to take these studies with a pinch of salt.
The problem is, it’s very difficult to separate out the beneficial effects of a single food that someone may be eating, from the rest of their diet or other behaviour.
So, yes, if you do a survey of 1,000 people and find that those who ate raw cabbage three times a week were more likely to be slim than those who didn’t, are we to assume that raw cabbage is the new superfood for weight loss?
Or could it be that those who ate raw cabbage were more likely to be fitness enthusiasts and it was the running that kept the weight under control?
You see the problem.
However, the underlying theme to many of these studies is the recommendation to increase the proportion of real food in our diet – not heavily processed apologies for food that are high in sugar, bad fats and chemicals.
So, there’s not a whole lot to lose – other than the symptoms of the many diseases that are increasingly recognised as being related to our poor food choices.
Here are a few treatments that you can pick up from your local food store rather than the pharmacy…
Nature’s prescription: Avocado
Use it for: High Cholesterol
According to a recent study, consuming an avocado a day, as part of a moderate fat diet with 34 per cent of calories from fat, could actually help to reduce your cholesterol.
While we know that avocados are high in fat, most of their fat content is mono-unsaturated, or ‘good’ fat, which has been found to help lower cholesterol, reduce risk of stroke and heart attack, and improve heart health in general.
Now, I was just a little bit sceptical when I spotted that this study was funded by the Avocado Council.
But, as it was published in the Journal of the American Heart Association, who should know a bit about cholesterol, I feel more confident in passing this prescription on.
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