The Greens We Eat

This post was originally published as Still Not Eating Greens? by Laurel on Health Food blog.

One of the first things I learned in my health counseling training was that leafy greens are the #1 food missing from the typical American diet. It’s something worth mentioning, because greens are one of the most important foods for us to eat!

Good news: I read another study that proves leafy greens are life-saving foods. Yesterday I read about new research from the Hallym University College of Medicine in South Korea. Scientists studied the amount of folate in the diets of women with colorectal cancer and without cancer. They found that women who ate the most folate every day were 50% less likely to develop cancer than those who ate the least amount. (Ref: Oprah Magazine, Jan 2010, p. 92).

Make sure to focus on getting your folate from real food sources. Some studies have found that synthetic folate provides no protection against cancer. So fill up on green foods like:

Asparagus, spinach, romaine lettuce, turnip greens, mustard greens, and broccoli. Lentil beans are also an excellent source.

Think of greens as a way to cleanse your body. If you compare nutrition to nature, the trees and plants on the Earth’s surface take in carbon dioxide and release oxygen back into the atmosphere. The greens we eat as food also cleanse our bodies and support strong respiratory and circulatory systems.