Sulforaphane is a miraculous compound that enhances brain function, promotes healthy fat distribution, and greatly reduces the risk of cancer, brain diseases, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. It is like a health insurance policy for your cells. And guess what? It’s all natural. Sounds like another supplement sales pitch, right? That’s what I thought when I first heard about it, but then I dug through the research.

In a scientific article published by Dr. Thomas W. Kensler and his colleagues, sulforaphane is described as one of…

…the most potent naturally occurring inducers of Nrf2 signaling.”

Nrf2 is a cytoprotective (cell-protecting) pathway that protects your cells from oxidative stress and removes toxins from the body. This means that nrf2 plays a key role in preventing and reversing common health issues like:

• Heart disease
• Diabetes
• Cancer
• Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, traumatic brain injury and other brain diseases
• Multiple sclerosis
• ALS
• Autism and other behavioral disorders
• Chronic pain
• Rheumatoid arthritis
• Asthma

The best part is that you won’t have to climb to the top of a mountain or scavenge the Amazon jungle and sit through a 6-hour ceremony to reap the benefits of nrf2. All you need to do is eat cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, and cabbage. Sulforaphane will be yours.

Related: Foods, Vitamins, and Herbs That Kill Cancer

Where Does Sulforaphane Come From?

Technically, sulforaphane does not naturally occur in cruciferous vegetables. A healthy, mature broccoli plant, for example, will contain no sulforaphane. However, as soon as the plant is damaged an enzyme called myrosinase is released that reacts with glucoraphanin, a compound that is sulforaphane’s precursor.

This process is not a gift from nature to ensure human health, it is actually the plant’s defense mechanism. Sulforaphane is designed to be toxic to the plant’s predators. In fact, it can be toxic to humans in large quantities. For example, when we ingest the majority of our calories from raw cruciferous vegetables, we can impair our thyroid function.

However, in small quantities, sulforaphane creates a hormetic effect. A hormetic effect is what happens when we gain beneficial effects from something that would be toxic or lethal in higher doses. For example, daily cold exposure triggers brown fat production. This is a healthier version of fat that increases our energy and heat production. This means that cold exposure has a hormetic effect on our bodies, but if we are exposed to frigid temperatures for too long, we will begin to accumulate frostbite instead of brown fat.

Although you won’t get frostbite from eating too many cruciferous vegetables, very high intakes of these vegetables have been found to cause hypothyroidism. This is because compounds in cruciferous vegetables called glucosinolates can be broken down into goitrins in the body. These goitrins interfere with the production of thyroid hormones causing hypothyroidism. However, if you maintain an adequate iodine intake, you will need to eat a lot more cruciferous vegetables to experience adverse effects. Fortunately, you won’t have to eat a tremendous amount of cruciferous vegetables. The benefits of sulforaphane can be experienced by eating just 3 to 5 servings per week. In fact, doing this may prevent cancer.

Cancer Prevention? Yeah, That Too

If you dig through the literature on sulforaphane, you will find an abundance of studies on cancer. Sulforaphane has been found to prevent the formation of breast, prostate, colon, skin, lung, stomach, and bladder cancer. One study found that a diet of three to five servings per week of cruciferous vegetables is sufficient to decrease the risk of cancer development by 30% to 40%. It was also found that consuming one portion of cruciferous vegetables per week is associated with a significantly reduced risk of oral cavity and pharynx, esophageal, colorectal, breast, and kidney cancer.

These profound effects are not only due to sulforaphane’s cell protecting properties. Sulforaphane also has the capacity to be selectively toxic to malignant cells, while simultaneously enhancing the detoxification of aflatoxins and airborne toxins like smoke. It also has been shown to have potent affects on the brain.

Brain Transformation

Sulforaphane is essential for brain health, especially in healing damaged brains. In cases of traumatic brain injury and Alzheimer’s disease, sulforaphane has been found to improve memory and learning abilities. Scientists think that this may be associated with its ability to promote neurogenesis and reduce the aluminum load in the brain.

Autism is also positively affected by sulforaphane. In one study, autistic children that supplemented with sulforaphane showed an improvement in social interaction, abnormal behavior, and verbal communication.

Related: Increase your IQ with the Right Foods, Herbs, Vitamins

Fat Loss & Gut Health

Studies have found that sulforaphane triggers the creation of brown fat in mice. Brown fat is a healthier form of fat storage that actually increases energy consumption.

Sulforaphane also improved the gut flora of mice compared to other mice that were fed the same diet without sulforaphane. This may mean that sulforaphane can change our body composition by promoting brown fat storage and a healthy gut flora while staving off unhealthy, inflammatory white fat.

Related: Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases

And There’s More

Studies have also found that sulforaphane aids in the reversal of fatty liver disease, preventing lung damage from inhaled toxins, reducing hypertension, and improving mood.

Okay. That’s it.

I am sure there is more, but that is enough of the science for today. Let’s get practical.

How to Get More Sulforaphane

Simply eating cruciferous vegetables is not enough to guarantee that you are getting sulforaphane in your diet. Many different environmental factors can cause glucoraphanin to not be converted into sulforaphane. And glucoraphanin is useless to the body.

One environmental factor that reduces the production of sulforaphane is heat. Studies have found that exposing cruciferous vegetables to temperatures higher than 158 degrees Fahrenheit deactivated the myrosinase enzyme leading to a sharp decrease in sulforaphane production. This suggests that cooking your cruciferous vegetables will rob you of the benefits of sulforaphane. But before you make a raw kale salad or have some raw broccoli to get your daily dose of sulforaphane, it is important to note that myrosinase activity decreases as the cruciferous vegetable matures. Luckily, there is a much easier and tastier way to increase the amount of sulforaphane in your meals.

The Best Source of Sulforaphane

Even if you eat raw broccoli or cauliflower, you are still getting 10 to 100 times less sulforaphane than when you eat 3-day-old broccoli sprouts. In fact, one ounce of broccoli sprouts can convert to as much sulforaphane as one-and-a-half pounds of mature broccoli. This is mainly because myrosinase activity is increased in young sprouts compared to adult plants. This increase in enzyme activity helps ensure that the vulnerable sprout can protect itself into adulthood.

The increased activity of the myrosinase enzyme in broccoli sprouts also helps you to convert the glucoraphanins from other vegetables in your meal to sulforaphane. You can reap these benefits with every salad by garnishing it with broccoli sprouts. Dr. Rhonda Patrick suggests adding around 2.5 ounces of broccoli sprouts to your daily smoothies, salad, or snack.

Supplementing with Broccoli Sprouts

Buying a broccoli sprout supplement may seem like the best option, but don’t let the tempting price of $10 a month fool you. This will cost you 20x more than buying broccoli sprouts in the store, and supplements can’t even guarantee that the myrosinase enzyme will be present or active.

When you buy fresh broccoli sprouts you can at least guarantee that you are getting sulforaphane in your diet. Store bought broccoli sprouts will cost you about $1 per ounce or you can easily grow them at home for the cost of around 9 cents per ounce.

Related: You Need Sulforaphane – How and Why to Grow Broccoli Sprouts

Conclusion

Sulforaphane is a compound that comes with a list of beneficial effects that gets longer as we continue to study it. You can reap the benefits of sulforaphane by eating around 5 servings of raw or minimally cooked cruciferous vegetables a week. However, the simplest and most effective way to consume sulforaphane is by eating broccoli sprouts.

Just one ounce of broccoli sprouts converts to as much sulforaphane as one-and-a-half pounds of mature broccoli. A reliable source of broccoli sprouts is your local organic food store, but this added expense can easily break your grocery budget. The cheapest way to supplement your diet with broccoli sprouts is by growing them at home. After 5-7 days you can have up to a half pound of sprouts for 10x less than the cost of broccoli sprouts in the store.

Related Reading:

• Detox Cheap and Easy Without Fasting – Recipes Included
• Foods, Vitamins, and Herbs That Kill Cancer
• Holistic Guide to Healing the Endocrine System and Balancing Our Hormones
• The Difference Between Heirlooms, Hybrids, and GMOs

Sources:

• Keap1-Nrf2 Signaling: A Target for Cancer Prevention by Sulforaphane — NCBI
• Sulforaphane treatment of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) — NCBI
• Sulforaphane, a Dietary Component of Broccoli/Broccoli Sprouts, Inhibits Breast Cancer Stem Cells — NCBI
• Dietary Sulforaphane in Cancer Chemoprevention: The Role of Epigenetic Regulation and HDAC Inhibition — NCBI
• Frugal Chemoprevention: Targeting Nrf2 with Foods Rich in Sulforaphane — NCBI
• Oxidative Stress and Neurodegenerative Diseases: A Review of Upstream and Downstream Antioxidant Therapeutic Options — NCBI
• Sulforaphane, a phytochemical in broccoli sprouts, ameliorates obesity — Science Daily
• Sulforaphane improves cognitive function administered following traumatic brain injury — Science Direct
• Neuroprotective Effects of Sulforaphane on Cholinergic Neurons in Mice with Alzheimer’s Disease-Like Lesions — NCBI
• Broccoli sprouts: an exceptionally rich source of inducers of enzymes that protect against chemical carcinogens. — NCBI
• Heating decreases epithiospecifier protein activity and increases sulforaphane formation in broccoli. — NCBI
• Refrigerating — Sprout People
• Potential health benefits of sulforaphane: A review of the experimental, clinical and epidemiological evidences and underlying mechanisms — Academic Journals
• Broccoli sprouts: an exceptionally rich source of inducers of enzymes that protect against chemical carcinogens. — NCBI
• Myrosinase activity and total glucosinolate content of cruciferous vegetables, and some properties of cabbage myrosinase in Taiwan — Journal of the Science and Food Agriculture
• Brown Fat in Humans: Turning up the Heat on Obesity — Diabetes
• Sulforaphane Bioavailability from Glucoraphanin-Rich Broccoli: Control by Active Endogenous Myrosinase — NCBI
• Cruciferous Vegetables — Oregon State University

Billions of people are exposed to dangerous fine particulate matter, known as PM2.5, from diesel fumes, wood burning stoves, and chemical reactions between other polluting gasses. PM2.5 particles are incredibly tiny, with a diameter less than 2.5 micrometers. They can lodge deep in the lungs and cause heart and lung problems, and they are thought to alter genes associated with the immune system. How do you protect yourself against something with that has the ability to change your DNA? You take B vitamins.

Researchers in the U.S. discovered that four weeks of B vitamin supplementation limited the PM2.5 effects by 28-76% at ten gene locations. Though limited by their small sample size and the high doses of B vitamins in the study, scientists nevertheless saw a connection. The B vitamins made a difference both in epigenetic changes and on a mitochondrial level.

Looking for B Vitamins

B vitamins give us our energy. They provide essential support for neurotransmitters and nerve tissue. The specific B vitamins used in this study were B6, folic acid (or B9), and B12. The inclusion of folic acid and B12 is especially interesting as they are some of the building blocks involved in repairing DNA, and they are involved in the metabolism of every cell in the body. Despite common fear that if you have the gene for something you automatically get it, the body can be influenced. Genes change.

Gun Seeks Magic Bullet

So the question becomes how do we get enough B vitamins to offset that pollution, to support all of those essential processes in the body, and to keep our genes intact or improve them? While we can produce B vitamins in the gut, it doesn’t happen without the right foods or the right gut environment. Fresh, organic vegetables and fruits replenish B vitamins, but the amount of nutrition to be found in our food is declining overall. There’s also the issue of assimilation. A digestive system that isn’t working properly won’t be able to use those vitamins to their best effect. The good news there? Maintaining the same produce rich way of eating that provides and creates B vitamins is the best way to have a healthy digestive system.

Related Products:

• Vitamin B Complex – Green Lifestyle Market

Related Reading:

• Mental Health, Physical Health & B Vitamins – Nature’s Valium
• Detox Cheap and Easy Without Fasting – Recipes Included
• How to Detoxify and Heal the Lymphatic System
• Holistic Guide to Healing the Endocrine System and Balancing Our Hormones
• Natural Remedies for PMS, Mood Swings, Bloating, Cramps, Etc.

Sources:

• B Vitamins May Have ‘Protective Effect’ Against Air Pollution – BBC
• Mental Health, Physical Health & B Vitamins – Nature’s Valium – Organic Lifestyle Magazine
• Dirt Poor: Have Fruits and Vegetables Become Less Nutritious? – Scientific American

Monsanto is currently embroiled in a lawsuit from farmers claiming that glyphosate caused their non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, contradicting the EPA’s finding that the chemical is “…not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.” On Tuesday, documents from the case were unsealed, including an internal email exchange at Monsanto that implies they wrote portions of EPA studies on the herbicide. According to one email, “…we would be keeping the cost down by us doing the writing and they would just edit & sign their names so to speak…” Another email specifically mentions portions of studies that would be ghostwritten by Monsanto employees, as opposed to regulatory agencies.

Suspect Everyone

Federal judge Vince Chhabria, who is based in Northern California and is overseeing the litigation against the company, has indicated that, “My reaction is when you consider the relevance of the EPA’s reports, and you consider their relevance to this litigation, it seems appropriate to take Jess Rowland’s deposition…” Previous documents released in the case included a letter from a long-time EPA employee, alleging that Rowland and other colleagues played “political, conniving games with the science to favor the registrants.” Other emails directly from Rowland indicated that he would quash another assessment of glyphosate from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, among other things. Rowland’s testimony will be key for the plaintiff, as his time as the chair of the Cancer Assessment Review Committee coincides with the release of the EPA memo that disputes the World Health Organization’s classification of glyphosate as probably carcinogenic. A subpoena will likely be necessary to interview Rowland, as he has declined a previous, voluntary request.

The EPA is also concerned about their standing in this lawsuit. Raven M. Norris, the attorney representing them this case,  stated, “The agency has legitimate concerns about being pulled into private litigation…They want to be able to maintain their impartiality.” If the already released documents are any indication, impartiality is already off the table. They are left fighting for plausible deniability.

Monsanto has maintained its defense of glyphosate, and Bill Heydens, one of the alleged ghostwriters, has given sworn testimony about his original emails, claiming, “It was things like editing relatively minor things, editing for formatting, just for clarity, really just for overall readability to make it easier for people to read in a more organized fashion…”. Rowland will hopefully provide the other side of that conversation, but it is likely his testimony will protect the company.

A Vulnerable Position for the Agricultural Giant

Complaints and studies against Monsanto and glyphosate have been piling up for quite some time now. While the WHO has reclassified the chemical after extensive research, the U.S. regulators have lagged behind with a different script. The EPA may be able to claim that they were unaware of this manipulation, though plaintiff attorneys have suggested that the EPA “may be unaware of Monsanto’s deceptive authorship practices.” But there really isn’t a good position here. If Rowland implicates Monsanto and saves the EPA, Monsanto’s $66 million dollar merger with Bayer might be in jeopardy. If Rowland follows the money (history indicates probably) or martyrs himself, the EPA looks incompetent. For the rest of us, we’ll get a better picture of who is pulling the strings when this case is decided.

Recommended Reading:

• Understanding and Detoxifying Genetically Modified Foods
• Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases
• Scientists Against GMOs – Hear From Those Who Have Done the Research
• Why Anti-Vaxxers Don’t Vaccinate
• Vaccines, Retroviruses, DNA, and the Discovery That Destroyed Judy Mikovits’ Career
• How To Detoxify and Heal From Vaccinations – For Adults and Children
• Doctors Against Vaccines – Hear From Those Who Have Done the Research

Sources:

• Monsanto Cancer Suits Turn to EPA Deputy’s ‘Suspicious’ Role – Bloomberg Business
• EPA Official Accused of Helping Monsanto `Kill’ Cancer Study – Bloomberg Business
• Monsanto Accused of Ghostwriting Papers on Roundup Cancer Risk – Yahoo! Finance
• Lawsuit Alleges That Monsanto Influenced the EPA’s Classification of Glyphosate – Organic Lifestyle Magazine

“Love the skin you’re in.” Though it may be cliche, take a moment to think about why you wouldn’t want to take care of your body’s biggest organ. After all, your skin is one of the first things others notice about you, so it pays to keep it in the best shape possible.

There’s just one problem. Most of us do a pretty terrible job of tending to our skin. Sure, we slather on some sunscreen on a hot summer day or casually rub in lotion during winter dry spells, but few people take the time to think about what’s really going on their skin. That’s a mistake. Your skin does more than look pretty, it’s actually a natural barrier, the first line of defense that keeps toxins from the outside world from getting inside you. However, your skin is far more permeable than most people notice.

Think of a nicotine patch. It works by allowing trace amounts of addictive chemicals to be absorbed directly through the skin and into the bloodstream. Just as skin is no barrier against a flood of nicotine, it also doesn’t prevent any other chemical from going through. This means that any chemical product you put on your body (bug spray, lotions, makeup) have every possibility of flowing through your bloodstream.

If that doesn’t scare you, it should.

Using Conventional Lotions? Think Again.

In today’s world, smelling amazing is no guarantee that something’s actually good for you. Your lavender scented lotion might be a pretty purple color and even come with flowers on the label, but chances are that most of the contents of that bottle never came close to a plant.

Below are some of the common chemicals used in conventional lotions and their effects on your body and the planet.

Paraffin: Made from petroleum, this chemical is known for coating your skin in a thin plastic covering, clogging pores and building up toxins along the way.

Parabens: A common cosmetic preservative in over 10,000 beauty products, parabens have been shown in studies to have connections with cancer, and they disrupt your body’s endocrine system by mimicking the hormone estrogen.

Propylene Glycol: Used as a moisturizer in many lotions, propylene glycol has been shown to inhibit skin cell growth and cause irritation, and some evidence points to it causing kidney and liver abnormalities.

Sodium laurel sulfate: Over 90% of personal care products have some form of sodium laurel, a chemical known for breaking down your skin’s moisture barrier so that it (and other chemicals) can easily get into your bloodstream. Studies have shown that SLS can lead to hair loss.

Ready to exchange these icky products for something a little less toxic? Keep reading to learn about the importance of taking care of your skin the natural way.

Natural Body Butters: The Quality Comes from the Ingredients

When it comes to taking care of your skin, nothing can compare to a natural body butter. Actually, “body butter” is a general term used to describe dozens of different body creams that are dense and full of nutrients that add extra hydration to your skin. Most body butters are filled with essential oils, vitamins, and nutrients that make them invaluable in a skin care routine. There is a huge range of ingredients that can be used to make body butters, all of which have distinct benefits that make them useful in a variety of ways.

In most cases, body butters are made from cold pressed oils that are extracted from nuts, seeds and fruits, and then combined with fatty acids and other forms of oil to thicken the consistency. Most body butters are solids at room temperature that melt from your skin’s heat when you slather them on, creating a deeply moisturizing treatment that lasts for hours.

Some of the best benefits of natural body butters are described below.

• Plenty of Moisture: Skin sucks in everything you put on it, but thankfully natural body butters will provide nothing but hydration. Nut-based butters are filled with emollients that provide skin soothing moisture long after conventional lotions have quit.

• Protection: The thick ingredients in body butters form a protective barrier over your skin to keep moisture in check. This prevents you from drying out in heat, hot sun or cold winter air that otherwise sucks away moisture. Instead of relying on parabens like other products, natural butters take advantage of the natural emollients found in nuts and seeds to trap moisture deep into the fatty layers of your skin for optimal moisture protection.

• Skin Nourishing Vitamins: No matter the type, body butters are rich in omega 3 fats that benefit you both inside and out. These highly moisturizing fatty acids help keep inflammation in check and make vitamins far more accessible for your skin to absorb.

• Reduce Wrinkles: Allowing your skin to dry out is a quick way to start looking old and faded. A better option is to protect yourself with moisturizing body butters that help your skin retain its elasticity so you keep a healthy glow, no matter your age.

• Softer Skin: Chronic, chapped skin is no problem when combated with the moisturizing power of homemade body butter. Regular treatments of this rich cream can eliminate dry, cracked skin and even clear up chronic conditions like eczema. Just slather on some body butter immediately after showering and your skin will stay noticeably softer throughout the day.

• Affordable: Are you currently paying a small fortune for your skin care products? Switching over to homemade body butters will save you money, and you’ll get to control exactly what goes in them.

• Cuticle Saver: If your cuticles look ragged much of the time, a gentle coating of body butter will help them stay hydrated and healthy, getting your nails back to top shape in no time.

• Stretch Mark Solution: Having children can be brutal for your body, but a little body butter can make those scars a little less visible. Regular treatments of body butter help the skin to heal and regenerate, which means you can hide the appearance of stretch marks before they get out of control.

Top Ingredients for Making Homemade Body Butter

There are so many ways you can make your own body butter, you’re truly limited only by your creativity. Whether you choose to stick to staple ingredients like coconut and shea butter or opt for something a little more exotic like cupuacu or jojoba butter, the possibilities of what you can do is endless.

While it’s usually best to plan on using a ration of 75% solid to 25% liquid oil for your natural butter, the oils listed below are some of the best to invest in when first getting started.

Almond Butter: You want to lick yourself all day when you make a butter with sweet almond oil. This thick, rich butter is great for moisturizing and is a smart way to hydrate a dry scalp.

Cocoa Butter: Known for being a highly stable fat, cocoa butter can last on your shelve for years and is flush with natural antioxidants. A silky smooth texture and delicate fragrance makes it useful for a wide range of products, and pregnant women have been relying on cocoa butter to prevent stretch marks for centuries. Because of the high moisture content of cocoa butter, it’s not always a great choice for oily skinned people.

Shea Butter: Definitely one of the most popular butters available today, shea butter has a unique fatty acid composition that makes it versatile for many products, including dry skin, massage creams, and sun protection. A great all around oil, everyone can benefit from a little shea butter in their life.

Jojoba Butter: If you need an intensive moisturizing boost that only the best can get you, jojoba oil is worth checking out. Perfect for treating eczema and psoriasis, jojoba oil works well on all skin types.

Coconut Oil: With a melting point so low it’s practically a liquid at room temperature, coconut oil gives your body a delicious tropical smell and is great for treating troubling dry spots.

Cupuacu Butter: Made from the cupuacu fruit (commonly grown in Brazil) cupuacu butter is a perfect ingredient to add to your homemade hair conditioner, though it should be used sparingly on your skin if you tend to be oily.

Two Ways to Make Your Own Natural Body Products

Interested in making your own body butter? These recipes will get you started!

Extra Hydration Body Butter

You could truly spend weeks trying out recipes for different types of body butter, but for your first batch, you’ll want to go for something as nourishing as possible. This recipe combines four types of butters into one batch in order to get you maximum skin hydration. Great for babies or anyone with sensitive skin, this butter also makes a good gift.

Take half a cup each of shea butter, mango butter, coconut oil, and olive oil, and combine them all into a double boiler on medium heat. Stir the mixture constantly until it all melts and remove it from the heat. If you’re looking for a particular scent, you can add between 10 to 30 drops of essential oil. Put the entire mixture into the fridge and let it cool for an hour, or to the point where it starts to harden but is still pliable. Take a hand mixer and whip the batch for 10 minutes until fluffy, after which it should be put back in the fridge for 10-15 minutes. Once set and somewhat hardened, you can store your butter in a glass jar with a secure lid and use it like any regular lotion. So long as your home is less than 75 degrees F, the butter will stay whipped. Any hotter than that, and you should store it in the fridge between uses.

Homemade Hand Lotion:

While not truly a body butter recipe, this lotion uses all natural ingredients for a hydrating blend that is too good to miss out on. Body lotion and body butter are more similar than they are different, but the difference comes from the liquid content. Lotions sometimes contain up to 70% water, and the moisturizing effects don’t go as deeply or last as long as body butters. Even so, lotions are great when your skin needs a quick pick me up but doesn’t want all the excess hydration of a true body butter.

Instead of water, this recipe relies on oil for its texture, making it more hydrating than other versions. To make your own lotion, combine a half cup of liquid oil (almond works well), with a quarter cup each of coconut oil and beeswax. Melt them together in a double boiler, stirring constantly so nothing burns. Once everything melts, add a teaspoon of Vitamin E and a few drops of essential oil. Pour the mixture into a glass jar with a tight fitting lid, and dip in whenever you need an extra hydration boost. This product is best used within six months.

Simple Tips For Using Natural Body Products

Using body butters and lotions is a fairly straightforward process. In essence, you put a little butter on your hands and rub it in where you want it. Even so, the tips below can help answer some of your questions about use.

• Body butters are super concentrated, so a little goes a long way. Take a tiny amount and carefully warm it with your hands before putting it on your body so that it absorbs more easily into your skin.
• The kinds of butter you purchase for your body butter is crucial. Look carefully on labels for terms like “unrefined,” “crude,” and “cold pressed,” as these are signs that the oil was extracted through natural methods, not high heat that destroys the butter’s natural nutrients.
• So long as you store your butter in an airtight container, it should last for a year or more.

In Summary

Your skin does a lot for you, so it pays to take care of it. By relying on natural skin care remedies like body butters, you’ll be keeping your body’s biggest organ in top shape. Add some homemade body butter to your skin care routine, and your skin will stay hydrated, healthy and beautiful, at almost no cost to you.

Recommended Reading:

• 35 Things You Could Do With Coconut Oil – From Body Care to Health to Household
• Heal Cavities, Gum Disease, Naturally with Organic Oral Care – Toothpaste Recipes Included
• How to Optimize Curcumin Absorption – With Golden Milk Tea Recipe
• Five DIY Organic Shampoo Recipes for Beautiful Hair
• Natural, Safe Sunscreen Options with Homemade Sunscreen Recipe
• Homemade Vitamin C

Sources:

• Skin Barrier Function – Just About Skin
• Homemade Lotion Recipe – Wellness Mama
• What is Cold Pressed? – Livestrong
• Natural Butters- Garden of Wisdom

Brain Enhancing, Fat Burning, Cancer Preventing, DIY Homemade Supplementation

It is not another drug or folk remedy. You can prevent many forms of cancer, improve gut health, establish healthy body fat composition, enhance brain function, detoxify your cells, and reduce depression with this one miracle compound.

It’s called sulforaphane, and it is naturally produced when cruciferous vegetables are damaged. We initiate the reaction that creates sulforaphane with the process of chewing, which allows us to reap a plethora of benefits that make the scientific research on sulforaphane look like a late night TV ad.

The Scientific Sales Pitch

Although there are many proposed effects of sulforaphane, let’s stick with what has been studied. Sulforaphane has been shown to prevent the growth of many cancers including breast, prostate, colon, skin, lung, stomach, and bladder cancer. The risk of common diseases like diabetes, heart disease, gastric disease, neurodegenerative disease, ocular disease, and respiratory diseases are reduced with the consumption of sulforaphane as well. Even behavioral disorders like autism have been helped with sulforaphane supplementation. And if that isn’t enough, sulforaphane has been shown to decrease fat gain and improve body composition in mice. All this is possible because sulforaphane stimulates protective and detoxifying mechanisms in the cells. This allows the cells to eliminate environmental toxins like mercury and air pollutants from the body and repair themselves from the damage caused by oxidative stress.

The Best Source of Sulforaphane

With positive and protective effects on almost every cell in the body, sulforaphane is like a health insurance policy for your cells. This compound can be found in raw or minimally cooked cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, kale, cauliflower, and Brussels sprouts.

It is important to note that sulforaphane cannot be produced from vegetables that are cooked at a temperature above 158 degrees Fahrenheit. This is because the enzyme that helps create sulforaphane is deactivated when is heated above 158 degrees Fahrenheit.

The enzyme that helps create sulforaphane may also become less active in mature cruciferous vegetables, so it is uncertain how much sulforaphane you will actually get from mature plants. This is where crucifer sprouts save the day. Due to their increased enzyme activity, crucifer sprouts are the best source of sulforaphane. But one sprout, in particular, may provide the most sulforaphane of them all. That sprout is the broccoli sprout.

Where To Get Broccoli Sprouts

After seeing the benefits of broccoli sprouts it is tempting to add that $10 bottle of broccoli sprout capsules to your cart, but don’t let the tempting price fool you. At $10 per bottle, you are spending 20x more than if you bought broccoli sprouts in the store, and supplements can’t even guarantee that they actually have any sulforaphane or enzyme activity.

With store bought broccoli sprouts you can at least guarantee that you are getting sulforaphane in your diet. However, store bought broccoli sprouts will run you about $1 per ounce when you can easily grow them at home for the cost of ~9 cents per ounce.

With one 64 oz mason jar, a seed strainer lid, broccoli seeds, a glass bowl, and water you can grow up to 15 pounds of sprouts per pound of broccoli seeds. That means you can have a half pound of sprouts every week for over 6 months. Fifteen pounds of broccoli sprouts would cost you $240 if you bought them in the store or almost $5,000 in capsule form, and you can get them for less than $50.

How to Grow Your Own Broccoli Sprouts

Growing your own broccoli sprouts is simple and easy. It doesn’t require gardening skills, and after less than a week you can have up to half a pound of delicious broccoli sprouts for the cost of less than a dollar.

Here is what you need:

• Organic broccoli seeds for sprouting (~$15 per pound)
• A 64-ounce mason jar (~$10 per jar)
• Strainer sprouting lids that fit the mouth of your jar (~$9 per lid)
• A glass bowl
• A cool, dark place
• Optional: full spectrum light
• Optional: salad spinner

Estimated yield: 3 tablespoons of seeds will most likely sprout to a half pound of broccoli sprouts in about 5-7 days.

Step by Step Guide to Sprouting Your Broccoli Seeds

Step 1

Put 3 tablespoons of broccoli seeds in your mason jar, cover the seeds with cool, distilled water or spring water (60-70 degrees Fahrenheit), and swish the water around gently. Put your mason jar, with the sprouting lid on, in a cool dark place for 6-12 hours to allow the seeds to soak.

Step 2

Drain off the water by tipping the mason jar to let the water pass through the strainer. Take the glass bowl and rest your mason jar inside of it so that the remaining water can drain. Put it in a cool dark place for 8-12 hours to let the seeds drain and sprout.

Tip: make sure the jar is tipped enough so that the seeds can drain and have adequate airflow. The most common cause of poor sprouting is inadequate drainage.

Step 3

Rinse the seeds 2x daily and put the jar back in the bowl in a cool dark place so it can drain. It might help to set reminders on your phone.

Here’s what mine looked like 60 hours after the beginning of the first rinse:

Tip: Try not to expose them to too much light until most of them are sprouted with tiny yellowish leaves.

Step 4

After 3 to 4 days you will notice white sprouts with tiny yellowish leaves coming from the seeds. When this happens for most of your seeds, you can begin exposing them to indirect sunlight or a full spectrum light bulb so that they can start to green up. Continue to do the same rinsing process as before.

84 hours after the beginning of the first rinse:

Step 5

After a day or two of light exposure, rinse them once again, and let them drain overnight. The next morning they will be ready to eat!

After the first day of sun exposure:

The finished product, about 6 ounces of broccoli sprouts from 2 and a half tablespoons of broccoli seeds:

Bonus Step: How to Increase Sulforaphane content by 3.5x

Studies have actually been conducted to find out how to increase the bioavaliability of sulforaphane from broccoli sprouts. One study found that If you want to get the most out of your broccoli sprouts, you must never expose them to temperatures greater than 70 degrees Celsius (158 degrees Fahrenheit). However, if you let them sit in 65 to 70 degree Celsius (149 to 158 degrees Fahrenheit) water for 10 minutes, you can increase sulforaphane content by around 3.5 fold. The greatest increase was found at 70 degrees Celsius (158 degrees Fahrenheit) with a rapid decrease when the sprouts were exposed to greater temperatures.

To try this broccoli sprout hack at home all you need is a pot, thermometer, a glass bowl, a timer, water, and your broccoli sprouts. Put your broccoli sprouts in a glass bowl while you heat up the water in the pot until it reaches 70 degrees Celsius. Cover your sprouts with the water and set your timer for ten minutes. Check the temperature of the water that the sprouts are in every couple of minutes and add 70 degree Celsius water to the broccoli sprouts periodically to maintain the temperature between 65 and 70 degrees Celsius. After 10 minutes, drain the sprouts, pat they dry, eat them, add them to a smoothie, or store them in the refrigerator.

If that description was to confusing, check out how Dr. Rhonda Patrick hacks her broccoli sprout sulforaphane content:

How to Store Your Sprouts for up to Six Weeks

To keep the sprouts fresh and nutritious for six weeks follow these steps:

1. Eight to twelve hours after the final rinse and drain, pat your sprouts dry and/or use a salad spinner until the sprouts are reasonably dry. Nothing kills produce quicker than refrigerating it wet.
2. Put the sprouts in a plastic bag or container that will ensure minimal exposure to air. If they are exposed to too much air they may dry out completely.
3. Refrigerate them for up to six weeks and eat them whenever and however you like.

Enjoy!

Recommended Reading:

• Fight Cavities and Gingivitis Naturally With Homemade DIY Oral Health
• Total Nutrition – Make your own Homemade Multivitamin and Mineral Formula
• Natural, Safe Sunscreen Options with Homemade Sunscreen Recipe
• How To Make Natural Body Butters That Actually Moisturize Your Skin

Sources:

• Keap1-Nrf2 Signaling: A Target for Cancer Prevention by Sulforaphane — NCBI
• Sulforaphane treatment of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) — NCBI
• Sulforaphane, a Dietary Component of Broccoli/Broccoli Sprouts, Inhibits Breast Cancer Stem Cells — NCBI
• Dietary Sulforaphane in Cancer Chemoprevention: The Role of Epigenetic Regulation and HDAC Inhibition — NCBI
• Frugal Chemoprevention: Targeting Nrf2 with Foods Rich in Sulforaphane — NCBI
• Oxidative Stress and Neurodegenerative Diseases: A Review of Upstream and Downstream Antioxidant Therapeutic Options — NCBI
• Sulforaphane, a phytochemical in broccoli sprouts, ameliorates obesity — Science Daily
• Sulforaphane improves cognitive function administered following traumatic brain injury — Science Direct
• Neuroprotective Effects of Sulforaphane on Cholinergic Neurons in Mice with Alzheimer’s Disease-Like Lesions — NCBI
• Broccoli sprouts: an exceptionally rich source of inducers of enzymes that protect against chemical carcinogens. — NCBI
• Heating decreases epithiospecifier protein activity and increases sulforaphane formation in broccoli. — NCBI
• Refrigerating — Sprout People
• Potential health benefits of sulforaphane: A review of the experimental, clinical and epidemiological evidences and underlying mechanisms — Academic Journals
• Broccoli sprouts: an exceptionally rich source of inducers of enzymes that protect against chemical carcinogens. — NCBI

What’s the next phase in omega-3 fatty acid supplementation? If biotechnology and agricultural trading giants like Monsanto, Dow Chemical, and Cargill have anything to say about it, the future is soy and canola.

There is no way to meet the demand we currently have for fish oil.Peru, the world’s leader in fish oil and fish meal production, had a banner year in 2016, getting the highest recorded average price per metric ton. But those record numbers come at a time when production levels have declined 61% from the previous year. The production levels aren’t likely to improve either, as the United Nations reports 90% of the world’s fish are fully or partially overfished. Farm-raised fish are unlikely to be a good source of Omega-3s as they themselves are frequently fed other fish oils to boost their health. We are approaching the point where a big source for Omega-3s, wild-caught fish, will no longer be available, and farm raised fish currently require supplementation instead of providing it.

The Big Business Solution

The demand for fish oil products has created a 2.4 million dollar market, and many big companies have settled on grains as the solution to the problem left by dwindling fish oil supplies. One of the companies with ambitious plans in this area is Cargill, an agricultural trading company based in Minnesota. In a bid to create a fifth of current fish oil supplies, 159,000 metric tons, they’ve earmarked up to half a million acres of Montana farmland to grow their new strain of canola. Projected to be ready in 2020, the canola will contain long-chain omega-3 fatty acids from algae. Dow Chemicals has also jumped on the canola train, although they plan to grow their canola in Canada.

Monsanto, on the other hand, is sticking with what they know – soy. Soybeans are already a  source of ALA (alpha-linolenic acids), and the company’s plan is to develop a soybean specifically meant to be processed into a soy oil for baked goods and soup. Other companies are launching omega-3 products with algae. Archer Daniels Midland in Chicago, a commodities trading and food processing company, created an algae-based product for fish supplementation. TerraVia Holdings Ltd is another company focused on algae, using it to convert sugar into omega-3s.

A Little People Solution

Omega 3 fatty acids are essential to any healthy diet, but other options are out there? Quality fish and fish oil are hard to find and hard to justify from an environmental perspective. Many of the proposed big businesses solutions focus on GMO crops. Both of these options are problematic.

Getting omega-3s in your diet doesn’t have to be all about fish oil. Algae is a great source of omega-3s, and it’s important to get different colors. Green algae like spirulina and chlorella, are a source of EPA. Brown algae like wakame and hijiki are sources of DHA, a key nutrient in supporting a healthy brain. Other vegetable based sources of omega-3s include flax, chia, and nuts, especially walnuts. The acids are also in a number of vegetables like spinach, winter squash, and brussels sprouts, though the amount is much less than what is found in seaweeds, nuts, and seeds.

The World is Not Enough

This is not the only important part of the food chain disappearing. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, close to 75% of plant diversity has been lost. Six different livestock breeds are lost every month. Our gut bacteria has been slowly losing its variety, leaving us more open to disease. From a health viewpoint and an environmental viewpoint, now is the time to look for different, diverse foods. How long will it be before whole nutrients groups disappear from our world like so many plant varieties or members of our gut flora?

Related Reading:

• The Fascinating Bacteria in our Gut, and How it Affects Our Whole Lives
• Scientists Against GMOs – Hear From Those Who Have Done the Research
• Understanding and Detoxifying Genetically Modified Foods
• Monsanto Company Profile
• Holistic Guide to Healing the Endocrine System and Balancing Our Hormones

Sources:

• Grain Traders Prepping Fish Oil Substitutes for Aquaculture, Health Fads – Reuters
• Record Short First Fishmeal and Fish Oil Season in Peru Leads to a Five Year Production Low, Prices Declining Partially Due to Hardship of Companies – Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
• Top 10 Foods Highest in Omega 3 Fatty Acids – HealthAliciousNess
• What is Happening to Agrobiodiversity? – Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

If you’re a gardener, the single most time-consuming thing you probably do for your greens is to weed them. Unless you have a killer raised bed setup, the odds are good that your wimpy garden plants won’t be able to withstand the onslaught of weeds perfectly optimized to thrive in the conditions you’ve created.

Watching your kale get overrun by chokeweed is enough to make the most seasoned gardener despair, but what if the way you are thinking about these garden nuisances is actually completely wrong?

Weeds aren’t always bad. Ralph Waldo Emerson once famously proclaimed that weeds were simply misunderstood, as “…a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered”. Though it might be hard for you to match his candor, the truth is that there’s a lot to like about common weeds that few of us are aware of.

As it turns out, weeds have far more benefits for our health than you can imagine.

Garden Weeds: Even Healthier Than Your Vegetables?

It takes a tremendous amount of effort to get garden plants to produce food. No matter how carefully you try to coax your tender plants to thrive, the odds are good that without some significant effort on your part, the close-growing weeds will soon take them over. While it’s easy to hate weeds for their effortless abilities to overwhelm your hard work, the truth is that the scrappiness of weeds is part of what makes them so special.

To understand this, keep in mind that every garden plant once started as a weed that was carefully grown over centuries until it came to resemble the plant that it is today. Fruits got bigger, inedible seeds got smaller, and unpleasant bitterness in leaves slowly became reduced. However, as the traits humans enjoyed best slowly became more prominent, the biggest benefits of these plants – their nutritional content – was slowly weeded out.

Wild plants don’t get the benefit of careful gardening to keep them alive, so they’ve adapted to defend themselves. For this reason, weeds are often full of phytonutrients, essentially an “arsenal of chemicals” that helps them fend off diseases and predators. While the bitter taste they produce often keeps the hungry away, these chemicals are full of health benefits for humans that help them fight off diseases like heart disease, dementia, and even cancer. Filled with vitamins and mineral levels that regular vegetables can’t compete with, garden weeds are truly more nutritious than supermarket greens. If you want the easiest, most efficient way to fill your diet with foods as close to nature as possible, chomping on wild weeds is a great place to start.

Types of Edible Weeds

The complete list of edible weeds is far too vast for any web article, but this list of common weeds from around the world should get you started.

Clover

You’ll find yourself lucky in a patch of clover even when four leafed varieties are nowhere to be found. Red clover is full of the phytoestrogen genistein, a substance that has been studied to treat colon and prostate cancers. While you might have to compete with the honeybees for your supply, raw clover can be chopped into salads or sauteed with other greens. However, there is some concern for pregnant women. Studies have shown that the large amounts of the phytoestrogens in clover may increase your risk of breast cancer and possibly birth defects.

Lambs Quarters (Goosefoot)

Young, tender, and very versatile, lambs quarters can be used as a substitute for spinach in any recipe. This is great news for salad lovers, as lambs quarters peak right when spinach is winding down for the summer. Loaded with vitamins A, C, and K and full of calcium and protein, you are actually better off eating this wild spinach over the cultivated variety. If you are filled with patience, the seeds from lambs quarters can also be collected and cooked as a quinoa-like grain filled with 16% protein.

Dandelions

Though you might cringe at the sight of their sunny-hued flowers blanketing your lawn, dandelions are actually nutritious and surprisingly delicious when used well. In fact, European settlers first brought the dandelion to the U.S. for use as a salad green. One cup of raw dandelion greens contains well over your daily needs of vitamin A and vitamin K.  The best ways to eat dandelions tends to be raw in salads or dried into herbal teas. For those feeling a little more adventurous, the yellow flowers can be breaded and fried for a tasty snack.

Catnip

Not simply a treat for cats, catnip actually has some fascinating health benefits for humans, too. Native to Europe, catnip easily grows around the world and makes for a great herbal tea that encourages relaxation. The mild mint flavor is tasty when snacked on raw or sauteed with other greens

Plantain

Though it has little resemblance to the tropical fruit with the same name, plantain weeds grow all over the world and make for a stellar medicinal plant that can be used topically to soothe skin ailments like rashes or burns. Even better, the younger leaves are tasty in salads and can be steamed, boiled, or sauteed. If you take the time to harvest the seeds, they can be ground into a nutritious flour that’s great for baking.

Bamboo

Though bamboo’s versatility has been put to use on everything from flooring to kitchen cutting boards, few people are aware that this fibrous plant is also edible. Often described as tasting like corn, bamboo shoots can be harvested when they are less than two weeks old and added to your favorite stir fry. Simply peel off the outer leaves and cut the tender middle into one-eighth inch slices before boiling them in an uncovered pan for twenty minutes. After the bitterness has been boiled out, you can eat bamboo any way you choose.

Garlic Mustard

Though it’s highly invasive throughout much of the world, garlic mustard originally came from Europe. The flowers, leaves, seeds, and roots of garlic plants make them great for weight loss and controlling cholesterol levels, and their faint garlic scent makes them a tasty addition to any dish. You can harvest garlic mustard all season long, but the tastiest roots need to be collected in the early spring.

Green Amaranth

Similar to lambs quarters but with a more mild taste, green amaranth is also known as redroot, pigweed, and wild beet. Because of the detergent-like qualities of the saponon on raw leaves, green amaranth is best cooked before eating to eliminate the strange aftertaste. For this reason, it’s often best to serve green amaranth with a stronger tasting vegetable to offset its mild flavor.

Watercress

There’s no avoiding the high price tag of watercress in classy grocery stores, but you can harvest it yourself for free. This weed can be found throughout the U.S. Adding it to your salads is a foolproof way to boost up your daily antioxidants.

Kudzu

While “the weed that ate the south” is a symbol of despair for millions in America, this voracious plant is actually edible itself. Simple to make into jams and jellies and tasty when the flowers are pickled, there’s a lot of ways to experiment with this tricky vine. Commonly used as a digestive aid in China, you can also chop up a cup of kudzu leaves and boil them for thirty minutes before drinking the health-infused creation.

Mallow (Cheeseweed)

Common to see in yards around the world, mallow is a blessing for adventurous eaters to enjoy. Both the leaves and seed pods are edible and can be enjoyed steamed, boiled, or raw as a salad green. Mallow is full of vitamins and minerals that make it useful as an herbal medicine, especially when used as an anti-inflammatory, diuretic, or laxative.

Purslane

If you only choose to eat one weed from your garden bed, purslane should be the one. This succulent looking plant grows close to the ground and in between the cracks of the sidewalk. If you find some, you’re in luck. This juicy, lemon-tasting green is filled with omega-3 fatty acids. It is tasty eaten raw, cooked or blended in a smoothie. Because every part of the plant can be eaten, you won’t have to worry about shoving it all in your mouth at once. As an extra benefit, purslane consistently produces a bumper crop of edible seeds, which can be used for baking. All you need to do is dry out the seeds for several weeks on a sheet of plastic before winnowing out the tiny, black seeds.

In Summary

The benefits of spending your summer days wrist deep in garden dirt cannot be underestimated, but there’s a lot you can do to enjoy fresh grown produce without the effort. Garden weeds are equipped to thrive where your vegetables suffer, and most of them actually contain more vitamins and minerals than conventionally grown produce. If you’re ready to enjoy the benefits of these long-valued “famine foods”, give your garden weeds a try and see how they make you feel. You might be amazed at the results.

Related Reading:

• The Amazing Benefits of Stinging Nettles, with Recipes
• Mulberries and Mulberry Recipes
• How to Start a Vegetable Garden – How to Grow Vegetables
• Dandelions
• The Health benefits of Moringa: A Modern Miracle Tree

Sources:

• Breeding the Nutrition Out of Our Food – NY Times
  Phytoestrogens – Wikipedia 
• Eight Weeds You Can Eat – Rodale’s Organic Life
• Please Eat the Dandelions: Nine Edible Garden Weeds – Treehugger.com