What can you eat to prevent cancer? While no single food can cure cancer, a reasonable and healthy diet is of great significance in preventing the occurrence of tumors. Below, I'll share some dietary habits that can help prevent cancer, as well as the 5 major carcinogenic foods you should avoid.
3 Major Dietary Habits to Prevent Cancer
1. Eat more vegetables
Currently, it is recommended that the intake of animal-based protein be controlled to within 1/3, with the majority of other nutrients coming from plant-based foods. Fruits and vegetables are rich in cancer-fighting nutrients, and the more vibrant their color, the more of these nutrients they contain. Additionally, these fruits and vegetables help maintain or achieve an ideal weight, which also helps reduce the risk of tumor development. Being overweight increases the risk of inducing various tumors, including colon cancer, esophageal cancer, and kidney cancer. Eating a variety of vegetables, especially dark green, red, and orange ones, is more helpful in preventing cancer.
2. Eat less sugar
As far as is known, simple sugars do not directly cause cancer, but they may affect the protective and anti-cancer effects of other nutrients. The calories added by sugars can lead to being overweight and obese, which is also a risk factor for cancer. Therefore, you should avoid sugar and can satisfy your craving for sweetness with fruits, while also consuming a large amount of vitamins.
3. Choose the right cooking methods
The way meat is cooked also affects the occurrence of tumors. When frying, grilling, or roasting meat, high temperatures can cause some substances in it to change, increasing the risk of cancer after consumption. Stewing, boiling, or steaming meat creates fewer of these chemicals. It's even healthier to add some protective vegetables when stewing meat.
In addition to maintaining good eating habits, you also need to stay away from the following 5 carcinogenic foods.
Avoid the 5 Major Carcinogenic Foods
1. Salted fish
Salted fish produces dimethyl nitrite, which can be converted into the carcinogen dimethyl nitrosamine in the body. Salted eggs, pickles, and other similar foods also contain carcinogens and should be eaten as little as possible.
2. Barbecued foods
Barbecued beef, duck, lamb, goose, suckling pig, lamb skewers, etc., should not be eaten in large amounts as they contain strong carcinogens.
3. Smoked foods
Smoked meat, smoked liver, smoked fish, smoked eggs, smoked tofu, and other foods contain the carcinogen benzopyrene. Frequent consumption can easily lead to esophageal and stomach cancer.
4. Fried foods
When food is fried until charred, it produces carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. When coffee is burnt, the amount of benzopyrene increases 20-fold. Fried pancakes, stinky tofu, fried taro puffs, youtiao (fried dough sticks), etc., often use reused oil, which produces carcinogens at high temperatures.
5. Moldy substances
Foods such as rice, wheat, beans, corn, and peanuts are prone to moisture and mold. After being contaminated by mold, they produce a carcinogenic toxin—aflatoxin.