6 Powerful Health Benefits of Sea Vegetables

Kale has long been considered the darling of the health food world, but perhaps that’s only because everyone has been sleeping on the unsung hero of superfoods: edible seaweed, or sea vegetables.

Many Westerners associate sea vegetables primarily with nori—the green stuff wrapped around sushi rolls—but edible seaweed actually comes in three varieties, separated by color: green, brown and red. What’s more, sea vegetables are loaded with essential vitamins and minerals and powerful health benefits.

Whether you’re using kombu—a type of kelp common in Japanese cuisine—to make a dashi broth, or incorporating wakame into a fresh seaweed salad, any dish you prepare with sea vegetables is bound to provide a powerful nutritional punch. 

HEALTH BENEFITS OF SEA VEGETABLES

1. They’re full of natural iodine—which helps your thyroid.

An iodine deficiency can cause a host of unpleasant symptoms, which are extremely similar to hypothyroidism, or low thyroid hormones. Seaweed, such as nori, kombu, wakame and kelp, is full of iodine.

2. They might help regulate estrogen and estradiol levels.

These two studies (here and here) suggest that, due to edible brown kelp’s ability to regulate the aforementioned hormones, sea vegetables could potentially lower your risk of breast cancer and help improve PMS and other related female fertility issues.

3. They’re mineral-rich.

In addition to its main mineral, iodine, sea vegetables are also loaded with calcium, potassium, copper, magnesium and iron.

4. They’re a good source of vitamins and antioxidants.

Sea vegetables contain antioxidant vitamins A (in the form of carotenoids), C and E. They’re also a good source of vitamins D and B.

5. They contain soluble fiber.

Soluble fiber packs a double punch of benefits. On the one hand, it increases feelings of satiety, which will help you stay feeling fuller for longer. On the other hand, it helps to lower your LDL levels—that’s your “bad” cholesterol.

6. They reduce your risk of cardiovascular diseases.

Research suggests that because seaweed can help reduce that bad cholesterol and because it has such a high mineral content, sea plants could play a role in protecting our cardiovascular health.

READY TO EAT SOME SEA VEGETABLES?

If you’re excited to start incorporating different edible seaweeds into your daily diet, just remember that despite their amazing nutritional benefits, you don’t want to go overboard. Make sure to keep serving sizes—which can range from one to three grams of something like spirulina to two giant sheets of nori—in mind before embarking on your sea veggie journey.