Exploratory Studies on the Potential Health Benefits of Spices and Herbs

This review is an analysis of reported studies that address the broad categories of diet quality and metabolic health. Among the noteworthy findings was that offering vegetables with a reduced-fat dip containing herb and spice flavors increased tasting, liking, acceptance, and/or consumption of vegetables among preschool children 3-5 years old. Consumers reported increased liking of an herb and spice-modified low-salt (LS) soup after repeated exposure, while no such increase was seen for its LS counterpart without spices and herbs. A study among cafeteria patrons reported similar appreciation for a LS legume-based mezze with herbs and spices and its counterpart with 50% higher salt, suggesting that the addition of herbs and spices is a feasible strategy to reduce salt content while maintaining consumer acceptance. Studies in the category of metabolic health have reported that speed of working memory was increased by an acute low dose of rosemary (750 mg) provided in tomato juice among free-living elderly study participants (65-90 years of age), whereas the opposite effect resulted from the highest dose (6000 mg). An ex vivo study among young adults (20-39 years of age) found that consumption of paprika, rosemary, ginger, heat-treated turmeric, sage and cumin for 7 days protected peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from DNA strand breaks while black pepper, cayenne pepper, cinnamon, clove, oregano (heat-treated or dried), and turmeric (no heat treatment) did not. A study among overweight/obese (mean BMI = 27 kg/m2) women provided with dietary red pepper and turmeric for 4 weeks demonstrated that these spices did not affect oxidative stress or inflammatory markers compared to a placebo, and another study showed that black pepper did not affect 24-hour energy expenditure or substrate utilization among postmenopausal women when provided at 0.5 mg/meal.