What Kind of Food Is Brain Food?

Brain food improves your brain function, but often times foods that are healthy for your brain can cause problems for your heart. Creating a balance in the types of food you ingest may be the answer to optimal brain and body function.

Identification

• Eating the right kinds of fats improves your brain's performance. Intellectual performance relies heavily on omega-3 fatty acids, commonly found in fish. B vitamins, sugars and carbohydrates are also important for brain function.

Misconceptions

• Beware of certain oils believed to be healthy for the heart, because they can be especially bad for the brain. A proper balance is required of both omega-3s and omega-6s (found often in canola and walnut oil).

Effects

• Hara Estroff Marano, editor at large for Psychology Today, writes that brain food can "help you concentrate, tune sensorimotor skills, keep you motivated, magnify memory, speed reaction times, defuse stress, perhaps even prevent brain aging."

Expert Insight

• Dr. Michael Green, a teaching professor at the School of Life and Health Sciences at Aston University in England, believes that eating more frequent but smaller meals keeps the brain working at its best. The brain functions best on 25 mg of glucose running through its system. This is about the amount found in a banana.

Fun Fact

• According to Psychology Today, eggs, rich in choline (a fat-like B vitamin), enhance memory and reaction time, and also significantly minimize fatigue.