This is the third in a series of four posts about the superfoods identified as being the fruits, vegetables, seafood, dairy, grains and nuts that are best for our health and also help prevent serious conditions including heart problems, high blood pressure and cancer. There’s enough variety in these four articles to give you recipe ideas for menus that will help prepare the way for a long and healthy life. The antioxidants in these foods also combat the free radicals that make us look older so, with exercise to back it up, this diet should keep us looking our best. In today’s and tomorrow’s articles I’ll be looking at sources of protein.
Protein is essential for a healthy diet and, whether or not you’re a vegetarian, there are good protein sources to be found among the superfoods. Although there’s no meat on the list there is seafood and I’ll start with that. Crab is a wonderful source of Vitamin B12 and also zinc, both great nutrients. If you can’t get crab fresh, or find it hard to work with, then buy it canned. It can be eaten cold with salads or cooked using a standard fishcake recipe or in soup. Take care when buying packaged meals supposedly made from crab as they could be mainly made from another type of fish.
Salmon, mackerel and tuna are the best fish to choose to get your omega 3 for the day, and this helps prevent heart disease. All three types of fish are available fresh or canned, and the canned variety is easy to prepare in salads and sandwiches. For an easy salmon recipe, get the salmon prepared into individual portions by the fishmonger, or chop into portions large enough for each diner. Put each salmon portion on to some kitchen foil, large enough that you will be able to fold the foil up around the fish. Put a few spoonfuls of chopped tomato (canned is fine) on top of each piece of salmon. Sprinkle finely chopped garlic on top of this (about half a clove of garlic is right for each portion). I like to add a knob of butter to this, and top it off with a good sprinkling of chopped parsley plus salt to taste. Fold the aluminium foil up around the fish and pinch it closed then fold the top edge over to seal in the flavour as it cooks. Make sure there are no open edges low down to let the sauce out but don’t fold the fish in too tightly. Bake on a tray in the oven for 30 minutes and put the whole parcel on each plate so guests get all the juice.
Moving on to dairy products, the best milk for you is the skimmed variety, and it tastes delicious once you get used to the change from full or half-fat. Along with a higher amount of calcium, it has vitamin D and vitamin A. A shortage of vitamin D can lead to muscle pain, and it’s not one of the easiest vitamins to get. Vitamin A is good for the skin and is thought to be of benefit for people with eczema and allergies. Skimmed milk also provides vitamin B2, also known as riboflavin, which is good for eyesight.
Choose active culture yoghurt for calcium to help strengthen bones. This is a good substitute for cream on fruit desserts, and makes a good breakfast with fruit and maybe a sprinkling of wheatgerm.
Tomorrow I’ll finish this series on superfoods with nuts, pulses and grains. If any of you have recipe ideas for these ingredients post them here as I’d love to try them out. Natural remedies are also welcome.
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