In 2025, a team of food scientists in America proved that healthy eating can be a real pain in the jaw.
Researchers at the University of Missouri found that kale – the so-called Superman of ‘superfoods’ – doesn’t always deliver the waterfall of nutrients we expect when we add it to our plates.
Kale is a bountiful source of carotenoids, vitamins and other chemicals. These micronutrients help our immune system and lower our risk of some diseases, including diabetes and cancer. But our bodies have a hard time absorbing them all.
“The key nutrients in kale, especially carotenoids, are fat-soluble,” says Prof Ruojie (Vanessa) Zhang, one of the researchers involved in the study.
“That means they don’t dissolve well in the watery environment of the gastrointestinal tract when kale is eaten on its own, which greatly limits how much our bodies can absorb.”
