Add lettuce to your plate for 6 healthy reasons
Lettuce is a common ingredient in salads, sandwiches and burgers that adds greatly to the taste of these foods. This vegetable is quite famous and is one of most widely used raw vegetables because of its myriad health benefits. This green leafy vegetable scores high on taste, nutrition as well as its health quotient. Here are the top six reasons to include lettuce in your diet regime –
It controls blood pressure
Like all other green leafy vegetables, lettuce is rich in magnesium, potassium and fibre. It is because of the presence of these minerals that this raw vegetable is helps to maintain your blood pressure levels within the normal range.
It boosts sperm motility
Lettuce is loaded with beta-carotene, an antioxidant that plays a key role in the production of healthy sperm along with improving sperm motility. Add some lettuce leaves to your daily dietary intake and improve your sexual health.
It is great for weight loss
Lettuce is known to be a perfect food for weight loss as it contains high levels of dietary fibre, 95% of water and cellulose. The presence of fibre fills your stomach and makes you eat less, thereby aiding in the weight loss process.
It lowers blood cholesterol levels
The high amount of dietary fibre in lettuce plays an important role in the removal of bile salts from the body. In the process of eliminating these bile salts, there is a breakdown of cholesterol. As a result, blood cholesterol levels drop, which in turn protects your heart health.
It is good for pregnant women
In case you are pregnant, include lettuce as a part of your daily diet as it contains a wide range of nutrients that are crucial to the protection of your baby from congenital defects. This leafy green vegetable is a great source of folate and calcium in addition to various important micronutrients like manganese and iron.
It helps relieve stress
It is found that lettuce possesses amazing relaxing properties that help to lower stress levels in the body. Add a few leaves of this raw vegetable to your diet or use it in raw salads to combat stress naturally.
It acts as a digestive aid
The high fibre and water content in lettuce helps with the normal digestion of food. This leafy vegetable is also believed to help provide relief to people suffering from bloating and constipation, by easing the process of digestion and aiding the passage of food through the intestinal tract.
Source: The Health Site
Published: 29 July 2014
Category: Features, Wellness and Complementary Therapies
