Chicken Curry and Beyond - The CurryFocus Blog

Capsaicin has been shown to relax blood vessels and this lowers blood pressure, reducing the chances of having a heart attack.

Chinese scientists have uncovered this property of capsaicin where they observed its powers in tests with laboratory rats. And the scientists have also worked out that people in the north east China have a much lower rate of hypertension (high blood pressure) than in other parts of China because they eat more spicy food – food with chilli in it.

Capsaicin is found in the vein and seeds of a chilli and is the ingredient of chilli that makes the chilli “hot”.

Which makes a good curry that contains chilli not only a great meal but also a smart thing to eat to improve your health by lowering your blood pressure.

You can read more about this latest piece of research here.

We regularly write about the health properties of curry ingredients and you can read the Curry Focus health articles to find out more.

A news item has just been seen that talks about the way that curcumin has been found (again) to help in the continual fight against cancers.

Melanoma is a life-threatening skin cancer that kills nearly 50,000 people a year and curcumin has been found to be good at disabling melanoma cancer cells.

And the same researchers have found out that curcumin stopped breast cancer from spreading.

The ever-increasing list of ailments that can be treated with curcumin is pretty amazing and we’ve written a few blogs on the subject over the years.

This latest research says that you have a lower chance of getting some cancers if you eat turmeric (one of the most used curry ingredients).

There are several face creams for sale that claim to slow down the skin aging process with the assistance of turmeric and/or curcumin. So now the cream makers know that there product can help protect against melanoma.

You can read about this new curcumin research for yourself.

The Daily Mail reports that a woman called Suki Burai has lost 42 lb (3 stone or 19KG) by eating curries from recipes that she has developed. And she has started a successful slimming group that uses the recipes.

Making your own curries to stay slim and healthy is not news to the frequent visitors of the Curry Focus website who have been able to read articles such as “How Many Calories In A Curry?” and “Curry Calorie Count”.

The main point in the articles is that you are in control of how many calories there are in a curry when you make the curry yourself. Curries that you buy from a restaurant (either dine-in or takeaway) are often laden with calories.

Most diets tend to be boring but eating a curry is seldom boring.

There are a lot of yummy curry recipes on the Curry Focus website and a lot of the curry recipes have been reviewed so you can see their heat and taste rankings on the recipe review page.

There’s no reason why you can’t keep an eye on your calorie intake, as well as eating delicious food, so make sure you read the “How Many Calories In A Curry?” article to find out about curry calories.

Another Internet article has been brought to our attention about some Chinese research into the health benefits of some of the common ingredients in curries.

One item of research has uncovered the fact that eating pungent foods (such as curries) could reduce the risk of getting prostate cancer, a disease that only affects men.

And once again, curcumin has been highlighted as possibly being effective in treating Kennedy’s disease, also known as spinal and bulbar muscular atrophy, that is another disease that only affects men.

Curcumin has often been attributed with being able to combat a wide range of diseases. You can read more about curcumin’s powers by reading the “Claim that Curcumin Kills Cancer” and “An Update on Curcumin, Turmeric and Your Health” blog articles.

You can see the full Chinese research article here.

The Internet news feeds are alive with a potential new health use for one of the spices used in Indian cooking. The spice in question is saffron, which is often added to rice to give it a slightly bitter taste and a golden yellow color.

Australian and Italian scientists say that saffron improves eyesight and may prevent blindness.

A recent Curry Focus article described the saffron spice but, at the time, there was no indication that saffron could improve your vision.

There are a lot of Internet articles about this new research with a good one being on the Hindustan Times website.

We are all getting older so maybe this latest research will be of increasing interest to us all.

Russian doctors have made the amazing claim that eating curries will prevent the onset of swine flu and the common cold.

The curry spices, such as ginger, zeera (cumin) and turmeric are credited with being the main virus fighting ingredients.

You can also eat garlic and raw onions to combat the viruses.

You can read the story here.

Curcumin, a natural chemical in turmeric, has again been reported as having cancer killing abilities.

An Irish research center team has made the claim that appears on the BBC News website.

The team has discovered that curcumin kills gullet, or oesophageal, cancer which is instrumental in 5% of UK cancer deaths.

Research is continuing in the hope that new cancer treatments will be developed from the natural curcumin chemical.

The full story can be read here.

Not long after the latest excitement about being able to lose weight by eating a curry (see Try To Lose Weight By Eating Curry), along comes a new theory that you can prevent Alzheimer’s and Dementia by eating curry.

Professor Doraiswamy presented this theory at the Annual Meeting of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.

Some experts are sceptical about the claim that puts forward another health application for curcumin, which is in turmeric (an often used ingredient in curries).

Professor Doraiswamy has speculated that a curry pill might be developed from this research.

The idea Alzheimer’s and Dementia can be prevented by eating curry may be a bit hard to swallow, if only because you would need to eat a very large amount of curry in order take the amount of curcumin that was used in the research.

Even so, I think that I would prefer to eat great curries than to pop a pill.

You can see this amazing story on the BBC news website.

The internet is buzzing with stories about the recent announcement of the result of experiments where mice were fed with curcumin and the mice lost fat and weight.

Three weeks ago we wrote an article about this, called “Lose Weight with Turmeric and Curcumin”.

This exciting development has been picked up by lots of organizations, including the Times of India, the Marie-Claire magazine and the Los Angeles Times.

As you no doubt know, turmeric is an ingredient in lots of different curries.

More tests and experiments are planned and, no doubt, testing on people will take place sometime soon. If the results of the tests are positive, you can be sure to see a new range of curcumin-based weight loss and diet products arriving in the market.

Until then, you can eat a good curry with the thought that maybe you can lose a bit of weight in the process.

Curcumin, found in turmeric, has again reached the health news headlines.

A couple of articles about turmeric and curcumin have already appeared on the Curry Focus website - “Turmeric is it Spice or Medicine?” and “An Update on Curcumin Turmeric and Your Health”.

This time curcumin has been found to be a potential wonder weight loss aid.

Mice have been given doses of curcumin with their food.

And the mice that were given curcumin lost body fat and weight.

The experiment has not yet been tried with people but we’re sure that it won’t be too long before it does.

The research is well documented on the internet, such as on the Nutra Ingredients website.

Seeing that turmeric is an often used spice in curries, will we one day see weight loss diets that advocate eating a curry in order to lose weight?