¹Department of Nutrition, Faculty of Medicine, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

Correspondence: Dr E Bere, Department of Nutrition, Faculty of Medicine, University of Oslo, Box 1046 Blindern, Oslo 0316, Norway. E-mail: e.t.bere@medisin.uio.no

Received 11 January 2006; Revised 16 May 2006; Accepted 8 June 2006; Published online 9 August 2006.

Abstract

It has been reported that some wild green vegetables are good sources of -linolenic acid (ALA, an essential omega-3 fatty acid). Using available data from the Norwegian food composition table, the present study shows that three common Nordic berries (blueberry, cloudberry and cowberry) on average contain 0.7 g of fat (=21% of total energy) and 0.25 g ALA (=36% of total fat) per 100 g, which is quite similar to what has been reported for the ALA-rich wild green vegetables. In addition, this study shows that a hypothetical replacement of 5% of Norwegian 8th grade girls' diet, with a similar energy amount of wild berries, would significantly improve the diet – also improve intake of nutrients not commonly associated with berries.