What foods lower cholesterol: list of foods

How much bad has already been said about cholesterol. And so much attention is paid to it that sometimes it may even seem as if it is the main enemy of humanity. Although getting rid of it is not difficult, if only you adjust your diet and eat foods that lower cholesterol in the blood.

Enemy or friend?

Many articles about cholesterol call it harmful. But is this really true, considering that this substance is even produced by the human body itself? And is our body really so imperfect that it can harm itself?

The reason for this discrepancy is the lack of information. Not everyone knows that there are two types of cholesterol. And at the same time, they differ not only in their characteristics, but also in the effect they have on a person.

The liver is an important human organ responsible for producing cholesterol, which exists in the body in the form of special compounds consisting of protein and fat. Such compounds are called lipoproteins, and they can vary in density.

High-density lipoproteins are called good cholesterol, because they help form new cells, participate in the production of some hormones, and prevent various cardiovascular pathologies. It turns out that it is too early to talk about the harm of cholesterol.

But there is another type of cholesterol – low-density lipoproteins. They are the ones we talk about when we talk about bad cholesterol. And it is considered bad because it can accumulate on the walls of blood vessels, gathering in groups and forming cholesterol plaques, which significantly reduce the lumen of blood vessels. This leads to circulatory disorders and stagnation in the vessels, which in turn entails an increase in blood pressure and the formation of blood clots, which further reduce the internal diameter of the vessels. And everything would not be so sad if the blood clots did not break off and cause complete blockage of the vessels, which is fraught with such life-threatening pathologies as myocardial infarction, cerebral stroke, pulmonary embolism, etc.

Based on special studies, scientists conclude that harmful cholesterol is one of the main risk factors for the development of various cardiovascular pathologies, in particular vascular atherosclerosis and arterial hypertension (persistently high blood pressure).

So far we have talked about cholesterol, which is produced in our body. But the thing is that the liver produces only about 70 percent of this substance, the remaining 30 percent a person gets from food, among which there are products that lower cholesterol.

Read also: Diet for high cholesterol

But it is also not worth blaming products containing a lot of lipoproteins for the increase in harmful cholesterol. Some foods, such as fish and seafood, caviar and egg yolk are famous for their high cholesterol content, but when we eat them, we are unlikely to notice an increase in the level of low-density lipoproteins in our body. The source of cholesterol in this case is the unsaturated fats Omega 3 and 6, which are necessary for the human body. This is useful cholesterol, which participates in various physiological processes.

But fatty meat and lard, offal and butter supply our body with saturated fats, which are a source of harmful cholesterol, from which dangerous plaques are formed on the walls of blood vessels.

In fear of the word "cholesterol", many patients of cardiology centers and people who are zealous about their health begin to avoid eating foods containing cholesterol. However, a person cannot completely give up cholesterol.

Despite the fact that bad cholesterol dissolves very poorly, and when accumulated, it complicates the work of the heart and blood vessels, it is also needed by the body in limited quantities. Do not forget that cholesterol, whatever it is, contains protein, which is the building material of a living cell. Protein is the basis of the cell membrane. But our entire body consists of cells, including muscles and blood vessels. This means that the strength of the vascular walls and the maintenance of muscle tone depend on cholesterol. It turns out that a lack of cholesterol can cause the same vascular pathologies (vessels weaken and can burst) and heart disease (weakness of the heart muscle is fraught with tissue damage under blood pressure).

The correct functioning of the endocrine system, and in particular the thyroid gland, depends on the intake of saturated fats. But here you need to know when to stop. If a person adheres to a diet of 2 thousand kilocalories, then the total volume of saturated fats entering the body should not be higher than 15-17 g. The rest of the cholesterol will simply remain unused and will gradually be deposited on the walls of blood vessels.

It turns out that cholesterol cannot be unequivocally called an enemy or a friend. A person's health and well-being depend on whether he or she adheres to the cholesterol norm that the body needs for life. Depriving your body of building material is simply stupid; it is wiser to use food products to correct the balance of harmful and beneficial cholesterol, reducing the amount of the former and increasing the intake of the latter.

Read also:

• The most common methods of treating high cholesterol
• High Cholesterol Pills

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How to normalize blood cholesterol with the help of food?

It is important to understand that the amount of cholesterol produced by the body is a constant value. And the cholesterol that we receive from outside is considered a more or less stable value. Another matter is the ratio of harmful and useful cholesterol, which can change in one direction or another depending on what products prevail on our table.

It is clear that you can normalize your blood cholesterol level by minimizing the consumption of foods containing bad cholesterol. These foods include fatty dairy products, butter, fatty meats, especially fried (and even fried in unrefined sunflower oil), and mayonnaise. This list also includes a recently popular additive - palm oil. It can be found in many sweets, semi-finished meat products, and fast food products. By the way, palm milk is also considered a rich source of harmful cholesterol.

As we can see, you can adjust your diet even without giving up your favorite dishes. For example, fatty fried meat can be replaced with boiled or baked lean meat, adding more favorite spices during the cooking process. Butter can be successfully replaced with refined sunflower or olive oil, which, by the way, can successfully replace mayonnaise in salads. Refined oils do not affect the level of harmful cholesterol.

It is not necessary to give up dairy products either, you just need to tip the scales towards products with a small content of milk fat. As for pork fat, eating a small piece of this symbol of true Ukrainians is unlikely to greatly shake the balance of good and bad cholesterol in the blood towards the latter, especially if you eat it together with products that reduce low-density cholesterol, which we will write about below.

The hardest thing is to part with the “gifts” from hot countries where spreading palm trees grow, because palm oil is present in the composition of most ready-to-eat products and semi-finished products that we find on the shelves of our stores and supermarkets. But there is a way out here too. After all, various semi-finished meat products, delicious hamburgers with a homemade cutlet or sausage, tasty and healthy candies from fruits and berries can be made at home (fortunately, you can find a great many recipes on the Internet). Such dishes will taste no worse than store-bought ones, but they will not contain harmful palm oil, which increases cholesterol.

Products that lower cholesterol and cleanse blood vessels

It just so happened that some readers began to observe their excess weight, noticed that their heart began to act up, their blood pressure increased, and other symptoms appeared that indicate high cholesterol in the blood. Even if they change their taste preferences taking into account our advice, and cholesterol will return to normal, but what about the harmful cholesterol that has already firmly stuck to the walls of blood vessels, disrupting normal blood flow?

Apparently, in order to put the entire circulatory system in order, you will have to not only minimize the consumption of dishes that increase the content of lipoproteins, but also love products that reduce cholesterol by destroying its harmful component and preventing the adhesion of protein-fat compounds to the inner surface of blood vessels. And fortunately, there are many such products.

It is also important that all these products are truly healing, so including them in your diet will not only help lower blood cholesterol, improving blood vessels, but also improve the functioning of other organs and systems. Let's look at the most popular cholesterol-lowering products and their beneficial effects on the body as a whole:

Carrot

This sunny vegetable, which caring mothers love to feed their babies, turns out to be able to fiercely fight harmful cholesterol and show tangible results. Just one month of active consumption of carrots (2 medium root vegetables per day) makes it possible to reduce the level of bad cholesterol in the blood and on the walls of blood vessels by almost 7.5%. All vegetables and fruits with a high content of pectin have this property.

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Broccoli

Broccoli is rich in vitamins C and K, as well as folic acid. What a wonderful tandem: cranberries, containing a lot of iron, and broccoli with rich reserves of folic acid, which helps the body absorb iron! But there is a small nuance in storing the product - when frozen, it retains much more useful substances for a long time.

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Red tomatoes

Well, this red vegetable is popular, because it is a decoration of both festive and everyday tables, and the juice from ripe tomatoes is used in the preparation of many dishes and is consumed as a healthy drink. Tomatoes owe their scarlet color to a special substance - locopene, which destroys bad cholesterol. Drinking 2 glasses of tomato juice, we reduce cholesterol levels by almost 10%.

By the way, this same pigment in spinach is useful for older people, because it prevents age-related deterioration of vision.

Garlic

This hot vegetable is known to many as an effective preventative for colds and viral pathologies. But not everyone knows that garlic effectively cleanses blood vessels. The smell and noticeable pungency of garlic is given by a special substance - alliin, which, when reacting with oxygen when the vegetable is chopped, is converted into allicin. It is the latter that is able to control the level of harmful cholesterol, cleanse blood vessels and, due to this, reduce blood pressure in hypertension.

However, due to its high calorie content, you should not overuse this fruit.

Nuts (especially almonds, cashews, walnuts, pistachios, pine nuts)

Due to the fact that nuts have a high calorie content, it is not recommended to consume more than 60 g per day. But even such a portion, if taken regularly for a month, can reduce the level of harmful cholesterol by 7.5%.

Legumes are not only good for blood vessels. They contain antioxidants that actively fight aging of the body, and B vitamins that optimize the functioning of the nervous system.

Whole grain and bran

They, like nuts and beans, are important sources of fiber, which means that cereals and bran can also be classified as cholesterol-lowering foods. Among other things, they can also stabilize blood glucose levels, which is very useful for patients with diabetes.

Salmon, mackerel, tuna, sardines, and herring, a fish that is quite affordable for many, are considered rich in Omega-3.

Red grape wine

It turns out that quite a lot of fiber is found even in liquid dishes, such as the heady drink of a rich burgundy color. Wine from red grape varieties is recognized as useful for the body even by doctors. They have no doubt that red wine can reduce the level of bad cholesterol. And the higher the cholesterol level, the more actively wine affects it.

According to research by American scientists, drinking black tea reduces the level of harmful cholesterol in the blood by almost 10%. And this is during only 3 weeks of the experiment. Green tea, rich in flavonoids and catechins, is not far behind black tea, thanks to which the body more actively absorbs cholesterol, helping to cleanse blood vessels of it.

Seasonings and spices

We have already told you about the benefits of garlic, but it is not the only spice product that can reduce cholesterol in the blood. For example, turmeric, considered a powerful antioxidant, also actively cleanses blood vessels from cholesterol deposits. Cinnamon also prevents the formation of atherosclerotic plaques in the lumen of blood vessels by reducing the amount of blood lipids and lowering the level of bad cholesterol.

Don't forget about margarines. This product may not be considered particularly healthy for the body, but high-quality varieties with a high content of plant sterols also slightly reduce harmful cholesterol in the blood.

In addition to the above products, the following have the property of lowering cholesterol:

• vegetables (white cabbage, potatoes, eggplants, melon)
• many fruits (apples, plums, apricots, as well as overseas guests: bananas, pineapples, kiwi, oranges, pomegranate)
• berries (strawberries, raspberries, currants, wild strawberries, grapes, hawthorn, chokeberry, etc.)
• seeds (flax seed, sesame seed, sunflower seed, pumpkin seed)
• greens (dill, parsley, green onions, leeks, artichoke, lettuce)

Cholesterol and blood pressure

Hypertension, or consistently high blood pressure, is truly the scourge of our time. Both old people and very young people suffer from this pathology. The causes of the disease can be different. But why do doctors first advise people with high blood pressure to pay attention to blood cholesterol?

There is nothing surprising about this, because, settling on the walls of blood vessels, bad cholesterol reduces their lumen. But the blood supply from the heart does not decrease, but only increases the blood pressure on the walls of the arteries, which causes a noticeable deterioration in the well-being of patients.

For such patients, to stabilize blood pressure, it is enough to consume products that reduce blood pressure and cholesterol by preventing the latter from settling on the walls of blood vessels. In principle, all of the above products will be useful for hypertension, because they all actively cleanse blood vessels. But there are also products that deserve special attention.

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Orange juice

This is not only a tasty, but also an incredibly healthy sunny-colored drink with a rich content of vitamin C, which helps thin the blood and reduce blood pressure. And oranges themselves also belong to the category of products that reduce cholesterol (despite the fact that they themselves do not contain it at all). Such a complex effect on the body allows orange juice to effectively stabilize blood pressure with regular consumption of just 2 glasses of freshly squeezed juice per day.

Watermelon

The amino acid L-citrulline contained in this huge berry makes it very useful in terms of lowering blood pressure by dilating blood vessels. The thing is that the above-mentioned amino acid stimulates the production of nitric acid in the body, which increases the lumen of blood vessels.

Chocolate

This is a truly heart-healthy product, considered an excellent antioxidant. It is not for nothing that it is recommended to give preference to dark chocolate, which is more effective than milk chocolate in increasing the level of good cholesterol and preventing blood cells from sticking together, which results in the formation of dangerous compounds in the vessels – blood clots.

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Green tea with honey and lemon

This is truly a divine drink, capable of maintaining normal blood pressure. Tea helps cleanse blood vessels of cholesterol, and vitamin C from lemon makes blood less viscous, and it moves more easily through the capillaries. As for honey, it is a storehouse of useful substances that help improve the health of the entire body.

But when preparing a healing drink, do not forget that honey and lemon are added to already cooled tea, so that they do not lose their beneficial properties and do not acquire carcinogenic ones. For those who have been diagnosed with an allergy to bee products, adding honey to tea is unacceptable. Although even without honey, tea with lemon will remain a very useful drink for arterial hypertension.

Of the products we have already mentioned above, with high blood pressure, preference should be given to fast-acting natural "medicines". Let's figure out which products lower blood cholesterol quickly, which allows them to be used to effectively lower blood pressure in a short time.

Almond nut

To lower blood pressure, you need to take only raw nuts. Almonds processed at temperature or with chemicals do not have the same properties as raw almonds. Raw almonds contain a large amount of monounsaturated acids, and therefore, eating 1 handful of peeled almonds every day can maintain normal blood pressure, fight inflammatory pathologies and cholesterol dominance in the vessels.

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Turmeric

The curcumin contained in its root effectively fights various inflammatory phenomena in the body, reduces blood pressure and the concentration of harmful cholesterol in the blood. By adding the spice little by little to different dishes, you can give them not only a bright color, but also increase the benefits of their use.

Garlic

Those who have high blood pressure and do not like garlic should urgently reconsider their views on this healthy spice, because it is one of the best means for quickly lowering cholesterol and high blood pressure.

Spinach

This low-calorie vegetable contains all the necessary substances to maintain the cardiovascular system. Adding it to omelets, salads and sandwiches, you can forget about high blood pressure.

Sunflower seeds

Who among us does not like to enjoy fried sunflower seeds while having a pleasant conversation or watching TV? How could we do without them? That's right, you don't need to limit yourself to small pleasures, especially if they can keep your blood pressure normal. Important: you can eat sunflower seeds raw or fried, but you don't need to salt them, because salt can have the opposite effect.

Let's pay a little more attention to chocolate. Many, having heard that dark chocolate can reduce cholesterol and blood pressure, may rush to try out the new medicine. Don't rush to devour the delicious chocolate piece by piece.

This is a fairly high-calorie product that should be consumed very carefully. Overdo it with the dose and you will get the opposite effect. But that small permitted dose of 30 kcal is unlikely to quickly reduce blood pressure (except with regular intake for 3-4 months). You can get a much faster effect by consuming unsweetened cocoa, because the hypotonic effect of dark chocolate is based on this component.

Products that lower cholesterol are not uncommon on our tables. We just didn’t know how useful they are for cleaning blood vessels from harmful cholesterol and normalizing blood pressure. But live and learn. Now you can successfully apply your knowledge when creating a diet so that in the future you won’t have problems with your heart or blood vessels.