What we are referring to, when properly formulated, should be thought of more as a liquid whole food than a fruit juice.

Any 'fruit juice' that you can hold up to the light and see through with perfect consistency throughout should be the first indication that you are not looking at anything remotely close to a whole 'live' fruit blend.

Besides convenience, nutrients, in liquid form of the whole fruit, are quickly and efficiently absorbed in your body.  Studies show that nutrients in high quality fruit blends can have well over 90% absorption rate in the body.  This is considerably higher than any other format.

redefining the superfood - the açaí berry

When looking at antioxidant and nutrient density, clearly all fruits are not created equal.  One of the fastest growing trends today is the deserving focal point of this months issue - the açaí berry.

It has rapidly created a sensational wave across the US and internationally.  It has the media raving from Oprah Winfrey highlighting it as #1 on three separate episodes, Dr. Perricone, Dr. Oz, The Doctors’ Show, The Wall Street Journal, The Rachael Ray Show, all the major news networks, Vogue magazine, Woman’s World and scores of others.  Celebrities like Brad Pitt, Denise Richards and Owen Wilson swear by it.  Scores of professional athletes credit it with increasing their peak performance and stamina.  Science has revealed it to be over ten times more effective than anything ever tested and its numbers of won-over proponents doubles every few months.

As you will discover in the remainder of this feature issue, for once science is showing there is  more actual substance than the wave of hype would even dictate.  Seeing the actual data in these pages, such as the USDA data indicating that açaí's antioxidant activity is over ten times that of any other food ever tested, one would wonder why we have not heard of it until the last 5 or 6 years.

The açaí berry only grows wild atop 60-75 foot high palms in the heart of rainforest in the Amazon River basin.  Until recently the transportation and refrigeration infrastructures were simply not in place to extract this Crown Jewel of the Amazon for export.  Among the açaí berry's unique properties is the fact that is degrades very rapidly, once harvested.  If not properly processed, the berry is essentially useless in twenty-four hours - nearly deplete of any nutritional value.

The other sections and the available CD-ROMs go into detail on the amazing health-giving attributes of the açaí berry and what to look for.

Here we want to highlight what the açaí is most noted for - its extraordinary antioxidant properties that are well beyond any other fruit, vegetable or nut.

Knowing that this chain reaction oxidation process of free radicals is the root to nearly every disease and condition popular today, the açaí berry is especially compelling.

The following table, from this issue's Science Corner and the Super-Açaí Package, gives some idea of just how excited science has become since research of açaí began going public.

The ORAC capacity is basically a measure of the antioxidant activity of a food.  Because of its direct correlation, its also been called 'anti-aging points'.



With whole fruit-based antioxidants being the #1 defense in disease prevention, we see that a whole food blend, high in carefully processed açaí (see Science Corner) is a powerful solution to the reasons over 95% are in a continuous aging, oxidative stress stage at the cellular level.
 

While most habits, like regular exercise, take discipline and are not necessarily looked forward to during the first weeks the habit is being developed, drinking an açaí juice blend is an easy habit to develop when it is an experience you actually look forward to everyday!
 

While drinking a quality açaí fruit blend a couple of times a day July be an easy, enjoyable and very effective habit to develop, in today's economic environment, the cost of this solution becomes a very real consideration.
 

Being sensitive to this, and rather curious as well, a small comparison was conducted to compare costs of using this simple solution to the traditional way of, that over 95% are not doing - buying, preparing and eating sufficient servings of quality fruit on a daily basis.