Salty snack noshers, take heart: You may now have a way to decrease your risk of hypertension naturally – eat more grapes.

Researchers believe there’s something about the chemical composition of grapes – likely their richness in antioxidants – that seems to reduce high blood pressure levels, this after feeding several groups of rats variations in their diets of salt and grape extract.

Researchers from the University of Michigan’s Cardioprotection Research Laboratory fed each group of laboratory rats (12 in each) the same weight in food, some high in sodium, others low in sodium. Some of the rats were also fed grape extract in powdered form; others were fed no grape extract at all. Among those that were fed the grape extract, it made up no more than 3 percent of their overall diet, independent of whether or not the group was on a high or low-salt diet.

Some of the findings were fairly clear-cut and unsurprising. For instance, those that were on the low-salt diet and no grape extract had lower blood pressure levels than those on the high-salt diet but with the grape extract. But when comparing the groups with the same kind of diets – low-salt to low-salt or high-salt to high salt – and adding grapes to the equation, the inclusion or exclusion of grapes determined blood pressure levels. For example, the rats fed the grape extract and on a high-salt diet had much lower blood pressure readings than the other group on the high-salt diet but sans the grape extract.

“[S]omething within the grapes themselves has a direct impact on cardiovascular risk, beyond the simple blood pressure-lowering impact that we already know can come from a diet rich in fruits and vegetables,” said lead researcher Mitchell Seymour in a statement at the conclusion of the study.

Improved blood pressure wasn’t all they found, though. They also found that the rats consuming the grape extract – which they say had the same nutrient quality as grapes straight off the vine – had better overall heart function, showed less heart damage and exhibited less inflammation throughout the body.

The 18-week study’s findings have since been published in the Journal of Gerontology: Biological Sciences.

What explains the great grape’s heart-healing headiness? Researchers can’t be sure, but they believe it has something to do with their high flavonoid content, the same antioxidant found in other foods and drinks fingered as heart-healing like green tea and red wine, raspberries and chocolate.

Of course, more research needs to be done before researchers can give any definitiveness to grapes impact on people’s heart health, but such human-based research is in the offing.

So, does this finding suggest one can eat salty foods and not worry about high blood pressure? Certainly not. If it wasn’t obvious already, the researchers found that the lowest blood pressure rates were those groups on the low-salt diet, independent of whether or not they had grape extract. What it does suggest, though, is that there are more health properties to the grape than meets the eye… or should I say ‘heart’?