Increase Your Fruits & Vegetables Nutrition

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Again, from our friends at Prevention, here are some unknown ways to increase your fruits & vegetable nutrition.  You may be saying, “But I already eat a lot of fruits and vegetables. Isn’t that enough?”  Not anymore.

Frankly, I don’t know anyone (including me) that actually thinks they eat enough fruits and vegetables, but never mind that.  Produce nutrition is not what it used to be. Here are some fascinating produce nutrition facts:

• A team of researchers has tested 43 different fruits and vegetables from 1950 – 1999.  They discovered an alarming downward trend in nutritional value – Broccoli, for example, had 130 mg of calcium in 1950, but only has 48 mg. today.
• Synthetic fertilizers and selective breeding has decreased the produce ability to absorb nutrients from the soil.

Organic produce does not have this problem and in fact, organic tomatoes have been shown to have 30% more phytochemicals in them than conventional ones.

However, organic can be expensive and although it is still your best choice, here are other ways to increase the nutrients in your fruits and vegetables.

1.  Look for Strong Colors – for example, red leaf lettuce has more nutrients than iceberg. Darker orange carrots have more phytochemicals.

2. Smaller is Better – if the produce is smaller, then its level of nutrients will be more concentrated.  So those big tomatoes may not be more nutritious.

3. Cook Them Less – however, some fruits and vegetables release more nutrients when they are cooked. Broccoli and carrots are better steamed than boiled and tomatoes are better cooked than raw.

4. Eat Fruits and Vegetables Within a Week – If you keep them longer than week after you buy them, they’ll lose most of their nutritional value.

5. Skip the Pre-Done Bagged Produce – Peeling and cutting reduces the nutrients – that should be done just before preparing.

6. Try Variety – we all tend to buy the same types of produce, but if you mix them up, you’ll be getting more (and different) nutrients.  Example: try the purple cauliflower or the heirloom tomatoes.

7. Try Older Varieties – Speaking of Heirloom tomatoes, there are also older varieties of other vegetables, too. Plants that were bred prior to World War II are naturally hardier because they were established—and thrived—before the development of modern fertilizers and pesticides. They may be more difficult to find, which brings us to our next step:

8. Find a Farmer’s Market – Any local, freshly harvested, in-season fare is bound to have more nutrients than supermarket produce which has to be picked before it’s ripe.

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