Tomatoes in the News

• Gene discovery could lead to better tomatoesSan Francisco ChronicleThe discovery, made by an international research team headed by UC Davis, could have broad benefits to California's tomato industry - a $1.3 billion business. By looking at a collection of mutant and wild tomatoes at UC Davis collected in the 1950s by ...
• Tomatoes Ripe With Powerful Health BenefitsFood Product DesignResearchers from the National Center for Food Safety & Technology, Illinois Institute of Technology and ConAgra Foods Inc. examined current research to discover the role tomato products play in health and disease risk reduction. ...Tomatoes Pack A Nutritious Punch, Study FindsBETTER Health Researchall 3 news articles »
• Small Cancer Benefit Seen with Multivitamin UseMedPage TodayCo-authors disclosed relationships with the Tomato Products Wellness Council, Cambridge Theranostics, DSM Nutritional Products, BASF, Cognis, Pronova BioPharma, Pharmavite, Aurora Foundation, Bristol-Myers Squibb, AstraZeneca, Novartis, Merck, ...and more »
• Eat Your Heart Out With Healthy Red FoodsTyler Morning TelegraphProcessed tomatoes — sauce and paste — are more effective than raw tomatoes at reducing cancer risk. In the raw tomato, the lycopene is bound into the cell walls and fiber. Processing breaks down these cell walls and frees the lycopene to be absorbed ...and more »
• Counsel & Heal Tomatoes May Lower Risk of Stroke and Fight Prostate CancerCounsel & Heal(Photo : Flickr/PurpleFoodie) Experts say in the journal Neurology that cooked and/or processed tomatoes with cooking oil have the highest and most active levels of lycopene. Which makes sun-dried tomatoes the tastiest way to combat a stroke. According ...and more »
• Dan Morain: Will jobs be lost with cap and trade?Sacramento BeeRANDY PENCH / rpench@sacbee.com. Energy is needed to produce the steam that sanitizes gallon containers soon to be filled with processed tomatoes. Cap and trade costs at the plant remain to be determined. 7FO19FLUME.JPG ...

A Health Report on Tomatoes

Every rule has an exception, and tomatoes are clearly that when it comes to the old saying, "If it tastes good, it must be bad for you." Recent scientific studies have discovered that tomatoes are not only delicious and versatile, but loaded with health benefits.

For instance:

BETTER THAN ONE-A-DAY: Skip the vitamin pill and start your day with a glass of tomato juice: One, four-ounce tomato supplies about one-third of the daily RDA for vitamin C, plus a little beta carotene, potassium, folic acid and other B vitamins, iron and fiber.

FIGHT CANCER, EAT A TOMATO: Lycopene, the ingredient that makes a tomato red, can also make you well. Tomatoes are packed with Lycopene, which is a potent antioxidant and has been shown to prevent cancer.

DOES IT GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS? Lycopene occurs in only a few foods besides tomatoes and since you absorb more lycopene when you eat a little fat with your tomato some olive oil or cheese isn't such a bad thing after all. Go for it!

PIZZA TO THE RESCUE: Consuming tomatoes, tomato sauce and even pizza twice a week is associated with a slightly reduced risk of prostate cancer. Other research has shown benefits against cervical, stomach and other cancers.

GET CANNED, GET HEALTHY! The Lycopene in cooked and processed tomatoes (sauce, paste, salsa, canned tomatoes) is more easily absorbed than in raw tomatoes. Conclusion: let the ketchup flow!


To view the complete Tomatoes & Health Report in Adobe PDF format, click here.