If apples, pistachios, cocoa, and tea are not part of your diet, consider incorporating them into your regular menu.
Thanks to its flavanol content, doing so can reduce age-related memory loss. That’s according to a new study from Columbia University and Harvard Medical School’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
Here’s what you need to know about this study and the best foods to increase your daily flavanol intake.
What are flavanols?
Flavanols belong to the flavonoid family, a large group of over 6,000 protective plant compounds found in fruits, vegetables, and many other plant foods.
Specifically, apples, apricots, strawberries, peaches, plums, cocoa powder, dark chocolate, black tea, pecans, pistachios, and cinnamon contain flavanols.
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Flavanols are thought to benefit cognitive health by promoting the growth of neurons and blood vessels in the hippocampus, a region of the brain involved in learning and memory. (Neurons are specialized cells in the brain and nervous system that send and receive information.)
The American Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics recommends 400-600 mg of flavonols in your diet, but this advice is primarily based on flavonols’ ability to improve cardio-metabolic health (blood pressure, cholesterol, triglycerides, glucose levels, etc.). Based on evidence suggesting it helps.
normal cognitive aging
As we age, the brain shrinks and there are fewer receptors for neurotransmitters, chemicals that send messages from the brain to other body tissues. The number of synapses, where neurons connect and communicate with each other, also decreases.
These age-related changes contribute to mild cognitive deficits in memory, processing speed, attention, reasoning, planning, problem-solving, and multitasking.
About new research
The randomized controlled trial, published May 29 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, aims to determine whether flavanols reduce age-related memory decline in healthy older adults.
The study, called COSMOS-Web, assigned 3,562 participants, with a mean age of 71 years, to receive a daily 500 mg cocoa flavanol supplement or a placebo tablet for three years. COSMOS stands for COcoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study.
At the beginning of the study, all participants completed a questionnaire evaluating the quality of their usual diet.
They also conducted a series of web-based cognitive tests designed to detect normal age-related short-term memory loss. Cognitive testing was repeated annually for the duration of the study.
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Overall, memory scores improved only slightly in the group that took flavanol supplements. However, memory scores differed when researchers considered diet quality.
After one year of flavanol supplementation, participants with low dietary quality scores were found to have a 10 percent increase in memory scores compared to the placebo group and a 16 percent increase compared to baseline cognitive scores.
These improvements, although modest, were maintained over the remainder of the study.
Short-term memory did not improve with flavanol supplementation in people with high dietary quality scores and who were already consuming high amounts of flavanols.
These findings build on previous research linking flavanols to healthy aging of the brain and suggest that a low-flavanol diet may promote age-related memory loss.
They also support the idea that just as certain nutrients are essential for brain development, certain nutrients also strengthen the aging brain.
This trial is characterized by its large scale and long duration. Study participants were predominantly Caucasian and highly educated, so this finding may not apply to others.
Eat These Foods to Get Your Daily Flavanols
You don’t have to rely on supplements to get 500 mg of flavanols daily.
It is very achievable through diet. In addition, flavanol-rich foods are rich in other protective nutrients and phytochemicals.
Consider that an 8 ounce cup of green tea contains 332 mg of flavanols. An 8 ounce cup of black tea contains 273 mg.
A medium-sized Red Delicious apple has 271 mg of flavanols, 1 cup of sliced strawberries has 236 mg, 2 plums has 291 mg, and a medium-sized peach has 104 mg.
A quarter cup of pistachios (49 grains) contains 237 mg of flavanols, and a quarter cup of pecans cut in half contains 123 mg of flavanols.
One-half teaspoon of cinnamon contains 105 mg of flavanols, and one tablespoon of unsweetened cocoa powder contains 75 mg.
However, don’t rely on dark chocolate for daily flavanol intake.
Chocolate with a higher percentage of cocoa solids contains more flavanols. However, even dark chocolate bars with a high percentage of cocoa solids contain varying levels of flavanols.
That’s because cocoa flavanols are often destroyed during many stages of cocoa processing. As a result, the flavanol content of dark chocolate can vary significantly. Sorry for the disappointment.
Leslie Beck, a Toronto-based private practice dietitian, is Director of Food and Nutrition at Medcan. follow her on her twitter @LeslieBeck
