Spice Up Your Life! Spices To Help You Stay Strong

Are you a spice girl (or boy)? Well if not, you should be! Certain spices have amazing properties to help boost your health and keep you feeling spry. Incorporate these 5 spices into your diet and you’ll be feeling the benefits in no time. We’ve included delicious recipes from GIY under each entry that utilise the spice – get cooking!

Turmeric

Turmeric is a powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory – it’s a bit of a wonder ingredient, and has been linked to preventing heart disease, helping improve memory, and helping flush illness out of the body. It has a bit of a bitter taste, which is why it’s added to curries or sauces which mask a little bit of that bitterness with other tastes.
 

Fennel

Fennel doesn’t often feature in our diets, but it should! The distinct aniseed flavour doesn’t pair well with a lot of dishes, but incorporating it has a number of wonderful benefits: it contains phosphates and calcium that encourage healthy bones, iron and zinc to help keep your skin clear and healthy, and plenty of potassium, helping to reduce blood pressure and keep your heart healthy.
 

Cumin

Cumin is one of those spices you find in pretty much every curry you’re likely to eat, and rightfully so. It’s full of health benefits! The main benefit of cumin is how it can help with indigestion and stomach trouble: it increases the activity of the proteins in your gut to help you digest foods better. It’s also packed full of iron, so it’s great for your skin too.

Cinnamon

Cinnamon is delicious, but it’s also nutritious! When you sprinkle it on your porridge in the morning, you’re actually getting a dose of cinnamaldehyde, an oil high in antioxidant polyphenols. Cinnamon can also improve sensitivity to insulin, thus helping fight diabetes, and has anti-inflammatory qualities that helps to fight disease.
 

Cloves

People often associated cloves with Christmas, but there are plenty of reasons to tuck into this delicious little spice all year round. Clove oil helps to kill off bacteria, including E.coli, and it promotes oral health and fresh breath. They also contain eugenol and vitamin C, two compounds that neutralize free radicals in your diet and improve your health overall.