Hemp Seeds Are Nutritious Superfood

Though it may be just a small seed, hemp offers huge nutritional content. Hemp seeds are naturally a fantastic protein source: they contain all of the essential amino acids, are highly digestible, and are one of the highest sources of complete protein of all plant-based foods.

Hemp is nothing to be afraid of. It’s not marijuana and has no drug value. In fact, hemp contains 0.00% THC. Consumption of any hemp foods will never cause failure on any type of drug test. For more information visit TestPledge.com

Hemp also has a very well-balanced ratio of essential fatty acids (EFAs) – Omega 3, 6, and 9 – which are excellent for cardiovascular health and promote a strong immune system (among many other benefits). A great source of dietary fiber, magnesium, iron, zinc, and potassium, hemp is a true superseed.

Hemp is one of the earliest known plants to be cultivated by humans, with a recorded history of over 12,000 years, and has since been grown all around the world for food. An immensely sustainable crop, this hearty plant can be utilized for many different purposes: including using its fiber for textiles and paper, its oil for vehicle fuel and human health, and its seeds for nutrition and vitality. Just like our earliest ancestors understood, hemp’s nutritional benefits are highly renowned, and the hemp seed legacy continues as an ideal source of fuel for human health and energy.

Nutrient-Dense Nut

A soft nut, shelled hemp tastes reminiscent of a sunflower seed, with a distinctive richness. Enjoy hemp seeds by themselves, or try them sprinkled on just about anything: including granola or yogurt, salads, soups, dips, or baked into recipes. Milled hemp protein has a mild taste, which becomes a background flavor when combined with other ingredients. Just a spoonful or two of this powder is the perfect protein boost when added to any smoothie, or mixed into flour for baking.

Hemp seeds are a superior vegetarian source of protein. They contain 25 percent protein content, second only to soy among plant foods. However, soy has very high amounts of a substance calledphytic acid, an anti-nutrient that prevents your body from absorbing certain minerals. Hemp seeds don’t contain phytic acid and are highly digestible, giving them an advantage over soy.

Approximately 44% of the weight of hempseed is healthy edible oils, containing about 80% essential fatty acids (EFAs). Hempseeds amino acid profile is close to “complete” when compared to more common sources of proteins such as meat, milk, eggs and soy. The proportions of linoleic acid and alpha-linolenic acid in one tablespoon (15 ml) per day of hemp oil easily provides human daily requirements for EFAs. Unlike flaxseed oil, hemp oil can be used continuously without developing a deficiency or other imbalance of EFAs. This has been demonstrated in a clinical study, where the daily ingestion of flaxseed oil decreased the endogenous production of GLA.

Essential Fatty Acids (EFAs)

There are 45 nutrients that humans can’t live without, and which their bodies cannot manufacture; 21 minerals, 13 vitamins, eight amino acids and two Essential fatty acids. No single food has them all, but Hemp seed has all eight amino acids and the oil pressed from the hemp seed is one of the best known sources of the two Essential Fatty Acids (EFA’s) we can’t live without; Omega 3 AIpha-Linolenic Acid and Omega 6 Liholeic Acid, and is more than 90 per cent unsaturated.

EFA’s are as vital to human life as vitamins and minerals. Nutritionists refer to these polyunsaturates as ‘Vitamin K ‘ and commonly recommend EFA’s for lowering blood pressure, cholesterol and triglyeride levels. They also play an important role in reducing heart disease and stroke risk. They improve cell growth, organ function, vitality, mental state, and enhance thought processes with the transportation of oxygen, electrons and energy throughout our bodies.

Linseed or ‘flax’ oil has previously been seen as a good source, containing both omega-3 and omega-6 fats. However, nutritionists believe the best ratio is three times as much omega-6 as omega-3, and the only oil containing that is hemp.

Hemp seed oil is also a source of vitamins A and E which are powerful antioxidants (anti toxin/free radicals).

The protein in hemp seed is very similar to the protein in human blood plasma. It is therefore easy to digest. This is good news for those who have problems with cows milk and or soya beans. Hemp seed does not contain the anti-nutrient trypsin inhibitors found in soya milk. Hemp Milk recipe.

Hemp seeds can be eaten raw, ground into a meal, sprouted, made into hemp milk (akin to soy milk), prepared as tea, and used in baking. The fresh leaves can also be eaten in salads. Products include cereals, frozen waffles, hemp tofu, and nut butters. A few companies produce value added hemp seed items that include the seed oils, whole hemp grain (which is sterilized by law in the United States, where they import it from China and Canada), dehulled hemp seed (the whole seed without the mineral rich outer shell), hemp flour, hemp cake (a by-product of pressing the seed for oil) and hemp protein powder. Hemp is also used in some organic cereals, for non-dairy milk somewhat similar to soy and nut milks, and for non-dairy hemp “ice cream.”

IMPORTANT: Hemp seed oil should not be heated because this dramatically reduces its beneficial effects.

Store Hemp Seeds in a dark glass container sealed in a refrigerator.

Building Blocks Of Life And Immunity

There are eight amino acids the human body cannot make and two more the body cannot make in sufficient quantity, so they are essential to life. A diet without any one of them will eventually cause disease and death. These essential amino acids, along with eleven others the body can make from them, are chained together in accordance to genetic guidelines, via RNA formats from DNA blueprints, into structural proteins that give body to life, and into enzymes (globular proteins) that carry out the mechanics of living.

Hemp is not unique in having all the essential amino acids in its embryonic seed. Flax seeds also contain all the essential amino acids as do many other seeds in the plant kingdom. What is unique about hemp seed protein is that 65% of it is globulin edistin. That is the highest in the plant kingdom.

Globulins are one of seven classes of simple proteins. Simple proteins are constructed from amino acids and contain no non-protein substances. Globulins are in seeds and animal blood. Edistins are found in seeds; serum globulin is in blood. Edistins are plant globulins. And globulins along with albumins are classified as globular proteins. All enzymes, antibodies, many hormones, hemoglobin and fibrogin (the body converts fibrogin into non-soluble, fibrin, a blood clotting agent) are globular proteins. They carry out the main work of living

During digestion proteins in food are broken down into amino acids. The amino acids are then taken into the body and reassembled into human proteins according to need and the availability of the amino acids necessary to make specific proteins.

The body needs the necessary kinds of amino acids in sufficient quantity in order to make proteins such as the globulins. Proper quantities of the right kinds may not be available to the body much of the time. So even though the body has enough essential amino acids available to prevent deficiency diseases, it may not have enough to build quantities of immunoglobulins necessary for the immune system to repel infection.

The best way to insure the body has enough amino acid material to make the globulins is to eat foods high in globulin proteins. Since hemp seed protein is 65% globulin edistin, and also includes quantities of albumin, its protein is readily available in a form quite similar to that found in blood plasma. Eating hemp seeds gives the body all the essential amino acids required to maintain health, and provides the necessary kinds and amounts of amino acids the body needs to make human serum albumin and serum globulins like the immune enhancing gamma globulins. Eating hemp seeds could aid, if not heal, people suffering from immune deficiency diseases. This conclusion is supported by the fact that hemp seed was used to treat nutritional deficiencies brought on by tuberculosis, a severe nutrition blocking disease that causes the body to waste away. [Czechoslovakia Tubercular Nutritional Study, 1955]

Antibodies are globulin proteins programmed to destroy antigens (any substance eliciting a response from lymphocytes: bacteria, viruses, toxins, living and dead tissue, internal debris, etc.). Circulating in blood plasma like mines floating in a harbor antibodies await contact with the enemy, then initiate a cascade of corrosive enzymes that bore holes in the antigen surface causing it to break apart.

Antibodies are custom designed to neutralize or disintegrate one specific type of antigen. White blood cells called B cell lymphocytes seek out and lock-on to antigenic proteins or sugars on the invader’s surface. The B cell then uses that lock and key pattern to make antibodies tailored to that antigen only. It also will make clones of itself called plasma cells. Most of the clones begin producing antibodies for that antigen. Others become memory cells which may spend years wandering through the blood stream looking for that specific antigen. If the body is exposed to it again the memory cells lock-on to one and begin producing plasma cell clones and a flood of antibodies that wipe out the invader. One lymphocyte can divide into hundreds of plasma cells in a few days. A mature plasma cell can make about 2000 antibodies every second for the few days it lives. This is how the body acquires immunity.

The body’s ability to resist and recover from illness depends upon how rapidly it can produce massive amounts of antibodies to fend off the initial attack. If the globulin protein starting material is in short supply the army of antibodies may be too small to prevent the symptoms of sickness from setting in.

Hemp seed is the premier plant-seed provider of globulin starting material — the highest in the plant kingdom. Eating hemp seeds will insure the immune system has the reservoir of immunoglobulin resources needed to make disease destroying antibodies.