What Should You Eat for an Anti-Inflammatory Diet? (2024)

The anti-inflammatory diet is an eating pattern that is thought to help reduce the risk of diseases that are associated with chronic inflammation. The typical anti-inflammatory diet includes plenty of fruits, vegetables, lean protein, nuts, seeds, andhealthy fats while avoiding packaged food, sugary and salted foods, and processed red meat.

This article explores what chronic inflammation is and how an anti-inflammatory diet may help lower markers of inflammation in your body. It also lists some of the foods to eat and avoid on an anti-inflammatory diet and offers some tips on how to build an anti-inflammatory diet plan.

What Is an Anti-inflammatory Diet?

Inflammation is the body's normal response to infections, diseases, and injuries. Inflammation is part of the body's healing process, and it gets better once a problem has been fixed. If inflammation does not go away (becomes chronic), it can contribute to health problems.

The idea behind an anti-inflammatory diet is that the foods you eat may help with inflammation in the body and help lower the risks of diseases associated with chronic inflammation.

There’s no one way to follow an anti-inflammatory diet. You can mix it up and tailor the eating plan to your family's tastes and needs. That said, there are some guidelines that you can follow on an anti-inflammatory diet:

• Eat five to nine servings of antioxidant-rich fruits and vegetables each day.
• Replace red meat with lean poultry, fish, beans, and lentils.
• Swap margarine and butter for health-promotingfats like olive oil.
• Reduce your intake of refined grains like white bread, saltines, and pastries, and choose more fiber-rich whole grains like oats, quinoa, brown rice, and pasta.
• Use anti-inflammatory herbs like garlic, ginger, and turmeric instead of seasoning your meals with salt.
• Do not deep fry your food—opt for baked, boiled, or braised cooking instead.

Benefits of an Anti-Inflammatory Diet

Certain foods are known to contribute to inflammation in the body. One example is red meat, which contains a lot ofsaturated fat—one of the substances (along withtrans fatand refined sugar) that cause immune cells to release inflammatory proteins into the bloodstream.

Other foods do not trigger this effect and, in some cases, may help reduce inflammation. In general, these foods are rich in substances called antioxidants that fight chemicals (free radicals) that cause long-term damage to cells and can increase inflammation in the body.

Our food choicesinfluence the level of inflammation in our bodies. The anti-inflammatory diet is thought to help reduce chronic inflammation and prevent the health conditions associated with it, like heart disease, arthritis, and cancer. While there is some evidence of a benefit to eating an anti-inflammatory diet, it's not known exactly how much the diet can really help lower the risk for health conditions linked to inflammation.

For example, an anti-inflammatory diet may help protect against:

• Obesity and metabolic disorder
• Heart disease
• Diabetes
• Cancer
• Arthritis
• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)
• Inflammatory bowel disease
• Alzheimer’s and dementia

According to a 2016 study,an anti-inflammatory diet led to a 37% decrease in inflammatory substances in the blood (such asC-reactive protein) in people with type 2 diabetes after just one year of following the eating plan.

Other studies looking at different variations of the anti-inflammatory diet, such as vegetable-rich diets or seafood-rich diets, have shown similar benefits, especially in people with heart disease.

Foods to Include

Research suggests that people who eat a lot of vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, healthy oils, and fish have a reduced risk for inflammation-related diseases.Certain substances, like antioxidants andomega-3 fatty acids, may also have anti-inflammatory effects.

Foods that are high in antioxidants include:

• Apples
• Artichokes
• Avocados
  
• Beans (such as red beans, pinto beans, and black beans)
• Berries (such as blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries)
• Broccoli
• Cherries
• Dark chocolate (at least 70% cocoa)
  
• Dark green leafy vegetables (such as kale, spinach, and collard greens)
• Eggs
  
• Grapes
• Herbs and spices (like ginger,turmeric, and garlic)
  
• Green tea
• Mushrooms
  
• Nuts (such as walnuts, almonds, pecans, and hazelnuts)
• Sweet potatoes
• Peppers
• Pro- and pre-biotic-rich fermented foods (yogurt, kimchi)
• Tomatoes
• Whole grains
  

Omega-3 fatty acids are "good fats" that may help protect against heart disease, cancer, arthritis, and other conditions. Foods that are high in omega-3 fatty acids include:

• Flaxseed
• Oily fish (such as salmon, herring, mackerel, sardines, and anchovies)
• Omega-3-fortified foods (including eggs and milk)
• Walnuts
• Extra virgin olive oil
  

Foods to Avoid

Foods that increase inflammation include those that are high in omega-6 fatty acids. Although fats are important to bone health, brain function, and the conversion of food to energy (metabolism), eating too many omega-6 fatty acids can actually increase inflammation.

Foods that are high in omega-6 fatty acids include:

• Alcohol
• Full-fat dairy products (such as milk, cheese, butter, and ice cream)
• Margarine
• Red and processed meat
• Refined carbs (e.g., white bread and cereals, baked goods)
• Peanuts
• Processed foods (e.g., snack cakes, packaged meals)
• Sugary foods (e.g., sweets, candies, pastries)
• Salty foods (e.g., chips, pretzels)
• Soda and other sugary drinks
• Fried foods (e.g., French fries)
• Trans fats

Your omega-6 fatty acids should be balanced with your omega-3 fatty acids.

Food with a highglycemic index (GI)can also increase inflammation. These are foods like sugar and refined grains that raise your blood glucose (sugar) level too much and too fast. To help control inflammation, avoid sugary drinks, white bread, desserts, and processed foods. Instead, eatlow-GI foodslike chicken, fish, whole grains, leafy greens, andnon-starchy vegetables.

Types of Anti-Inflammatory Diets

There is no single set eating plan for the anti-inflammatory diet. You can mix it up and even tailor it to your family's tastes and needs. But there are certain guidelines that can help you make healthy choices. There are several popular diets that may have some anti-inflammatory benefits:

• DASH Diet: The Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet can help people avoid foods that are high in salt and could have a negative effect on their health, especially their blood pressure. However, the general guidelines of the diet make it an anti-inflammatory eating plan since it emphasizes fresh, whole foods and avoids processed foods.
• Mediterranean Diet: This diet can help curb the inflammation caused by arthritis. Fish, nuts, beans, fruits, vegetables, and olive oil have all been found to be beneficial in maintaining healthy joints.
  
• MIND Diet: This diet is a spin on the Mediterranean diet and DASH diet that’s focused on foods that may help with healthy brain function. Since it’s based on two diets that have anti-inflammatory foods on their “to eat” list, it’s another eating plan that includes plenty of inflammation-fighting foods.

Example of an Anti-Inflammatory Diet

Here are some examples of what you could eat for meals and snacks on an anti-inflammatory diet:

• Breakfast: Breakfast smoothie, chia bowl, or oatmeal
• Lunch: Green salad with quinoa and vegetables, soup with vegetables and lentils, or grilled salmon
• Snacks: Fresh blueberry fruit salad, apples with nut butter, walnuts, chia seed pudding, or guacamole with whole-grain crackers
• Dinner: Skinless roast chicken breast, grilled mackerel on a three-bean salad, or stir-fried vegetables with brown rice
• Beverages: Cup of ginger-turmeric tea, golden milk, green juice or smoothie, herbal tea, turmeric tea, or green tea

More Ways to Reduce Inflammation

There are other things you can do besides changing your diet to help prevent inflammation, such as:

• Exercising regularly
• Reducing stress
• Getting to and maintaining a weight that supports your health
• Avoiding substances like alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs
• Making quality sleep a priority
• Working with your provider to manage chronic health conditions
  

Summary

An anti-inflammatory diet is an eating plan that is thought to reduce the risk of certain diseases that are linked to chronic inflammation in the body, such as heart disease, arthritis, COPD, and cancer. On this kind of diet, you’ll focus on eating foods that are rich in antioxidants and omega-3 fatty acids, as they may help reduce inflammation. You’ll also work on limiting food that can increase inflammation, such as high-glycemic-index foods and those rich in omega-6 fatty acids.