Superfoods

Go back to the 1980s and if you’d asked anyone – even in a health food shop – about ‘superfoods’, you probably would have got a blank stare.

Apparently it was the United Fruit Company in the US that first used the term back in 1918 to promote their bananas, describing them as ‘a practical source of cheap and easily digestible nutrition’. It was also used to tout the nutritional benefits of a muffin (which surprisingly doesn’t make the list these days) in a 1949 Canadian newspaper.

But the term ‘superfood’ didn’t really take off until the late 1990s, when blueberries were unofficially designated as a ‘superfood’ after some nutritional research shared by the Wild Blueberry Association of North America – and the rest is history. And sales of blueberries in America in the late 1990s virtually doubled overnight.

Even though you might think that the word ‘superfood’ had a precise definition, it doesn’t. In fact any food manufacturer could in theory call anything a superfood, so even your fast food french fries could be designated ‘super’. But there’d probably be a bit of a ruckus about it.

Due to this very issue, in 2007 the European Union banned the use of the word to describe any food unless the term was backed up by a health claim supported by credible scientific research.

So despite the use of the word itself being controversial, there is however some consensus in the medical/health/nutrition world that some foods do deserve the title.

Sometimes it is used to describe a very specific food, but in many cases it refers to food groups rather than specific foods. In fact we have already written about a few superfoods without having mentioned the word itself – check out our article on Brussels sprouts here and on fermentation here.

Perhaps the best definition of what is commonly held to be a ‘superfood’ is listed in the Merriam-Webster dictionary as ‘a food (such as salmon, broccoli, or blueberries) that is rich in compounds (such as antioxidants, fibre, or fatty acids) considered beneficial to a person’s health’.

Which still isn’t specific enough, really.

So without further ado, let’s summarise which foods deserve the moniker. The list below is based on four websites (three medical sites and one a healthfood chain – see sources below), with foods that appear in all four lists scoring the top mark – 4 – down to those that only appear on one list, scoring 1.

Maybe not the most scientific approach, but it’s at least a little scientific…

Score – 1

These are the contested superfoods that only made it on to one list!

Apples
Barley
Beans
Beets
Blueberries (can you believe it!)
Brazil nuts
Broccoli
Cacao
Cherries
Chia seeds
Chlorella
Citrus fruit
Dark chocolate
Fermented foods
Fish
Flax seeds
Hemp
Kale
Low phosphorus cheese
Maca
Manuka honey
Quinoa
Root vegetables
Seafood
Shellfish
Soy
Spices
Squash
Strawberries
Sweet potato
Tea
Tofu
Tomatoes
Wheatgrass
Whole grains
Wine/grapes

Score – 2

A little more consensus here…

Açai berries
Eggs
Ginger
Green tea
Herbs
Kefir
Legumes
Mushrooms
Nuts/seeds
Olive oil
Pomegranate
Salmon
Seaweed
Spirulina
Yoghurt

Score – 3

A privileged spot…

Avocado
Berries
Garlic
Turmeric

Score – 4

Only one item made it, drumroll please…

Leafy greens (the darker the better)

Well there you have it. If you think we’ve got anything wrong here please let us know!

This is not medical advice, but this is what we’re going to do:

Tick off all the foods we eat anyway
Start at the bottom and work our way up, until we’re superfooded out!

BTW if you don’t eat any of these foods at all, [INSERT ADVICE HERE]

Our sources

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/true-superfoods
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/303079#what_are_superfoods
https://www.kidney.org/kidney-topics/superfoods#:~:text=Chia%20and%20Flax%20Seeds,Eggs
https://www.hollandandbarrett.com/the-health-hub/food-drink/diets/superfoods/what-are-superfoods/ (BTW they say they list 26, but they missed out no. 12 so only 25)
https://www.ucdavis.edu/food/news/what-makes-superfood-so-super
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfood