By Josh Miller

As a personal trainer and prep coach, I am constantly designing meal plans and learning which foods work best for each client. When it comes to choosing the very best foods for each client’s individual physique goals, this can be very difficult. This column is to help make it easier for you to find the best of the best.  Through research, trial and error, I have found these “power foods” to have a significant impact on building that perfect physique.

Each food was chosen because it contains incredible effects on the human body. I make no guarantees, but, eating these foods often will quite likely change your health and change your life.

Here are my choices in no particular order, along with the reasons why I’ve included them:

Eggs

Eggs are very affordable, great sources of protein. They contain a number of essential vitamins and minerals making them a nutrient-dense food.

Sweet Potatoes

A great source of Vitamin A (in the form of beta-caratine), sweet potatoes contain loads of fiber and potassium. They have more grams of natural sugars than regular potatoes but more overall nutrients and with fewer calories.

Broccoli

Broccoli is known to boost the immune system, build bones, fight birth defects, and to ward of degenerative eye diseases.

Walnuts

Walnuts help prevent cardiovascular disease.

They are one of the few plant-derived sources of  Omega-3 fatty acids.

They’re also high in plant sterols, which reduce cholesterol. Combine that with their arginine-powered ability to keep the insides of blood vessels smooth and you can understand their effect on heart health.

In addition to all that, they’re the nut with the highest anti-oxidant activity.

Olive Oil

Aside from making arterial walls more elastic, olive oil has many of the same benefits that walnuts do.

As far as bodybuilders and other athletes are concerned, adding olive oil to your meals is a necessity to balance fat intake.

Blueberries

Blueberries contain more antioxidants than any other known fruit or vegetable. Just one serving contains more antioxidants as five servings of carrots, apples, broccoli, or squash. These high anti-oxidant levels  helps prevent cancer, cardiovascular disease, and degenerative eye diseases.

Spinach

Studies that show that the more spinach eaten, the lower the risk of almost every type of cancer.

Tomatoes

Tomatoes are on my list for one main reason, or rather, one main nutrient: lycopene. This member of the carotenoid family could be the silver bullet in preventing prostate cancer.

Consider the 1995 study that showed men who ate ten or more servings a week of tomatoes reduced their risk of prostate cancer by 35% and their risk of aggressive prostate cancer by 50 percent.

Turkey Breast

Turkey is practically the leanest piece of meat on the planet. It’s inexpensive and has a nice array of nutrients.

Yogurt

Yogurt contains probiotics which help your digestive system function properly. Gastrointestinal problems are likely at the root of a lot of health problems.

Yogurt that contains live active cultures of bacteria encourages the growth of “good” bacteria and hampers the growth of the “bad”.

Cottage Cheese

Cottage cheese is another excellent source of protein. What seperates this protein source from others is that cottage cheese is one of the top food sources of casein (a slow-digesting milk protein). The fact that is is digested slowly means that it provides a steady release of amino acids to rebuild and repair muscle fibers, and to help prevent muscle breakdown.

Josh Miller is a personal trainer and owner of Transformation Personal Training. He has a BS in exercise science. He can be reached at (859) 744-7050 or josh@TransformationPersonalTraining.com.