Jacksonville's Neighborhood Garden

The Doctor's Office

This week we have some of the most powerful anti-cancer fruits and vegetables known available to us!  When it comes to cancer protection, all vegetables are not created equal.  The most powerful inhibitor of cancer cell growth are the allium family of vegetables, which include onions, garlic and leeks.  Extracts from these veggies consistently beat out dozens of other vegetables when it came to inhibiting cancer cell growth from a multitude of different cancers.  To maximize the benefit from garlic, crush or chop it and let it sit 10 minutes before cooking it.  This is because the protective compound is not in the garlic clove, but is made when an enzyme alliinase mixes with alliin and creates allicin, our anti-cancer friend.   Heating the garlic will destroy the enzyme, making allicin less available.
You can reap the benefits eating raw garlic as well, it's great in salsa, sauces and dressings. 

The second best anti-cancer family of vegetables are the cruciferous vegetables, which include kale, broccoli, brussel sprouts and cauliflower.  These wonderful plants contain many beneficial phytonutrients, but I want to concentrate on sulforaphane.  Sulforaphane, or it's precursor,  is found in highest concentration in cruciferous vegetables, and it has potent anti-cancer effects.  It has been most widely studied for it's effects on breast cancer, and has been shown to attack the cancer cells in many ways.  It is likely this multi-pronged attack that makes cruciferous vegetables such great preventative medicine!

I want to close with a word about spices.  Many spices have been used medicinally around the world, and with good reason.  Spices not only make our food taste better, they also contribute to our health in powerful ways.  My wife has included a curry recipe today, so I'd like to concentrate on turmeric, which gives curry the yellow color.  Tumeric comes from the turmeric root, which is a member of the ginger family. It has such strong anti-inflammatory properties that researchers compared it to standard treatment in rheumatoid arthritis patients.  The results were remarkable. Not only did the curcurmin (the active yellow component of turmeric) outperform diclofenac, it had no side effects. The same could not be said for the diclofenac, but when taken together, the curcurmin was protective against the side effects of the drug.  So go ahead and spice up your cooking, and feel good knowing these delicious flavors are doing your body good!