Why are fruits and vegetables important?
When looking at the Mediterranean diet, the eat well plate and advice from the NHS, the emphasis is always on basing meals around fruits and vegetables. Fruits and vegetables provide the body with fibre, water, vitamins, minerals and trace elements, all of which are vital for our overall health.
Eating fibre can help to keep a healthy gut and keep the digestive system running efficiently, as well as reducing your risk of cardiovascular disease, insulin resistance and obesity. We should be aiming to consume 30g of fibre daily.
Many vitamins are water soluble and cannot be stored in the body, meaning that they have to be consumed regularly to prevent any deficiencies. For example, magnesium helps to regulate blood sugar, blood pressure, muscle and nerve function and with diabetes, blood sugar and nerve function is already impacted, so keeping magnesium levels topped up is important. Magnesium foods include spinach, banana, avocado and broccoli.
We are advised to eat a minimum of 5 different fruits and vegetables a day, which consists of 80g a portion or 3 tablespoons. 5 a day, or around 400g of fruit and vegetables a day, has been shown to lower the risk of serious health conditions such as heart disease, stroke and some types of cancer.
Here are some easy ways to include more fruits and vegetables into your diet:
• Chop up a banana into porridge
• Utilise herbs and spices to make your vegetables flavoursome
• Blitz up vegetables into sauces such as red pepper, onion and tomatoes into a pasta sauce
• Try one new fruit or vegetable a week to get in variety
• Try to include at least one fruit or vegetable with each meal – e.g. some berries with cereal, salad in a sandwich and broccoli with a stir fry.
Eating a variety of fruits and vegetables is key to getting the maximum health benefits. Try and think about eating the rainbow and getting all of the different colours in.
References:
Alissa Em and Ferns GA (2017) ‘Dietary fruits and vegetables and cardiovascular diseases risk’, Critical reviews in food science and nutrition, 57(9), pp. 1950-1962.
Li M, Fan Y, Zhang X, Hou W and Tang Z (2014) ‘Fruit and vegetable intake and risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus: meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies’, BMJ Open, 4(11), pp. e005497.
NHS (2022) Why 5 a day? Available at https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/5-a-day/why-5-a-day/ (Accessed on 29 December 2022).
WHO (2020) Healthy Diet. Available at https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/healthy-diet (Accessed on 29 December 2022).