Golden vs Brown Flaxseed: Which Has More Benefits?

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Which kind of flaxseed has more cancer-fighting lignans?

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Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.

Embellished as a so-called miraculous defense against some critical maladies, flaxseeds are one of the original health foods, going back thousands of years to the time of Hippocrates. You can buy them in bulk for about three dollars a pound, which would last you nearly two months at the one-tablespoon-a-day dose I recommend in my Dr. Greger’s Daily Dozen app.

Flaxseeds come with nature’s own finest packaging: a hard natural hull that keeps them fresh inside. Unfortunately, nature’s packaging is a little too good. If we eat flaxseeds whole, they are likely to just pass right through us, come out the other end, and not do us much good. So, chew them really well, or grind them in a coffee or spice grinder, a mini food processor, a good blender, or just buy them already ground. Ground flaxseeds can be stored for months at room temperature in an airtight container.

Ground flaxseeds have a nice binding quality that makes for thick, rich, milkshake-y types of smoothies. In fact, you can use ground flaxseeds to replace eggs in baking. For each egg in a recipe, blend one tablespoon of ground flax with three tablespoons of water until it gets all gooey. With that swap, you’d be actively lowering cholesterol—based on more than five dozen randomized controlled trials—rather than raising it, as the eggs would.

There are brown flaxseeds and golden flaxseeds. Brown may have about 20 percent more omega-3s than golden, and like 30% more antioxidant power. They both lower blood pressures similarly, but golden flax appears better at lowering cholesterol levels. Both golden and brown helped seal a leaky gut, but brown seems better at reducing endotoxemia. As far as I’m concerned, brown wins, because brown flaxseed beats out golden with 60 percent more lignans––those anticancer compounds activated by our gut flora.

That’s the main reason ground flax is better than flaxseed oil, in addition to being more stable. Ground flaxseeds don’t oxidize even after nearly a year at room temperature in an airtight container, presumably because they are packed with antioxidants. But strip those away to make flaxseed oil, and it can start to turn rancid within a matter of weeks. The lignans are also stripped away in flax oil. If you look at the ingredients of so-called “high lignan” flaxseed oils, it’s a scam—they just sprinkle in some ground flax into the oil to add a pittance.

Lignans are why flaxseeds are so powerful at dampening the effects of estrogen. Eating just a single tablespoon of ground flaxseeds a day extends the length of a woman’s menstrual cycle—not the menses itself, but the whole month-long cycle—by an average of about one day. Beyond improving ovulation and reducing common PMS symptoms such as breast pain and cramping, the lengthening of the cycle means you have fewer periods throughout your life, which means less estrogen exposure, and lower breast cancer risk.

Lignans may explain why flaxseed consumption is associated with a lower risk of getting breast cancer and dying with it, whereas greater antibiotic use is associated with an increased risk of getting and dying from breast cancer––presumably because antibiotics can wipe out some of the good bacteria in our colon that activate the anticancer activity of flaxseed lignans. Check out my videos on preventing and treating breast cancer with flax.

Flax is good for men too, improving enlarged prostate symptoms comparable to the common drugs that are used that can cause a wide array of adverse side effects, including impotence––whereas the side effects of flax are not only lower cholesterol, but better blood pressures, better blood sugars, and maybe fewer hot flashes, though that’s not usually a big problem in sufferers of enlarged prostates.

Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.

Motion graphics by Avo Media

Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.

Embellished as a so-called miraculous defense against some critical maladies, flaxseeds are one of the original health foods, going back thousands of years to the time of Hippocrates. You can buy them in bulk for about three dollars a pound, which would last you nearly two months at the one-tablespoon-a-day dose I recommend in my Dr. Greger’s Daily Dozen app.

Flaxseeds come with nature’s own finest packaging: a hard natural hull that keeps them fresh inside. Unfortunately, nature’s packaging is a little too good. If we eat flaxseeds whole, they are likely to just pass right through us, come out the other end, and not do us much good. So, chew them really well, or grind them in a coffee or spice grinder, a mini food processor, a good blender, or just buy them already ground. Ground flaxseeds can be stored for months at room temperature in an airtight container.

Ground flaxseeds have a nice binding quality that makes for thick, rich, milkshake-y types of smoothies. In fact, you can use ground flaxseeds to replace eggs in baking. For each egg in a recipe, blend one tablespoon of ground flax with three tablespoons of water until it gets all gooey. With that swap, you’d be actively lowering cholesterol—based on more than five dozen randomized controlled trials—rather than raising it, as the eggs would.

There are brown flaxseeds and golden flaxseeds. Brown may have about 20 percent more omega-3s than golden, and like 30% more antioxidant power. They both lower blood pressures similarly, but golden flax appears better at lowering cholesterol levels. Both golden and brown helped seal a leaky gut, but brown seems better at reducing endotoxemia. As far as I’m concerned, brown wins, because brown flaxseed beats out golden with 60 percent more lignans––those anticancer compounds activated by our gut flora.

That’s the main reason ground flax is better than flaxseed oil, in addition to being more stable. Ground flaxseeds don’t oxidize even after nearly a year at room temperature in an airtight container, presumably because they are packed with antioxidants. But strip those away to make flaxseed oil, and it can start to turn rancid within a matter of weeks. The lignans are also stripped away in flax oil. If you look at the ingredients of so-called “high lignan” flaxseed oils, it’s a scam—they just sprinkle in some ground flax into the oil to add a pittance.

Lignans are why flaxseeds are so powerful at dampening the effects of estrogen. Eating just a single tablespoon of ground flaxseeds a day extends the length of a woman’s menstrual cycle—not the menses itself, but the whole month-long cycle—by an average of about one day. Beyond improving ovulation and reducing common PMS symptoms such as breast pain and cramping, the lengthening of the cycle means you have fewer periods throughout your life, which means less estrogen exposure, and lower breast cancer risk.

Lignans may explain why flaxseed consumption is associated with a lower risk of getting breast cancer and dying with it, whereas greater antibiotic use is associated with an increased risk of getting and dying from breast cancer––presumably because antibiotics can wipe out some of the good bacteria in our colon that activate the anticancer activity of flaxseed lignans. Check out my videos on preventing and treating breast cancer with flax.

Flax is good for men too, improving enlarged prostate symptoms comparable to the common drugs that are used that can cause a wide array of adverse side effects, including impotence––whereas the side effects of flax are not only lower cholesterol, but better blood pressures, better blood sugars, and maybe fewer hot flashes, though that’s not usually a big problem in sufferers of enlarged prostates.

Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.

Motion graphics by Avo Media

Doctor's Note

For more on flaxseeds, see:

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