Health Gem

IF YOU DO ONE THING THIS WEEK . . . EAT MORE GARLIC

The French use it with abandon, it has been revered for millennia as a medicinal plant and it is even supposed to have fortified hard-working pyramid builders in ancient Egypt. So join the club and eat more Allium sativum, otherwise known as garlic.

Over the past decade, thousands of studies have teased out its health benefits, indicating that garlic can help to combat cellular damage, protect cardiovascular health, boost the immune system and may even help prevent cancer.

Most of garlic’s biological effects are attributed to its richness in sulphur-containing compounds.

It’s thought that crushing garlic several minutes in advance of consuming or cooking it helps to make those beneficial compounds more available.

However, it’s worth noting that cooking garlic seems to reduce its health-boosting potency, so it’s considered best to eat it raw if you can stomach it – and the anti-social effects on breath. Garlic preparations like oils and supplements may also be a palatable way to bump up your intake of the bulb’s beneficial compounds.