and magnesium to manganese and zinc — exist on earth in a natural
form (most came from the sun during the earth’s creation). But feed-
ing a synthetic vitamin made by a drug company to yeast, adding the
yeast to a supplement and then calling it “natural” and “real-food” is
misleading to me.
Now that you better understand the difference between HSAIDS
and truly natural dietary supplements, let’s look at some different
types of products and how they might be useful for improving health.
These are some of the types of supplements I have found useful for
my patients, my children and grandchildren, and that I take myself.
These products include those made from whole foods, many certified
organic, that have been concentrated without heat, through freeze-
drying in the case of vegetables and fruits, and distillation in the case
of fish and other oils. They contain therapeutic food ingredients like
that of a meal or a day’s worth of food. In addition to containing the
specific nutrients, such as in a vitamin C product, they also contain
the associated vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients normally found
in the foods as they occur in nature.
Most companies don’t produce supplements made from whole
foods. It’s difficult and costly to find foods dried with a low-heat
process that preserves heat-sensitive nutrients, including the phy-
tonutrients. It’s even more difficult to find supplements made from
certified-organic materials. In addition to these issues, many dietary
supplements contain unwanted added ingredients. These fillers,
binders and other chemicals are very common; avoid products con-
taining casein, gluten, soy, wheat, artificial colorings, artificial flavor-
ings and sugar.
Vitamin C Complex
As discussed above, vitamin C in nature is accompanied by many
nutrients, perhaps thousands if we include the important phytonutri-
ents that also affect fitness and health. Vitamin C is found in relative-
ly high concentrations in certain foods, including acerola berries, cit-
rus peel and vegetables such as broccoli. Supplements made from real
food obtain all their vitamin C from these foods, as compared to syn-
thetically manufactured vitamin C called ascorbic acid (or other ver-
sions of synthetic vitamin C).
REAL ‘REAL-FOOD’ DIETARY SUPPLEMENTS • 139