Anti-Inflammatory Diet: What you should definitely consider when cooking

Diet and lifestyle have a major impact on health. Here’s how to best prepare anti-inflammatory diet foods. It is important for health to prevent chronic diseases and inflammations in the body, which often develop slowly and go unnoticed for a long time.

According to the AOK Health Insurance Fund, lifestyle factors such as lack of exercise, smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, stress, and an unhealthy diet play an important role in the development and maintenance of chronic inflammatory processes. The good news is that you can influence these factors yourself. In addition to a low-sugar, high-fiber and wholesome diet, anti-inflammatory foods can also be used to improve health. Not only fruits and vegetables can help against inflammation. Vegetable oils and certain spices also have an anti-inflammatory effect. There are a few things you should pay attention to.

A handful of the right foods are enough to prepare anti-inflammatory dishes. Basically, you should note the following:

• When buying ingredients, opt for organic quality if possible: the quality seals from Demeter, Bioland or Naturland guarantee that food is grown without chemical-synthetic pesticides.
• According to utopia.de , the anti-inflammatory effect is generally strongest in natural, raw foods. However, in most cases, the preparation of meals does not work without cooking, roasting or baking.
• Use cold-pressed vegetable oils to preserve the valuable ingredients. The knowledge magazine Quarks explains that the production with traditional cold pressing is particularly gentle because no heating is necessary. Cold-pressed oils should not be heated later, if possible.
• Desserts are best sweetened with natural honey, ideally organic honey from regional beekeepers. Honey can only unfold its healing effects if it is of impeccable quality. According to the Apotheken-Umschau, honey has an antibacterial effect and can prevent pathogens such as bacteria from spreading further.

Anti-inflammatory diet: How oils and spices work?

Some sources of fat also have a positive health effect. These include vegetable oils from rapeseed, olives, algae or flaxseed and fish oil. They all have a high proportion of omega-3 fatty acids. The fatty acids in vegetable oils make them anti-inflammatory. As Utopia.de reports, the omega-3 fatty acids in linseed oil in particular prevent the development of inflammatory processes in the body. Linseed oil is a vegetable source of omega-3 fatty acids, which are otherwise found in fish. Olive and rapeseed oil contain oleic acid, which has an antioxidant effect.

Numerous spices, both local and exotic, have very healthy ingredients. Spices such as turmeric or cinnamon are particularly effective against inflammation in the joints, for example in arthritis. Osteoarthritis is a chronic form of joint inflammation. One study showed that cinnamon consumption improved markers of inflammation in women with arthritis. Another study demonstrated the effectiveness of turmeric extracts in relieving symptoms of joint osteoarthritis. The fiery capsaicin from the chili pepper not only stimulates blood circulation but also relieves inflammation and pain and strengthens the immune system. Incidentally, capsaicin is also found in heat patches. Cumin and rosehip powder are also considered pain-relieving spices.