Why I Love Brocolli...

To start, broccoli is a cruciferous vegetable. The cruciferous family is composed of broccoli, cauliflower, bock choy, brussel sprouts, and cabbage.

Onions and garlic both contain some sulphur that contributes to the stronger flavor of both of these vegetables, and is why both are favorite dish flavorings in both French and Italian recipes.

Cruciferous vegetables contain more sulphur than many other vegetables, and sulphur ingested through the gut from the food we eat helps to stop inflammation within our bodies.

If you have a physical condition where you experience aches and or pain in your body then eating cruciferous vegetables helps to stop the inflammation that causes this condition.

Back in 1992 I learned from a recovered uterine cancer patient that one of the foods she ate every day was broccoli. It was her oncologist who told her that broccoli would help keep her cancer from returning. It was this piece of information that prompted me to research cruciferous vegetables to learn why her doctor thought that broccoli would help her to stay healthy.

From my research I learned that broccoli as well as all of the other cruciferous vegetables, contains a ‘natural’ occurring chemical called sulforaphane, and it is within sulforaphane where you find the sulphur that reduces inflammation within the body. But sulforaphane does a lot more than reduce aches and pains caused by inflammation within the body. Sulforaphane has special properties that help inhibit cancer cells from reproducing, and this special property was why my friend’s doctor encouraged her to eat broccoli every day.

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center recommends a diet high in all of the cruciferous vegetables including broccoli, cabbage, bock choy, brussel sprouts and cauliflower, plus they also recommend non-cruciferous collard greens and mustard greens, green kale, red radishes, old fashioned turnips, and rutabagas and last but not the least, watercress, to ‘reduce’ the risk of developing prostate Cancer in men. In women the same vegetables are recommended by the same cancer research center to ‘prevent’ breast cancer. Here the recommendation is to PREVENT rather than to treat. I want to make that distinction so you understand that once a person has cancer, they have to allow a professional physician to treat them in order to acquire a cure. Eating right in the first place to prevent cancer is what we all should do. Once a person has been cured from cancer it is a good idea for them to eat right to help prevent a recurrence of the cancer.

At the prestigious Linus Pauling Institute scientists doing research on the sulforaphane that is found in naturally growing broccoli, proposed in an article they published back in October 2009, that Broccoli, because it contains more sulforaphane than the other cruciferous vegetables, may be useful as a chemopreventive agent for high-risk prostate cancer patients. This is because sulforaphane acts as a ‘histone deacetylase inhibitor’ on the cancer cells, which means that when a patient who has prostate cancer eats broccoli the sulforaphane in the broccoli slows down the cancer cells reproduction within their bodies.
The sulforaphane is in addition to the other chemical, radiation and surgical treatments the doctors are giving their patients to get rid of the prostate cancer..

Sulforaphane in lower doses in fresh broccoli has been found to be not as effective at destroying cancer cells in animal testing trials as the concentrated chemical compounds of sulforaphane that research doctors have been using. But the sulforaphane in fresh cruciferous vegetables, most notably broccoli, has been very helpful in stopping cancer cells from reproducing thus sulforaphane helps to destroy cancer cells by stopping reproduction. This has been shown in both prostrate and colorectal cancer according to the prestigious Linus Pauling Institute.

As long as you don’t over cook broccoli it won’t get that bad smell that turns off many people to the vegetable. It is the sulphur in broccoli, the ‘good stuff’, that makes the bad smell. This happens only if the broccoli is over cooked.

The best method I have found to cook broccoli is to simply microwave it on high in a microwave proof bowl. For a full container of fresh washed and chopped florets and stems I add a couple of tablespoons of water, and microwave in a microwave safe bowl for five minutes. I often add some chopped up red, green or yellow bell peppers to the broccoli florets and stems. Once cooked you can eat the broccoli as is or add it to another dish you are cooking, or you can just top it off with some grated cheddar cheese for added flavor. This is my favorite side dish with just about any meat, fish or egg entrée.

Just a note here; if you get gas from eating broccoli, cabbage or any of the other cruciferous vegetables you should try taking Beano before meals. Beano is an over the counter digestant that replaces the complex carbohydrate, digestive enzyme that many of us lose the ability to manufacturer in our guts, as we age. Taking Beano, replaces this ‘lost’ enzyme, and stops gas before it has a chance to start.

Copyright © 2010/2011 by Carol Garnier Dutra