As the saying goes, “you are what you eat”, and it is no secret that diet plays an enormous part in our health and wellbeing. Eating too much of certain foods can lead to a range of health problems, while upping your intake of others can have the opposite effect.

With this in mind, a doctor has revealed three specific types of food we should all be eating more of to protect our hearts and brains.

Speaking on the latest Zoe Health podcast, cardiovascular expert Doctor William Li advised how to keep your blood vessels healthy and in turn lower your risk of heart disease and dementia, among other serious medical issues.

He explained: “One of the things that we're able to do is to use food as medicine to help heal and maintain the health of our blood vessels, that's something that's well established.

“All these things are sensitive to our diet, we can keep our blood vessels healthy.”

The best foods to eat to do so, according to Dr Li, are:

• Colourful vegetables
• Oily fish
• Dark chocolate

Colourful vegetables

Dr Li advised that “eating the rainbow” when it comes to your vegetables can help blood flow smoothly through the vessels.

This is due to the fact they contain a naturally-occurring compound known as polyphenols.

“Well, eating plant-based foods, you know the polyphenols that come in our colourful vegetables - eat the rainbow - guess what that rainbow helps to heal the blood vessels and keep that lining nice and smooth so blood can flow,” Dr Li said.

His recommendation is backed by a study published in Nutrients journal in 2022, which concluded that a diet rich in multiple polyphenol-rich foods is “likely to improve vascular health and reduce the risk of hypertension”.

Separate research, published in Advances in Neurobiology journal in 2016, said that “increasing the consumption of polyphenol-rich food may alleviate the effects of dementia”.

Oily fish

Dr Li went on to say that foods packed with omega-3 fatty acids can boost both heart and brain health.

He said: “We know that marine omega-3s, which you can actually get from oily fish and even not so oily fish and even shellfish, can actually help to preserve and maintain that slippery smooth normal lining of the blood vessels.

“Very important for our brain health, not just for heart health, right.”

The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends a diet rich in omega-3s from fish, or fish oil supplements, as a way to reduce cardiovascular events, like heart attack or stroke, in people who already have cardiovascular disease.

Dark chocolate

Dr Li added that the flavanols present in certain dark chocolates could protect both the heart and brain.

“There have been studies looking at flavonols coming from plant-based foods like cacao,” he said.

“Cacao is the plant source for the material that's used to make chocolate. Dark chocolate has more flavonols and ultra-high flavanol chocolate has been studied and it protects not only heart health but lowers the risk of dementia by improving brain health at the circulation level as well.”

Existing research has linked both to improved blood vessel function, lower blood pressure, and a lower risk of heart disease in people with and without preexisting health conditions.

And one study, from 2017, linked the flavanols in dark chocolate to improved oxygen levels, nerve function, and blood flow in the brain.

However, it is important to not eat large amounts of chocolate due to the sugar and calorie content.

Dr Li also told the podcast that people should avoid “harmful ultra processed foods and preservatives and chemicals” which could harm the gut microbiome as this is linked to most aspects of our health.