Most people realize that tomatoes are healthy for you and that they have a number of important substances in them that helps us stay away from cardiovascular disease, cancers, cataracts and other health concerns. We are finding that tomatoes contain so many vital nutrients and we are coming to realize how important it is to have tomatoes as part of a health diet.

When you eat tomatoes, it's the color in them that makes them so good for you. The color comes from lycopene which is also found to be an incredible antioxidant. Antioxidants block the effect of oxygen free radicals in the cells and therefore, block the damage they can do to cells that cause cancer in the right circumstances. This is why tomatoes appear to have cancer-fighting properties.

The amazing thing about lycopene is that it is about twice a good as many of the other antioxidants in foods. It has been found by research to be effective in preventing breast cancer, lung cancer and prostate cancer. Lycopene is effective against aging as well.

Finding the best tomatoes

When buying or picking tomatoes, make sure you pay attention to the fact that the tomatoes which are the best for you are those that are the reddest and the ripest. These are the kinds of tomatoes that score the highest amounts of lycopene as well as beta carotene, another healthful ingredient.

The good news is that, while tomatoes are good eaten without cooking them, they also have amazingly more effectiveness when cooked. As it turns out, lycopene is found in the cellular wall of tomatoes so that cooking a tomato with a bit of oil, such as olive oil, helps bring out the effectiveness of the lycopene. When you cook tomatoes with a bit of olive oil, the nutrient aspects of the tomato are absorbed more effectively.

It is always a good idea to pick the very best in fresh tomatoes but, with tomatoes, you don't need to purchase them fresh. Even tomatoes that have been shipped from relatively far away are still great choices and still contain a great deal of lycopene. In addition, you can buy canned tomato sauce or tomato paste or any form of tomato in a can and you'll still get the antioxidant benefit.

Source: http://www.squidoo.com/tomato-facts