Bottom Line/HEALTH: Dr. Rubman, what are your favorite superfoods?

Dr. Andrew Rubman: Truth be told, fruits and vegetables, broadly. But they have to smell like they’re going to go bad the next day in the market.

Bottom Line: Ew.

Dr. Rubman: No, not “ew.” Just short of “ew.” You go and you look at it and you squeeze it and you smell it and you say, “Wow, I’m going to have this tonight because this is ready to rock and roll.”   Now, why is that important? At that stage of ripeness, you’re getting a peak activation of all of the factors that make the vitamins and minerals and other healthy compounds that are in the fruit and vegetable operate at their maximum efficiency.  If you said to me, “All right, that’s great, but what about a food? What about a fruit?”

Bottom Line: Yes—consider yourself asked that question.

Dr. Rubman: Dark berries and juices of dark berries. Or if you want to be really creative about it, you can make your own juices……you can get powdered extracts. But fresh, dark berries. Tremendous.

Bottom Line: Any and all?

Dr. Rubman: Berries that have dark blue and dark purple colors in them have some really marvelous chemicals that help tissues to take maximum benefit from the antioxidant vitamins. Really protect the tissues, help to stave against cancer, colds, infections and, I think, help promote longevity.

Bottom Line: So blueberries, blackberries, all that sort of stuff. How about these designer berries, the açai and the goji and all of those?

Dr. Rubman: Probably depends on the price point.

Bottom Line: Are they better? Forget about price. Are they better? Which one would you pick?

Dr. Rubman: Marginally, marginally. If you’re saying, “If I eat a very small amount of the goji, is it going to be better than a very small amount of the blueberry?” – why scrimp? Go and splurge. Get a box of blueberries.

Bottom Line: They taste better, actually.

Dr. Rubman: Yeah, of course they do.

Bottom Line: Now, let me ask you this also, because you mentioned the peak of freshness, and in fact it’s very difficult to go to the grocery store and find something at just that peak of freshness when it was picked—even if it’s organic—some period of time ago and shipped across an ocean. So how about frozen as an option?

Dr. Rubman: Not quite as good as fresh, but a lot better than canned.

Bottom Line: My choice is frozen or in the grocery store, but it doesn’t smell like it’s going to go bad tomorrow.

Dr. Rubman: Oftentimes frozen is the best choice. It depends on how fresh “fresh” really is. How far back has the stuff been picked, has it been harvested? Does it look like it’s fairly fresh to market? If not, you may be better off with frozen.

Bottom Line: All right, great. Thank you, Dr. Rubman.

Dr. Rubman: You’re welcome.

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