From garlic to sweet potatoes, there is a wide variety of immunity-boosting foods. Elements of each of these foods will both make you feel better and stay healthier all season long. Read more about the many vitamins and minerals that make up these delicious ingredients!
The immune system is complex and ever-changing as it adapts to fight new diseases and bacteria you encounter in your day-to-day life. Although your immune system does a great job on its own, you can boost how effective it is by eating certain foods.
Let's take a look at what foods support a healthy immune system by boosting immune function, and how you can easily incorporate them into your diet!
Oranges
Oranges, like practically all citrus fruits, are excellent foods to consume if you want a strong immune system! That's because all citrus fruits are extremely high in vitamin C: the primary vitamin that leads to a robust immune response. This fact is so well known that people often drink Vitamin C when they think they are coming down with a cold, oftentimes downing a glass of orange juice the moment they get a sniffle!
Oranges are both easy to find and easy to eat – snack on them by themselves, include them in meals, or use them for making juice. You'll get most of the nutritional benefits any of these ways, save for fiber, which you only get by eating the fruit.
It's also important to eat at least some citrus fruits every day since your body doesn't naturally produce vitamin C. Men need 90 mg per day while women need 75 mg.
Did you know that sailors, in bygone centuries, used to eat oranges and other citrus fruits to stave off scurvy? Talk about a useful fruit!
Garlic
Garlic is one of the most common and beloved spices in the entire world. Before its delicious role in modern cuisine, garlic used to be called Russian penicillin and was given to soldiers in WW2. Looking back a little further in human history, the Greek physician Hippocrates was one of the first to recognize the medicinal properties of garlic and recommended it for parasites and poor digestion!
Aside from adding a nice zing to your food, garlic was once used by earlier civilizations to fight off infections. The reasons for this aren't fully known, but there is some evidence that shows that garlic can lower your blood pressure and boost your immune system function.
That's partially because garlic is heavy in something called allicin, which offers medicinal benefits and can boost how effective your body's immune cells (white blood cells) are when they fight infections.
Broccoli
Broccoli is another excellent food for boosting your immune system. We can already hear the kids grumbling. But the truth is that most people who don't like broccoli just haven't had it prepared properly.
Many people boil their broccoli, which gets rid of tons of nutrients and the excellent flavors just hiding beneath the surface. Cook your broccoli correctly, and it'll be a tasty vegetable you'll be happy to make a regular part of your dinner table. Or try Thistle – we always steam or roast our broccoli to preserve both nutrients and flavor, and also use it shredded raw in our salads.
In terms of nutrients, broccoli has all kinds of vitamins and minerals, for example:
- Vitamins A and C
- Fiber
- Antioxidants
The list goes on. There's a reason why plenty of doctors recommend you make broccoli a regular part of your diet. All of those vitamins provide overall health benefits, and vitamin C, in particular, plays a big role in overall immune system health.
Broccoli can be used as a phenomenal side dish or even as a primary vegetable. You can also eat broccoli as part of a dense, vegetable-packed salad. Remember to steam your broccoli if you want to get the most nutrients out of every bite.
Ginger
Ginger, a popular flavoring ingredient for food and certain types of juices and soft drinks, is a perfect food to try after you're feeling a bit under the weather. Specifically, ginger can help decrease inflammation, like the kind you experience when you get a sore throat or suffer from inflammatory issues.
This is because ginger contains something called gingerol, which has tons of anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. But it can also help reduce the nausea you might feel while you are sick, particularly after surgery or if you are undergoing chemotherapy.
The great thing about ginger is that you only need to take between 1 and 1.5 grams to benefit from all these healthy side effects. Its potency means that, in the past, ginger was used as a treatment for seasickness. Today, you can find it in desserts, ginger-based soft drinks, and as a flavoring agent for many plant-forward dishes.
Spinach
Spinach, of course, is one of the most well-known foods that can boost your immune system. After all, the classic cartoon Popeye the Sailor Man revolves around the superhuman benefits of the vegetable!
While you won't necessarily grow muscles disproportionately large to your body, spinach does have a high concentration of vitamin C, the primary vitamin responsible for immune system health and overall virus defense. Other vitamins, like vitamin A and vitamin K1 (responsible for blood clotting), can be absorbed from spinach as well.
Adding to this is the high concentration of antioxidants and beta-carotene, both of which improve immune system health. To say that spinach can boost your immune system's "muscles" is closer to the truth than what Popeye demonstrated.
Spinach is best if you cook the vegetable as little as possible – this prevents many of the key nutrients from being boiled away. To this end, be sure to steam your spinach or consume it in its raw form as the main leaves for a great salad. You can also replace anything that uses lettuce with spinach for a similar but more intense flavor experience.
Leafy green veggies in general such as kale are a good source of vitamins and amino acids that boost the immune system, too!
Turmeric
Unlike the other foods on the list so far, turmeric isn't usually consumed by itself. Instead, turmeric is most often eaten as a part of curry – it's one of the key spices that give curry its distinctive kick. It's usually bright yellow in color, so it's easy to identify.
You'll also usually hear turmeric described with curcumin, which provides that bright yellow flavor. Curcumin, which is almost always consumed with turmeric, can also improve your immune system. Both curcumin and turmeric provide antiviral benefits and, when combined, taste phenomenal!
However, you need to consume both compounds together since curcumin can only be adequately absorbed by the body because of turmeric – otherwise, it passes through your system without as much benefit.
Speaking of benefits, turmeric can also provide:
- Anti-inflammatory benefits
- Protection from heart disease
- Increased antioxidant capacity
- Lower risk for brain disease
The list goes on. Suffice to say, spicy curry containing plenty of turmeric is an excellent dish anytime. Plus, plenty of delicious curries can be consumed with little to no meat – look for curries that include plenty of vegetables for tasty but healthy meals, like some of our popular weekly menu items.
Sweet Potatoes
Sweet potatoes are healthier alternatives compared to regular russet potatoes. They're just as starchy, but carry a sweet aftertaste that makes them a great complement to vegetable-heavy dishes, or for kids that prefer sweeter foods on average.
Aside from their flavor benefits, sweet potatoes contain tons of nutrients like:
- Vitamin A
- Vitamin C
- Vitamin B6
- Manganese
- Potassium
- Fiber
- Copper
- Niacin
Furthermore, you can eat orange and purple colored sweet potatoes. These come with extra antioxidants that can help protect your body from free radical damage or oxidative stress, which is thought to be one of the contributing factors to cancer.
Be sure to cook sweet potatoes fully so that they are soft and easy to eat. They'll taste much better, and can work as a healthy replacement for regular French fries.
Kiwi
Kiwis are quite similar to papayas terms of their nutritional content. But they're distinct fruits in and of themselves and have tons of vitamins and nutrients like:
- Potassium
- Vitamin K
- Vitamin C
- Folate
Vitamin C, of course, is responsible for bolstering immune system health and improving the efficacy of your white blood cells. In the meantime, the other nutrients you get from consuming a kiwi or two can help your body stay healthy overall, which gives your immune system a better leg to stand on.
Kiwis are, fortunately, quite tart and easy to combine with deserts. You can also eat them by themselves if you enjoy fruits like it. Even better, consider squeezing a little bit of kiwi juice into your water to create a tasty beverage that doesn't rely on artificial sweeteners.
Other Foods to Consider
Beyond all of these excellent choices, there are other immune-boosting foods you might consider adding to your diet or meal plan. For instance, Thistle uses natural and sustainable foods without gluten or dairy products – many of our ingredients are great for immune system health, too!
- Red bell peppers are thought to provide some immune system benefits. They actually have three times as much vitamin C as regular oranges, plus beta-carotene, which is eventually converted into vitamin A for skin and eye health
- Almonds can be great for your immune system since they contain vitamin E. It's a potent antioxidant that can improve your immune system's preparation for future diseases
- Don't forget sunflower seeds, which come with nutrients like vitamins B6 and E, phosphorus, and magnesium. They also have tons of selenium – a single ounce of sunflower seeds gives you half of the selenium you need per day
- Superfoods generally refer to foods high in vitamins, minerals, powerful antioxidants, and overall helpful nutrients that can help boost the immune system while also making for an overall healthy diet! While a lot of the things we mentioned above are considered superfoods, a few others we haven't mentioned yet include avocado, grapefruit, elderberry, and probiotics like miso!
Conclusion
All in all, each of these foods provides real benefits to your immune system and are great additions to any plant-focused meal plan. To this end, Thistle uses many of these foods in some of our most popular dishes. Be sure to try out our meal service if you want to eat healthier and give your body the tools it needs to fight off infectious diseases.
Resources:
https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25961060/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2722699/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25230520/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0271531715001359
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12490960/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23784800/
https://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/cjpp-2012-0303#.X0hGx3lKjcf
https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/food-details/170108/nutrients
From garlic to sweet potatoes, there is a wide variety of immunity-boosting foods. Elements of each of these foods will both make you feel better and stay healthier all season long. Read more about the many vitamins and minerals that make up these delicious ingredients!
The immune system is complex and ever-changing as it adapts to fight new diseases and bacteria you encounter in your day-to-day life. Although your immune system does a great job on its own, you can boost how effective it is by eating certain foods.
Let's take a look at what foods support a healthy immune system by boosting immune function, and how you can easily incorporate them into your diet!
Oranges
Oranges, like practically all citrus fruits, are excellent foods to consume if you want a strong immune system! That's because all citrus fruits are extremely high in vitamin C: the primary vitamin that leads to a robust immune response. This fact is so well known that people often drink Vitamin C when they think they are coming down with a cold, oftentimes downing a glass of orange juice the moment they get a sniffle!
Oranges are both easy to find and easy to eat – snack on them by themselves, include them in meals, or use them for making juice. You'll get most of the nutritional benefits any of these ways, save for fiber, which you only get by eating the fruit.
It's also important to eat at least some citrus fruits every day since your body doesn't naturally produce vitamin C. Men need 90 mg per day while women need 75 mg.
Did you know that sailors, in bygone centuries, used to eat oranges and other citrus fruits to stave off scurvy? Talk about a useful fruit!
Garlic
Garlic is one of the most common and beloved spices in the entire world. Before its delicious role in modern cuisine, garlic used to be called Russian penicillin and was given to soldiers in WW2. Looking back a little further in human history, the Greek physician Hippocrates was one of the first to recognize the medicinal properties of garlic and recommended it for parasites and poor digestion!
Aside from adding a nice zing to your food, garlic was once used by earlier civilizations to fight off infections. The reasons for this aren't fully known, but there is some evidence that shows that garlic can lower your blood pressure and boost your immune system function.
That's partially because garlic is heavy in something called allicin, which offers medicinal benefits and can boost how effective your body's immune cells (white blood cells) are when they fight infections.
Broccoli
Broccoli is another excellent food for boosting your immune system. We can already hear the kids grumbling. But the truth is that most people who don't like broccoli just haven't had it prepared properly.
Many people boil their broccoli, which gets rid of tons of nutrients and the excellent flavors just hiding beneath the surface. Cook your broccoli correctly, and it'll be a tasty vegetable you'll be happy to make a regular part of your dinner table. Or try Thistle – we always steam or roast our broccoli to preserve both nutrients and flavor, and also use it shredded raw in our salads.
In terms of nutrients, broccoli has all kinds of vitamins and minerals, for example:
- Vitamins A and C
- Fiber
- Antioxidants
The list goes on. There's a reason why plenty of doctors recommend you make broccoli a regular part of your diet. All of those vitamins provide overall health benefits, and vitamin C, in particular, plays a big role in overall immune system health.
Broccoli can be used as a phenomenal side dish or even as a primary vegetable. You can also eat broccoli as part of a dense, vegetable-packed salad. Remember to steam your broccoli if you want to get the most nutrients out of every bite.
Ginger
Ginger, a popular flavoring ingredient for food and certain types of juices and soft drinks, is a perfect food to try after you're feeling a bit under the weather. Specifically, ginger can help decrease inflammation, like the kind you experience when you get a sore throat or suffer from inflammatory issues.
This is because ginger contains something called gingerol, which has tons of anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. But it can also help reduce the nausea you might feel while you are sick, particularly after surgery or if you are undergoing chemotherapy.
The great thing about ginger is that you only need to take between 1 and 1.5 grams to benefit from all these healthy side effects. Its potency means that, in the past, ginger was used as a treatment for seasickness. Today, you can find it in desserts, ginger-based soft drinks, and as a flavoring agent for many plant-forward dishes.
Spinach
Spinach, of course, is one of the most well-known foods that can boost your immune system. After all, the classic cartoon Popeye the Sailor Man revolves around the superhuman benefits of the vegetable!
While you won't necessarily grow muscles disproportionately large to your body, spinach does have a high concentration of vitamin C, the primary vitamin responsible for immune system health and overall virus defense. Other vitamins, like vitamin A and vitamin K1 (responsible for blood clotting), can be absorbed from spinach as well.
Adding to this is the high concentration of antioxidants and beta-carotene, both of which improve immune system health. To say that spinach can boost your immune system's "muscles" is closer to the truth than what Popeye demonstrated.
Spinach is best if you cook the vegetable as little as possible – this prevents many of the key nutrients from being boiled away. To this end, be sure to steam your spinach or consume it in its raw form as the main leaves for a great salad. You can also replace anything that uses lettuce with spinach for a similar but more intense flavor experience.
Leafy green veggies in general such as kale are a good source of vitamins and amino acids that boost the immune system, too!
Turmeric
Unlike the other foods on the list so far, turmeric isn't usually consumed by itself. Instead, turmeric is most often eaten as a part of curry – it's one of the key spices that give curry its distinctive kick. It's usually bright yellow in color, so it's easy to identify.
You'll also usually hear turmeric described with curcumin, which provides that bright yellow flavor. Curcumin, which is almost always consumed with turmeric, can also improve your immune system. Both curcumin and turmeric provide antiviral benefits and, when combined, taste phenomenal!
However, you need to consume both compounds together since curcumin can only be adequately absorbed by the body because of turmeric – otherwise, it passes through your system without as much benefit.
Speaking of benefits, turmeric can also provide:
- Anti-inflammatory benefits
- Protection from heart disease
- Increased antioxidant capacity
- Lower risk for brain disease
The list goes on. Suffice to say, spicy curry containing plenty of turmeric is an excellent dish anytime. Plus, plenty of delicious curries can be consumed with little to no meat – look for curries that include plenty of vegetables for tasty but healthy meals, like some of our popular weekly menu items.
Sweet Potatoes
Sweet potatoes are healthier alternatives compared to regular russet potatoes. They're just as starchy, but carry a sweet aftertaste that makes them a great complement to vegetable-heavy dishes, or for kids that prefer sweeter foods on average.
Aside from their flavor benefits, sweet potatoes contain tons of nutrients like:
- Vitamin A
- Vitamin C
- Vitamin B6
- Manganese
- Potassium
- Fiber
- Copper
- Niacin
Furthermore, you can eat orange and purple colored sweet potatoes. These come with extra antioxidants that can help protect your body from free radical damage or oxidative stress, which is thought to be one of the contributing factors to cancer.
Be sure to cook sweet potatoes fully so that they are soft and easy to eat. They'll taste much better, and can work as a healthy replacement for regular French fries.
Kiwi
Kiwis are quite similar to papayas terms of their nutritional content. But they're distinct fruits in and of themselves and have tons of vitamins and nutrients like:
- Potassium
- Vitamin K
- Vitamin C
- Folate
Vitamin C, of course, is responsible for bolstering immune system health and improving the efficacy of your white blood cells. In the meantime, the other nutrients you get from consuming a kiwi or two can help your body stay healthy overall, which gives your immune system a better leg to stand on.
Kiwis are, fortunately, quite tart and easy to combine with deserts. You can also eat them by themselves if you enjoy fruits like it. Even better, consider squeezing a little bit of kiwi juice into your water to create a tasty beverage that doesn't rely on artificial sweeteners.
Other Foods to Consider
Beyond all of these excellent choices, there are other immune-boosting foods you might consider adding to your diet or meal plan. For instance, Thistle uses natural and sustainable foods without gluten or dairy products – many of our ingredients are great for immune system health, too!
- Red bell peppers are thought to provide some immune system benefits. They actually have three times as much vitamin C as regular oranges, plus beta-carotene, which is eventually converted into vitamin A for skin and eye health
- Almonds can be great for your immune system since they contain vitamin E. It's a potent antioxidant that can improve your immune system's preparation for future diseases
- Don't forget sunflower seeds, which come with nutrients like vitamins B6 and E, phosphorus, and magnesium. They also have tons of selenium – a single ounce of sunflower seeds gives you half of the selenium you need per day
- Superfoods generally refer to foods high in vitamins, minerals, powerful antioxidants, and overall helpful nutrients that can help boost the immune system while also making for an overall healthy diet! While a lot of the things we mentioned above are considered superfoods, a few others we haven't mentioned yet include avocado, grapefruit, elderberry, and probiotics like miso!
Conclusion
All in all, each of these foods provides real benefits to your immune system and are great additions to any plant-focused meal plan. To this end, Thistle uses many of these foods in some of our most popular dishes. Be sure to try out our meal service if you want to eat healthier and give your body the tools it needs to fight off infectious diseases.
Resources:
https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25961060/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2722699/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25230520/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0271531715001359
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12490960/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23784800/
https://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/cjpp-2012-0303#.X0hGx3lKjcf
https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/food-details/170108/nutrients
