If you are consuming something unhealthy, is there anything you can eat with it to reduce the damage it may cause?
When comparing the arterial function of vegetarians and meat eaters, those who eat a vegetarian diet have a significantly greater healthy ability to dilate their arteries and allow more blood to flow through them. And not just a little bit. As you can see below and at 0:24 in my video “Foods that protect your arteries from saturated fats,” the story is 4 times better.
Vegetarians tend to be younger, smoke less, are slimmer, and have lower rates of diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and heart disease. However, the researchers controlled for all this and only included healthy non-smokers in the study. They also recruited a group of meat eaters who were similarly slim, had comparable blood pressure, and about the same cholesterol levels. But truly healthy omnivorous populations are still fed by vegetarians, and the longer they go without meat, the better. The degree of good arterial function was correlated with the number of years without eating meat. As you can see below and at 1:03 of my video, their arterial function didn’t get worse with age, it got better the longer they ate that way.
This suggests that a vegetarian diet by itself has a direct beneficial effect on arterial function and may help explain the reduction in atherosclerosis and cardiovascular mortality.
Since the researchers were able to control for other known risk factors, they thought it must be food. But what aspects of food? Is it simply that the harmful effects of meat are absent? Or could it be that vegetarians are eating more whole, healthy plant foods? For example, you can eat up to one more serving of vegetables per day.
Researchers compared two junky meals: Egg McMuffins, Sausage McMuffins, Hash Brown Patties and Frosted Flakes, and found that fatty fast food meals reduced arterial function within hours, while sugary cereal meals did not. They blamed fat, but high-fat whole plant foods like nuts don’t have the same effect, so it could simply be animal fat. In fact, a systematic review of all randomized controlled trials on the effects of nut consumption on arterial function shows that nuts actually produce significant improvements over time.
Is it enough to counter the artery-paralyzing effects of salami sandwiches? The answer is yes for walnuts, but no for almonds.
Just as some fruits are better than others, like blueberries over bananas, some nuts are better than others. Walnuts are like nutty blueberries.
What about blueberries among berries? That would be the blueberry itself. A randomized controlled crossover trial tested the effects of consuming cooked blueberries, raw blueberries, or no blueberries at all. Researchers fed people bread made with flour, eggs, butter, and salt (which primarily contained sugar and eggs) and observed a gradual decline in arterial function over the next six hours. But adding a cup’s worth of wild blueberries to the same bread significantly improved arterial function, as if the blueberries were just mixed with water. You can see this below and at 2:57 of my video.
Roughly the same amount of strawberries, two cheese blints, whipped cream, sweet syrup, eggs, and bacon couldn’t save my arterial function, which is quite a strain to endure.
How about comparing acai berries to a diet containing a similar amount of fat? Blending 1.5 frozen acai smoothie packs with half a small banana dissolved in water significantly restored arterial function compared to a control smoothie containing the same banana and water but colored like the acai version. (Of course, it would have tasted different.) You can see the results below and at 3:20 of my video.
Another research group went all out and conducted a double-blind, randomized controlled trial using raspberries. Researchers measured arterial function two hours later and again 24 hours after participants drank either a smoothie made with frozen red raspberries (about 3/4 cup or about 1.5 cups mixed with water) or a placebo drink designed to match both color and taste. The fake berry drink had no effect on arterial function, but both raspberry drinks did, as you can see below and at 3:56 of my video.
Note that a 3/4 cup dose appears to be just as effective as a 1 1/2 cup dose. This is a phenomenon seen in blueberries. After about 1 cup, the effects plateau.
The bottom line is that “consumption of achievable amounts of red raspberries in the diet rapidly improves arterial function for up to 24 hours.” Yes, that’s true, but it’s only likely to rise by about 1% by the end of the day. However, at a population level, each 1% increase reduces the risk of cardiovascular events such as heart attack and stroke by 12%. It all starts with a berry smoothie.
What about berry juice? The researchers tested five different concentrations of cranberry juice, along with a placebo control whose color and taste were clearly indistinguishable. Drinking 25% cranberry juice slightly increased arterial function after 2 hours. The 50% juice was still effective after 8 hours. The remaining three (75% juice, near-pure juice, and ultra-concentrated juice) also improved arterial function within hours of consumption, as you can see below and at 4:52 in my video.
But this, like the previous raspberry study, involved only straight berries, without the artery-crushing diet.
Could berry juice stop arterial insufficiency caused by a high-fat diet, which can reduce arterial function within hours? Researchers created a cocktail of grapes, blueberries, strawberries, lingonberries, and black aronia berries, but found no significant changes after the high-fat diet. (Of course, drinking only berries may improve arterial function, but it’s better than drinking nothing at all.)
So what about drinking something a little less exotic than black aronia berries, like orange juice? Study participants were given a high-fat meal of ham and cheese croissants and a glass of water, orange juice, green tea, or red wine. Their arteries don’t really like croissants, and the orange juice didn’t help either, as did the green tea and red wine, so it’s probably better not to have the ham and cheese croissant in the first place.
In fact, drinking orange juice with a fatty meal can make your symptoms worse. When study participants were given bacon and cheese muffins with or without orange juice, researchers found that orange juice caused increased fat levels in the blood over a long period of time. This may be because the body preferentially burns for energy all rapidly absorbed free sugars in the juice, i.e., sugars that are not wrapped in cell walls, as in whole fruit.
doctor’s note
This is the third in a three-video series about fast food. If you missed the first two, check out “Can just one meal cause your arteries and lungs to fail?” and “Can exercise counter high-fat diets?”
If you would like to learn more about the effects of specific foods, please see the related articles below.
