When the temperature outside dips, your first instinct might be to reach for a warm blanket, or huddle on a cosy sofa in front of the TV or on your bed. Sure, these items are great at keeping you warm and cosy, but they aren’t the only ones capable of doing so.

Instead of reaching for that heavy blanket, consider adding some nuts into your daily routine as they will keep you warmer than you think. Besides, nuts have the tendency to keep you away from seasonal diseases. So, if you didn’t know why squirrels store nuts, now you know it — to have loads of food when it is really hard to get something to eat, and to keep warm in the harshness of the cold weather.

Let’s dig deep into the nutty business and find out the health benefits of eating nuts in winter.

What’s so special about nuts?

Nuts are a class of healthy foods that contain oil or moisture in the kernel seed, or fruit. Unlike dried fruits, nuts are raw and contain the oil inside the kernel.

They are considered excellent sources of protein, minerals like potassium, sodium and chromium, that are essential for good health and immunity; as well as vitamins like vitamin A, E, B3, B5, B6, B9, and B2 and healthy fats, like monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats.

Nuts are a great source of fuel for the body and brain. And the list of the benefits doesn’t end here, most of these nuts are rich in selenium, a mineral that helps to guard against heart disease and provides protection against brain degeneration. Plus, they are also rich in antioxidants, which help prevent cell damage.

What’s in a ‘nut’?

Nuts are power banks, each one of them is packed with a bundle of nutrients, but the type of nuts you should consume will largely depends on what you are trying to accomplish.

If you are trying to stay warm, then consuming nuts with higher fat content, like macadamia nuts, almonds and walnuts. If you are trying to stay healthy throughout winter, however, consuming more vitamin E rich nuts do the best job. But it doesn’t mean that when a certain nut has a certain nutrient and doesn’t provide other benefits. It means that some nuts have more vitamin E, while some have more vitamin B6, so in a ‘nutshell’ they are superpowers in their own might.

Let’s take for example, almonds, hazelnuts, pine nuts, peanuts, Brazil nuts, pistachios, and seeds, like sunflower and pumpkin seeds have more vitamin E, which is essential for strong immune system function and is a fat-soluble nutrient. In the body, it acts as an antioxidant and helps protect cells from the damage caused by free radicals. Free radicals are compounds formed when our bodies convert the food we eat into energy. Furthermore, vitamin E provides protection against heart disease, diabetes and neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s disease.

Nuts improve memory

We are often told by our elders to eat almonds as they help improve memory. Isn’t it? To improve normal brain development and for keeping the nervous system and immune system healthy, nuts like almonds, pistachios and macadamias are perfect choices to make. Each nut brings something special with it; for instance, almonds help improve memory, oil from pistachio nuts help preserve fatty acids and prevent inflammation, and macadamias contribute to normal brain function.

While other nuts like walnut, chestnut, cashew, hazelnut and seeds like sesame, lotus and flaxseeds are rich in vitamin B 6, essential for normal brain development.

Add a few nuts in your snack pack

Eating a handful of mixed nuts provides you with all the health benefits and power supplements that you need for your growth and improved cognitive function. You can add these nuts in your snack pack so that you can munch them regularly. And the added benefit is that you will eat less unhealthy junk food because nuts are filling and you won’t have the appetite to go for unhealthy and tempting stuff around you.

A study published in The Journal of Nutrition found that children who ate nuts at least once a week had taller stature and weighed more than the average kids.

In short, nuts and dry fruits provide us with tonnes of health benefits, and you can easily incorporate more of these nutritious foods into your daily diet, especially in winter. So, whether you’re looking for something new or want to add more nutrients to your diet, nuts and dry fruits are definitely worth checking out!

Published in Dawn, Young World, December 31st, 2022