Bhubaneswar: If pickles complete your definition of a perfect plate of meal, but you resist eating them fearing they might not be healthy, here’s good news.

Pickles don’t just tickle your taste buds with their crunchy and tangy flavour. They also have quite some health benefits when consumed with meal, but, of course in little proportion.  That’s why they are served not just with meals, but also with sandwiches, burgers and even barbeque.

Here are five reasons why you should add pickles to your meals:

  • Helps with digestion

Pickles are naturally fermented products, rich in probiotics. That makes them ideal for a person’s gut health.  They also help with morning sickness and nausea.

  • Checks blood sugar

Pickles with vinegar-based brine are known to help control blood sugar levels thus, checking intense hunger in a person. A check on blood sugar results in managing risks of diabetes in a person.

  • May ease muscle cramps

A study from the year 2010 suggested that pickle juice works wonders in healing muscle cramps. It is suggested to work better than water in relieving the cramp.

  • Fight diseases

Pickles like those prepared from cucumbers are high in antioxidants called beta-carotene.  Studies have shown that these compounds help lower a person’s chances of death by cancer, cardiovascular diseases and respiratory diseases.

  • Restores electrolyte balance

Electrolytes are minerals in the blood, urine tissues and other human body fluids that have an electric charge and help balance the body’s water and pH level.  They also play an active role in moving nutrients into the cells and wastes, out of the cells. The electrolyte balance in people fluctuates with changes in the amount of water in their bodies.  Pickles that are rich in sodium content help restore a person’s electrolyte levels.

However, people with elevated blood pressure levels should refrain from consuming pickles as a generous amount of salt is added for their preservation.