5 Benefits of Adding Spirulina to your Diet
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Spirulina is HANDS DOWN one of my favorite superfoods. Why? Because it’s so easy to add to my daily smoothie, giving me a dose of greens, and it has SO many health benefits. I love the rich green color of the powder and love that it turns my smoothie that color too. I’m a firm believer that plants hold energy from the sun and earth to give us that life force too and when you look at spirulina you can just tell it’s high vibe and nourishing for your body.
Spirulina is a blue-green micro-algae that grows in fresh water lakes and is said to have the highest nutrient content of any other food on the planet. There is a company called Nutrex, which is the brand of spirulina I use and love, that has made their own man-made reservoir to cultivate and harvest their spirulina. Nutrex grows their spirulina without any harmful pesticides, herbicides, or GMO’s. The way they harvest and cultivate their spirulina also ensures that they can control any outside (potentially toxic) substances from leaching into the spirulina.
Let’s take a look at some of the amazing benefits spirulina offers..
It’s VERY nutrient dense
Spirulina is about 60% protein and it contains all of the essential amino acids our bodies need to get from outside sources and it also contains 10 out of the 12 nonessential amino acids. It also contains lots of phytonutrients, antioxidants, b vitamins, copper, manganese, iodine, gamma linoleic acid, omegas, potassium and iron.
Helps reduce inflammation
This blue-green algae also helps the body fight off inflammation due to its’ antioxidant content and gamma linoleic acid. The antioxidant, phycocyanin, is responsible for giving this algae it’s blue/green color and helps to fight off oxidative stress caused by free radicals. The gamma linoleic acid (GLA) in spirulina (which is an anti-inflammatory essential fatty acid) helps to reduce inflammation in the body as well.
Helps balance the body’s pH
Green plants are so amazing at alkalizing the body. Disease thrives in an acidic environment and green plants are so great about balancing the pH, thus creating a less desirable environment for disease to live in. We want to keep our bodies as alkaline as possible and include lots of leafy greens as well as superfoods like spirulina to go in detox and alkalize the body on a daily basis.
It detoxifies the body
Spirulina helps to detoxify the body by pulling out and leaching to heavy metals and other toxins that can be harmful to our digestive system and overall health and wellbeing. Toxic substances and chemicals, like heavy metals, get stored in our fat tissue and organs and when our bodies don’t have the support they need to detox them, they can wreck havoc on our health. Spirulina is such an amazing daily addition to make sure that the heavy metals and other toxins we are exposed to on a daily basis don’t stay in our bodies and are flushed out of our system.
Boosts the immune system
Because of the high nutrient content in spirulina like protein, vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and phytochemicals, it helps to boost our immune system and keeps our system thriving. At least 70% of our bodies immune system lives in our gut, so with spirulina being so great at pulling heavy metals and other toxins out of our digestive system, it helps create a more desirable environment for our immune system to live.
I hope you decide to give spirulina a try. The easiest way to add it into your diet is to add it to a green smoothie in the morning or sometime throughout the day. The smoothie is able to mask the algae taste of the spirulina and you still receive all the same benefits this amazing superfood has to offer. If you want to check out more about the specific spirulina that I love and have used for years, you can go HERE .
With love,
Ashley
