One thing that most of us can agree on is that we should all be eating our leafy greens. They are the most nutritious members of the plant kingdom and the health benefits that they have to offer are substantial.
The Importance of Vitamins
Mustard greens are a dark leafy green, similar to kale or spinach, and they contain many of the same nutrients, such as vitamins A and K. Notably, these vegetables tend to be high in vitamin K2, which is necessary for transmitting calcium to our bones. Many of us have grown up hearing that we need to drink our milk and eat our cheese in order to get sufficient levels of calcium in our diet, but there’s a catch. Without vitamin K2 to act as a carrier, the calcium will never make it to our bones. It will just build up in our arteries, piling up life-threatening layers of plaque. Dairy may have plenty of calcium, but it doesn’t have the vitamin K2 that we need to put the calcium to good use. Leafy greens, on the other hand, are an excellent source of both calcium and vitamin K2.
Mark Sisson has a whole post on why leafy greens are such an important part of our diet. Check out the TED talk he links to in that post. It’s definitely worth a watch.
