Eat Natural To Lose Weight
By Nick Dinic
“If you can”t tell where it came from just by looking at, then you shouldn”t eat it!” is one piece of nutritional advice we often see in food magazines. Somehow, this adage seems to be too extreme. But slowly, somehow, it makes sense.
Food preparation these days stick to two very different philosophies – those that would, in every way possible enhance the taste of the food as much as our buying capacity would allow to make it palatable (so we”ll buy them) and those that as much as possible would try to maintain the food”s natural goodness.
An example would be the humble potato. The first type of food preparation would give you the potato chip – food rich in oil and salt to enhance the potato”s taste.
In order to transform the potato coming from the ground to the potato chip that you buy off from the market shelf, your humble potato will have to be machine-peeled, sliced, cooked in oil, added salt and preservatives, pressed and packed in a sealed wrapper, delivered to the shelf where you”re looking at it, right now. The second line of thought would give you sliced potatoes boiled in water in a plate.
It doesn”t look particularly gorgeous but believe it or not, this ugly duckling packs fiber, vitamin C, vitamin B6, potassium, and small amounts of thiamine, magnesium, folate, niacin, iron, zinc and riboflavin.
The big difference in food preparation arises from the fact that most nutrients found in food are in the area immediately below the skin. Hence, peel too much and you lose a lot of the vitamins and minerals naturally found in food.
Further cooking, especially frying further reduces these vitamins as some of them react with oil. Another difference is in the amount of fat that are being added whilst in food preparation. Cooking the potato in fatty oils as in the case of French fries greatly increases the finished product”s fat content.
And not only the potato, this holds true to most fruits as well. Apples (also a rich source of vitamin C and phosphorus), tomatoes (this contains a whopping 22% of an average Australian”s vitamin C requirement), strawberries (source of calcium, potassium and other amino acids) etc. Over preparation zaps a way the food”s nutritional value.
Not only that, it is also nutritionally advisable to eat food prepared at home than buy convenience foods from the counter. Because even though you already alter the foods natural content by your own preparation, at least you can be sure they are not so heavily processed they don”t look like the original thing anymore.
Still, best if you can grow your own fruits and veggies from your own garden. You can be sure the food that you eat is not heavily processed and much of the foods” nutritional value is retained. Have you ever seen a farmer having severe fat issues? No. The amount of activity they do in order to maintain their crops and the kind of food they eat compliment so they stay fit and healthy.
About The Author
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