If you’re at risk of heart disease, eating the right foods can help to keep your cholesterol levels down
If you’re keen on keeping your cholesterol in check, eating a daily dose of a certain superfood might just do the trick. Cholesterol is essentially a waxy substance that’s both made by our bodies and found in some foods.
We all need a bit of cholesterol, but only a smidge – and it turns out there’s good and bad kinds. Health buffs from livestrong are praising walnuts as the go-to nibble when it comes to keeping cholesterol levels down.
You can snag a bargain with, for example, ASDA’s 97p pack of Almonds, Walnuts, Cashews and Hazelnuts Nut Selection, making it easy to add to your diet. You can also toss these nuts on top of your porridge, pairing them with fruit, sprinkling over pancakes, or mixing into yoghurt, reports Surrey Live.
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Walnuts are such a flexible addition that they can transform any breakfast into a cholesterol-busting meal. The experts at livestrong highlight that “increased blood levels of cholesterol – particularly the LDL or ‘bad’ cholesterol – have been linked to a greater risk of heart disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).”
That’s why slashing “dietary cholesterol” is crucial, and eating the right food is key. One of these foods is of course nuts which is a “great source of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats.” These, according to the health experts, are healthy fats that are great for the heart.
Full of vitamins, minerals, fibre, antioxidants and omega-3 fatty acids, according to the Mayo Clinic, it’s crucial to add these types of foods to your diet to stay healthy.
In fact, according to one study, published in Journal of the American College of Cardiology, people who ate peanuts, tree nuts and walnuts one or more times per week, had a 13 to 19 percent lower risk of heart disease and a 15 to 23 percent lower risk of coronary heart disease.
What foods are low in cholesterol?
The experts at livestrong note that there are a variety of foods that you can add to your diet, on a weekly or daily basis, to help keep the bad cholesterol down, and the good cholesterol levels up.
During your next shop, try and pick up:
- Oats
- Barley
- Berries
- Fruits
- Veggies
- Dark chocolate
- Fatty fish
- Fortified orange juice
- Beans
- Peas
- Lentils