Medical Benefits Of Cranberries

Since I'm not dating anyone right now, I'll fight with you, Sylvia

Out of all fruits, cranberries have one of the lowest amounts of sugar. In every cup of cranberries, there is only 4g of sugar. This compares to raspberries, blackberries, and strawberries, which have 5, 7, and 7 grams of sugar per cup, respectively. Other similar fruits such as cherries and grapes, have 18 and 15 grams of sugar per cup, respectively.

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I made homemade cranberry sauce for a Thanksgiving meal years ago. My niece was 4 years old at the time. I guess she thought she was eating jam, and ate most of it. I later made a batch just for her. (I probably didn't do her any favors with all that sugar.)

I've yet to have a variance on a c. sauce recipe that I did not like (cinnamon, cloves, orange rind, ginger root.)

 

Do you make sure all of the berries pop so you don't get a tart surprise? As I mentioned, I use a potato masher.

 

*shudders*

 

Let's all go down a rabbit hole...

I was looking for cranberry supplements online because I try to keep a supply of supplements beyond my immediate needs, and Walmart only had a couple of bottles of the Spring Valley on hand. CVS has their house brand on sale, and when I looked at the ingredients of both I discovered this:

-Spring Valley is from vaccinium oxycoccos
-CVS house brand is from vaccinium macrocarpon

Being the inquisitive sort, I found an NIH study on 3 different cranberry species in their Plant Medicine category:

Comparisons of large (Vaccinium macrocarpon Ait.) and small (Vaccinium oxycoccos L., Vaccinium vitis-idaea L.) cranberry in British Columbia by phytochemical determination, antioxidant potential, and metabolomic profiling with chemometric analysis

Abstract
Full Text

This study assessed the antioxidant [cancer prevention] potential, not the urinary tract benefit.
As you're reading, keep in mind that anthocyanins are the pigments that give the berries their color, and that contain antioxidents.

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Results Section Extract (bolding was added by me)

While the phytochemical composition of common cranberry (V. macrocarpon) has been relatively extensively studied, there have been very few studies of the native BC Vaccinium spp. including V. oxycoccos and V. vitis-idaea. Our objective was to develop a qualitative and quantitative understanding of the phytochemical consistency and diversity among the wild and cultivated species of Vaccinium. To investigate the potential for the berries of the Vaccinium spp. to withstand environmental exposures that generate radical oxygen species, known metabolites with strong antioxidant potential were determined ([Fig. 2]), including anthocyanins, vitamin C (ascorbic acid), melatonin, and serotonin. V. macrocarpon had the highest total anthocyanin content, and all 5 of the major anthocyanins common to cranberry were quantified in the berries ([Fig. 2 A]), with peonidin-3-O-galactoside present at significantly greater concentrations than other anthocyanins. The Vaccinium oxycoccos fruit also contained all 5 of the major anthocyanins but the ratio of glycosylated peonidins to cyanidins was about 20 : 80, as compared to 60 : 40 in V. macrocarpon ([Fig. 3]). The V. vitis-idaea berries contained measurable amounts of only the glycosylated cyanidin anthocyanins and did not contain measurable amounts of glycosylated peonidins ([Fig. 2 A]). Interestingly, there was a strong negative correlation (r = − 0.92) between the anthocyanin content and the relative antioxidant potential ([Fig. 2 A, D]).

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The Discussion section voices surprise that the anthocyanin content and the relative antioxidant potential are negatively correlated in this study, because that finding contradicts prior studies. This study concluded that the ascorbic acid [Vit C] levels were more indicative of the antioxident potential than anthocyanins were. They hypothesized that the conflict could be because (1) the total anthocyanin contents include antioxidant phytochemicals not detected by their targeted analysis of specific anthocyanins or (2) specific physiological mechanisms affected by individual dietary antioxidants may not be elucidated in a measure of the total antioxidant potential. They also acknowledged that some of the berries for the study were from cultivated plants while others were obtained from plants in the wild, which may have made a difference in their phytochemical content.

 

I was online looking at beefing up my inventory because my Walmart had limited inventory of the Spring Valley extract I like, and I discovered that of the (4) Spring Valley cranberry extracts they carry in the store, (3) are Vaccinium macrocarpon (as are the CVS capsules that I bought.) The version I happened to grab is the only Vaccinium oxycoccos. The one other Spring Valley cranberry extract on Walmart's website doesn't even mention the species...it only says "Fruit Extract."

Vaccinium macrocarpon is by far the prevalent ingredient. I did stumble upon one other brand made from Vaccinium oxycoccos...but there are tons of brands out there I did not look at, and "Species" is not a searchable term.

I don't know if all this really means anything, but I thought it was kind of odd. And it does make me wonder how accurate any of those Spring Valley labels are.

Had I grabbed any of the other 3 options, this subject would not even be on my radar screen.