02 Oct

Superfoods: What Are They and Why Are They Called Superfoods?

Blueberries

The term “Superfood” is often used when talking about nutrition and health. It was first mentioned by Aaron Moss in the August 1998 edition of his Journal entitled, Nature Nutrition. In the journal, he stated that “Humans have many options when it comes to fueling their bodies, but the benefits of some options are so nutritious that they might be labeled as superfoods”. In this context, superfood refers to certain groups of food that offer us great concentrations of unique nutrients that provide us with many different health benefits.

So What Exactly are the Criteria – When Can You Label a Food as a Superfood?

Well, foods worthy to be called superfoods contain high concentrations of antioxidants, minerals , vitamins and unique compounds such as phytonutrients, polysaccharides and essential fats.

Some of these attributes exist in almost all superfoods. The nutrients and antioxidants in superfoods are usually present in extreme amounts when they are raw and uncooked and compared to other “ordinary” foods. Another quality of a superfoods is that they it can be a part of our regular diet. We can usually  eat them as much as we want and as often as we want without worrying about dosage and adverse side effects.

Benefits of Consuming Superfoods

A few well known benefits of consuming superfoods on a regular basis primarily include optimal nutrition without overeating, aiding the body to detoxify and cleanse itself from potentially harmful toxins, and helping the body to rebuild itself. When these primary benefits from superfoods take place, secondary benefits follow, which include healthy, radiant skin, beautiful hair, weight loss, fit body, reduced risks to chronic illnesses and premature aging.

A Few Superfood Examples

One of the most common examples of superfoods are blueberries. They contain moderate concentrations of anthocyanins, vitamin C, manganese and dietary fiber.

Other well-known superfoods include goji berries, raspberries, raw cacao, broccoli, spinach, pumpkin, nuts, the lycopene-rich tomatoes, spirulina, whole grains, fish oil and superfruits like avocados. Each of the foods mentioned contain their own array of unique and remarkable nutrients and compounds. Fortunately, superfoods exist in most food groups. You can find them amidst the wide variety of fruits and vegetables, as well as in some species of seaweed.

If you make these foods a part of your regular diet you will feel healthier & stronger so give them a try.

16 Mar

Best Blueberries For Blueberry Juice And How To Choose Them

Aah! The taste of fresh blueberry juice. When juicing your own fruit juices, it can’t get any better than a bold, fresh taste full of flavor and nutrients. Using blueberry juice as your base, and mixing it with the juice from other fruits, can create quite a stunning mixture. Try pairing blueberries with plum, apple, pear, or other berries.

Blueberry Varieties

The North American harvest season for blueberries is anywhere from May through September. To get the cheapest and best blueberries for juicing, try to purchase berries during this time. There are nearly 20 different species of blueberries, a native fruit to North America. If you are planting your own blueberry bushes, there are easily 50 different plant varieties from which to choose.

The four basic varieties are highbush, half-high, lowbush, and rabbiteye. The most popular types are highbush and lowbush. Highbush blueberries are most commonly found in grocery stores and are believed to be among the best blueberries for juicing, due to their large size and juice content. Lowbush, or wild blueberries, are often found in the freezer section, but are not recommended for putting into your juicer.

Best blueberries for juice

What to Look For

Look for blueberries with a powder-blue color (not too light or too dark), firm (not too hard or too mushy), and uniform in size (not too small or too big). Wild blueberries tend to be smaller, firmer, less juicy, and tangier in flavor with some sweet and some sour.

Choosing the best berries for your juicer will result in the best juice possible. Fresh blueberries from your local produce supplier will yield the highest amounts of juice for your homemade blueberry juice recipes. Happy juicing!

08 Mar

Blueberry Juice Side Effects – Can You Drink Too Much Of It?

While its classification leaves it considered as something that is likely safe for most people, there are a few different blueberry juice side effects that have the potential to affect you. You should familiarize yourself with these possible risks before eating the fruit or drinking its juice.

Salicylate

Raw blueberries and blueberry juice have relatively high levels of salicylate, which is similar in nature to aspirin and comes from salicylic acid. Much like aspirin, salicylate is known to cause stomach irritation and upset in some individuals. However, even if you are prone to salicylate-induced stomach irritation, you will likely find that small amounts of the fruit and its juice are still enjoyable without noticeable ill effects.

Blueberry juice side effects

Diabetes

Most types of blueberries will not have a negative effect on blood sugar levels. However, there are a few types that can lower your blood sugar levels, and even interfere with diabetes medication and insulin if you are an individual with diabetes. It is recommended that you carefully monitor your blood sugar if you have diabetes and plan on consuming blueberries or blueberry juice.

Tannins

Blueberries contain relatively small amounts of tannins – the same chemical compound that gives coffee its bitter taste – and can cause stomach upset in sensitive individuals. If you consume large amounts of tannins, you are also at a greater risk of liver or kidney damage.

Surgery

Because blueberries and blueberry juice can affect blood sugar levels, this can create difficulty in moderating proper blood sugar levels throughout and after surgery. If you have a surgery planned, it is recommended that you avoid blueberries for at least two weeks beforehand.

Although there are several possible blueberry juice side effects that have negative repercussions, it is still generally considered that blueberries are a safe and healthy fruit. As with all foods, pay attention to your body’s reactions to fruits you digest, and you will likely have nothing to worry about.

24 Jan

Blueberry Nutrition Facts

Blueberry Nutrition Facts

Betaine 0,2 mg
Calcium 6 mg
Calories 84,4 Calories
Carbohydrate 21,4 g
Carotene-a 0 mcg
Carotene-ß 32 mcg
Choline 6 mg
Copper 0,1 mg
Dietary Fiber 3,6 g
Fluoride 0 mcg
Folate 6 mcg
Iron 0,3 mg
Lutein-zeaxanthin 80 mcg
Lycopene  mcg
Magnesium 6 mg
Manganese 0,3 mg
Niacine 0,4 mg
Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC) 5562 µ mol TE
Pantothenic Acid 0,1 mg
Phosphorus 12 mg
Phytonutrients 112 mcg
Potassium 77 mg
Protein 1,1 g
Pyridoxine Vit. B6 0,052 mg
Riboflavin Vit. B2 0 mg
Selenium 0,1 mcg
Sodium 1 mg
Sugar 14,7 g
Thiamine 0 mg
Total Fat 0,5 g
Vitamin A 54 IU
Vitamin B6 0,1 mg
Vitamin C 9,7 mg
Vitamin E 0,6 mg
Vitamin K 19,3 mcg
Water 84,2 g
Zinc 0,2 mg

02 Dec

Blueberry Juice Health Benefits: Blueberrries Have Earned The Right To Be Called A ‘Super Food’

The term “super food” gets thrown around a lot, but when it comes to the blueberries and blueberry juice health benefits, the term is well-deserved and no exaggeration. Blueberries are a veritable miracle of nature. The taste of blueberry is one of life’s greatest pleasures. As a beverage, blueberry juice is sublime – all this, and the health benefits it supplies are enormous.

THIS JUICE IS AN ANTIOXIDANT POWERHOUSE

First, blueberry juice is a powerhouse source of antioxidants. As you may know, antioxidants are composed of a variety of compounds, including vitamins, bio-flavonoids, enzymes, and peroxidases. What these substances do is “scrub” something called “free radicals” from the human body. Free radicals attach themselves to healthy cells in your body and essentially deteriorate them leading to a host of negative effects, including making you age faster and rendering you less able to fight off diseases, from colds to cancer.

Blueberry juice health benefits

So when you drink blueberry juice, you charge your body with free radical eliminating agents that get rid of as many of them as possible, thus helping you stave off aging and fend off disease. That almost sounds like a claim too good to be true for a fruit juice, but solid science backs it up.

Yes, many foods contain antioxidants, among the most common of which are Vitamin C, A, and E. But blueberry juice is not only exceptionally high in these essential antioxidant vitamins; it also delivers them to your body without also loading unwanted junk into your body, like fat or refined sugars. Blueberry juice is so naturally sweet that adding artificial sugar is absolutely unnecessary, even for a person with the most demanding sweet tooth!

ESSENTIAL ACIDS OFFER DIFFERENT BLUEBERRY JUICE HEALTH BENEFITS

Blueberry juice is also high in tannic acid, or tannins, which is well known to be an anti-inflammatory agent. The tannins in blueberry juice can ease intestinal inflammation, and also inflammation of the joints, or even the skin.

Let’s talk about one of the most dreaded diseases – cancer. Anyone can get cancer, and so it only makes sense to get as much of those healthy foods which do the most to give you the greatest chance of fending off the start of cancer. Blueberry juice does that, and in a variety of ways. One of the rich level of antioxidants in blueberry juice, which we have already talked about. But blueberry juice also contains ellagic acid. This natural form of acid is known to “switch off” certain metabolic processes that can lead to cancer in the stomach.

Blueberries juice also prevents cancer of the stomach and colon because it contains pectin, which is a soluble form of fiber. Pectin helps break down “bad” cholesterol, both reducing your cholesterol level, but also preventing bile buildup, which is known to lead to some forms of cancer.

EYE PROTECTION AND BLUEBERRIES

Amazingly, blueberry juice offers some protection for the agonizing condition of macular degeneration of the eyes – something for which there is no cure, and which causes blindness. A rigorous, 18-years study published in the Journal of Ophthalmology which followed 100,000 people found that those who drink high amounts of fruit juices, especially antioxidant rich juices like blueberry juice, have far less chance of developing macular generation as they grow older.

Blueberries and their health benefits

BLUEBERRIES AS A MEMORY AGENT

Another one of the blueberry juice health benefits is memory improvement. Blueberries have been shown to not only increase brain function, but specifically memory. This is creating excitement among the scientific community because it suggests high-blueberry/juice diets can play a role in preventing or staving off Alzheimer’s disease. The study which provided these results was published in the Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry.

PROTECTING ELEMENTS IN THE JUICE

Now let’s talk about a rather tongue-twisting compound in blueberry juice called pterostilbene. This is a substance closely related to resveratrol. The latter is produced in plants naturally when they are attacked by harmful fungi and bacteria, enabling the plant to fight off these attacking agents.

As it turns out, pterostilbene and resveratrol can deliver similar benefits to human being when they ingest them via plant products. Only blueberries and grapes contain pterostilbene. The end result is that, by taking in these substances via blueberry juice, you arm yourself with a powerful way to fight of a host of diseases caused by all kinds of substances, from molds and fungi, to bacteria and viruses.

When talking about the health benefits of blueberry juice, it’s almost difficult not to sound like a snake-oil salesman making outlandish claims, as if it were some kind of magical potion. But in the case of blueberry juice – it’s all true!