The next time you feel like eating eggs, you might want to consider serving them with colourful vegetables such as carrots, tomatoes and kale.

New research suggests the eggs can help your body absorb the carotenoids in the veggies – it’s the pigment that gives them their colour. Because the carotenoids act as antioxidants – protecting the body’s cells from free radicals that can break down cells – they may reduce the risk of certain cancers and eye disease.

Researchers served subjects a salad rich in carotenoids, with baby spinach, romaine lettuce and goji berries. One group was served the salad with one and a half scrambed eggs. A second group’s salad was served with three scrambled eggs. A third was served with no eggs.

Using blood tests, researchers found that subjects who ate the most eggs with their salads absorbed three-to-nine more times the carotenoids than the other two groups.

Building a better salad
Wayne Campbell, a professor of nutrition science at Purdue University in Lafayette, Indiana, and the lead researchers, said in a statement that one way to counter the trend of North Americans not eating enough vegetables is to find ways to increase the nutritional benefits of the ones they do eat.

Given other recent studies which suggest concerns over the cholesterol in eggs have been overstated, his current work is timely.

Dr. Campbell has been working on engineering a better salad for a few years now. His previous work has found that fats in salad dressings play a similar role to eggs.

Read on to learn about 5 common antioxidant-rich foods and for ideas on how to make healthy salads at home.