Who Needs Wonder Drugs When Broccoli and Spinach Are Here to Protect Us Against Diseases?

Broccoli can protect against cancer and treat autism, while spinach is the healthiest food on the planet.

Broccoli is incredible. It can prevent DNA damage and metastatic cancer spread; activate defences against pathogens and pollutants; help to prevent lymphoma; boost the enzymes that detox your liver; target breast cancer stem cells; and reduce the risk of prostate cancer progression.

The component responsible for all this is thought to be sulforaphane, which is formed almost exclusively in cruciferous vegetables — including rocket, brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, spring greens, horseradish, kale, mustard greens, radishes, turnip tops and watercress.

Sulforaphane may also help protect your brain and your eyesight, reduce nasal allergy inflammation and manage type 2 diabetes.

It was even recently found to help treat autism. A placebo-controlled, double-blind, randomised trial of boys with autism found that two to three servings of cruciferous vegetables a day improves social interaction, abnormal behaviour and verbal communication — within a matter of weeks.

But here’s something you need to know. To get the full benefit of the sulforaphane, you need to eat your cruciferous vegetables raw or adopt what I call the Hack and Hold method.

That’s because there’s an enzyme that doesn’t activate the sulforaphane until raw broccoli, say, is chopped or chewed. And that enzyme is destroyed by cooking — unless you wait.

So first, chop the broccoli (or other cruciferous vegetable) and then wait 40 minutes. At that point you can cook it.

What about frozen broccoli? Sadly, commercially produced frozen broccoli lacks the ability to form sulforaphane because the vegetables are flash-cooked before they are frozen. After that, it doesn’t matter how much you chop or how long you wait — you won’t get any sulforaphane.

But there’s another way. The enzyme you need for the sulforaphane is also contained in mustard powder.

This means that instead of waiting 40 minutes, you can sprinkle mustard powder over cooked broccoli — even the frozen variety — and activate the sulforaphane.

Of all the food groups analysed by a team of Harvard University researchers, greens turned out to be associated with the strongest protection against major chronic diseases.
That meant about a 20 per cent reduction in risk for heart attacks and strokes for every additional daily serving. Yet today, only about one in every 25 people even eat a dozen servings in a month, let alone a week.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-3468692/Forget-wonder-drugs-need-broccoli-spinach-protect-against-deadly-diseases.html#ixzz422TKuGBU
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