With Chrismas and New Year and other hollydays almost everybody has eaten as much as they can handle. Stakes and other not so healthy foods filled the tables and they just would not go in so well without a glass of wine; make that several glasses of wine. Alas now it is time to make way for some healthier foods and to find a way to get rid of the effects of those foods.

Just as additives help gasoline burn cleaner, a new research report shows that the food industry could take a similar approach toward reducing health risks associated with fatty foods. Israel researchers discovered that consuming polyphenols (natural compounds in red wine, fruits, and vegetables) simultaneously with high-fat foods may reduce health risks associated with these foods.

“We suggest a new hypothesis to explain polyphenols,” said Joseph Kanner, senior author of the report. “For the first time, these compounds were demonstrated to prevent significantly the appearance of toxic food derivative compounds in human plasma.”

They made a very interesting study where six men and four women were fed three different meals consisting of dark meat turkey cutlets. One meal, the control, consisted of turkey meat and water. The second meal consisted of turkey meat with polyphenols added after cooking (one tablespoon of concentrated wine) followed with a glass of red wine (about 7 ounces). The third meal consisted of turkey meat with polyphenols added before cooking and then followed by a glass of wine. At some moments the scientists took blood samples from them and found that MDA levels nearly quintupled after the control meal, while MDA was nearly eliminated after subjects consumed the meals with polyphenols.

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