What’s Good About Winter Market Produce?
Continued…
Broccoli
Broccoli is a powerhouse of healthy nutrition which supports just about every organ and tissue in the body. Broccoli helps promote healthy vision, nervous system, immune system, bones, brain, cardiovascular, cancer prevention and much more. Many supplement companies will put broccoli in as part of their recipe. But, guess what?
Nothing surpasses your Farmer’s Market broccoli for your health!
There is a little known enzyme in Broccoli called myrosinase which helps us absorb five to eight times more of some of the most important phyto-nutrients.
Destroying enzymes is how foods are preserved to keep them fresher looking with a stronger shelf life. Also, cooking will kill all the enzymes as well.
However, if you eat it raw or lightly steam your broccoli, you will have the all powerful enzymes to help you heal with your beautiful Farmer’s Market foods.
Definitely try not to overcook this powerful healing food.
Cabbage
Certain periods in history cabbage has been known as the most important healing substance in the world.
Cabbage has been used medicinally both internally and externally especially in Roman times.
Cabbage leaves were used judiciously as a poultice to naturally treat injuries. Cabbage has also been used on skin eruptions.
Please be a little cautious cabbage is a very strong medicinal and it can aggravate skin conditions before healing them because it‘s sulphur compounds stimulate the immune system to great action.
Cabbage juice has been explored in modern research as an effective treatment in peptic ulcers in particular (I believe Harvard Medical College did this study).
And, like most veggies especially cruciferous, cabbage has great potential in cancer prevention too.
One of the best general rules in choosing foods for health is high concentrated nutrition in low calorie foods. This is where cabbage definitely rules!
Cauliflower Power
Here is another Farmer’s Market cruciferous veggie with incredible health benefits for us and our families. Cauliflower is really a super-food. There are many reasons why cauliflower has such incredible health power.
I’d like to mention just two of the special health nutrients for the braissica family of veggies such as broccoli, cabbage, brussels sprouts, and our cauliflower. These two exceptional nutrients are sulphurofane and indole-3-carbinol. Both are known to be exceptional for cancer prevention.
Sulfurophane reduces inflammation in our bodies, kills h-pylori (presumed to cause ulcers), prevents and helps diabetes, protects arteries, and more.
Indole-3-carbinol is fascinating in that it reduces estrogens in our body, and has been found to act on more estrogen driven cancers then tamoxifen which is a drug used to suppress hormonally driven cancers. In studies indole-3-carbinol has shown to directly reverse some cervical dysplasias in women. I would love to write more on the great health benefits of balancing estrogen in both men and women.
Enjoy your Farmer’s Market cauliflower power,
Carrots
We all know carrots are healthy, but did you know carrots were originally used medicinally?
Yep, carrots have an extraordinary reputation for healing throughout history. The most commonly known health benefits are for anemia and eyes.
Carrots have been medicinally used throughout the ages to treat many conditions such as; chronic kidney problems, allergies, rheumatism, constipation, diarrhea, and much more….
But, did you also know?
There have been recent mainstream studies showing the benefits of carrots for preventing cancer in animals which have been induced to produce cancer.
Even more interesting is the Gerson therapy used to treat advanced stage cancer for decades now. A very large portion of the Gerson program is based on fresh organic carrot and organic green apple juice taken multiple times daily.
There seems to be developing a bit of a debate whether carrots have more anti-cancer properties when raw or cooked. When carrots are cooked they release more of one cancer fighting element called Falcarinol, but at the same time vitamin C and other basic nutrients which are water soluble are lost.
I usually choose the value of raw over cooked in the majority of foods. Vitamin C is also known to heal and prevent cancer and the synergy of a food makes more sense to me then looking to use a single constituent as a drug.
Swiss Chard Of The Highest Regard!
Chard in some circles is considered one of the top anti-cancer veggies around with high vitamin K, C,E and high chlorophyll, fiber, and carotenoids.
Chard gives so-called super-foods a run for their money!
Leafy greens such as chard are incredibly alkalizing for our bodies. Processed foods, sugar, alcohol, caffeine, and animal products have a tendency to create acidity. Acid environments are conducive to irregular cell growth and cancer.
I’ve experienced vegetables like chard to be a lifeline, especially when juiced, nourishing our bodies and seemingly starving acidic disease conditions.
Professionally I’ve experienced great results with the help of leafy greens, like chard, giving new hope and life to people that otherwise were given a death sentence medically.
Watching clients learn how to beat the medical odds with live foods, has been a joy!
Citrus Oranges
One of the best things about oranges and many citrus is how they ripen in the winter, October – February.
When cold winter months normally reduce our accessibility to many foods we get a powerhouse of nutrition for our health with our Farmer’s Market citrus fruits.
When is cold and flu season? As soon as Halloween candy starts hitting the grocery stores and lasting through the winter, perfect for orange season.
Nature seems to know how to take care of us. It’s a blessing to have a Farmer’s Market which provides seasonal food. Eating with the seasons helps us stay well where others who eat processed foods continuously succumb to the epidemics of flu’s and colds.
Oranges naturally have more sugars if we add processed sugar we increase the mucous production and negate the health benefits of the oranges and other citrus in our diet. Same with milk products. Processed sugars and milk products create inflammation in the mucous membranes and leave us wide open for allergies, colds, and flu.
To best help nature work for our health let’s eat Farmer’s Market produce and try Farmer’s Market recipes, helping us enjoy great health through the winter season.
Garlic the Stinking Rose…
While garlic may not be healthy for your relationships if eaten too profusely, garlic is probably the most famous medicinal food in the world today.
Garlic is known as the stinking-rose.
Garlic can keep away more then people…
Garlic is known as an antibiotic, antiviral, anti-parasitical, anti-cancer, and I’m guessing none of these creatures like the smell of concentrated garlic’s sulfur content either. Garlic is known to be beneficial in reducing high blood pressure, and high cholesterol greatly benefiting our circulatory systems.
Garlic’s properties help with our immune system on many levels. Garlic is considered a diuretic, expectorant, decongestant, and reduces inflammation.
Personally one of my favorite uses for garlic is on a very busy day at work, my clients seem to respect my personal space better and be happy to leave on time or a little early on my garlic eating days.
Gotcha! Had to use a little “Health Nut” humor…
Seriously, garlic is rose for healthy living.
Just a note on preparing garlic. Your garlic from Farmer’s Market should be lightly chopped or mashed and left to sit at room temperature for about 15 minutes before being tossed into your recipe. This brewing time allows certain potentially medicinal enzymes to work and enhance the health benefits of your incredibly tasty Farmer’s Market garlic.
Kale
Let your food be your medicine and your medicine be your food.
–Hippocrates–
Kale is just that food.
Kale is a great anti-inflammatory. Which means basically it can help in a majority of health conditions. Kale is a great alkalizer as most leafy dark greens are. Kale is full of wonderful nutrition such as fiber, omega fatty acids, vitamin B-6, C, K, and A.
Kale is also a rich source of minerals calcium, magnesium, Iron, copper, potassium, manganese and phosphorus.
Kale is a brassica family veggie like broccoli and cabbage, and like them has the incredible healing potential of sulphur containing compounds. The calcium content is much more available to your body to uptake then any common dairy product, and better then some other leafy greens like chard and spinach.
When a family member comes down with a respiratory condition I like to recommend boiling kale for 5 min in a stainless steel pot of water and then drinking as much of the broth as possible after it’s cooled a bit. I get great reports of this making a big difference in breaking up the mucous, reducing the cough and speeding up recovery.
With all those nutritional items and the anti-inflammatory help, it would be hard to find better nutritional help in the winter.
Leeks
The tasty cleanser…
Leeks are a wonderful cleanser. They bind with other substances and help to purge them out of the body. With their high fiber and potassium levels, leeks are perfect to help with a nice internal spring cleaning.
The fiber in leeks slows down the digestion of food in a good way especially for diabetics. Slowing the uptake of the sugars in the food and slowing the need for insulin to be released keeps us from having those excessive blood sugar spikes.
Leeks also help reduce cholesterol absorption, lowering the bad and raising the good.
Leeks like onions have a good amount of quercitin which reduces allergies and inflammation. Leeks are a good source of vitamin C, and Folic Acid too. Leeks have lutein and zeaxanthin (now there’s a mouthfull) which are both foods for our eyes.
Leeks show some promising potential on the cancer prevention front as well especially colon, prostate, and ovarian.
Has anyone noticed how almost everything is considered to cause cancer these days?
Have you also noticed how pretty much every veggie and fruit has information about how it prevents or heals cancer?
Could be a “no brainer”…
Radishes and turnips are just as healthy as all the rest. I will just have to find some time to write about them…
Enjoy your Wrightwood Certified Farmer’s Market| The heart and health of your community!
Ron
Nurture Yourself, Nurture Your Community!
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