apple Archives - Amazing Health Advances

Flavonoid Benefits from Apple Peels

The AHA! Team — Tue, 23 Jul 2024 08:28:19 +0000

Michael Greger M.D. FACLM via Nutrition Facts – Peeled apples are pitted head-to-head against unpeeled apples (and spinach) in a test of artery function. Regularly eating apples may contribute to a lower risk of dying prematurely. “Moderate apple consumption,” meaning one or two apples a week, “was associated with a 20% lower risk of all-cause mortality”—that is, dying from all causes put together—“whereas those who ate an apple a day had a 35% lower risk of all-cause mortality compared with women with low apple consumption.” You’ll often hear me talking about a lower or higher risk of mortality, but what does that mean? Isn’t the risk of dying 100 percent for everyone, eventually? As you can see in my graph below and at 0:40 in my video Friday Favorites: For Flavonoid Benefits, Don’t Peel Apples, I present some survival curves to help you visualize these concepts. For example, if you follow thousands of older women over time, nearly half succumb over a period of 15 years, but that half includes those who rarely, if ever, ate apples—less than 20 apples a year. Those who ate one small apple or about a quarter of a large apple a day survived even longer Instead, those averaging more like half a small apple a day lived longer; over the same time period, closer to 40 percent or so of them died. And those who ate one small apple or about a quarter of a large apple a day survived even longer. Why is that the case? It seems to be less the apple of one’s eye than the apple of one’s arteries. Even a fraction of an apple a day is associated with 24 percent lower odds of having severe major artery calcifications, a marker of vascular disease. You may think that’s an obvious benefit since apples are fruits and fruits are healthy, but the effect was not found for pears, oranges, or bananas. Both of these studies were done on women, but a similar effect (with apples and onions) was found for men. We think it’s because of the flavonoids, naturally occurring phytonutrients concentrated in apples. As you can see below and at 2:02 in my video, they’re thought to improve artery function and lower blood pressure, leading to improvements in blood flow throughout the body and brain, thereby decreasing the risk of heart disease and strokes. You don’t know, though, until you put it to the test. When I first saw a paper on testing flavonoid-rich apples, I assumed they had selectively bred or genetically engineered a special apple. But, no. The high-flavonoid apple was just an apple with its peel, compared to the low-flavonoid apple, which was the exact same apple with its peel removed. After eating the apples, flavonoid levels in the bloodstream shot up over the next three hours in the unpeeled apple group, compared to the peeled group, as you can see below, and at 2:36 in my video. This coincided with significantly improved artery function in the unpeeled apple group compared to the peeled one. The researchers concluded that “the lower risk of CVD [cardiovascular disease] with higher apple consumption is most likely due to the high concentration of ﬂavonoids in the skin which improve endothelial [arterial] function”—though, it could be anything in the peel. All we know is that apple peels are particularly good for us, improving artery function and lowering blood pressure. Even compared to spinach? As you can see in the graph below and at 3:14 in my video, if you give someone about three-quarters of a cup of cooked spinach, their blood pressure drops within two to three hours. If you instead eat an apple with some extra peel thrown in, you get a similar effect. The researchers concluded that apples and spinach almost immediately improve artery function and lower blood pressure. Researchers concluded that apples and spinach almost immediately improve artery function and lower blood pressure What’s nice about these results is that we’re talking about whole foods, not some supplement or extract. So, easily, “this could be translated into a natural and low-cost method of reducing the cardiovascular risk profile of the general population.” For more about apples, see the topic page and check out the related videos below. What about dried apples? See Dried Apples vs. Cholesterol. What about apple cider vinegar? Check out Flashback Friday: Does Apple Cider Vinegar Help with Weight Loss?. And what about apples going head-to-head with açai berries? See The Antioxidant Effects of Açai vs. Apples. Key Takeaways Women eating one apple a day had a 35 percent lower risk of dying from all causes (compared with women with low apple consumption) and a 20 percent lower risk after eating one or two apples a week. Women consuming even a fraction of a single apple a day had 24 percent lower odds of having severe major artery calcifications, a marker of vascular disease. This effect was not found for pears, oranges, or bananas. A similar effect was found for men eating apples and onions. It’s thought that the flavonoids, naturally occurring phytonutrients in apples, improve artery function and lower blood pressure, thereby decreasing heart disease and stroke risks. When testing flavonoid-rich apples, researchers compared the effects of eating apples with their peels on versus removed. Eating unpeeled apples resulted in higher flavonoid levels in the bloodstream and significantly improved artery function, compared to eating apples without their skins. Consuming spinach, like apples with their peels, almost immediately improves artery function and lowers blood pressure. To read the original article click here.

The post Flavonoid Benefits from Apple Peels appeared first on Amazing Health Advances.

Apple Peels Put to the Test for Chronic Joint Pain

AHA Publisher — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 08:00:37 +0000

Michael Greger M.D. FACLM via Nutrition Facts – Are the health benefits associated with apple consumption simply due to other healthy behaviors among apple-eaters? Regular apple intake is associated with all sorts of benefits, such as living longer and, more specifically, a lower risk of dying from cancer. At 0:17 in my video Apple Peels Put to the Test for Chronic Joint Pain, you can see the survival curve of elderly women. Of those who do not eat an apple a day, nearly a quarter had died after 10 years and nearly half were gone after 15 years. In comparison, those who eat on average about half an apple a day don’t die as young, and those eating one daily apple—more than three and a half daily ounces, which is around a cup of apple slices—lived even longer. Is it possible that people who eat apples every day just happen to practice other healthy behaviors, like exercising more or not smoking, and that’s why they’re living longer? The study controlled for obesity, smoking status, poverty, diseases, exercise, and more, so the researchers really could compare apples to apples (so to speak). What they didn’t control for, however, was an otherwise more healthful diet. As you can see at 1:04 in my video, studies show that those who regularly eat apples not only have higher intakes of nutrients like fiber that are found in the fruit, but they’re also eating less added sugar and less saturated fat. In other words, they’re eating overall more healthful diets, so it’s no wonder apple-eaters live longer. But, is apple-eating just a marker for healthful eating, or is there something about the apples themselves that’s beneficial? You don’t know, until you put it to the test. Given that “athletes use a variety of common strategies to stimulate arousal, cognition, and performance before morning training,” subjects were randomly assigned to a caffeinated energy drink, black coffee, an apple, or nothing at all in the morning. Did the apple hold its weight? Yes, it appeared to work just as well as the caffeinated beverages. The problem with these kinds of studies, though, is that they’re not blinded. Those in the apple group knew they were eating an apple, so there may have been an expectation bias—a placebo effect—that made them unconsciously give that extra bit of effort in the testing and skew the results. You can’t just stuff a whole apple into a pill. That’s why researchers instead test specific extracted apple components, which allows them to perform a double-blind, placebo-controlled study where half the subjects get the fruit elements and the other half get a sugar pill, and you don’t know until the end who got which. The problem there, however, is that you’re no longer dealing with a whole food, removing the symphony of interactions between the thousands of phytonutrients in the whole apple. Most of those special nutrients are concentrated in the peel, though. Instead of just dumpingmillions of pounds of nutrition in the trash, why couldn’t researchers just dry and powder the peels into opaque capsules to disguise them and then run blinded studies with those? Even just a “small amount could greatly increase phytochemical content and antioxidant activity…” The meat industry got the memo. A study found that “dried apple peel powder decreasesmicrobial expansion” in meat and protects against carcinogen production when it’s cooked. One of the carcinogens formed during the grilling of meat is a beta-carboline alkaloid—a neurotoxin that may be “a potential contributor to the development of neurological diseases including Parkinson’s disease.” Uncooked meat doesn’t have any. The neurotoxin is formed when meat is cooked, but you can cut the levels in half by first marinating it with dried apple peel powder, as you can see at 3:27 in my video. Apple peel also cuts down on the amount of fecal contamination bacteria in meat. At 3:36 in my video, you can see a graph showing fecal bacteria growth in pork, beef, and turkey. After the addition of dried apple peel powder, the amount of fecal bacteria decreased. Apple peels can also inhibit the formation of genotoxic, DNA-damaging, heterocyclic amines (HCAs). As I show at 3:55 in my video, apple peels reduced the levels of these cooked meat carcinogens by up to more than half. “In view of the risks associated with consuming HCAs,” these cancer-causing compounds in meat, “there is a need to reduce exposure by blocking HCA formation such as by adding an ingredient during the cooking of meats to prevent their production”—an ingredient like apple peel powder. (Of course not cooking the meat to begin with be another way to reduce exposure…). What about consuming apple peels directly? It was found that dried apple peel powder “exhibits powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory action,” but that was in mice. Does it have anti-inflammatory properties in people? You don’t know, until you put it to the test. A dozen people with moderate loss of joint range of motion and associated chronic pain were given a spoonful of dried apple peels a day for 12 weeks. As you can see at 4:45 in my video, month after month, their pain scores dropped and the range of motion improved in their neck, shoulders, back, and hips. The study’s conclusion? “Consumption of DAPP [dried apple peel powder] was associated with improved joint function and…pain reduction…” Why just “associated”? There was no control group so the subjects might have simply been getting better on their own, or the placebo effect could have come into play. Regardless, why not give apple peels a try by eating more apples? If you want to learn more about meat carcinogens, see my video Essential Tremor and Diet, and check out Reducing Cancer Risk in Meat-Eaters for more on HCAs. KEY TAKEAWAYS After controlling for such factors as obesity, smoking status, and exercise, researchers studying elderly women found that those who eat an apple a day (more than 3.5 daily ounces, about a cup of apple slices) live longer than those who only eat about half an apple on average, who themselves live longer than those who do not eat an apple a day. Studies show that subjects who regularly eat apples have higher intakes of fiber, which is found in the fruit, while eating less added sugar and less saturated fat. An apple in the morning was found to work as well as a caffeinated energy drink or black coffee, but the study wasn’t blinded so the possibility of expectation bias, a placebo effect, cannot be dismissed. Many special nutrients are concentrated in the peels of apples, and dried apple peel powder has been found to decrease “microbial expansion” in meat and protect against production of carcinogens during the cooking process. Beta-carboline alkaloid, a neurotoxin that may contribute to the development of Parkinson’s and other neurological diseases, is one of the carcinogens formed during the grilling of meat, and its levels can be halved by first marinating the meat with dried apple peel powder before cooking. Apple peels also reduce the amount of fecal contamination bacteria in meat and can inhibit DNA-damaging heterocyclic amines (HCAs) from forming. A daily spoonful of dried apple peels for 12 weeks resulted in subjects with moderate loss of range of motion in their joints and related chronic pain to experience improvements in their necks, shoulders, backs, and hips, as well as lower pain scores. To read the original article click here.

The post Apple Peels Put to the Test for Chronic Joint Pain appeared first on Amazing Health Advances.

Cranberry Apple Cider Recipe: A Great Holiday Drink!

AHA Publisher — Thu, 16 Dec 2021 08:00:04 +0000

Dr. Josh Axe, DC, DNM, CN – As the weather changes in the fall and winter months, we begin to look for warming and comforting foods and beverages. My cranberry apple cider recipe is the perfect drink to sip on during those cold nights. It’s packed with antioxidants and serves as a great alternative to mulled wine yet packs more flavor than simple apple cider. Try it out — it’s easy to prepare and undeniably delicious. The Perfect Fall to Winter Drink What makes the perfect fall to winter drink? It’s a drink that makes you feel warm, at ease and fulfilled. It also contains warming spices, like cinnamon, cardamon, ginger and clove. That’s exactly what I added to my cranberry apple cider. It’s made with a combination of apples, cranberries, oranges, maple syrup and these warming, antioxidant spices. It’s easy to drink, but that’s okay because it’s full of free radical-fighting antioxidants and works to improve your health. So next time you’re looking for the perfect cold weather drink to enjoy, opt for making your own cranberry apple cider. Not only does it make you feel good in the moment, it has long-term health benefits that will keep you energized and healthy for the coming months too. Key Ingredients Here are some of the top health benefits associated with the ingredients in this cranberry apple cider recipe: Apples: Apple nutrition contains fiber, vitamin C, potassium and vitamin K. Apples are also an excellent source of strong antioxidants (like quercetin and catechin) that can help to fight free radical damage and signs of early aging. Cranberries: Did you know that cranberries are packed with disease-fighting antioxidants? Like apples, eating cranberries can help to fight inflammation and reduce your risk of heart disease. Plus, cranberries can work to help prevent urinary tract infections because the antioxidants found in the fruit can change the bacteria so they don’t stick to the urinary tract. Orange: Oranges are a great source of vitamin C, potassium, vitamin A and vitamin B6. Eating oranges or adding fresh orange juice to your water, smoothies or homemade beverages can help to strengthen your immune system, increase your energy levels, aid digestion and boost circulation. Cinnamon: Like so many of the ingredients in this cranberry apple cider recipe, cinnamon is also packed with disease-fighting antioxidants. Consuming cinnamon (and using cinnamon oil) helps to fight infections, strengthen your immune system, reduce inflammation and even fight diabetes. Ginger: Did you know that there are 115 different chemical components found in ginger root? Ginger has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, which contributes to the many ginger health benefits that you receive when cooking and baking with ginger. How to Make Cranberry Apple Cider To begin preparing your cranberry apple cider, start chopping the fruit into wedges. You’ll need six Granny Smith apples, six Honeycrisp apples and two oranges. Place the fruit wedges into a large pot and add a 10-ounce bag of fresh or frozen cranberries. Next, add 3½ quarts of water to the pot. Now add in your spices: ½ teaspoon whole clove, 1 teaspoon ginger, ½ teaspoon cardamom and ½ teaspoon allspice. Next, place four cinnamon sticks into the pot, ½ cup maple syrup … and one sprig of rosemary. Now that all of your ingredients have been added to the pot, you’ll bring it to a boil and let it simmer on low for one hour. Once time is up, with a potato masher, crush the fruit in order to release the juices. This will make your cranberry apple cider super flavorful. After mashing the fruit, let it simmer for another hour and let it cool. Now it’s time to strain your cider. Using a cheesecloth, strain out the fruit fibers and herbs so you only have the liquid left. And just like that, your cranberry apple cider is ready! Store it in a sealable container and you can store it in your refrigerator for about one week. Reheat your cider before drinking or serving it. I hope you enjoy this comforting and warming cranberry apple cider. Cranberry Apple Cider Recipe My cranberry apple cider recipe is the perfect drink to sip on during those cold nights. It’s packed with antioxidants and serves as a great alternative for coffee, tea or hot cocoa. INGREDIENTS 6 Granny Smith apples 6 Honeycrisp apples 2 oranges 10-ounce bag cranberries, fresh or frozen 4 cinnamon sticks ½ teaspoon clove, whole 1 teaspoon ground ginger ½ teaspoon cardamom ½ teaspoon allspice ½ cup maple syrup 1 sprig rosemary 3½ quarts water INSTRUCTIONS Chop fruit into wedges. Combine all ingredients in a large pot over high heat. Bring to a boil. Simmer on low for 1 hour. With a potato masher, crush the fruit to release the juices. Simmer for at least one more hour. Allow to cool before straining. Strain out the fruit fibers and herbs with a cheesecloth. Store in a sealable container in the fridge for about 1 week. Heat before serving. To read the original article click here.

The post Cranberry Apple Cider Recipe: A Great Holiday Drink! appeared first on Amazing Health Advances.