• Combining certain foods together can help your body absorb more nutrients.
• A dietitian shared the food pairings you need to know if you want to reap the benefits.
• Try eating healthy fats with leafy greens to absorb more vitamins A and K.

Lemon and honey, peanut butter and jelly, salt and pepper — some flavors just taste better together. And it turns out that eating certain food combinations can benefit your health too.

“There are certain nutrients that help the absorption of other nutrients, and sometimes, there are two nutrients that work synergistically together, so they kind of help each other in the processes our body goes through on a day-to-day basis,” Jordan Hill, a registered dietitian and sports dietetics specialist working with Top Nutrition Coaching, told Insider.

And the good news is a lot of these combinations are very common and taste good together, Hill said.

Hill recommended eating the food pairings within the same meal or snack to reap the benefits.

Salmon and asparagus

Healthy fats help us to absorb vitamins A, D, E, and K, which support the body in a range of ways from promoting bone and eye health to reducing inflammation and regulating mood, Hill said.

“If you don’t have enough healthy fat in your diet, then you’re not able to break down those vitamins, which could lead to a deficiency,” she said.

So it’s helpful to pair healthy fats, such as olive oil, nuts, seeds, and avocado, with vitamin-containing foods. Leafy greens such as kale have both vitamins K and A, and eggs contain vitamins A, D, and K. Salmon also contains vitamins D and E, Hill said.

“You could pair olive oil with a salad that has spinach and kale in it, or you could have nuts and apricots as a snack for dinner, or salmon and asparagus. Those fat foods will help absorb the vitamins,” she said.

Tomatoes and avocados

Healthy fats also help us absorb carotenoids, which are fat-soluble molecules with antioxidant properties. They are good for eye health and help protect us against heart disease and some types of cancer, Hill said.

Common forms include lycopene, beta-carotene, and lutein, she said, which can be found in foods such as carrots, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, and spinach.

“Anything that’s orange is going to have a carotenoid in it,” she said. It is also responsible for the red and yellow colors we see in foods.

Pairing any of these vegetables with olive oil, salmon, avocado, or nuts and seeds will enhance the solubility of the carotenoids, making them easier to absorb.

Eggs and Greek yogurt

We tend to get most of our vitamin D from the sun and there aren’t many foods that contain it, Hill said, however, it’s important to get enough because we need it to absorb calcium.

“If we don’t have enough of it, then it can kind of compromise how much calcium is also in our body,” she said.

Pairings that contain both vitamin D and calcium include salmon and leafy greens, eggs and Greek yogurt, and vitamin D-fortified orange juice with breakfast cereal and milk.

Oranges and nuts

Getting enough iron is really important. It helps deliver oxygen to the muscles through our blood and people with low iron levels, often feel very tired or experience fatigue, Hill said.

The iron we get from animal products, known as heme iron, is readily absorbed, but plant or non-heme iron is less soluble. If you are vegan or vegetarian or mostly rely on plant iron, combining it with vitamin C will help to enhance its absorption and improve the uptake when it reaches the intestines, she said.

“Pretty much any fruit or vegetable that is yellow, orange or red, is likely going to have vitamin C in it, and a lot of green vegetables also have vitamin C,” she said.

Some non-heme iron and vitamin C food combinations include bell peppers and spinach, orange juice and iron-fortified cereal, or oranges and nuts.

Prebiotics and probiotics

Prebiotics and probiotics work together for overall gut health and to improve immune function, Hill said.

Probiotics are the trillions of bacteria that live inside of our gut, and prebiotics are the food they need to grow and carry out functions. “Without prebiotics, our probiotics are not growing properly. They’re not populating and doing their duties in the intestines,” she said.

Eating prebiotics and probiotics together helps with their “synergistic relationship.”

Combinations include oats, a prebiotic, and yogurt, which contains probiotics.

“A snack could be an apple, which has prebiotic fibers in it, and then you drink a glass of kombucha, which is a probiotic,” Hill said.