By now we’ve all heard the term ‘superfoods’ and their supposed value when it comes to things like cancer and heart disease prevention. But what exactly is a ‘superfood’? How do they work?
The answer is, they don’t.
The term ‘superfood’ is often used to describe foods that are nutritionally dense or thought to reduce risks of disease. Over the years, the term has been awarded to a broad range of foods, from leafy greens to legumes to beans. Sometimes it’s given to an entire category, like seafood and berries. Even water has been classified as a superfood!
But there is no clear definition for it, so the food industry can put it on just about anything, wait for the inevitable media headlines of “The one superfood you need to be eating” and sit back as sales go up. It’s a big market too: in 2018 the global market for superfoods was valued at $137 billion dollars. As long as the fountain of youth eludes us, superfoods may be considered the next best thing.
In reality, superfoods are a marketing gimmick. The term is so vacant that in 2007, the EU ruled to ban it. In an interview with The Guardian, Catherine Collins of London’s St George’s Hospital said that “The term ‘superfoods’ is at best meaningless and at most harmful.”
Of course, some foods are more nutritious than others, but the implication is that superfoods are life-saving miracle foods. This is probably an indictment of our current diet: we’re so used to foods being nutritionally empty that when we see something nutritious, it astounds us.
But there’s no miracle food that will keep you young, fit and healthy forever. The closest thing for that is being metabolically healthy, which is achieved through consistent diet and lifestyle choices. Eating dark leafy greens and legumes won’t make you healthy if the rest of your diet consists of Twinkies and packaged foods – despite what the marketing teams try to imply, no single food item can make you healthy.
That’s why my recommendation is instead of looking for superfoods promoted as a shortcut to health, eliminate the worst offenders from your diet. Let’s take a look at those here:
Processed foods
Much like superfood, ‘processed food’ is a vague term. Some of them are obvious and easy to avoid, like cookies, cakes and potato chips. But there are also a lot of products that fly under the radar with labels like ‘sugar-free’ or ‘heart healthy.’
If you have any cereal or granola in your cupboards, go and read the labels. I can guarantee you that it includes sugar or an unhealthy oil.
The truth is the label on your ‘heart-healthy’ granola box is lying to you.
The problem isn’t just that these products contain these unhealthy additives (although that is certainly one of the problems), but also that by eating them, you’re simultaneously denying your body the healthy fats and proteins that it actually requires.
As I’ve said before, a general rule for establishing a healthy diet is to consume things that grow in the ground or which eat things that grow in the ground i.e. animal products, seeds, nuts etc.
But there’s another rule you can follow to help you spot the many processed products that are advertised as healthy. Simply, you should be able to tell what’s in a product by looking at it. If you need to check the list of ingredients to know what’s in your food, then most likely you should avoid it.
Artificial trans-fats
If you’re focusing on heart disease prevention, perhaps the most important products to eliminate from your diet are those that contain artificial trans-fats, or partially-hydrogenated fats.
There’s a lot of conflicting information when it comes to improving heart health, especially what kinds of fats should be consumed. Yet one thing that is almost universally agreed on is that artificial trans-fats are unhealthy, dangerous, and best avoided. So much so that there have been many calls to ban them, with some success.
Trans-fats can often be found in:
- Vegetable oil
- Cakes and pastries
- Fast food
- Fried food
- Potato and corn chips
- Ice cream
Unfortunately, they can often be concealed even in products that claim to be healthy, making it difficult to avoid them entirely. Healthline writes, ‘In the United States, manufacturers can label their products “Trans-fat free” as long as there are fewer than 0.5 grams of these fats per serving.’
Misleading statements like that are just one of the reasons why it is always best to avoid foods that come in a box or packet if you want to eat for heart disease prevention.
Low-fat dairy products
In their recently published dietary guidelines for 2021, the American Heart Association recommends low-fat or fat-free dairy products.
It saddens me that even in 2021, we’re scared of fats – to such an extent that we’re told to eat processed, sugar-laden alternatives.
By definition, low-fat and fat-free dairy products are processed, and the fats are typically replaced with sugar. Yet the naturally occurring fats of meat and dairy products are an important part of the human diet.
Natural fats are important as they:
- Maintain blood vessels
- Are used for making hormones
- Help the functioning of the nervous system
But because removing the fat also removes flavor, manufacturers increase sugar. This increases the risk of:
- Diabetes
- Heart disease
- High cholesterol
It’s ironic that by being fearful of a healthy food, we encourage the use of an alternative food that is partly responsible for the high levels of obesity and metabolic disease in the USA.
Conclusion
The simple truth is there’s no single ultra-healthy food that can outweigh an otherwise poor diet, no matter what may be printed on a product’s packaging. While trying to incorporate so-called ‘superfoods’ isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it’s important that you add them as supplementary to a diet that is already healthy, and not use them as justification for eating bad foods. In other words, if you’re living off fast food and sodas, your focus should be on removing those first – not increasing your intake of beetroot.
If you want to learn how to eat healthy foods on any diet – including low-carb, carb-free, vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free – I cover all of this in my new book Stay Off My Operating Table. Get your copy here.