12 Foods to Lower Blood Pressure

Plenty of fruits, vegetables, and the occasional square of chocolate can all help to keep you and your heart much happier and lower your blood pressure.

Here are 12 of our suggestions for blood pressure-lowering foods.

1. Peppers

Stuff a pepper for your dinner and you’ll increase your vitamin C intake even more than with citrus fruits. Packed with antioxidants these will help boost your cardio health.

2. Apricots

Slash your blood pressure and lower your risk of chronic disease by sprinkling dried apricots on your breakfast or by eating as a healthy snack.

Try adding to a smoothie and these beta-carotene-loaded are guaranteed to lead to healthier blood pressure.

3. Dark chocolate

You’ll be delighted to hear that chocolate is not off limits when it comes to boosting your heart health. Flavonoids, a type of plant-based pigment, have been linked to reductions in blood pressure, and you can find plenty of them in dark chocolate.

4. Mangoes

A great source of beta-carotene and fibre, mangoes are a great fruit to choose to help lower your blood pressure.

5. Salmon

Oily fish is beneficial for many reasons – loaded with healthy Omega-3 fatty acids it can boost brain power, and also lower your risk of heart disease.

6. Apples

Apples contain a very effective antihypertensive called quercetin, which has been shown to lower blood pressure. So it’s true what they say – an apple a day…!

7. Carrots

As well as helping you to see in the dark (!) carrots are great at lowering blood pressure due to all that beta-carotene goodness.

8. Eggs

Recent research has knocked former ideas about eggs into touch, and now we are realising their potential as protein rich food can help you lower your blood pressure naturally.

9. Cherries

Reductions is systolic blood pressure have recently been linked to the resveratrol content of cherries. Not only that, but they’re packed with fibre, quercetin and Vitamin C.

10. Spinach

Be more Popeye and eat the green stuff daily for an ultimate blood pressure-lowering dose. Beta-carotene and vitamin C all help, as well as it being a super-easy veg to add to pretty much anything.

11. Tomatoes

Tomatoes contain lycopene, which can significantly lower your blood pressure. Try and avoid the ketchup versions, but stick to all-natural sauces or fresh tomatoes.

12. Blueberries

Long hailed as a superfood, blueberries are a low-glycemic, high fibre fruit packed with resveratrol which can help significantly boost heart-health.