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Health Check: Can Chopping Your Vegetables Boost Their Nutrients?

  • May 26, 2017

We all want to eat more vegetables, right? But what’s the best way of getting more? Is it juicing? Or cutting them up? Or should we simply just try to eat as many as we can, whatever way we can? The Conversation provides some healthy hints for getting the most out of your veggies. Ideas include cutting them, which increases their polyphenol content, and keeping them chilled to slow polyphenol loss.

Most vegetables are very low in calories and net carbs, while being high in healthy fiber and the valuable vitamins and minerals your body needs for optimal health, so as a general rule, vegetables are a nutritional cornerstone. However, some are more beneficial than others when it comes to antioxidants and phytochemicals that reduce inflammation and eliminate carcinogens.

To this end, sprouts deliver high amounts of nutrients in small packages, including antioxidants, minerals, vitamins and enzymes that protect against free radical damage. So, in terms of volume you can get away with eating far less if you opt for sprouts. Two of my favorite sprouts include watercress and broccoli. Watercress contains more iron than spinach, more calcium than milk, and more vitamin C than oranges.

Three-day-old broccoli sprouts contain anywhere from 10 to 100 times the amount of chemoprotective compounds found in mature broccoli. Research also suggests broccoli sprouts can help detox environmental pollutants such as benzene.

If you do enjoy juicing and prefer getting the maximum amount of nutrients per volume, juicing may be a powerful tool for enhancing your health, whether done daily or as part of a regular detoxification plan. Juicing also makes it easier to get a wider variety of vegetables into your daily food plan.