Pickles and salted vegetables are traditional foods in China, Japan, and Korea; cured meats are also a specialty in many countries. As traditional foods, pickled foods have long been popular with people, becoming a staple on the tables of ordinary households, and some people even eat pickled foods for a long time and form a habit.
Eating a little pickled food for breakfast can give people a refreshing feeling, but eating too much pickled food is not good for human health and can bring many health problems.
1. Eating a large amount of pickled vegetables can easily lead to vitamin C deficiency and kidney stones in the human body.
In the process of pickling, vitamin C is largely destroyed. After pickling, the vitamin C content is almost "completely wiped out." Eating a large amount of pickled vegetables can lead to a deficiency of vitamin C in the human body. Therefore, eating a moderate amount of pickled vegetables can regulate the appetite and increase the desire to eat, but if you have a craving for pickled vegetables, it is not advisable. If consumed for a long time, it can easily cause various diseases.
The pickled sauerkraut contains more oxalic acid and calcium. Because of its high acidity, it is not easy to form calcium oxalate in the intestine and be excreted after consumption, but it will be largely absorbed. Calcium oxalate will then crystallize and deposit in the urinary system to form stones.
2. Contains carcinogenic substances - "nitrosamines"
The reason for limiting the consumption of pickled foods is that a lot of salt is added during processing. Salt contains impurities such as nitrites and nitrates, which can produce harmful substances such as nitrosamines.
During the pickling process, pickled foods are easily contaminated by bacteria. If the amount of salt added is less than 15%, nitrates in the vegetables may be reduced to nitrites by microorganisms. The nitrite content increases after 1 hour of pickling, peaks after 2 weeks, and can last for 2-3 weeks.
Eating such pickled foods can, in severe cases, cause nitrites to combine with amines in the body to form a carcinogenic substance called nitrosamine. Therefore, often eating pickled foods is detrimental to health and can induce cancer.
For example, natural vegetables such as radishes, pickled mustard greens, and cabbage contain a certain amount of non-toxic nitrates. If the temperature is high when pickling, the salt content is less than 10%, and the pickling time is less than 8 days, it will cause a large number of bacteria to breed, and nitrates are also easily reduced to toxic nitrites. After 9 days of pickling, the nitrite content begins to decrease, and after 15 days, it drops to a safe level.
If the pickling is not done well, the pickled vegetables will directly contain the carcinogenic substance nitrosamine. Eating more crude and unhygienic pickled vegetables poses a potential carcinogenic risk. In addition, pickled foods contain a relatively large amount of nitrates and nitrites, which can combine with secondary amines in meat to form nitrosamines, which is a direct cause of stomach cancer.
Another category of foods, such as sausages, cured ham, and other cured animal products, have nitrites artificially added as food additives for processing needs such as coloring, flavor enhancement, and preservation, which also increases the possibility of producing nitrosamines, so the intake of such foods should be controlled.
3. Excessive salt content, affecting the mucous system. (Harmful to the stomach and intestines, leading to high blood pressure, excessive burden on the kidneys, leading to nasopharyngeal cancer, and prone to ulcers and inflammation)
Because food requires a large amount of salt during the pickling process, this leads to an excessive sodium content in such foods, causing a heavier burden on the kidneys for those who often eat pickled foods and an increased risk of high blood pressure.
In addition, the pickling process of food can produce a large amount of carcinogenic nitrosamines, increasing the risk of developing malignant tumors such as nasopharyngeal cancer.
High concentrations of salt can also seriously damage the gastrointestinal mucosa, so people who often eat pickled foods have a higher incidence of gastrointestinal inflammation and ulcers.