We hope you’ve been enjoying our deep-dives on all of the healing ingredients in Broth Masters.
Today, we’re talking onions: a tasty, timeless vegetable with exceptional medicinal and healing properties.
Trust us: any tears from the onions in our broth will be joyful ones ;)
Here’s a closer look at why we use them in every single batch.
We have ALWAYS known this here at Broth Masters, which is why we use not only the onion but all the peels in our broth.
We made this decision because of numerous reputable studies backing up the clear benefits.
Like garlic, onion peels have been used medicinally for millenia because of their antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, wound-healing, and immune-boosting properties.
A medical review published in the journal Pharmaceutical Biology in 2021, for instance, stated that: “The effect of onion and its constituents” (“its constituents” meaning the peel) showed “therapeutic value in treatment of various diseases associated with oxidative stress, inflammation, and immune-dysregulation.”
Similarly, a 2014 study in Nutrition & Metabolism found that onion peel extracts were so high in a special antioxidant phenol called quercetin (which we’ll say more about soon) that they improved hyperglycemia and insulin resistance in lab animals.
This makes sense, because most of the onion’s quercetin content is in the peel, NOT the flesh!
A study in Free Radical Research found that onion peel extract reduced inflammation by suppressing the production of inflammatory markers throughout the body.
And another study in Food Processing & Technology from 2015 found that onions “showed good antimicrobial properties against Staphylococcus aureus” which is known to be one of the most important bacteria that cause disease in humans.
Findings like these (and more that we’ll get into below) are why we include onions in Broth Masters.
So many of us feel less than our best because of inflammatory diets or stressful modern lifestyles and onions do a lot to clear inflammation up!
It’s not just general inflammation that onions fight, though –– if you’re concerned about heart disease, high blood pressure, colon cancer, or osteoporosis then consider the following.
That’s the key takeaway from a study published in the Journal of Nutrition & Metabolism in 2011.
First, researchers fed lab animals fructose (sugar) for 14 weeks, leading to oxidative stress and inflamed blood vessels.
For the final 8 weeks, some of those animals were given water with garlic and onion extracts mixed in –– and the results were remarkable.
The researchers stated: “Garlic and onion administration to F animals reduced oxidative stress, increased eNOS activity, and also attenuated VCAM-1 expression. These results provide new evidence showing the anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effect of these vegetables.”
If you didn’t know, “eNOS activity” means heart endothelial nitric oxide synthase –– which promotes strong blood flow. More is better, and it went up in this study.
And when the researchers say that garlic and onions “attenuated VCAM-1 expression”, they mean that it reduced blood vessel inflammation.
Since excess sugar consumption is a chief cause of inflammation in humans, these results are really promising!
But it’s far from the only example of onions supporting the body’s natural healing ability.
The main antioxidant in onions, as we mentioned earlier, is a phenol called quercetin –– and there’s evidence linking it to lower risk of heart disease.
A 2006 pilot study in the British Journal of Nutrition split human participants into two groups.
The first group ate onion soup with a low amount (5 milligrams) of quercetin. And the second group ate onion soup with a high amount (69 milligrams.)
Next, the researchers took blood samples from all of the participants after finishing their soup.
What they discovered was that “collagen-stimulated platelet aggregation was inhibited” in those who ate the soup with more quercetin.
That’s a huge finding, because “platelet aggregation” is when your blood cells start clumping together around injured blood vessel tissue –– which is a precursor to heart disease.
This study shows that consuming high amounts of quercetin (from onions) directly inhibits this process!
The researchers concluded: “Those who preferentially consume high amounts of quercetin-containing foods have a reduced risk of thrombosis and cardiovascular disease risk.”
Also, if you’re wondering, the serving size of onion soup in the study was 20 ounces. A pouch of Broth Masters has 16 ounces of bone broth.
For this 2015 study, researchers split 70 overweight-to-obese patients with pre-hypertension and stage 1 hypertension into two groups.
The first group received 162 milligrams per day of quercetin from onion peel extract for six weeks. The second group received a placebo with no quercetin.
Researchers took the ambulatory blood pressure from all 70 participants before and after the experiment.
After the six weeks were up, they found that quercetin had “decreased 24 hour systolic blood pressure” and “significantly decreased day-time and night-time systolic blood pressure” in the hypertensive patients.
The studies above are just a taste (pun intended) of the healing that onions have to offer.
A few more findings that are worth your attention:
- A 2015 research paper in Genes & Nutrition reported that “quercetin-rich red onion extract” lowers blood sugar in humans.
- A 2019 study in the Asia-Pacific Journal of Clinical Oncology found that eating allium vegetables (like garlic and onion) can reduce the incidence of colorectal cancer by up to 79%.
- A 2020 study in the Journal of Functional Foods states that the amount of quercetin accumulated in your body by eating onions over time amplifies the antioxidant effects.
One especially fascinating study came from the University of Bern in Switzerland, where researchers discovered that a peptide in onions called GPCS reduced bone loss in animals that ate dried onion flakes –– intriguing results for the fight against osteoporosis.
Together with the garlic that we use in Broth Masters, onions and their peels may have a lot to do with healing that our customers report.
We simmer them “slow and low” gently coaxing the quercetin and other nutritional compounds into the broth.
If you haven’t tried us before, treat yourself today!
Warmly,
-Dorothy & Laya