Açaí berries, #1-ranked antioxidant plant food

Every week over the past year, the Berry Doctor's Journal has been published as an objective, science-based voice for the nutrient and antioxidant food values of berries.

Continuing this week, we celebrate our anniversary by republishing the 3 most popular essays as picked by an automated web counter tracking hits and searches.

The silver medal winner, #2, begins this way:

How would we use antioxidant rankings of foods if there was a measurement

reliable enough to put on food labels?

Current antioxidant measurements like ORAC are done only in a test tube --

not in the human body where it really matters.

Still, we need to get a handle on antioxidants in foods and understand

that even within a single food group, like berries,

there are wide differences in antioxidant content.

Let's take what science is available and compare the facts!

Look below for the essay.

 

[click on this color for Wikipedia links]

In this 3-part series, we're looking at the ORAC assay and how it might help us

recognize the antioxidant value of a food -- just by glancing at a food label ORAC code!

Quick review:

Every food you eat today contains antioxidants - chemicals in food usually associated with colors or pigments that preliminary science indicates may provide health benefits.

Recall our 3-part discussion of The Color Code!

(#1, #2, #3)

The amount of antioxidants in different foods varies mainly on color:

the deeper or more varied the color = more pigments

= greater antioxidant strength

Even foods that are white, like the flesh of a pear or potato, contain antioxidants, although at amounts much lower than in colorful foods.

                             

Science is leading the public toward use of numerical values for antioxidant strength of foods.  ORAC (oxygen radical absorbance capacity) is the most commonly used, but there are others with confusing names only to be mentioned here

(FRAP or ferric iron-reducing ability in plasma; TRAP or radical trapping antioxidant parameter; TEAC or Trolox equivalence antioxidant capacity; total phenolic content)

 

 

Once considered the antioxidant king, cultivated highbush blueberries, courtesy of Bremner Foods

 

Wikipedia on ORAC

 

Also see the Brunswick link for further background on measuring

oxygen radicals, antioxidants and ORAC

In Part 1 (click), we covered what the ORAC number actually measures

 

In Part 2, we listed ways the ORAC number may vary or be misinterpreted

 

Today!

A berry countdown

for the top 10 ORAC rankings

Notes:

• Not all berries have been studied for their specific ORACs
• Not all have been analyzed for their content of phenolic acids
• Not all have been tested for presence of carotenoids
• Antioxidant assays other than ORAC may rank these berries differently (click!)

This study ranked blackberries with the highest antioxidant rating

• Not all have been tasted for sourness by me!
• The rankings are educated estimates!

Berry	Botanical	ORAC	Phenolics	Sourness*	Carotenoids
		units per 100 g	0 to 4	0 to 4	0 to 4
10. Blackberry	Rubus ursinus	5,300	2	1	0
9. Wild blueberry	Vaccinium angustifolium	9,300	2	2	0
8. Cranberry	Vaccinium macrocarpon	9,500	2	2	0
7. Elderberry	Sambucus nigra	12,000‡	3	3	1‡
6. Muscadine grape	Vitis rotundifolia	15,000‡	3	3	1‡
5. Black raspberry	Rubus occidentalis	16,000	3	3	0‡
4. Black chokeberry	Aronia melanocarpa	16,000	4	4	0‡
3. Goji (wolfberry)	Lycium barbarum	30,300	3	1	4
2. Seabuckthorn	Hippophae rhamnoides	70,000‡	3	4	4
1. Açaí	Euterpe oleracea	102,700	4	3	1‡

     ORAC values are from several published sources on dried fruit or fruit powders (available upon request)

       * Sourness, a subjective indicator for phenolic acid content. Berries with 0-1 ratings have high sugar content

         that offsets sourness

      0 to 4 are subjective ranks by the Berry Doctor

     ‡ Estimated, as analyses are preliminary or there have been no comprehensive reports

 

How much ORAC does a person need each day?

• There is no scientific information on this daily requirement.

Educated estimates are that a total of 5,000 to 10,000 ORAC units per day

via dietary intake would be sufficient.

• That would mean just 5 grams of açaí freeze-dried pulp and skin powder

(only about 0.2 ounces) would fulfill the daily ORAC need!

• At the other end of the scale according to the above table --

a one cup serving of blackberries (about 100 grams) would meet the daily need.

• Good evidence from human studies indicates that berry antioxidants (or those from any food) are not very bioavailable. What does this mean? It indicates that antioxidant phytochemicals like phenolics do not stay in the body's tissues,

but rather flux back into blood and get excreted in the urine.

It also means that trying to saturate yourself with antioxidant-rich foods or supplements

is not going to help you, so don't waste your money on these products!

 

Rather....

Eat a colorful diet!

picture courtesy of Berry Wise Inc.

 

Summary and Interpretation of the Table

1. Scientists say ORAC is approximately proportional to phenolic and carotenoid content

2. By subjective indices, seabuckthorn may be the highest-rated ORAC berry,

but its ORAC has not been studied or publicly reported yet

3. Berries rich in both phenolics and carotenoids (seabuckthorn and goji) may

have the highest ORAC, but this has not been precisely studied

(see ORAC Primer part 2)

 

Seabuckthorn berries (Hippophae rhamnoides): ORAC king-in-waiting?

 

~~~~~~~~

Check out the

Archives!

Share this information by referring a contact to http://berrydoctor.com for sign-up!

Dr. Paul
The Berry Doctor

References for The Color Code, paperbacks available at Amazon.com Books

* Heber, D. What Color Is Your Diet? ReganBooks, 2001

* Joseph JA, Nadeau DA, Underwood A. The Color Code, Hyperion, 2002.