Why fiber?
Like all nutrients, fiber has its own special skills and benefits. However, Only about 5% of adults in the United States meet their daily fiber recommendations, but fiber is beneficial to gut health, mood, heart health, and other aspects of health.
How does fiber provide these benefits?
1. Supports regularity.^
This is the benefit of fiber that most people know: Fiber can help promote normal, healthy and comfortable bowel movements.^ We get it. Bathroom visits are private matters – but insoluble fiber adds volume and bulk, which can make it easier to go. Diets rich in certain fibers promote GI health, including bowel regularity.^
2. Helps satisfy your hunger.^
Since fiber doesn’t provide calories but is filling, eating foods that contain fiber can make you feel satiated or full. This can help support your overall diet and manage hunger throughout the day.^ When a meal contains fiber, it helps slow down your digestion so you feel full for longer.
According to research, fiber can help boost satiety hormones including cholecystokinin and lower levels of hunger hormones like ghrelin.
3. Helps out probiotics.^
Probiotics are the good bacteria in your gut; prebiotics are their food. Consuming prebiotic fiber helps maintain a healthy balance of beneficial flora in the gut and gives your digestion a boost.^
What are Functional Foods?
You may have heard the mantra “food first” when it comes to nutrition. Functional foods help bridge the gap when we aren’t getting the recommended amounts of certain nutrients. For example, milk is commonly fortified with vitamins A and D, plant-based milk alternatives sometimes contain added calcium and other nutrients and juice can contain added probiotics.
Functional foods have been around since the 1980s, though breakfast cereals and other foods have been fortified since the last 1930s. They are simply foods that deliver a benefit or nutrient beyond their basic nutritional value. In the case of fiber, functional foods offer an alternative to gloopy, sticky and not-so-tasty- fiber drinks or supplements that increase fiber intake too much, too soon (leading to unpleasant side effects). That’s why we have a new, tasty way to boost fiber intake any time of day (for under 100 calories).
