Green artichokes can promote digestion and lower cholesterol

Edelgemüse: Healthy artichoke helps digest

Christmas cookies, gingerbread, mulled wine, eggnog: In the Advent season, it is not easy to resist the delicious delights. Unfortunately, the delicacies often provide high blood lipid levels and extra pounds. It can help to integrate artichokes into the diet. The noble vegetables help with digestion and help to lower the cholesterol.

High-calorie dishes in the Advent season

Low calorie winter dishes are pretty rare. Cookies, Christmas stollen, mulled wine, Christmas goose and baked apples: Heavy food has more tradition in the cold season. Some people may think that the body can tolerate more calories in the cold and freezing anyway. But the luscious dishes at Christmas time often provide high blood lipid levels and extra pounds. In such cases, artichokes can help. The noble vegetables stimulate the digestion and lower the cholesterol values.

Artichokes promote digestion and can help lower blood lipid levels. The vegetables offer even more health benefits. (Image: helenedevun / fotolia.com)

Good for digestion

The fact that artichokes help with digestive problems has already been shown in scientific studies.

Especially after days of gluttony, such as in Advent, at Christmas or New Year, health experts like to point out that a glass of artichoke juice is better than schnapps if you want to stimulate digestion.

If you do not want to make this yourself, you can also buy dried artichoke leaves and flowers from the pharmacy and use them for an infusion.

Crucial for the digestive effect of the noble vegetables is cynarin. This bitter substance also promotes fat burning and bile production. Artichokes thereby increase the bile flow.

Lower cholesterol levels

In addition, an extract of artichokes can lower cholesterol levels. According to research, this also improves the ratio of HDL to LDL.

The artichoke has nutritional but even more to offer: In addition to plenty of fiber, it contains the most suitable for diabetics carbohydrate inulin.

There are also vitamin B1 and minerals such as iron.

Artichokes strengthen the liver

In addition, artichokes have a diuretic, anti-inflammatory and strengthen the liver. Some experts therefore recommend that they also detoxify the liver.

Because artichokes stimulate the appetite, they are perfect among other things as a starter. Although some consumers only know it from the jar inlaid, fresh artichokes are especially delicious.

The preparation requires some practice, but it is not difficult. First, rinse the artichoke under running water. Then the stem is unscrewed or broken over a table edge, so that the hard inedible fibers dissolve on the ground.

Then remove the outer, hard leaves and shorten the tips of the leaves. Rub all interfaces quickly with lemon juice so they do not discolour. Now the artichoke is cooked in salted water with lemon juice.

Caution: In aluminum pots it assumes a metallic taste and discolored. After 25 to 40 minutes, the noble vegetables are cooked. For consumption, the individual leaves are pulled out, the lower, fleshy end dipped in a dip and removed with the teeth.

The coronation is the delicate heart piece that is cut with a knife and fork. First, however, the inedible fibers, the "hay", must be removed with a spoon, as explained by the Federal Center for Nutrition (BZfE).

Hobby cooks can find simple recipes on the internet, among others. There are, for example, ideas for soups, sauces, casseroles or a delicious artichoke salad. (Ad)