Foods containing pungent flavour are often rich in sulphur content. These foods not only are great mould deterrents, they also play vital roles in DNA repairs. Cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, garlic and onions are sulphur rich and powerful inducers of protective enzymes like superoxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase. They are also high in indoles and can inhibit colorectal, bladder, lung, mouth, throat, stomach and breast cancers.

Cruciferous vegetable are particularly rich in isothiocynates.  Isothiocyanates have amazing anti-aging properties; this is because they are potent inhibitors of enzymes that promote glycation.  Glycation occurs when oxidation of sugars coating the surface of proteins like collagen result in the formation of Advanced Glycated Endproducts – AGEs. As the name implies, AGEs literally cause premature aging with the formation of saggy, wrinkly skin.  Note that any external signs of aging are accompanied by the aging of  internal organs as well.  The external and internal are never mutually exclusive. 

This aging process is even more pronounced in diabetics as AGEs form more quickly with elevated blood sugar levels.  It is not uncommon for a diabetic diagnosed at the age of 30 to have a physiological age of 75 by the time they reach the chronological age of 60.  It is a well-known fact that accelerated aging comes with poorly controlled blood sugar levels.  Hence, to reduce age-related cell damage, diabetics should tuck into large quantities of these vegetables to decelerate the glycation process and its accompanying premature aging.
In conclusion, these vegetables protect you from DNA damage, stimulate cancer cell death (cell apoptosis) and keep you looking and feeling young. Why would you not eat heaps more of them daily?

The NHMRC (2006) recommendations for adequate intake of dietary fibre are 25g/day for women and 30g/day for men.  Most Australians consume only a third of the above recommendation. 

Native Africans have 10 times lower colon cancer rates than their white counterparts possibly because they regularly consume cold maize porridge as a dietary staple.  Maize porridge is rich in resistant starch which ferments to produce short chain fatty acids which lower the pH in intestinal lumen. This phenomenon plays an integral role in protecting against colorectal cancer.

So where can you get your resistant starch? 

1. Cooked cooled potatoes
2. Cooked cooled rice
3. Cooked cooled pasta
4. Cooked maize
5. Cooked beans / lentils (pulses)
6. Heinz baked beans
7. Wonder White bread
8. Uncle Toby’s fruit bars
9. Healthwise cereals
10. Sanitarium Up and Go drinks
11. Nabisco high fibre premium
12. Kellogg’s K-time bars
13. Vogels breakfast cereals
14. Lowan whole foods soy flakes
15. Heinz soft fruit bars
16. Aussie Bodies Protein FX Energy bars
17. Basco Gluten Free Wheat Free Pancake Mix

References

1. National Health and Medical Research Council (2006) ‘Nutrient reference values for Australia and New Zealand including Recommended Dietary Intakes’.
2. Topping D, Clifton P. ‘Short cain fatty acids and human colonic function – roles of resistant starch and non starch polysaccharides’ Physiol. Reviews 2001, 81: 1031-64.
3. Nugent A. P. ‘Health Properties of Resistant Starch’, British Nutrition Foundation, Nutrition Bulletin 2005, Vol 30 No.1 27-54.
4. Ramakrishna B. S. et al. ‘Amylase-Resistant Starch plus Oral Re-hydration Solution for Cholera’ New England Journal of Medicine 2000, Vol.342, No5, 308-313.  
5. Slavin J. L. ‘Dietary fibre and body weight’ Nutrition 2005, (3):411-8.