Turbo Charge Your Energy – Increase Polyphenols

According to Dr. Steven Gundry, the most effective way to increase your energy is to increase polyphenols and eliminate lectins from your diet.  This means there are two parts to your energy equation:

Learn how to eliminate lectins

Learn how to increase polyphenols

In this post we’ll focus on how to increase polyphenols in your diet. Click here to read our post on how to eliminate lectins from your diet.

What Are Polyphenols and What Do They Do?

Polyphenols are phytochemicals or phytonutrients that have antioxidant properties. They’re mainly found in plants with over 8000 that have been identified.

As antioxidants they help protect the cells in your body, especially cell membranes, from free radical damage. Free radical damage plays a critical role in the aging process. There are three major groups of antixidants:

• Carotenoids

• Allyl Sulfides

• Polyphenols

And polyphenols can be broken down into 4 major categories:

Flavoniods, which have both antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties

Stilbenes, which help protect the cardiovascular system

Lignans, which help stimulate your body’s ability to produce lignans that boost your immune system and specifically target cancer cells

Phenolic acids, which your body uses, along with the other 3 categories, to support a wide range of biological benefits. Those benefits are:

• Fighting cancer cells

• Fighting free radicals

• Reducing inflammation

• Protecting your skin against ultraviolet radiation

• Promoting brain health and protecting against dementia

• Supporting normal blood sugar levels

• Protecting your cardiovascular system

• Promoting normal blood pressure

• Help in lowering cholesterol

• Improving endothelial function for greater nitric oxide production

• Improving arterial flexibility

That’s a wide range of benefits. And the ones that directly benefit your energy are supporting blood sugar levels, improved endothelial function, and reducing inflammation.

Blood glucose or sugar is a key energy source and the better you can regulate this the more consistent your energy levels will be over time.

Endothelial function is tied to nitric oxide production. This improves blood flow, which in turn improves the delivery of oxygen and nutrients. Aerobic respiration, which is energy production with oxygen, produces 18 times more energy then anaerobic respiration, which is energy production without oxygen.

Inflammation robs your body of its energy as it try to heal the areas that have been damaged.

How to Increase Polyphenols in Your Diet

The best way to increase polyphenols in your diet is to consume foods that are rich in these ingredients. But it’s a bit more complex since your body also has to absorb these nutrients.

Polyphenols are fat soluble. This means that if you want to optimize their absorption, then you need to consume them with healthy fats.

Growing condition and the way your food is processed can also make a significant difference in the amount of polyphenols contained in your food source. Typically organically grown foods statistically have higher levels of polyphenols when compared to conventional food processing methods. Also, freeze-drying will preserve higher phenol content than air-drying methods.

According to the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, here are the top 20 foods to optimize your polyphenol intake:

Cloves

Peppermint

Star Anise

Raw Cacao

Mexican Oregano

Celery Seed

Dark Chocolate

Flaxseed Meal

Black Elderberry

Chestnut Seeds

Dried Sage

Rosemary

Spearmint

Thyme

Blueberries

Blackcurrant

Capers

Black Olive

Hazel Nuts

Pecans

That’s a nice list and you’ll notice that herbs and spices are typically high in polyphenols. So adding them liberally to your cooking can provide you with an easy method to increasing your polyphenol consumption.

One other rule of thumb. The more colorful the fruit or vegetables the higher their polyphenol content. One of the simplest ways to harness this is to add frozen mixed berries (blueberries, blackberries, red raspberries, and strawberries) to your morning smoothie.

Bottom Line to Increasing Polyphenols

There are plenty of documented health benefits to increasing your polyphenol consumption beyond just improving your energy levels. They are:

Type 2 Diabetes – Polyphenols have been shown to stabilize both blood sugar and fat metabolism, reduce insulin resistance, and lower inflammation levels in the body. This helps to prevent long-term complications of diabetes like cardiovascular disease, neuropathy, and retinopathy.

Cancer – Multiple studies have shown the benefits of polyphenols in the prevention of cancer by protecting DNA from free radical damage, which can be a trigger for the development of cancer.

Cardiovascular Disease – Flavonoid polyphenols help keep blood platelets from sticking together to naturally reduce the potential for strokes and heart attacks. And they enhance the endothelium’s ability to increase nitric oxide production leading to better blood flow.

Alzheimer’s Disease – Resveratrol, found in grape skins and red wine has been shown to have neuroprotective effects. Other studies have shown that a diet rich in polyphenols reduces the progression of dementia.

Osteoporosis – Polyphenols improve bone metabolism to reduce your risk for bone loss.

Microbiome or Gut Health – Emerging science is showing how your microbiome or gut flora influences your health. Poor gut health leads to significant health issues. Good gut health leads to health improvements. Polyphenols appear to have a prebiotic effect by helping your gut colonize good bacteria while reducing bad bacteria.

Weight Loss – We’ll be doing a separate post in this area but it seems that there are two types of bacteria that play a major role in weight loss. Polyphonels influence both of them

So the bottom line is choosing spices, herbs, and darkly colored fruits and vegetables that you can consume on a daily basis to improve your polyphenol intake. For most people this will result in improved energy and overall health.

Blessing Lives Through Nitric Oxide Therapy!

Dan Hammer