When it comes to maximizing the nutritional value of healthy food choices, how you eat it matters.
How can healthy food choices become unhealthy?
Here’s how — making healthy choices is only part of healthy eating. How you choose to eat it can optimize or decrease the nutritional benefits. For instance, peeling your fruit and vegetables can remove most of the minerals and vitamins.
Nutritional value of skins and peels
Most of the nutritional value is in, or under, the skins or peels of fresh fruits and veggies. Therefore, removing the skins of products with edible peels is not a good idea. If you have to peel them, save the skins. I’ll follow this up with a list of uses for kitchen scraps.
Maximize the nutritional value of potatoes
Eating chilled potatoes, in a salad, or at room temperature affects the nutritional value. The fewer resistant starches in carbs, the more severe the effect on blood sugar. Studies have determined that cooling potatoes overnight increases the resistant starches. In turn, this reduces the blood sugar response that is typical when eating hot potatoes. The health benefits include a healthy gut and reduced risk of diabetes, colon cancer and obesity.
Cooking Broccoli damages nutritional value
The best method to prepare broccoli is to steam it. Stir-frying, boiling and microwaving break down most of the nutrients in broccoli. These include proteins, chlorophyll and Vitamin C.
Notably, the shorter the time of heat exposure, the more bang you’ll get per bite. Healthy ways to dress steamed broccoli include a splash of lemon juice, some sea salt and a bit of olive oil.
The nutritional value of fresh fruit vs. fruit juice
Quenching your thirst by drinking water and eating fresh fruit is a hundred times better than drinking fruit juice. The “100% Pure” on the juice label means the manufacturers added nothing. However, what they don’t tell you is that a significant percentage of the nutrients are lost in the manufacturing and bottling process.
For example, once processed, the juice no longer has high volumes of fiber. The fiber in fresh fruit slows sugar absorption by your system, and it makes you feel full.
The lack of fiber can cause sugar spikes that could lead to health problems like obesity, liver damage and diabetes.
How you eat eggs determines their nutritional value
There are many myths about how eggs can harm health. However, its nutritional value busts them all. A large egg has only 71 calories, and its high-quality protein content is around 6.24 grams. Furthermore, when it comes to essential amino acids, one egg contains all nine. Besides, it has high levels of vitamin D. This is one vitamin that is not easily obtained from food.
However, how you eat eggs matters. You can ruin all the nutritional value by frying them in fat or oil. Moreover, your eggs can become a health hazard if you have them with butter and syrup-coated pancakes, hashbrowns and bacon. To maximize the goodness of eggs, eat them hard-boiled on whole-grain bread or enjoy sauteed spinach with a poached egg.
How do you have your coffee?
If your answer is “with cream and sugar,” your hot beverage is no longer healthy. The same applies if your weakness is a Double chocolate chip frappe chino!
Coffee provides a caffeine boost and many antioxidants for cell protection. However, all the yummy extras to your coffee served in a cup the size of a bucket will have no nutritional benefits.
How you eat red meat matters
Protein, zinc, niacin, iron and omega-3 fatty acids are all valuable nutrients in red meat. However, your choice of cut and preparation can ruin it all. To optimize red meat’s nutritional value, you must choose only lean cuts and still remove any visible fat. Also, any preparation method that includes frying in fat or breading makes red meat more dangerous than nutritional.
Yes or No for red wine?
The jury is still out regarding the health benefits or health damage linked to red wine. However, one thing most health authorities agree is crucial, and that is moderation. They suggest one glass per day for women and two drinks for men. Potential health problems include heart and liver damage, risks of some cancers, and severe harm to unborn children.
Bottom line — how you eat, rather than what you eat matters!
