Powerful Antioxidant foods with Anthocyanidins
Anthocyanidins, from the flavonoid family, are powerful antioxidants found in a wide variety of foods. They account for the different colours of many plants — for example, purple, red, orange, yellow and green plants all contain different types of anthocyanidins. (So you can be sure of a good intake by eating a naturally colourful diet.)
A diet rich in fruit and vegetables can deliver up to a gram of these important nutrients which may be as significant in their health-promoting properties as vitamins and minerals.
Anthocyanidins (sometimes called anthocyans) provide dramatic colours in foods such as those in black grapes, blueberries and cranberries. They are found in fruits, stems, bark, leaves and, more specifically, in flowers. Grape seeds, bilberries, cranberries and pine bark (pycnogenol) are especially rich sources. Other sources include hibiscus flowers, poppy flowers, cornflowers, mallow flowers, peony flowers, rose leaves and hollyhocks — many of these have traditional uses as natural remedies. A sub-family of the anthocyanidin family — proanthocyanidins — are also found in fruits, roots and shrubs and cover the spectrum of red—violet—blue. Grapes are a rich source of a proanthocyanidin called catechin.
As well as being important antioxidants, anthocyanidins are also anti-inflammatory which can make them useful in treating or preventing a wide range of inflammatory diseases, from asthma to eczema and arthritis. They also help stabilise collagen (our intercellular glue) which protects against ageing, and keeps tissue firm, supple and healthy. One of their most remarkable properties is that they provide protection from a wide variety of toxins in both the watery and fatty parts of the body (unlike vitamin C which protects only the watery parts and vitamin E which works only on fat-based compounds). Much reasearch has demonstrated that, in the laboratory, anthocyanidins can be 50 times stronger than vitamin E. They are even more powerful when combined with other key antioxidants, especially glutathione-related compounds, which they help recycle.
The heart disease prevention power of flavonoids such as anthocyanidins is well illustrated by what is known as the French paradox. Despite smoking, drinking alcohol and eating a high-fat diet, the French have significantly lower rates of heart disease. This led to the theory that drinking wine was protective. A study in Israel proved that red wine reduces oxidation of fats in the blood while white wine increases it. Of course, while alcohol per se has many negative qualities, red wine is especially rich in proanthocyanidins, which almost certainly explains the association between a decreased risk of cardiovascular disease and an increased intake of wine. An alternative and more beneficial strategy would be to drink grape juice or take in another concentrated source of proanthocyan-idins.
There are two ways to increase your intake of health- promoting anthocyanidins. One is to eat them; the other is to supplement your diet with concentrated extracts. To do both confers the most health benefits. Foods to eat include all sorts of berries, black grapes, citrus fruits, buckwheat and flowers used for herb teas. Drink berry juice and red grape juice (diluted due to its high sugar content) and choose red wine in preference to white. In terms of supplements, many antioxidant formulas now include some source of anthocyanidins, together with other vitamins, minerals and substances such as lipoic acid. Supplements of anthocyanidins are likely to name the source. For example, bilberry extract would be in a concentrated form to provide a particular percentage of actual anthocyanidins. So, 100mg of bilberry in a 4:1 concentrate, for example, would provide 25mg of anthocyanidins.
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Powerful Antioxidant foods with Anthocyanidins
November 25 2008 07:17 pm | Supplement
