Eat Your Fruits & Veggies, Not Just the Concentrates

I've been asked over & over again about the utility of various fruit & vegetable concentrates and other nutritional supplements.  They're all the rage, especially amongst multi-level marketers, being promoted as giving you all the benefits of multiple servings of fruits & vegetables in the convenience of a capsule or two.

In a recent randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled crossover trial of 64 adults w/metabolic syndrome randomized to 8 week sequences of the fruit & vegetable concentrates +/- added berry powders, no significant difference was noted in endothelial function, glucose, insulin, lipids & weight compared to placebo.  Granted, 8-16 weeks of any supplement might not be enough time to demonstrate any improvement but given the lack of fiber in these capsules and given a recent study associating more fiber with lower mortality, I'm going to stick with the real thing and eat my fruits & vegetables as is, whether cooked, canned, frozen or fresh, but not processed into capsules & powders.