This Is Why You Should Start Eating More Garlic

If you love garlic as much as we do, we've got news that's so good it will make you want to grab all the garlic you can find in your house and add it to every single dish you cook from now on! According to Ariana Lutzi, naturopath and nutrition consultant for Bubs Naturals, it's kind of a secret superfood. "Garlic fights all types of infections — fungal, bacterial, parasitic, and viral — regulates blood sugar, lowers blood pressure, and lowers cholesterol, to name a few," Lutzi told Well+Good. Who knew? And that's not all.

As Dr. William W. Li, author of Eat to Beat Disease: The New Science of How Your Body Can Heal Itself, told SHAPE, garlic can even boost your immunity. "Garlic stimulates your health defenses by triggering immune cells to release chemicals that activate the immune system to find and wipe out foreign invaders in the body, helping to protect against infection," Dr. Li explained.

Even better, it may even have the potential to lower the risk of cancer. According to Tracey Brigman (via INSIDER), a food and nutrition expert at the University of Georgia, "[Garlic is] also a good source of phytochemicals, which help to provide protection from cell damage, lowering your risk for certain cancers." 

But there's a catch! Garlic is most potent when in raw form. And there is such a thing as too much garlic. As Lutzi told Well+Good, the overconsumption of garlic could lead to "gastrointestinal burning or irritation, heartburn, flatulence, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea." Worse still, "It can produce changes in intestinal flora." To stay safe, stick to no more than one or two raw cloves of garlic a day. And if you can't seem to swallow it whole, mix it up by crushing it and mixing it in salads or making your very own homemade garlic bread. Yum!