12 Best Foods to Reduce Anxiety and Stress Naturally
Are you wondering:
What are some foods that can help reduce anxiety?
Are there specific nutrients or vitamins that can help relieve stress?
Can incorporating certain foods into my diet help control anxiety symptoms and manage stress levels?
Anxiety and stress are common issues that many people face on a daily basis.
The good news is that diet changes can positively impact your mental well-being. Whether you are dealing with an anxiety disorder, PTSD, panic, or general anxious feelings, incorporating specific foods into your diet can have a profound impact on reducing anxiety and stress naturally.
In this article, I'll give you the top 12 research-based foods for anxiety relief that I discovered while writing my book Feed Your Calm: Anti-Anxiety Anti-Stress Diet and Supplement Tips for Stress Resilience.
Foods that made my list range from something as simple as water, to ones that are likely already in your diet but may have some additional things to look for when you're grocery shopping, to ones you may not be that familiar with.
Note: This post is NOT intended as medical advice. It is always advised to seek input from personal medical professionals.
What Vitamins, Minerals, Antioxidants, and Other Nutrients Help Anxiety?
Your body needs things from you so that it can function at its optimum. It needs nutrients for millions of reactions that keep you going and help you deal with stress. It needs proteins, minerals, vitamins, healthy fats, other supportive nutrients, and good-for-you gut bacteria.
Here are the eight elements we are looking for in foods that feed your calm and relieve anxiety symptoms by supporting your body’s response to stress:
- Magnesium
- Zinc
- B vitamins
- Vitamin C
- Vitamin D
- Omega-3 fatty acids: Eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA)
- Protein amino acids (especially complete protein, tryptophan, and glycine)
- Probiotics
In this post, for each of my Best 12 Foods to Reduce Anxiety Naturally, I'll include which of the anti-anxiety nutrients are prevalent in the particular food and links to other posts that provide more details.
🟢➜ If you are looking for a quick overview of supplements for anxiety, check out my post: Best Natural Supplements for Anxiety.
What Foods Can Relieve Anxiety Symptoms?
Here’s my list of a dozen foods to feed your calm and enhance your brain function and mental health.
Stress resilience foods
(The foods are not listed in order of recommendation. They are listed in a way that let me group together types of foods: protein sources, vegetables, fruit, and so on.)
- Water
- Wild-caught salmon, sardines, and herring
- Oysters
- Pasture-raised eggs
- Pasture-raised poultry and meat
- Sprouted lentils and beans
- Cruciferous vegetables
- Sweet peppers
- Fermented foods
- Seaweed
- Berries and cherries
- Sprouted rice and quinoa
1. Drink Water to Help Anxiety
Giving your body a stress-fighting boost may be as simple as drinking more water.
Research has shown that even mild dehydration can cause many health issues, including negative changes in mood and energy, increased confusion and anxiety, and poorer sleep quality.
The answer to the question "How much water is enough to relieve anxiety?" varies with your activity level, heat exposure, and body size. A common guideline is the number of ounces that equals half your body weight measured in pounds.
Body weight in pounds divided by 2 = number of ounces water
For example: 150 lbs divided by 2 = 75 oz
Increasing your water intake is a simple change that might improve your ability to deal with stress and reduce your anxiety.
🟢➜ The research behind the anxiety-water connection, and Top 20 Hydrating Foods list: Can Simply Drinking More Water Relieve Anxiety & Boost Mood?
2. Wild-Caught Salmon, Sardines, and Herring
Salmon, sardines, and herring are relatively low in mercury, and are good to great sources of anti-anxiety nutrients, including the target omega-3 fats, magnesium, B vitamins, and protein amino acids. When wild-caught, they have Vitamin D3 — and they don't have the downsides of being raised in overcrowded conditions, which often require the use of antibiotics.
🟢➜ More details: Best Protein Foods for Anxiety: Meat, Fish, and Plant Sources
3. Oysters
Oysters are a good to great source of B vitamins, protein amino acids, and our targeted minerals and omega-3 fats. They have the bonuses of being very high in zinc and relatively low in mercury contamination.
One caveat: Oysters are so high in zinc that you should not overdo them.
🟢➜ For the details: Best Protein Foods for Anxiety: Meat, Fish, and Plant Sources
4. Pasture-Raised Eggs
Eating eggs provides complete protein and other essential nutrients for combating stress. However, some egg benefits vary drastically with how they are produced. The welfare of poultry and the quality of eggs are influenced by farming methods.
🟢➜ I was surprised to discover that I had been misinterpreting what the egg label "Cage-Free" meant. It's way worse than I thought. Find out what I found out so you can make educated decisions: Why Eat Pasture-Raised Eggs for Mental Health?
5. Poultry, Beef, Pork, and Other Meats
This category of foods includes poultry (chicken and turkey) and beef, pork, lamb, and wild game animals like elk and deer. Protein in these foods help your body have the fuel to get through the day — that boosts your ability to deal with stress. They also offer other nutrients that can improve stress resilience.
🟢➜ For the breakdown, including why chicken's dark meat has an anti-anxiety nutrient advantage over the white meat: Best Protein Foods for Anxiety: Meat, Fish, and Plant Sources
6. Sprouted Lentils and Beans
Legumes, such as lentils and beans, are a vegetable source of protein. For vegetarians and others, lentils and beans have magnesium, zinc, B vitamins, and amino acids.
Sprouting has many nutritional advantages, including that it:
- Reduces phytates and lectins that may interfere with the minerals actually being available for absorption
- Increases the B vitamins
🟢➜ More about these foods and sprouting: Best Protein Foods for Anxiety: Meat, Fish, and Plant Sources
7. Cruciferous Vegetables
Cruciferous vegetables include broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale, and arugula.
They are good to great sources of magnesium, B vitamins (except B12), and vitamin C. Additionally, the sulfur they contain provides a bonus nutrient for stress resilience.
🟢➜ I explain about the benefits of sulfur and what to watch out for when eating this family of vegetables in Best Vegetables for Stress and Anxiety: Cruciferous Veggies & Peppers
8. Sweet Peppers
Green, red, orange, and yellow bell peppers are good to great sources of vitamin C and B vitamins (except B12). And they have a bonus antioxidant: carotenoids.
🟢➜ For more on the benefits of carotenoids, and cooking tips for getting the most out of peppers' nutrients: Best Vegetables for Stress and Anxiety: Cruciferous Veggies & Peppers
9. Fermented Foods
Fermented foods — such as yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, and fermented pickles — are a great source of probiotic bacteria.
Recent research demonstrates that what's in your gut impacts your mood. The connection is known as the gut-brain axis. There is so much excitement around the mental health benefits of certain gut bacteria that they have been given the name psychobiotics.
🟢➜ Get the lowdown on how to incorporate these foods into your diet and what to look for to make sure what you're putting in your grocery cart provides the benefits: Fermented Foods for Anxiety: Gut Health and Mood Connection
10. Eating Seaweed May Reduce Your Anxiety and Boost Stress Resilience
Seaweed (aka sea vegetables) is a good to great source of magnesium, zinc, and B vitamins (except B12, though some types of seaweed might have B12, it is disputed whether it is an active form). It also has a bonus stress resilience nutrient: iodine.
🟢➜ For the benefits of iodine, and the in's and out's of seaweed, including how to get more in your diet and which seaweed to avoid, check out this post: Seaweed for Anxiety: Iodine, Minerals, and Stress Resilience
11. Berries and Cherries
There are many types of berries, including acai, strawberries, raspberries, cranberries, and elderberries.
Berries and cherries are good sources of magnesium, zinc, and vitamin C. And they have the added antioxidant bonus of anthocyanins.
Anthocyanins are flavonoids associated with red, blue, and purple/black fruits and vegetables. They fight oxidative stress, are anti-inflammatory, and protect nerve cells. A study with stressed mice showed that anthocyanins helped mitigate stress by improving dopamine levels and reducing oxidative stress in brain tissue.
12. Sprouted Rice and Quinoa: Anti-Anxiety Foods
Quinoa is used similarly to rice in meal planning, but it actually is a seed, not a grain. It has a complete protein set of all 9 essential amino acids.
Sprouted brown rice has some amino acids, but is not a complete protein on its own. It can be combined with lentils and beans to create a complete protein meal.
Rice and quinoa are good to great sources of magnesium, zinc, and B vitamins.
Sprouting (aka germinating) rice and quinoa:
- increases their vitamins and minerals, including magnesium and zinc, and
- diminishes antinutrient phytates that could interfere with mineral absorption.
🟢➜ For the research behind the benefits of sprouting and more helpful info: Best Protein Foods for Anxiety: Meat, Fish, and Plant Sources
Feed Your Calm: More Diet Tips to Help You Deal Better With Stress
It took me four years to research and write my book Feed Your Calm: Anti-Anxiety Anti-Stress Diet and Supplement Tips for Stress Resilience because I wanted everything in it to be research-based.
Before studying to become a counselor, I was a medical lab technologist. That medical background, combined with my psychology training, was put to great use in assessing the quality of various research papers on physical approaches to anxiety relief. It helped me sort out good, solid research from weaker, potentially misleading studies.
Check out the resulting book and see how you can benefit from my research.
- Ann Silvers
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