Monday, June 06, 2016

Why You Need More Than SuperFoods

The hottest buzz word in supplements today is SUPERFOODS.   Everything from broccoli to carrots,  from chlorella to bee pollen, from pomegranates to blueberries, is being called a SUPERFOOD.   Some are organic.  Some are NON-GMO.  Most come from China.

Natural Biology decided in 2013 to develop a SUPERFOODS formula.   The easiest part of the research was eliminating what we could not classify as a SUPERFOOD.  Companies like Juice Plus and Texas Superfoods include everyday fruits and vegetables - calling them SUPERFOODS.   We think of them as good foods to eat but certainly not SUPERFOODS.   We highly recommend you eat daily as many servings of fruits and vegetables, fresh or frozen, to insure a balanced and healthier diet.  Taking fruits and vegetables, drying them out, then grinding them into powders and calling this SUPERFOOD is not what we could call a SUPERFOOD.  

Natural Biology defines a SUPERFOOD as a food that can completely sustain life.  It provides a nutritional profile that if you had to you could live off the SUPERFOOD you could.   SUPERFOODS are nutritionally dense, full of vitamins, minerals, amino acids (proteins), enzymes, antioxidants, and probiotics.  We believe the top SUPERFOODS in the world are Chia seeds,  Spirulina,  Chlorella,   Bee Pollen, Maca,  and Wheat Grass juice.  Chia even provides a complete Omega 3,6,9 complex.

This brings us to a good question.  If  these are the best why not stop here and develop a supplement with these ingredients only.    We thought about it.  There are a couple of issues.  One, none of them taste good.  The second problem is to realize the nutritional profile you need to eat them fresh.   The third problem is some of them like Chia are difficult to put into a powder form without losing most of the nutritional profile.

The first conclusion we made was not to include Chia - our favorite SUPERFOOD.  It is best eaten in seed form.  You can make gels easily with Chia Seed and add it to salad dressings,  toppings, or even make puddings and drinks from it.   See Paul Diprozitto's book.   Chia is also being added to bars, chips, and other foods by healthier food companies.  Did you realize Inca Indians would run hundreds of miles a week between villages carrying only a bag of Chia Seeds.

The most dense SUPERFOODS for supplement purposes are Organic Chlorella, Organic Spirulina, Bee Pollen, Organic Maca, and Organic Wheat Grass Juice.   With a couple of grams per day one can realize a significant increase in naturally occurring vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, enzymes, amino acids, and probiotics.   These SUPERFOODS are best in powder form.   How you process them is critical to the nutritional purity and density and each requires a unique approach.   Each has it's own part of the world where to best comes from.     For example,  the best Maca comes from Peru.   The best spirulina from Hawaii.  The best Wheat Grass Juice and Chlorella from the USA.

Natural Biology's VITA-TRATES provides you with Organic Chlorella,  Organic Spirulina, Organic Wheat Grass Juice,  Organic Maca, and Bee Pollen.   Compare these SUPERFOODS alone to what so many other companies are doing.  They are front loading their so-called SUPERFOODS with ground up vegetables and fruits, and for one reason, cost.  It's cheaper to make a formula from dried up fruits and vegetables than real SUPERFOODS.  By the way, they are not bad supplements just not great ones.   Just looking at ingredient cost, we estimate it cost us at least 12 times more to make a bottle of VITA-TRATES than it cost to make one bottle of Juice Plus but the selling price is the essentially the same.  Supplements should be about two things, quality and value.

more to come...and why Natural Biology did not stop with the best of the best SUPERFOODS....