The Color me Happy Diet

Colorful foods can help you eat a balanced diet and protect you from a multitude of ills

How can you make sure you're eating a balanced diet? Forget frantically calculating the relative benefits of bananas, tomatoes, spinach, and kale. Just think in technicolor. The compounds that give fruits and vegetables their color also have unique nutritional properties, so by eating a wide array of colors, you can maximize these benefits. A colorful diet protects your body against a multitude of ailments: cancer, heart disease, arthritis, and vision loss, among others. Here's a handy color-coded food guide:.

Raging Red

Fruits with a red hue, such as tomatoes, guava, and papaya, contain lycopene, a reddish pigment and nutrient. Large studies indicate that this substance protects against a variety of cancers, including that of the prostate, stomach, and lung. As an antioxidant, lycopene protects cell structures and DNA against the nefarious effects of free radicals—small particles that damage healthy cells and allow tumor cells to develop. Indeed, one study in Nutrition and Cancer showed that lycopene was better than two other antioxidants—alpha and beta carotene—at stopping uterine, breast, and lung cancer cells from developing in test tubes
Orange Crush

Carrots, mangoes, apricots, pumpkins, and sweet potatoes are brimming with cryptoxanthin and beta-carotene—two substances that reduce the risk for a variety of mental and physical ailments. For example, cryptoxanthin protects against arthritis and cancer, while beta-carotene keeps the mind sharp. In a 2005 study from the Archives of Internal Medicine, cryptoxanthin protected individuals from developing rheumatoid arthritis, even as other antioxidants did not; other studies suggest it reduces risk for lung cancer. Beta-carotene, for its part, kept cognition and memory from declining in a group of doctors who took part in an 18-year study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

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