Are you squeamish about fermentation?

Including fermented foods in your diet is among the most important strategies you can adopt for bowel and overall health. It is so important that I tell people to include at least one, if not many, fermented foods in your daily routine. Fermented foods literally come in thousands of different forms. Among the most familiar are yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, pickles, and fermented meats like salami and sopressata. (Note that most commercially sold sauerkraut, and pickles in the U.S. are not fermented, but simply packaged in vinegar and brine. Yogurt, and to a lesser degree, kefirs, are fermented for such a short time to hasten production that microbial counts are negligible.) In parts of the world in which consumption of fermented foods remains a popular practice, you can find an extraordinary variety of fermented foods: omeboshi (plums) and other forms of tsukemono in Japan, the many forms of kimchi in Korea, Horta in Greece, raw meats in Spain and Italy. A recent study conducted by the husband-and-wife team of Justin and Erica Sonnenburg and their team at Stanford is the clearest evidence of the benefits of consuming fermented foods. Vigorous consumption of fermented foods was associated with increases in microbial species diversity (the number of different species present that are lowest, for instance in people with obesity, type 2 diabetes, and neurodegenerative diseases) and decreases in multiple measures of inflammation such as IL-6 and IL-10. And the more fermented foods th...
Source: Wheat Belly Blog - Category: Cardiology Authors: Tags: Open bowel flora microbiota prebiotic probiotic undoctored wheat belly Source Type: blogs