Pomegranate Seeds
When you think about the healthiest seeds you should be eating, we will bet that pomegranate seeds weren’t the first ones to come to mind. These little red, juicy seeds are also called arils.
The seeds are inside the hard shell of the pomegranate, and it can be a bit of a challenge to get them out. But once you do, these little seeds are worth the wait. “A full cup of pomegranate seeds has only 130-calories, making it good for a light snack”. They are also high in
antioxidants and vitamin c.
How to Eat Pomegranate Seeds
1. To use these delicious seeds, toss them into a salad with sliced almonds and balsamic dressing. The red of the seeds will add great color, and each bite of pomegranate seeds will give you an added juicy sweet flavor.
2. Another idea is to put them in your morning smoothie or make a roasted brussels sprout salad with the seeds. But you can also snack on the seeds themselves too!
1. Antioxidant Benefits
These help keep free radicals from bouncing around your body, which has been linked to cell damage and diseases such as cancer. But while most fruits have some antioxidants such as vitamin C, pomegranates benefit from especially potent ones called polyphenols that also give the fruits their color.
These polyphenols are the same compounds that give green tea its healthy edge. They also contain almost half of the daily recommended vitamin C intake and have three times more antioxidants than tea or red wine.
2. Improved Digestion
Pomegranates can aid your digestive tract in more ways than one, which is especially helpful during the holiday season when the meals get a little bigger. Juice from pomegranates has been found to reduce inflammation in the gut related to Crohn’s disease and colitis, allowing food to pass more freely.
Meanwhile, pomegranates also contain a pretty healthy dose of dietary fiber. Fiber can aid in the health of your colon while adding weight to your stool and softening it to reduce the chance of constipation.
3. Better Heart and Artery Health
When it comes to the health of your arteries and your heart, pomegranates rank in the top tier. That’s because, according to studies, the juice can boost blood flow and prevent arteries from hardening. Medical technology notes that the juice can also inhibit plaque growth in the arteries, leading to a heart attack or stroke.
Not only can the fruit juice help stop the hardening of the arteries (known in the medical world as atherosclerosis), but it may also be able to reverse the damage and clear clogged passages. The source cites a study that simulated the effect of high blood pressure on cells, showing those cells treated with the fruit juice had less damage.
4. Lower Blood Pressure
Speaking of heart health, pomegranates may be beneficial to those who have high blood pressure. The only problem is that high blood pressure isn’t something you’ll know about unless you visit a doctor because there are usually little or no warning signs.
However, Medical technology notes that two glasses of pomegranate juice per day may help drop your systolic blood pressure, which is the amount of force on your vessels from blood being pushed out from your heart. A normal reading is below 120, and 140 or more suggests hypertension. Make sure you follow a doctor’s recommendations along with drinking pomegranate juice to address this.
5. Easing Inflammation
Aside from improving gut inflammation, pomegranates may have anti-inflammatory properties that benefit various conditions ravariouseart disease to cancer inked to chronic inflammation. T-inflammatory effect has been attributed to potent antioxidants in the fruit called punicalagin.
Healthline cites test tube research that shows that these antioxidants help the digestive tract and reduce inflammation in cert of cancer cells (includiand breast cancer). Another study shows that consuming about 1-cup of juice per day can reduce inflammatory markers in patients with diabetes, adds the source.
6. Potentially Slowing Cancer Growth
While the research is still in the early stages, some promising studies suggest pomegranate juice can halt the progress of prostate cancer cells. The source explains that early findings showed a longer a prostate-specific-antigen, a marker for prosthat tate cancer progression.
The soprostate-prostate-specificraten no confirmation studies of this sort since the initial findings and that the initial research didn’t use a control or placebo group. However, the American Cancer Society notes the research continues, looking at extracts from pomegranate, green tea, and others. Meanwhile, lab studies suggest that pomegranate extract might help slow or reverse breast cancer cells – but more research is needed.
7. Lower Stress Levels
Research from 2011 shows that these little red fruits could actually make you feel less stressed out, specifically at work, where stress levels often run high. Drinking about half a liter of pomegranate juice per day was shown to lower stress hormones.
The research involved 60 participants consuming 500-ml of pomegranate juice for two weeks. The results? All of them said they felt “more enthusiastic and less distressed” after consuming the beverage.
8. Increased Libido and Fertility
Should we be calling pomegranate juice the “love juice”? Well, that might be going a bit far. But Medical technology points out there have been indications that the juice can boost sex drive and make both men and women more fertile.
The source attributes this benefit to the high concentration of antioxidants, noting that oxidative stress can cause male sperm and female fertility problems. Meanwhile, the source adds that drinking the juice can raise testosterone levels in men (and women), leading to more trips to the bedroom.
9. Better Sports Performance
Pomegranate juice might be beneficial to those who like to test their limits in sport. The research to back this up, explaining that exercise puts a lot of stress – including oxidative stress – on the body. But the juice might help counteract some of this.
The source adds that some athletes are drinking the juice to experience less discomfort while training. The combination of antioxidants found in the fruit can boost athletic prowess and even muscle strength. For example, the polyphenols we mentioned earlier apparently aid in muscle recovery. Meanwhile, nitrates found in pomegranate can help deliver more oxygen to muscles by opening up blood vessels.
10. Antiviral Properties
The cold season is almost upon us – literally. But with a regular dose of pomegranate juice, you may be able to ward off some of those upper respiratory infections thanks to a rich source of vitamin C and vitamin E. For example, the compound punicalagin found in the fruits was shown to help suppress influenza (flu).
In fact, as Medical technology points out, pomegranate juice performed well in lab tests as an antibacterial and antiviral agent. It may even hold promise to help protect against food poisoning from pathogens, particularly dangerous to young children and the elderly. Of course, proper food handling and preparation are always the best lines of defense.
11. Cognitive Benefits
Do you remember the last time you drank pomegranate juice? If not, you may be able to more easily if you drink it regularly. There is some evidence that the fruit extract can positively affect memory, particularly in those who have had their memory affected by heart surgery.
Healthline cites a study involving 28 older adults that had concerns about their memory. When they consumed 8-ounces of pomegranate juice per day, they improved memory markers relating to visual and verbal recall. The source adds that some mice studies have suggested there could be benefits for Alzheimer’s patients.
12. Helpful For Diabetics
We’ve already mentioned how pomegranate juice can reduce inflammatory markers in diabetes patients. But there’s more to it – Medical Technology notes that the fruit juice could help regulate blood sugar (it lowers fasting glucose levels in diabetics) and reduce [a hormone that regulates glucose in the blood] resistance, even within a few hours of drinking it.
Too much glucose in their blood inhibits the body’s ability to convert it to energy. This can lead to prediabetes, which causes the pancreas to work even harder to produce the hormone to use the sugar. The pancreas might not keep up with the increased demand, leading to type 2 diabetes [a hormone that regulates glucose in the blood and levels are at risk for low blood sugar].
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