How Digestive Enzymes Support Digestion
Written by: Victoria S.
Medically Reviewed by: Erica Palmcrantz, Superfood Nutrition Expert
Updated on: 20/08/2026
5 MIN READ
At a Glance
Digestive enzymes break your food down into pieces small enough for your body to actually use — sugars, amino acids, fatty acids.
When one of these enzymes is in short supply, the food it's meant to handle often causes discomfort instead. Lactose intolerance is a perfect example for this.
There isn't just one enzyme doing all the work. Different enzymes handle different jobs — carbs, protein, fat, dairy sugar, and even plant fibre.
A varied diet supports natural enzyme activity. Some foods contain them directly.
In this article:
So what are digestive enzymes?
What are digestive enzymes actually for?
How are food intolerances connected to enzymes?
What are the 5 main enzymes involved in digestion?
Where do these enzymes show up naturally?
What are the signs of enzyme deficiency?
What does Herboxa Super Greens' enzyme complex look like?
What practical habits can help?
What's the bigger picture?
So what are digestive enzymes?
The body produces digestive enzymes at several places, such as in the stomach, the pancreas, and the small intestine.² They have an important yet everyday function since they break the food you eat down into smaller molecules that the body can absorb. Even if your diet is healthy, it will still be of no benefit to you since the body will not be able to obtain any nutrition from the food.
What are digestive enzymes actually for?
Picture digestion as a disassembly line. Carbohydrates are broken down into simple sugars. Proteins are composed of chains of amino acids. Fats are broken down into fatty acids and glycerol. Each of these smaller molecules crosses into your bloodstream and gets put to work — energy, cell repair, the basic maintenance that keeps you running.
Without enzymes doing this work, that whole process stalls before it starts.
How are food intolerances connected to enzymes?
Here's where it gets relevant to a lot of people's everyday experience. Food intolerances — lactose intolerance being the most familiar — usually come down to a missing or insufficient enzyme.
Lactase is the enzyme that breaks down lactose (milk sugar) into glucose and galactose; when there are insufficient amounts of it, lactose passes through the intestine undigested, and at this point the symptoms such as bloating and cramping occur.¹ The same thing happens in the case of deficiencies of other enzymes, although different foods are involved and different symptoms appear.
What are the 5 main enzymes involved in digestion?
A handful of enzymes cover most of what your body needs to break down:
Amylase, which turns starch into sugars
Protease, which breaks down protein into amino acids
Lipase, which splits fat into fatty acids and glycerol
Lactase, which digests lactose
Cellulase, which dismantles cellulose into glucose
That last one gets left out of most digestive-enzyme conversations, largely because the human body doesn't produce it on its own. Cellulose is a form of polysaccharide and may be found in the cell walls of plants where it provides them with their structural support. As a result, it is very difficult to digest since the body lacks cellulase. A great deal of the cellulose which is included in one's diet goes right through the digestive system.³
Where do these enzymes show up naturally?
Amylase turns up in sprouting grains — barley, wheat, corn — where it's put to work converting starch into sugar to fuel the sprout itself. Bananas and mangoes carry it too.
Protease is present in fermented foods, such as miso and soy sauce. It can also be found in certain fruits which have not been processed, such as kiwi and pineapple.
Lipase is present in many plant foods, but only in small quantities. The enzyme can be found in common foods including avocado, almonds, walnuts, chia seeds, and flax seeds.
Lactase, unlike the others, isn't really present in food in active form — your small intestine produces it directly. Fermented dairy (yoghurt, kefir) is the closest thing to an exception, since fermentation partially breaks lactose down before you even eat it.
Cellulase isn't something the human digestive tract naturally produces at all. A small amount of cellulose breakdown does happen courtesy of gut bacteria, but the enzyme itself largely has to come from an outside source — which is part of why it's worth paying attention to in a diet built around vegetables and leafy greens.³
Worth knowing: heat destroys most of these enzymes. Cooking and processing are convenient, but they come at the cost of whatever natural enzyme activity the food started with.
What are the signs of enzyme deficiency?
The usual symptoms of an enzyme deficiency are a general sense of discomfort, bloating, and diarrhoea after eating. But enzyme shortfalls can show up more subtly too — unexplained fatigue, unintended weight changes, skin that's acting up for no clear reason. None of these are exclusive to enzyme issues, but if they're showing up alongside digestive discomfort, it's worth paying attention to what's on your plate.
What does Herboxa Super Greens' enzyme complex look like?
Herboxa® Super Greens includes a digestive enzyme complex covering five enzymes, each contributing to a different part of the breakdown process. Per 6 g serving:
Amylase — 2,000 DU
Cellulase — 4,000 CU
Lactase — 2,000 ALU
Lipase — 20,000 FCCFIP
Protease — 40,000 HUT
The inclusion of cellulase is worth calling out specifically. Given that Super Greens is built around a dense blend of leafy vegetables and plant powders — spinach, kale, broccoli, wheatgrass, alfalfa grass and more — it's a formula where cellulose is genuinely part of the picture. Pairing a green-heavy blend with an enzyme suited to breaking down plant cell walls is a fairly deliberate piece of formulation, not an afterthought.
The other four enzymes round out the rest: amylase for the fibre complex's carbohydrate content, protease and lipase for general macronutrient breakdown, and lactase as a standard inclusion given how common lactose sensitivity is.
What practical habits can help?
If dairy tends to sit heavy, fermented versions (yoghurt, kefir) may be easier to tolerate than the unfermented equivalent — the fermentation process has already done some of the enzyme's work.
Cooking destroys most naturally occurring enzymes in food, so if you're relying on food sources specifically, raw or lightly prepared versions retain more.
Eating a wide variety of foods is healthier, at least because this guarantees that the body gets all of the enzymes it needs.
It's advisable to go and see a doctor if you are experiencing regular digestive discomfort rather than ignoring it.
What's the bigger picture?
Digestive enzymes rarely get much attention until something goes wrong — a food that never used to bother you suddenly does, or a meal leaves you uncomfortable for hours afterward. But they're doing constant, essential work in the background, turning the food on your plate into something your body can actually use.
Herboxa Super Greens' enzyme complex, cellulase included, reflects a formulation built around the reality of what's actually in the blend — a lot of plant material, and an enzyme profile chosen with that in mind, rather than a generic one borrowed from elsewhere.
