Kind: captions
Language: en
all right today we're going to talk
about something fun which is spices that
actually help uh slow aging and also
help heal your body by reducing
inflammation all right now I'm going to
talk about spices that you may or may
not have heard about so let's get
started the first one is star
Anis star Anis is from Southeast Asia it
is a very unusual looking spice because
it's dried and it looks like it has
eight points to it looks like a star and
star Anis and it's what's used to make
masala chai It's actually used to make F
the Vietnamese noodle dish and it's part
of the traditional Chinese five spice
powder all right you can find it though
in your grocery store now star Anis this
spice has a bioactive called aniol and
aniol has been showed in the lab to be a
potent Blocker of inflammation and the
lab research shows that the effects are
seen only when you actually give it
orally but not when you actually apply
it to the top of your skin so there's
something about the oral administration
of anthol that actually makes it
anti-inflammatory okay the other thing
that star Anis has in it is another
bioactive called shikimic acid now
shikimic acid is a natural chemical that
has antiviral properties in fact it's so
potent that the pharmaceutical industry
once went to Star Anis in order to
develop um uh the antiviral treatment
called Tamiflu Tamiflu is made out of
shikimic acid that's how potent this
actually is to improve your body's
immune defenses against viruses and
traditionally star Anis has been used in
um traditional Chinese medicine for
actually protecting against infection as
well okay where do you find it you find
it in the spice section of the grocery
store if you go to a Spice Market you'll
see it these are beautiful uh about the
size of a penny and they are uh eight
points on the side of it uh you should
definitely check it out you can also get
the powder but the whole uh the whole
star is what's really interesting and
you can actually put the star in this
you can put it into any sauce and to get
the um the flavor out of it now
researchers in Korea have even studied
star Anis for its anti-tumor properties
now inflammation is associated with
cancer and so and helps cancer grow so
any spice that has anti-inflammatory
properties can be useful to counter
tumor induced inflammation as
well so a little bit more about star
Anis uh it's a fruit actually from an
evergreen tree called Elysium verum
again it's found in Southeast Asia used
in traditional Chinese medicine and it's
found you can use it to make teas um and
it's used to fight joint pain and
inflammation and even viral infections
which makes a lot of sense given the
fact it has shikimic acid now in the
kitchen how I use star anus you can add
it to a soup a stew a broth you can
actually if you're making a dessert uh
you can actually use the fragrance the
dessert as well it's got this uh very
very light licoricey um Essence that's
absolutely delightful I encourage you to
try it all you got to do smell it and
you know exactly what that scents like
the next spice we're going to talk about
is Rosemary also one of my favorite
spices I use it during the holiday
season uh to actually cook uh during the
winter time now Rosemary has Ros marinic
acid named after its uh its source uh
and rosem marinic acid has potent
anti-inflammatory properties this has
been shown in lab research it's also
anti-androgenic rosic acid which means
it can starve cancers by cutting off its
blood supply it's also a powerful
antioxidant so this this nice very
spindly Branch it's herb uh fantastic uh
Health properties now in addition to
rosic acid Rosemary also has another
bactive called borol now borneol is also
anti-inflammatory and in the lab Bal
also protects nerves it's
neuroprotective and it's been found to
protect against Brain Injury uh in lab
research so this um uh really really
interesting herb that's been used for
since ancient times has more medicinal
properties than we ever expected
interestingly the ancient Greek used
Rosemary to improve memory during aging
and in fact it was known once as the
herb of remembrance think about that
neuroprotection right and the lab it's
been studied now actually there's been
other studies looking specifically at
Rosemary in animal models for
Alzheimer's disease and they found that
Rosemary can improve cognition and
improve memory as well now for me I like
to use rosemary in a simpler way I like
to use it as seasoning for Soups or
casseroles flavor vegetable dishes or
for roasts um and actually one of the my
favorite ways to actually experience
Rosemary is that when it's actually used
to um as a topping uh sprinkling onto
Folia that Italian bread made with extra
virgin olive oil very light and fluffy
Rosemary really makes that taste good
all right taste is obviously as
important uh when it comes to health
next spice saffron now saffron comes
from uh a purple flower called the
crocus uh and the part of the flower
that is saffron is the stigma you know
the little threads that are in the
middle of a flower when a flower opens
up it's got these little tendrils that
come up and that's what saffron's made
out of it now when you actually find
saffron in the Spice Market you're going
to recognize it immediately they're dark
red threads often in a jar or sometimes
it can come as a fine powder as well
this is a very very delicate seasoning
it's got a slightly sweet scent and it
gives any dish you cook a lovely bright
yellow orange color so it's actually a
food coloring as well and that's why
both for the scent and the color it's
used to make dishes like a classic
Spanish paa the rice dish it's got this
wonderful Aroma that comes from safron
it's also used to make risoto Millan a
yellow risoto that also has a really
really um delicate taste to it really
absolutely delicious so what are the
bioactives that are found in Saffron
well there's three of them at least one
is called croin one is called crotin and
the other one's called sa sappol all
right and all three of these bioactives
suppress inflammation and they've been
studied in the lab the bioactives from
saffron against the kind of inflammation
that you actually see in rheumatoid
arthritis ulcer of colitis and Asthma
there's inflammation in the lung and
saffron's also been studied clinically
as well one clinical study from Iran
looked at 60 people with type 2 diabetes
and gave them saffron or Placebo to
consume for 8 weeks all right so what
they found was that saffron eaters not
only had better blood sugar control
which is another benefit of saffron but
they also had lower levels in their
blood of an inflammatory marker called
tnf Alpha so clinically saffron eaters
had lower inflammatory markers in their
blood now researchers are also studying
saffron to see if it can combat
cognitive decline due to chronic stress
and also for helping the to slow the
symptoms of Alzheimer's disease so all
that is to C lots of exciting research
around saffron but my favorite way to
actually use saffron is actually to use
it to flavor rice dishes again like a PA
or risoto I like cooking traditional
Mediterranean dishes and when you buy
saffron here's the thing you want to do
make sure you go to a reputable seller
of spices and make sure you get the real
thing because there's a lot of fake
saffrons out there real saffron is
pretty expensive it's one of the most
expensive spices it can be more than
$400 per pound it's like gold okay and
you only need to buy tiny little amounts
of it just some small amounts of threads
and it flavors up a dish really really
well so if you find a saffron that is
like dirt cheap okay you get a deal it's
probably fake uh and but buying some of
the real deal is actually worth having
in your spice
cabinet all right the next spice I want
to talk to you about is Sichuan pepper
horns
orow all right now this could be the
coolest spice you've never heard of
because this spice comes from China
suchu on pepper corns and it's actually
not a pepper all right it is the dried
Berry of something called the prickly
ash tree and the spice part of it is
actually the part of the husk or the
skin of the berry the berry is kind of a
black seed you don't eat that it's kind
of bitter but actually you peel off the
dried husk of it of the seed toss the
seed away and that uh husk is actually
what gives you the spice now this spice
is used in the spicy cooking of the
Sichuan province of China if you like
spicy food like spicy hot pot it's going
to have Sichuan peppercorns and it has a
bright citrusy uh fragrance when you
actually eat it and the other thing it
does for you it's got this very very
unusual numbing sensation in your mouth
it's called Mala by the Chinese it's
feels spicy and tingling at the same
time it activates your nerve fibers but
it's not a chili pepper all right it is
a it is the berry of a tree U but it has
some of the same characteristics of
Chili Peppers it activates a receptor in
your tongue called trip trp V1 now Chili
Peppers with capsacin the spicy stuff
all right the heat also activates trip
V1 on your tongue and whether it's Chili
Peppers with capsacin or it's C on
peppercorns when that trip V1 receptor
is activated in your tongue what it does
it sends a signal to your brain and that
brain then releases hormones that
activate your body's Brown fat all right
and when your brown fat is activated
triggered by trip1 and then go into your
brain guess what your brown fat does it
fires up it undergos a process called
thermogenesis it heats up and it burns
down the excess fuel that it's got to
draw from your harmful white fat good
fat Brown fat burns down harmful fat
white fat and activating trip V1 with
cetro and peppercorns will actually get
that process kick that process off now a
study from North umer university in the
United Kingdom and the Mirabel
biochemistry group in Switzerland
actually looked at the bioactive in um
in cetan peppercorns this bioactive is
called sand shol all right s uh they
actually got it from the spice and what
they did is they studied 82 healthy
volunteers who are between 35 and 55
years old and they gave the subjects
this bioactive sanul from sich pepper
corns every day for 56 days and here's
what they found they found even a single
dose of Sanel would actually improve the
reaction time and cognitive power and
brain power endurance like how dedicated
you could actually focus on a task um uh
from the subjects and it also reduced
their mental fatigue so Sanel from
sichan pepper corns actually improved
performance that's pretty cool the other
thing that the researchers did is they
studied brain blood flow from the sandel
eaters and guess what the people who ate
sandel uh from cetron peppercorns also
had better cerebral blood flow or brain
blood flow which makes sense in terms of
the Improvement in brain power uh and
brain endurance okay now I love cetron
pepper corns I don't eat use it very
often um it's sort of one of these
things that you put do once in a while
but I definitely would recommend that
you give it a shot and if you don't know
what to do with it look up our recipe
online sichon pepper Corn's recipe click
on a video and watch somebody uh show
you how to use it and the classic recipe
is using sichon peppercorns come from
the Sichuan province of China so you can
check that out Sichuan cooking uh
Sichuan pepper corns uh and you'll find
dishes like mapo tofu or a hot pot broth
but you can actually use use it to cook
fish or chicken dishes and it's actually
also used to pickle cucumbers um for a
little summer treat that gives you a
little tingle when you have it all right
so if you love that tingling sensation
and you like this you want to spice it
up you can also use cetron pepper corn
powder on nuts that you can actually
snack on instead of Wasabi nuts or peas
try some cetron pepper corn for an
alternative Zing to it all right a
little goes a long way and that's what I
actually want to tell you about cetu and
pepper corns now last spice I want to
tell you about is the classic turmeric
all right and this is probably the spice
that everyone recognizes by now when it
comes to health and wellness right
you've heard about turmeric it uh it's
got something called curcumin in it and
you'd find turmeric uh in the either the
dried spice section of the grocery store
um it's a bright yellow powder that
comes in a jar but you can also find
whole fresh turmeric in the produce
section it's see these tiny little
root-like things um that if you break it
apart it's got a real orange middle of
it and the part of the turmeric that we
use for a spice is called the ryome
which is similar to the root it's not
quite bued to the ground it's like the
part of the plant that's almost a root
it sticks up now the plant that turmeric
is based on is a member of the ginger
family and that's why the root kind of
looks like ginger and this plant
originated in Southeast Asia and it's
very common they use an Indian Cuisine
uh in Indonesian cuisine uh especially
in curries it's got this warm peppery
flavor that's what you're looking for
when you actually cook with turmeric and
because of its yellow color turmeric
sometimes use as a fabric dye or
actually used to um colorize food as
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caption below now back to the
video the bioactive inter turmeric is
called circumin and circumin has
powerful anti-inflammatory effects and
this has been studied many times in
clinical trials and it's been shown for
its potency uh uh in almost every study
in fact one study that was conducted by
the Isfahan University in Iran they
looked at 60 people with osteoarthritis
in the knee this is like a really
painful uh wear and tear arthritis in
the knee and what they did is they gave
the subjects either turmeric or a
standard non-steroidal anti-inflammatory
drug like napasin okay uh and so
turmeric versus pharmaceutical every day
for four weeks and at the end of the
study what the researchers found is that
turmeric taking turmeric was just as
good as the pharmaceutical
anti-inflammatory drug when it comes to
reducing the inflammatory marker in the
blood called prostaglandin E2 so they
gave these people drugs versus turmeric
uh and they actually found that when it
looked at the inflammatory marker in the
blood that both of them reduced it
equally this is food is medicine in real
life another study from Spain looked at
68 individuals with NE arthritis same
kind and showed that it decreased the
blood marker inflammatory blood marker C
reactive protein or CRP as well again
two different inflammatory markers all
decreased by people with arthritis
taking turmeric
now curcumin the bioactive is also an
antioxidant it also improves metabolism
and my own research shows that it can
actually improve the health of your
blood vessels your circulation as well
in fact curcumin is so potent as a
bioactive that when you eat it your body
doesn't want to absorb and hang on to
all of it and kind of kicks it out uh in
your gut so if you want to H hang on to
your curcumin what you want to do is to
be able to eat it along with some
freshly cracked black pepper because
inside black pepper is a natural
substance called pierine that helps your
body retain curcumin all right so that's
why termeric and black pepper are often
mixed together like an a curry in order
to be able to get the most benefit from
this particular spice so here are some
Pro tips when it comes to turmeric if
you want to buy it fresh you want to
store it in the fridge make sure you dry
it really well if you're going to wash
it off which you should dry it really
well by wiping with a towel because
otherwise mold can grow very easily grow
on turmeric and if you have powdered
turmeric just start store it in a jar
make sure it's airtight and keep it in a
dark cool area and for some cooking tips
I'll tell you what I like to do I like
to add some dried turmeric to soups and
stews to give it some flavor that warm
peppery flavor a little bit of color and
if you're roasting vegetables like
carrots or cauliflower you can sprinkle
some turmeric on top of it it makes it a
beautiful color as well as to give it a
nice nice uh flavor to it as well the
other thing you can do if you're
roasting a chicken for example you can
actually sprinkle some turmeric on the
skin and cook it right into the chicken
and you'll get some again a nice
beautiful uh flavorful chicken and if
you want to also just scramble some eggs
you can also sprinkle turmeric on
scrambled eggs as well uh there's so
many different ways to use it you might
have seen it at a um coffee shop you can
put turmeric into coffee you can add it
to tea and of course if you're making
your own Curry like combining lots of
different spices this is actually you
where turmeric powder really really
shines that's it five spices that fight
aging and inflammation hope you learned
something from it and thank you for
watching hi there if you enjoyed
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