Powerful Parsley
Health Benefits of Parsley
If you want to be impressed by parsley, take a look at its vitamin K content – a whopping 574% of the daily recommended value. What this does is promote bone strength, but it also has a role in the treatment and possible prevention of Alzheimer's disease by limiting neuronal damage in the brain. The vitamin K dominance is enough to make the 62% daily value of vitamin C and the 47% DV in vitamin A look positively paltry, but the “C” content is 3 times more than in oranges, and the “A” augments the carotenes lutein and zeaxanthin, helping to prevent eye diseases like cataracts and macular degeneration.
The iron in parsley (twice as much as in spinach) is essential for the production of an important oxygen-carrying component in the red blood cells called heme. Copper is important because it’s required by the body for normal metabolic processes, but must be supplied through outside sources. The manganese in parsley contains super-antioxidant superoxide dismutase, and the folate helps form red blood cells and make up our genetic material.
Parsley is useful as a digestive aid with its high fiber content. This helps move foods through the digestive tract and controls blood-cholesterol levels, but has a diuretic effect as well. A tea made from parsley is a traditional remedy for colic, indigestion, and intestinal gas. As an herb sprinkled in food, it actually helps purify the blood and fight cancer. Eating parsley is now thought to be a way to detoxify the system of harmful compounds like mercury, sometimes found in dental fillings.
Quite a unique compilation of compounds and volatile oils is contained in parsley. Eugenol is used in dentistry as a local anesthetic and an antiseptic to help prevent gum diseases. It's also been found to reduce blood sugar levels. Polyphenolic flavonoids and antioxidants include apiin, apigenin, crisoeriol, and alphathujen. Volatile oils include myristicin, limonene, apiol, and alpha-thujene. It also contains one of the highest antioxidant counts among plants, with an oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC) of 74,349 per 100 grams of fresh, raw parsley.
Parsley is one of Dr. Mercola’s most highly recommended vegetables.