What Antioxidants REALLY Do (and easy ways to get enough)!

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Everybody has heard of antioxidants, everybody knows that are good for them and it feels like every food and drink product under the sun claims to have them.

But what are antioxidants and why are they so important? Oh, and what is the easiest, and best way to make sure we get enough!

Antioxidants: The Basics

Antioxidants literally do what they say on the tin, they prevent oxidation reactions in the body. They are anti-oxidising.

And why is this important? Because oxidation reactions in the body produce ‘free radicals’ which are serious cell damagers and the cause of many diseases and aging. In fact, oxidative stress has been shown to be pivotal in the onset of many diseases including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, motor neurone disease and a number of different cancers.

These oxidation reactions are natural in the body (they happen when our cells use oxygen) and we cannot and should not try to prevent them. But we do need to ensure we are consuming enough antioxidants to clean up the by-product of these reactions, the free radicals.

Antioxidants are free-radical scavengers, scuttling about through the body, not only removing these free radicals, but also repairing the damage that they have done. Brilliant.

Where Can I Get Some?

Thankfully antioxidants are found in tasty, tasty foods! Here are some of the most important, with a list of our favourite (alkaline, vegetarian) sources:

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  • Glutathione: because all other antioxidants depend upon the presence of glutathione to function properly, scientists call it ’the master antioxidant.’ To give your body the best chance of manufacturing enough you have to eat a nice, wide variety of sources. Foods that help are asparagus, broccoli, avocado and spinach.
  • Vitamin A and Carotenoids: these ones are easy to get, just hit the fresh aisle of the supermarket or grocery store and head for the colour! Carrots, peppers (capsicum), broccoli, sweet potato, greens, tomatoes are all a really great source. If you’re living alkaline then you’ll be getting plenty of vitamin A from your greens!
  • Vitamin C: people naturally assume oranges and other citrus, but if you are trying to live alkaline and/or trying not to consume too much sugar you can get your vitamin c from green capsicum (peppers), broccoli, spinach (and other greens), tomatoes and cauliflower. Can you see a theme emerging with some of these antioxidant sources?
  • Flavonoids / polyphenols:green tea is great, but don’t go overboard on the caffeine! Vegetables high in flavonoids include onion, kale, green beans, broccoli, celery, tomato, pepper/capsicum, cabbage, carrots and peas!
  • Vitamin E: no tomatoes in this list! Vitamin E is all about the almonds and sunflower seeds! Leafy greens are also pretty good, but almonds and sunflower seeds have almost double the Vitamin E of other food sources.
  • Lycopene: you probably already know to hit the tomatoes hard for your lycopene fix, and they are pretty much, hands-down the best source. The jury is still out as to whether lycopene is absorbed better from cooked instead of raw tomatoes, but it has been proven that vine ripened tomatoes outscore those tomatoes ripened off the vine. Pink grapefruit is also a decent source if you want to mix it up a bit (grapefruit is also great for the liver).
  • Lutein: greens, greens, greens. That’s all there really is to say on this one!
  • Lignan: flax seed/oil is the very best source of this antioxidant, giving another argument for the case to consume plenty of flax oil every day! Sesame seeds are also a great source, so if you use an oil blend like Udo’s Choice you should be flying! Again, greens are another of the best food sources. Are you getting tired of me mentioning greens yet?

The Four Easiest Ways to Antioxidants

So in order to get your body’s requirement of antioxidants daily there are three great sources:

  1. Drink Ionized Water: water that has been ionized is rich in antioxidants. Measured using a method called ORP (oxygen reduction potential) ionized water has an ORP of -450. To give this context, green tea has an ORP of -200, meaning that ionized water has over twice the antioxidant content of green tea. Drinking 304 litres of water from your ionizer each day will dramatically increase your antioxidant intake.
  2. Greens & Tomatoes: by getting plenty of serves of leafy green vegetables, other greens such as asparagus and tomatoes you will be getting a really good range of antioxidants and also providing your body with the sources it needs to manufacture Glutathione
  3. Dr Young’s Glutathione: Dr Young has created ‘the first natural water-based oral Glutathione from avocados. This product is a fantastic way to guarantee that you will give your body all of the Glutathione it needs to support the function of all the other antioxidants you ingest. What a great safety net!
  4. pH Ion’s Indigo: this is an absurdly amazing product. Each serve of Indigo has an ORAC (Oxygen radical absorbance capacity – the standardised measure of the antioxidant capacity of foods) level of 8000 – that’s the same amount of antioxidants as 4lbs of fruit in one serve – and without the sugar! This is easily one of the best products I have ever come across!

The Energise Anti-Oxidant Super Meal

So, to help you on your way to antioxidant heaven, here is our Energise Anti-Oxidant Super Meal. It is delicious, filling and takes about 10 minutes to make! Brilliant! Oh and it is so vibrant and colourful you’ll probably just want to look at it for ten minutes before you start eating.

Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Serves: 2

1/4 Red cabbage thinly sliced
2 Handfuls of spinach leaves
2 Vine-ripened tomatoes, sliced
1/2 red onion, diced
4 spring onions, thinly sliced/shredded
1/2 cucumber, cut into thin matchsticks
1 carrot, cut into thin matchsticks
1/2 broccoli, chopped small
Handful of beansprouts
1 serve of soba noodles
1 handful of coriander leaves
Juice of 1 lime
Bragg Liquid Aminos/Soy Sauce

Optional: handful of alfalfa sprouts

Directions:

Firstly, tear the coriander and squeeze the lime juice over it to marinate a little. Now slice everything as indicated above and quickly prepare the soba noodles (they don’t take long). Then simply mix everything together in a big salad bowl with the Bragg or soy sauce and eat!

This is a fantastic meal because it is 90% raw, but the noodles give it warmth and some satisfying substance.

With the Bragg or Soy choice it is up to you. If you want to keep this meal as being highly alkaline then go for the Bragg because soy sauce is highly acidifying in the body.

What are you waiting for?

So that is everything you need to know to start getting all of the antioxidants your body needs! Get out there and eat and cook with colour!

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  1. Tom Reply

    In your ‘The Four Easiest Ways to Antioxidants’ you suggest drinking 304 litres of ionized water every day. Did you mean 3 or 4? Because, let me tell ya, drinking 304 litres of any liquid a day will most definitely end anybody’s hayfever symptoms. And everything else they’ve got going on too.

  2. Peter Reply

    Doctors are confirming optimum ways to peak performance.
    Did you know glutathione is the most powerful, prevalent antioxidant in your body?
    However after the age of twenty the production of this essential antioxidant slows down.

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