Welcome to Dishing Up Nutrition's Ask a Nutritionist podcast brought to you by nutritional weight and wellness.

My name is Leah Kleinshrode. I'm a registered and licensed dietitian and your host for the show today.

On today's show, I'm answering a question that came in from one of our Dishing Up Nutrition Facebook page users.

And so in case you didn't know, we have a special page on Facebook. It's called Dishing Up Nutrition,

and you can request to become a member of this group and it's a great place to leave questions

or a suggestion that you have that you would like us to talk about.

So you just go on Facebook and search for the Dishing Up Nutrition Facebook group and we'd love to

have you on there.

So this person's question is, I was listening to your podcast and learned that omega-3s in ground flax aren't as easily absorbed by the body.

What are other health benefits of consuming flaxene?

So that's an awesome question.

I mean, and I'll talk about this in a second. I mean, most of us

think about flax as being high in omega-3. So if we're not quite getting the benefits of the

omega-3s from flax, then what's the point of eating flax? So let me back it up for just a minute,

and we'll address the omega-3 issue just in case some listeners haven't

heard of that before. So like I said, flax is touted as being high in omega-3s and it is a big

reason why a lot of people make it a point to eat flax seed or to take flaxseed oil.

And you'll hear some of the same thing about omega-3s in some other nuts and

seeds, so things like chia seeds, hemp seeds, walnuts, and things like that. Flax is high in the

plant form of omega-3s, which is a short chain fatty acid called alpha linolinic acid.

So I'm going to call it ALA for short from here on out so that I don't have to have

that mouth full every time.

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