The Nutrients We Need Each Day
Each day, we need hundreds of nutrients to stay healthy, and these
nutrients must be supplied by the food we eat.
The following chart will give you a sense of the variety of some of
the nutrients we must get each day from our food if we wish to
experience a healthy weight and optimal health. Please note that this
chart is by no means comprehensive; it doesn’t show you all of the
nutrients you need.
For example, phytonutrients—plant nutrients such as carotenoids
(beta carotene, lutein, zeaxanthan) and flavonoids (anthocyanins,
catechins, quercetin)—are now known to be essential to health, but
while researchers have identified approximately 10,000 phytonu-
trients, they estimate at least 40,000 phyonutrients may eventually
be catalogued.
Even though they have yet to be named or identified in the labora-
tory, these phytonutrients are still very much present—in nutrient-
rich foods, like the World’s Healthiest Foods. In fact, that is the only
place you can currently get them! They cannot, for example, be
obtained from dietary supplements because they have not yet been
isolated from the whole, natural foods that contain them. Nor are
they available in highly processed “fast” foods.
The following chart contains some well-established and well-
researchednutrients that are included in the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration’s “Reference Values for Nutrition Labeling.” Next
to each nutrient you’ll see the Daily Value (DV) that was established
as part of the FDA’s labeling program. Please note that this DV value
is a population-based goal and may not reflect the exact amount of
the nutrient that would be best for you (for this informationyou should
seek the advice of a nutrition-oriented healthcare practitioner). Yet,
these Daily Values can give you a sense of general nutrient intake
goals and emphasize how nutrient-rich World’s Healthiest Foods can
provide you with outstanding benefits in terms of Daily Values. (For
more on the functions of each of these nutrients, please see the chart
onpage 47.)
Healthy Weight Loss — Without Dieting