Cholesterol is a fat-like substance made by your body and found in animal foods such as meat and milk. Sometimes your body makes too much LDL, or bad cholesterol, and sometimes you eat too much food that contains it. The best way to lower high is to increase HDL, or good cholesterol levels. One of the best ways to do this is to eat food that raises HDL levels, such as food rich in vitamin B.
Features
While extra virgin olive oil and vegetables high in fiber are the best natural foods that lower cholesterol, you can include many foods that contain vitamin B in your daily diet that have the same effect. Oat cereal, whole grain cereal, and cereal containing flaxseed or psyllium have vitamin B6, fiber, folic acid, and other vitamins that increase good cholesterol and cause bad cholesterol levels to fall.
Function
Frequently eating beans (which contain many B vitamins such as thiamine, riboflavin, niacin and folacin) can lower cholesterol. Eating only 1/2 cup of beans a day makes a difference in cholesterol and triglyceride levels. High in fiber and folate, beans such as fresh lentils, kidney beans, chickpeas, pinto beans, soybeans and black beans also give you more control over blood sugar and offer additional heart healthy benefits such as lower blood pressure and improved blood flow.
Types
Whole foods are much better for lowering cholesterol than refined and processed foods. Whole wheat bread contains B vitamins that lower cholesterol while refined flour bread can cause health problems. Citrus fruits, nuts, seeds, garlic cloves, tomatoes and green leafy vegetables such as broccoli and spinach contain cholesterol-lowering B vitamins such as B6, B12, niacin, thiamine and folate.
Considerations
While most animal foods are considered high in bad cholesterol, there are some meats, poultry and fish that lower bad cholesterol. These include lean cuts of meat from free-grazing animals, chicken, salmon, tuna, trout and swordfish. All are good sources of cholesterol-lowering B vitamins.
Significance
Saturated fat and trans fat can raise bad cholesterol levels, causing such bad effects on your health as heart disease, stroke, obesity, cancer and diabetes. Monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fat are important in protecting you from these conditions. Polyunsaturated fats aren't produced by our bodies, so they must be added into our diets. We get a lot of omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids in Western diets but not as many omega-3 fats. To balance omega-3 and omega-6 fats, many foods containing B vitamins can be added to your diet. These include walnuts, pecans, soy nuts, wheat germ, wild salmon, tuna and salad dressings with soybean oil or walnut oil.
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