Garden Variety Anti-Inflammation

One of the reasons some studies haven’t shown more impressive results tying disease reduction to the quantity of fruit and vegetable consumption may be because of the quality of fruit and vegetable consumption. People are more likely to eat bananas than blueberries; more likely to eat cucumbers instead of kale. Variety is also important, though. If in one of these studies, you ate a whole cantaloupe, you would be recorded getting eight servings of fruits or vegetables. One head of iceberg lettuce makes ten cups.

We know that whole foods are better than eating individual nutrients. For example, a carrot is better than a beta carotene pill because of what’s called nutrient synergy—where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, as many of the nutrients interact, work together, complement one another. But what about synergy between foods?

Check this out. I’ve talked about the wonders of the spice turmeric, but the key component of turmeric has very poor bioavailability. Just a tiny bit gets into our bloodstream after eating a nice curry—unless we add some black pepper. The phytonutrient in black pepper boosts the level of the turmeric phytonutrient 2,000%! That’s why dietary diversity is so important.

Not only may the variety of fruit and vegetable consumption decrease disease risk, independent from quantity of consumption; sometimes variety may even be more important. Check this out. No difference in inflammation—C-reactive protein levels—between those eating six servings of vegetables a day, and those eating two servings. But those eating the more variety—even if they didn’t necessarily eat greater overall quantities—had significantly less inflammation.

This supports the American Heart Association’s latest dietary guidelines, which, for the first time, added a recommendation for also eating a variety of fruits and vegetables.

To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by veganmontreal.

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• American Heart Association Nutrition Committee, Lichtenstein AH, Appel LJ, Brands M, Carnethon M, Daniels S, Franch HA, Franklin B, Kris-Etherton P, Harris WS, Howard B, Karanja N, Lefevre M, Rudel L, Sacks F, Van Horn L, Winston M, Wylie-Rosett J. Diet and lifestyle recommendations revision 2006: a scientific statement from the American Heart Association Nutrition Committee. Circulation. 2006 Jul 4;114(1):82-96.
• Bhupathiraju SN, Tucker KL. Greater variety in fruit and vegetable intake is associated with lower inflammation in Puerto Rican adults. Am J Clin Nutr. 2011 Jan;93(1):37-46.
• Jacobs DR Jr, Gross MD, Tapsell LC. Food synergy: an operational concept for understanding nutrition. Am J Clin Nutr. 2009 May;89(5):1543S-1548S.
• USDA Food Availability. 2011.
• Shoba G, Joy D, Joseph T, Majeed M, Rajendran R, Srinivas PS. Influence of piperine on the pharmacokinetics of curcumin in animals and human volunteers. Planta Med. 1998 May;64(4):353-6.
• Mitka M. Study further erodes evidence for eating fruits and vegetables to prevent cancer. JAMA. 2010 Jun 2;303(21):2127-8.

Images thanks to Rick Harris and Vladimir Morozov via Flickr, and Josiedraus via Wikimedia Commons.

• bananas
• beta carotene
• blueberries
• cantaloupe
• carrots
• cucumbers
• curry powder
• dietary guidelines
• fruit
• inflammation
• kale
• lettuce
• pepper
• phytonutrients
• spices
• supplements
• turmeric
• vegetables