You may know that vitamin C is an important nutrient, but did you know how many different kinds of roles it plays for your health? The World’s Healthiest Foods has lots of interesting facts about vitamin C and how it should be an important part of your diet.
Most know that vitamin C comes from citrus fruits and that it helps to prevent scurvy. We have the British to thank for this. Although they didn’t know about vitamin C, they did discover that eating citrus, such as eating one lime a day, helped to prevent scurvy for its sailors.
However, what you may not know is that you can find vitamin C in a host of plant-based foods. These include:
- Broccoli
- Brussels sprouts
- Bell peppers
- Cauliflower
- Kale
- Bok choy
- Collard greens
- Asparagus
- Sweet potatoes
- Papaya
Food processing damages the content of vitamin C in these foods, especially freezing and canning. That’s why the World’s Healthiest Foods only recommends steaming foods for just five minutes. Any more than that and the cooking process will break down the nutrients too much.
There are several health benefits to vitamin C besides scurvy prevention. Such as:
- Used by the body to make collagen, which contributes to skin health.
- Important for making neurotransmitters that carry signals in the brain, such as serotonin.
- Has antioxidant properties which help with preventing free radicals.
- Can help with problems such as gout, seasonal allergies, gingivitis, and of course the common cold.
So, if vitamin C is important to our health, how much should we get each day? The recommendation for an adult male in the U.S. is 96 milligrams daily and 82 milligrams for adult women. However, most of us get less than the daily recommended amount. The maximum daily amount is 2,000 milligrams a day, yet it’s very rare to suffer any toxicity problems from too much vitamin C.
Want to learn more interesting facts about vitamin C? You can read the full article here: Vitamin C.
