Article By: John Fontana

Every Sunday morning I make the trek down to Hollywood and Vine to grab some fresh fruits, vegetables, meats and whatever else looks good at the time. The Hollywood farmers market is one of many in Los Angeles that is packed with an assortment of foods that come straight from the farmers. A farmers market has a feel to it that no grocery store can contend with.

From the buzzing excitement of the patrons to the street musicians jamming on their instruments to the vendors shouting, this isn’t your typical shopping experience. On top of that, you have multiple selections of just about any food item you can imagine. If I want strawberries or avocados I can stroll up and down the isles looking at the many options until I find a look and price I like. Many of the brands that Whole Foods stocks their shelves with get their start on the farmers market scene, testing out the goods before offering them to a major distributor. Each and every visit is exciting because a wide variety of new fruits and vegetables are always coming into season giving new options to chose from.

One of the foods that I was excited to see this past trip was guava, which looks like a cross between a green apple and a small pumpkin. Although it is rare to stumble upon guavas, whenever I see them I grab a few because of their great taste and nutritional benefits. Guavas are typically seen in jellies and juices but rarely in raw form. Usually by the time they are juiced or jellified (I know its not a word) a lot of the good fiber has been taken out of them. Either way, guavas are highly beneficial to your health and if you spot them you should grab up a few.

Why So Good?

Nutrition Facts

One guava will typically yield you around 110 calories. Of those calories you will find about 24g of carbs consisting of 9g of fiber and 15g of sugar. The fiber in the fruit will balance out the sugar keeping your blood insulin from spiking. This is another example of why the sugar in fruit is much different in sugar in fruit juice or high sugar treats. You will also find only 2g of fat, 4g of protein in the fruit and 209% daily recommended vitamin C. It is host to a low glycemic load and has pretty good anti-inflammatory benefits. All this makes guava a well balanced food to eat as an early day snack.

Antioxidant Power

Guava has consistently ranked within the top 10 of fruits and vegetables tested for ORAC value. ORAC is a test given to fruits and vegetables to see how much antioxidant value a food has. Some of the key players in the antioxidant levels are potassium and lycopene. Potassium is known to help prevent muscle cramping but can also help aid in digestion, regulate blood pressure and keep your skin healthy.

Lycopene is known to be most beneficial to males by keeping the prostate healthy. What many don’t realize is that it is actually very good for women to consume lycopene to help prevent breast cancer. The main source of lycopene for American’s are tomatoes, but guavas actually host almost 20% more lycopene per serving. Lycopene helps repair cells that are damaged by free radicals. Free radicals are linked to just about any and all health issues but are most commonly known to be cancer causing.

How To Eat?

Although it is tough to actually digest all of the lycopene from tomatoes, guava’s lycopene is fully and readably available. Tomatoes have tough cell walls which actually make it hard for our bodies to break down without cooking or processing. On the other hand guava’s do not, making it easy to get all the antioxidant benefits from lycopene simply by biting into a raw one.

I suggest eating the guava raw or mixing them in with a smoothie. Do not juice a guava because much of the 9g of fiber can be taken out of the fruit by doing so. Other than that get creative and mix them in a salad or a fruit cocktail.

One of my favorite nutrition sites is Nutritional Data. There you can see a detailed breakdown of the nutritional information including glycemic load and anti-inflammatory benefit. Here is the information for the Guava Nutritional Data.

–

I encourage any questions or comments, please:

Leave a response at the bottom of the article,

E-mail me personally at jfontana@shadowfit.com

or Tweet me @johnnyfontana on Twitter