 One of the reasons some studies haven't shown more impressive results tying disease reduction to the quantity of fruit and vegetable consumption may be because of the quality of fruit and vegetable consumption. People are more likely to eat bananas than blueberries, more likely to eat cucumbers instead of kale. Friday is also important, though. If in one of these studies you ate a whole cantaloupe, you would be recorded getting eight servings of fruits and vegetables. One head of iceberg lettuce makes 10 cups. We know that whole foods are better than eating individual nutrients. For example, a carrot is better than a beta-carotene pill because of what's called nutrient synergy, where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, as many of the nutrients interact, work together, compliment one another. But what about synergy between foods? Check this out. I've talked about the wonders of the spice turmeric, but the key component of turmeric has very poor bioavailability. Just a tiny bit gets into our bloodstream after eating a nice curry. Unless we add some black pepper. The phytonutrient in black pepper boosts the level of the turmeric phytonutrient 2,000%. That's why dietary diversity is so important. Not only may the variety of fruit and vegetable consumption decrease disease risk independent from quantity of consumption, sometimes variety may even be more important. Check this out. No difference in inflammation at C-reactive protein levels between those eating six servings of vegetables a day and those eating two servings, but those eating the more variety, even if they didn't necessarily eat greater overall quantities, had significantly less inflammation. This supports the American Heart Association's latest dietary guidelines, which for the first time added a recommendation for also eating a variety of fruits and vegetables.