This month I am going to talk about the nutrients in cooked/canned fruits and vegetables. Many people are under the impression that these are low quality foods and that they have lost all their nutrients due to the cooking process and or canning process. In one statement, this is just simply not true. In fact, did you know that canned fruits and vegetables can be just as nutritious, if not more than their fresh counterparts? Please refer back to my blog here to read more. Now back to cooking. Again most people think eating raw food is the best, I hear all the time that the enzymes are not lost and they are “alive”; I hear that nutrients are killed while they are cooked, among other things. Well I’m here to tell you that all ways of preparing your foods are good and nutritious. For example did you know that your body is better able to absorb the nutrients in kale, spinach and tomatoes if they are cooked verses raw? Cooking, in fact, can increase the amount of certain nutrients in certain vegetables, such as lycopene in tomatoes and carotenoid levels in carrots. The reason being that the bonds that lock the nutrients in are broken by the cooking process thus the body can absorb more of them. If you want to check out a specific fruit and or vegetable simple to go the USDA nutrient database and compare cooked verses raw in a particular produce item. Prepare yourself to be shocked!

The types of nutrients you will get more of depend on the cooking method.

It’s Alive! Not really…

Referring back to the claim that food is supposed to be alive, and that cooking it “kills” the food. This is simply not true. By the time certain foods, like meat, hit your table, even if it is raw; any cells in the food are dead. The cells in fruits and vegetables start dying after they are picked. Anything frozen will also be dead. Some things alive in the food, you probably don’t want there, such as bacteria that cause spoilage. The more important point, however, is that having living cells are irrelevant to nutrient content.

Cooking Methods and Nutrient Loss

According to the method of analysis of different cooking methods and the nutrient losses, the results are as follows: “Griddling, microwave cooking, and baking alternately produce the lowest losses, while pressure-cooking and boiling lead to the greatest losses; frying occupies an intermediate position. In short, water is not the cook’s best friend when it comes to preparing vegetables.”

That’s right – microwaving is among the best methods of cooking in terms of preserving nutrients. However, if you add water to the vegetable in the microwave you are technically “boiling it in the microwave,” thus expect the same nutrient loses to occur as regular boiling in a pan.

Boiling vegetables, therefore, has the most dramatic effect on their nutrient content, especially on water-soluble vitamins. The water leeches out the nutrients, which then evaporate with the water.

Digesting Nutrients

The fundamental reason we consume food is to extract the vital nutrients that different foods contain to allow our bodies to function properly. This is achieved by digestion, where foods are broken down in the body into a form that can be readily absorbed. However, many of the nutrients contained in foods are not readily accessible prior to cooking and thus, cannot be easily digested by the body. For example, the enzyme amylase (found in the mouth and intestine) breaks down the polysaccharide starch into its monomer glucose constituents, which can easily be digested by the body. Cooking foods containing starch (e.g., cereals and vegetables), prior to consumption initiates the breakdown of the polysaccharide, thus, aiding the action of amylase and the consequent digestibility of the carbohydrate component of the food.

“The nutrient content of food is only half the equation; we also need to know how much we can extract from the food through digestion. This is the main advantage of cooking; it weakens cell walls and breaks down proteins so they are easier to digest, enabling us to extract more nutrition. In fact, studies show that cooking broccoli increases the bioavailability of certain nutrients.

The bottom line is that cooking has complex but net positive effects on how much nutrition we get from our food, and that microwaving is one of the best methods for cooking (in terms of nutrient content).”

Source: ScienceBasedMedicine.org

Preserving the nutrient value of vegetables

Some suggestions to retain the maximum nutrition in the foods you cook include:

• Store foods properly, such as keeping cold foods cold and sealing some foods in airtight containers.
• Keep vegetables in the crisper section of the refrigerator.
• Try washing or scrubbing vegetables rather than peeling them.
• Use the outer leaves of vegetables like cabbage or lettuce unless they are wilted or unpalatable.
• Microwave, steam, roast or grill vegetables rather than boiling them.
• If you boil your vegetables, save the nutrient-laden water for soup stock.

Source: https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/…/food-processing-and-nutri

Edibility

Let’s not forget that it is very important to enjoy our food, eating good food is a very pleasurable experience. For many foods, the cooking process gives them the characteristics we associate with edible food, which are generated through an intricate series of physical and chemical changes that occur when foods are heated. Therefore, without cooking, these changes could not occur and many foods would be deemed inedible.

In conclusion, cooking processes may in some cases increase the availability of certain nutrients. Such is the case of lycopene and carotenoids, both of which are easier for our bodies to use once the foods sources rich in these nutrients have been exposed to heat. Cooking may also make our foods safer by killing microbes or making it difficult for them to grow and multiply (as in salted meats, which have a longer life due to the lack of water available for bacteria to grow). And, simply put, cooking usually turns plain ingredients into a wonderful meal!

 

 

 

Edibility

 

Let’s not forget that it is very important to enjoy our food, eating good food is a very pleasurable experience. For many foods, the cooking process gives them the characteristics we associate with edible food, which are generated through an intricate series of physical and chemical changes that occur when foods are heated. Therefore, without cooking, these changes could not occur and many foods would be deemed inedible.

 

 

In conclusion, cooking processes may in some cases increase the availability of certain nutrients. Such is the case of lycopene and carotenoids, both of which are easier for our bodies to use once the foods sources rich in these nutrients have been exposed to heat. Cooking may also make our foods safer by killing microbes or making it difficult for them to grow and multiply (as in salted meats, which have a longer life due to the lack of water available for bacteria to grow). And, simply put, cooking usually turns plain ingredients into a wonderful meal!