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How can I cook healthily?

How to retain more nutrients in food

By CustoPublished about a year ago 6 min read
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A healthy diet requires the right ingredients, the right mix, and healthy cooking.

The significance of cooking

On the one hand, it lies in killing disease-causing microorganisms and other food safety hazards and reducing anti-nutritional factors that affect digestion and absorption.

On the other hand, it is to make the texture of food easy to accept, speed up the digestion and absorption of food, and enhance the efficiency of nutrient utilization.

At the same time, cooking can also change the flavor of food, remove its off-flavor, increase its freshness and aroma, and promote appetite. If the food is cooked in such a way that it is difficult to swallow, the nutrients in it will not be fully utilized. Of course, cooking also inevitably loses some of the more sensitive nutrients.

In addition, cooking also introduces ingredients such as oil, salt, sugar, and brighteners, making the food contain more calories and more sodium.

The goal of healthy cooking

The goal of healthy cooking is to achieve food safety goals and bring good taste and flavor while minimizing nutrient loss, allowing food to be digested and absorbed at a rate consistent with human needs, and also avoiding the introduction of too much oil, salt, sugar and other ingredients that may be detrimental to the prevention of obesity and various chronic diseases.

1、How to retain more nutrients in food

Nutrients in food are not all very afraid of heat, including protein, fat and carbohydrates are more heat-resistant, dietary fiber and minerals are not subject to heat loss, only some vitamins and some components are more sensitive to cooking treatment. Therefore, it can not be said that the nutrients do not exist after cooking.

The factors of nutrient loss mainly include heating damage, oxidation damage, enzymatic damage, water solubility loss, oil solubility loss, etc.

Vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin E, and vitamin K, several fat-soluble vitamins, as well as lycopene, carotene, and other fat-soluble bioactive ingredients, mainly afraid of oxidative loss and loss of soluble oil, in deep-frying, a lot of oil frying, first stir-fry and then stew after a large loss, not only in the heating of oxidation, but also dissolved in the frying oil, left in the pan and plate, and finally was flushed down the drain. However, stir-frying or making soup with some oil (e.g. tomato and egg soup) will increase the bioavailability of these fat-soluble vitamins, i.e. increase their absorption, mainly because these fat-soluble vitamins will be freed from plant cells when heated and cooked with oil. However, they are not afraid of steaming and cooking.

Various B vitamins and vitamin C, as well as water-soluble antioxidant components such as polyphenols, are susceptible to water-soluble losses. When boiled and blanched in large quantities, these healthy ingredients dissolve in water in large quantities. Unless the water from shabu-shabu is drunk, the longer you cook and blanch, the greater the loss of nutrients and plant compounds.

Cereals

The nutrient with the greatest cooking loss in cereals, the staple food, is vitamin B1. Over-rinsing, pouring out the water used to soak the grain, deep-frying, and cooking porridge with alkali are the main reasons for the increased loss of vitamin B1. On the contrary, adding brown rice, millet, mixed beans, and other whole grain ingredients to rice, and often eating some steamed yams sweet potatoes and other potatoes, replacing part of the white rice, is a good way to increase a variety of B vitamins.

In vegetable foods, the most nutrients lost by cooking are vitamin C and folic acid, which are afraid of both heat and oxidation, and are also easily lost by dissolving in water. Vitamin B2 and some polyphenolic components are also easily lost by dissolving in water. In addition to eating them directly raw, steamed vegetables and quick stir-fries lose fewer vitamins. In addition, half a bowl of water with a small amount of oil to replace a large amount of stir-fry oil, turn the dish into a pan and then simmer for a minute or two, that is, "water and oil stew" cooking method, is also conducive to the preservation of a variety of vitamins, the preservation rate of vitamin C can reach 80% to 90% of the level.

The most important nutrient lost by cooking fish and meat is vitamin B1, but it is more important to avoid the oxidation of unsaturated fatty acids and proteins in cooking and avoid overheating to produce carcinogens. Therefore, steaming and stewing are good cooking methods, as are stir-frying meat without a lot of smoke and grilling wrapped in tinfoil and controlled temperature. Deep-frying and charcoal grilling is the most unhealthy cooking methods, which not only cause nutrient loss but also produce a lot of oxidation products and carcinogens. Several studies have shown that overheated meat promotes diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and is detrimental to the prevention of intestinal cancer.

2、How to make staple foods better digested

For staple foods, if the food is too hard, it will lead to slow digestion, which is not good for people with gastrointestinal diseases and indigestion. Therefore, for people with weak digestion, whole grain food should be soaked in the refrigerator for 12 to 24 hours, and white rice, and then be cooked in the electric pressure cooker in "mixed rice", or "mixed porridge" mode, but also can be baked and powdered and then brewed into a paste with boiling water The rice can also be baked and powdered and then brewed into a paste with boiling water, or beaten into a mixed grain rice paste with a wall breaker to fully obtain the nutrients.

3, how to control post-meal blood sugar

The cooking method of staple food is related to the speed of post-meal blood sugar response. If the food is too soft, it may increase the postprandial blood sugar response, which is not good for dieters and diabetics.

For people who need to control blood sugar, the proportion of whole grain mixes can be slightly larger, cooked directly in the rice cooker after soaking in the refrigerator overnight, without adding too much water to maintain a certain chewiness. It is best to eat less with the wall-breaker to beat the super-fine mixed grain paste because it is digested too fast, and is not conducive to controlling the rate of rising of blood sugar.

4、How to avoid too much oil and salt

Adding too much oil and grease in cooking will substantially increase the caloric value of staple foods and dishes. Therefore, people who need to control body fat and weight need to cook with less oil, and the daily consumption of cooking oil should be controlled to 25 grams (including the oil put in doughnuts and scallion cakes).

Do not eat "fancy staple foods" with added oil.

Eat fewer snacks.

By not eating fried dishes, and by increasing the proportion of steamed, stewed, and cold dishes, you can effectively reduce the amount of cooking oil you consume.

For example, eating one stir-fry, one stew, and one steamed or cold dish with a bowl of mixed grain rice or white rice at each meal can reduce fat intake and increase nutrient retention.

Cooking with reduced sodium is very important to prevent cardiovascular diseases such as hypertension.

Do not add salt to the pickles in advance when making cold dishes.

Put salt before starting the pan when stir-frying.

Drink less salty soup.

Eat fewer salty dishes.

Reduce the amount of salad dressing.

Reduce the use of salad dressings, reduce the use of various "cooking sauces", and

Replace regular salt with low-sodium salt.

If you put chicken sperm and MSG, put less salt ......

All these measures can effectively reduce sodium.

Learn these healthy cooking tips to make your diet healthy and delicious!

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About the Creator

Custo

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