Milk and cookies, chicken noodle soup, mashed potatoes with gravy—they’re called comfort foods because they make you feel better, at least emotionally. But can food really ease pain? Researchers are chewing on the subject, and their findings may someday make for a tasty prescription. “We’re not at the point where you’re going to go into a physician’s office and be prescribed tofu for your pain,” says Jill Tall, PhD, a professor at Youngstown State University in Ohio, who has studied how food helps relieve discomfort. “But I do believe that as an adjunct to traditional therapies, there are some possibilities.”
Some promising edible antidotes: Cherries Anthocyanins, which give tart
cherries their deep red color, have antiinflammatory properties similar to those in aspirin, says Muraleedharan Nair, PhD, a food-safety researcher at Michigan State University. The benefit hasn’t yet been studied in humans, so we don’t know the optimal doses, but barring any health problems, such as diabetes or acid indigestion, why not pick a few berries this summer? (Raspberries and, to a lesser extent, strawberries also contain pain-fighting anthocyanins.)