There is new and interesting research out on an herb that most of us love to use in our cooking, or maybe I’m being too presumptuous because I love to use it a lot, but I’m talking about garlic.  Not only is this bulb plant easy to grow and cheap to buy, but it is used in thousands of recipes, and tons of different ethnic recipes, ranging from Indian and Mexican food to American and Italian food.  It’s truly one of the most diverse herbs, and that is evident in the amount of recipes this little pungent herb can be found ground, flaked, dried or infused in.

Research has shown that garlic has heart protective effects, however, new research shows that only freshly ground garlic that is not cooked or dried has the most benefits when it comes to heart health. In other words, putting freshly ground garlic OVER your food instead of cooking it into your food or using it when dried, may have immense health benefits that you were not aware of. They say that dried and cooked garlic still does retain it’s antioxidant benefits though, but there is an important chemical process that does not occur when the garlic is dried or cooked that forms a gas that helps the cells to communicate to one another.

Garlic is also a great natural blood thinner, which is why many heart patients like to use it for their heart and circulatory health.  We all know that blood that does not move easily through the body can cause problems ranging from (ultimately) a heart attack, to a stroke.  One of the things I like to do with garlic that would fit this newly discovered attribute of eating it raw for optimum benefit, is to grind some up in my garlic grinder, and put it in my olive oil and vinegar based dressings for my salads.

This way, you are still eating the garlic fresh and without being dried, and you are also not heating it, so it maintains this beneficial gaseous component that the research has indicated has benefits.  Garlic tastes great in so many dishes that it’s easy to incorporate it into any meal, and although incorporating it in the raw may be a little more challenging, there are lots of ways you can find to do this also, just learn to be creative with your meals, and you’ll think of something!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 24th, 2009 at 7:22 pm and is filed under Foods. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.