Bananas must be the ultimate healthy snack, packaged in their own smart yellow wrapper and packed with essential vitamins, minerals and fibre. They also contain far more carbohydrates than most fruits, but are lower on the glycemic index than most tropical fruits. Made even lower by eating them with a handful of nuts or seeds.

Bananas pack lots of dietary fibre, with 100g – roughly one small fruit – providing 14% of your daily dose. Epidemiological research in the US has shown that eating plenty of high-fibre foods can, in the long term, lower the risk of cardiovascular and coronary heart disease by up to 12%. Eating fibre-rich foods also keeps your bowel movements regular, preventing constipation and reducing the risk of developing colon diseases such as diverticulitis and cancer.

Bananas are high in potassium, with that one small fruit providing 10% of your daily recommended allowance. Diets rich in potassium can help to lower blood pressure, which slashes your risk of having a stroke. 100g of banana also provide nearly 30% of your daily needs of vitamin B6, which plays an important role in manufacturing antibodies in the immune system, aiding protein metabolism and red blood cell formation and helping the central nervous system to function normally. Finally, bananas are also effective antacids, and contain substances that can inhibit Helicobacter pylori, a bacterium which has been identified as a major cause of stomach ulcers.

Finally, according to a recent review in Biotechnology Progress, researchers have found that bananas are the most promising edible vaccine against hepatitis B, which is carried by about five per cent of the world’s population.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 1st, 2007 at 10:10 pm and is filed under General Health, Nutrition and Healthy Eating. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.