Superfood is a term often exploited by food manufacturers to make products seem more nutritious than they actually are. Sometimes these products lack the scientific evidence to support their alleged health benefits and are no more than fads. This is a shame. Marketing hype aside, there is hard scientific research to show that some foods contain exceptional levels of nutrients that promote good health and protect the human body against disease. These are the superfoods I have focused on in this book.
Finding a standard measure of what constitutes a superfood is, however, complicated. A number of rating systems have been developed around the world that rank foods according to their nutrient density, the measure of nutrients per calorie. The problem is that these systems are not consistent. For example, some use different sets of essential nutrients as the basis for the rating. What’s more, nutrient density is not the only important factor. For example, there are thousands of phytochemicals that appear to have the potential to protect against a range of diseases, but these are not included in nutrient density measures because they have not been established as essential for bodily function.
After researching various rating systems, I have devised my own list of powerhouse foods (see superfoods table) that contain exceptionally high levels of vitamins, phytochemicals and other nutrients that are strongly associated with good health and reduced risk of chronic disease. The superfoods that appear on this list are emboldened within each recipe’s ingredients list, so that they can be identified easily.
The list is by no means exhaustive, but provides a cross-section of superfoods in different food groups to help you load your diet with as much goodness as possible.