Tomato is a juicy, nutritious fruit commonly eaten as a vegetable. This humble vegetable of Central America has seized the attention of millions of health seekers for its incredible nutritional properties. Interestingly, it has more health-benefiting compounds than that of some popular fruits like apple!
With its array of size, taste and colours this blooming fruit has the most nutritional health benefits known to man.
Here is a list of what you can most commonly benefit from, from this healthy fruit:
- Tomatoes are one of the low-calorie vegetables; hold just 18 calories per 100 g.
- They are excellent sources of antioxidants, dietary fibre, minerals, and vitamins.
- Tomatoes are also a good source of antioxidant vitamin-C, consumption of foods rich in vitamin-C helps the body develop resistance against infectious agents and scavenge harmful free radicals.
- Fresh tomato is very rich in potassium. Potassium is an important component of cell and body fluids that helps controlling heart rate and blood pressure caused by sodium.
- Tomatoes have anti- cancer benefits – While not well researched for all cancer types, tomatoes have repeatedly been shown to provide us with anti-cancer benefits. The track record for tomatoes as a cancer-protective food should not be surprising, since there is a very large amount of research on tomato antioxidants and a more limited but still important amount of research on tomato anti-inflammatory nutrients.
- Diets that include tomatoes have been linked with reduced risk of some neurological diseases (including Alzheimer’s disease) in multiple studies.
- Tomato-containing diets have also been linked in a few studies with reduced risk of obesity.
- As an excellent source of vitamin C and other antioxidants, tomatoes can help combat the formation of free radicals known to cause cancer.
- The fibre, potassium, vitamin C and choline content in tomatoes all support heart health.
- Helps with constipation – Eating foods that are high in water content and fibre like tomatoes can help with hydration and promote regular bowel movements.
- Fibre adds bulk to stool and is essential for minimizing
- Tomatoes provide an adequate folic acid intake that is essential before and during pregnancy to protect against neural tube defects in infants.