Caution: Improper Vegetable Consumption is Like Eating Garbage
Introduction: Vegetables are rich in vitamins, minerals, and dietary fiber, and also contain various functional components beneficial to health. However, many people do not know how to eat vegetables properly. Improper methods can lead to the significant loss or destruction of beneficial substances, and even allow harmful substances to endanger health. Let's take a look at how to eat vegetables correctly.
1. Wash Before Cutting Many nutrients and beneficial substances in vegetables are water-soluble. Cutting vegetables into small pieces before washing will cause a large amount of nutrients to be lost in the water. The correct method is to wash, then cut, and then cook.
2. Squeezing Out Vegetable Juice When making fillings for wontons or buns, vegetables need to be finely chopped, which releases a large amount of juice. Some people squeeze out the juice for easier shaping or filling, which discards 70% of the vitamins and minerals in the vegetables. The correct method is to chop and mix the vegetables with other ingredients like dried tofu, mushrooms, or meat, allowing the vegetable juice to seep into the other fillings. This also makes the buns more delicious.
3. Long-Term Storage Wilted vegetables not only taste bad, but most of their vitamin C is also destroyed. The harmless nitrates in vegetables can be converted into nitrites. Nitrites can convert normal hemoglobin into methemoglobin, which cannot carry oxygen. In severe cases, it can cause symptoms such as cyanosis of the nails and lips, and even the whole body, along with shortness of breath. Therefore, vegetables should be eaten as fresh as possible.
4. Improper Refrigeration The ideal storage temperature for most vegetables is 3°C-10°C, but cucumbers cannot be stored below 10°C. If refrigerated at around 4°C, the cucumber's color will darken, its body will soften, and a transparent, gel-like liquid will be visible after cutting, causing the cucumber to lose its fresh aroma completely.
5. Blindly Eating Raw Some vegetables are naturally toxic and must be heated to destroy their toxins, such as sword beans, lima beans, potatoes, and bean sprouts. Vegetables that can be eaten raw must be non-toxic, uncontaminated, and of good quality, such as radishes, tomatoes, and cucumbers. However, most vegetables on the market today have been sprayed with pesticides. Although people are accustomed to soaking vegetables before washing, this only removes about 30% of the pesticides. Eating such vegetables raw can harm human health.
6. Cooking for Too Long Vitamin C in vegetables is easily oxidized and broken down by heat. The loss is smaller when stir-frying over high heat or heating for a short time with a lid. If cooked for 10 minutes, vitamin C can be reduced by 60% or more.
7. Eating Leftovers Measurements show that after cooked green vegetables are left for 15 minutes, vitamin C decreases by 20%; after 30 minutes, the loss is 30%; and after one hour, it is reduced by 50%. Leftovers also spoil easily and can easily cause food poisoning. Therefore, it is best to cook and eat immediately for both hygiene and nutritional value.
8. Adding Too Much Oil Both vegetable and animal oil produce 9 kilocalories per gram. Consuming too much can induce obesity or lead to hyperlipidemia, cardiovascular, and cerebrovascular diseases due to excessive calorie intake. Therefore, oil should be used moderately when cooking. The recommended daily intake is 25 grams per person, not exceeding 30 grams.
9. The Cooking Water Must Be Discarded When cooking, about 30%-70% of the vitamin C and some water-soluble nutrients dissolve into the broth. If the vegetables were blanched before cooking to remove oxalic acid, nitrites, and pesticides, and if little oil and salt were used during stir-frying, then drinking the broth is harmless.
10. Eating Too Much The primary reason vegetables cannot be overeaten is that most are difficult to digest, especially those high in crude fiber like bamboo shoots, celery, and broad beans. Large quantities can aggravate gastrointestinal diseases and may induce gastric bleeding or esophageal variceal bleeding in patients with cirrhosis. A large amount of fiber can also affect the absorption of calcium and zinc, especially in pregnant women and children in their growth and development stages. Most of the protein in vegetables is "incomplete protein," lacking many essential amino acids required by the human body. For weight loss, long-term avoidance of adequate high-quality animal protein and its fat-soluble vitamins A and D can easily lead to malnutrition. The recommended daily intake of vegetables is 300-500 grams.