Health Benefits of Celery
Celery
This crispy and juicy treat is not only refreshing, it is highly nutritious and offers many health benefits. Celery stalks, leaves, roots, and seeds are all used to help treat and prevent many medical conditions.
Health Benefits of Celery
Blood Pressure
Celery contains an ingredient, phthalide, that has been shown to reduce high blood pressure. This compound, which gives celery its unique smell and taste, relaxes smooth muscles in blood vessels (causing them to dilate) and improves blood flow. Phthalide also reduces the production of catecholamines, stress hormones that are known to inhibit blood flow by restricting blood vessels. It does this by blocking enzymes that are needed to produce these hormones.
Safe Diuretic
Acting as a diuretic is another benefit of celery. It is high in sodium but it is also high in potassium (three times more potassium than sodium). This helps the body to rid itself of excess fluid without depleting potassium levels. Potassium is not stored in the body and without sufficient amounts, it can be dangerous to cell function.
Celery’s diuretic effects also promote healthy kidney function. It helps eliminate toxins from the body and can stop the formation of kidney stones.
Cancer
Eating celery can also help in the prevention and treatment of cancer. Celery contains anti-cancer compounds, including coumarins (which help prevent cell damage from free radicals) and phenolic acids and acetylenics (which both help inhibit the growth of tumor cells).
Other benefits include:
- relieving constipation because of its high fiber content
- lowering bad cholesterol
- normalizing body temperature on dry and hot days (drink 2-3 glasses of celery juice throughout the day)
- relieving inflammation related to asthma, bronchitis, gout, arthritis, and osteoarthritis
- calming the nervous system
- losing weight.
Celery is a good alternative to salt because of its salty flavor. You can add it to soups and salads or, instead of eating chips as a snack, fill celery stalks with all natural peanut butter or low fat yogurt.
Juicing is another wonderful way to get the health benefits of celery. Make your own tomato juice (tomatoes are also known to help reduce blood pressure). Juice 3 cups of chopped tomatoes, 1 celery stalk with leaves, and 1 cucumber. To spice it up, add a bit of cayenne pepper.
Photo Credit
Image courtesy of CC-BY-SA-3.0 / ZooFari at Wikipedia
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This post is part of the series: Other Healthy Vegetables
Health benefits of vegetables.
