From beetroot to brown rice, how 5 ‘ordinary’ foods deliver extraordinary health benefits, and why you should be eating more of them
- Beetroot is known to be good for muscle endurance, the heart and brain; broccoli aids memory and mood, and blueberries help reduce stroke risk and blood pressure
- There are lots of health benefits in eating everyday superfoods, from brown rice to mushrooms, that you may already have around your home. Here are some of them
Beetroot, blueberries, broccoli, brown rice and button mushrooms – five common foods beginning with B are often touted as good for us. But why? And what’s the science behind their reputations?
We speak with experts to learn what makes these seemingly ordinary foods extraordinary – and why we should eat them more often.
Beetroot
Andrew Jones, a professor of applied physiology at the University of Exeter, in the UK, is a champion of the humble beetroot; he even has @AndyBeetroot as his Twitter handle. He’s gaining quite the following in the world of sports science.
During his career he has focused on muscle energetics – the study of how muscles are fuelled – fatigue and respiratory physiology, and through these his interest in beetroot grew.
He discovered that eating, or drinking the juice of, these usually bright red root vegetables can improve exercise endurance and can provide significant benefits for the heart, muscles and brain.
His recently published study finds that consuming dietary nitrate, found in beetroot, significantly increases muscle strength during exercise; it makes muscles work better, harder and faster.
