Many people think that raw vegetables are packed with nutrients, but here’s a surprising fact: some foods have even more health benefits when cooked.
Cooking food doesn’t just enhance flavor: it can also have a huge impact on the nutritional value of what we eat.
Some foods are best eaten raw to preserve their nutrients, while others benefit more when cooked. While it’s true that heat can degrade some vitamins and minerals, it’s also true that your body can absorb some more efficiently.
The raw vs cooked food debate has been going on in nutrition circles for many years. Raw foods retain natural enzymes and heat-labile vitamins, but cooking increases the availability of other essential nutrients.
Understanding which foods have more nutritional value when cooked can help you make better dietary choices. Here are some of the most notable foods that are more nutritious when cooked than when raw:
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1. Tomato
Cooked tomatoes are high in lycopene, an antioxidant linked to reducing the risk of heart disease and cancer. Heat breaks down the tomato’s cell walls, making the lycopene more available.
However, it’s important to note that studies have shown that cooking tomatoes reduces their vitamin C content by up to 33 percent, so if you’re looking to boost your vitamin C intake, raw tomatoes may be your best option.
Additionally, tomatoes, or pretty much any food, can lose nutrients if they are burned or charred, so be careful not to cook them over high heat.
2. Carrots
Cooking carrots increases their beta-carotene content, which your body converts into vitamin A. This vitamin is essential for vision, immune function, and skin health.
But that’s not all. Cooking carrots also boosts their antioxidant power. In fact, Food Science Journal Cooking carrots with the skin on has been shown to triple the amount of antioxidants.
However, pan frying should be avoided as it can reduce the carotenoid content.
3. Spinach
Raw spinach is packed with nutrients, but cooking it reduces the levels of oxalic acid, which inhibits calcium absorption, making the calcium and iron in spinach more available.
Research has also shown that cooking spinach increases the bioavailability of nutrients such as vitamin A, zinc, magnesium, and vitamin E. Steaming spinach has also been shown to help maintain the folate content as well as reduce the oxalate content.
4. Mushrooms
Cooking mushrooms increases their potassium, niacin, and zinc content and enhances antioxidant availability: heat breaks down the cell walls, releasing these beneficial compounds.
The antioxidant ergothioneine becomes more bioavailable when mushrooms are cooked.
Additionally, choosing cooked mushrooms over raw mushrooms helps remove toxins such as agaritine, which can be carcinogenic, found in some mushrooms.
5. Asparagus
When you cook asparagus, the heat breaks down the stalks’ thick cell walls, making vitamins A, B9, C, and E more available.
When cooked, asparagus retains significant amounts of antioxidants, including ferulic acid (up to 25 percent). Cooking the vegetable also softens the fibers, making it easier to digest.
But that’s not all: Heating it increases phenolic acids, which may help prevent cancer.
6. Bell peppers
Most cooking methods help boost peppers’ vitamin C levels and increase the bioavailability of carotenoids, which are powerful antioxidants that protect cells from damage. Beta-carotene, beta-cryptoxanthin, capsanthin, and lutein are some of the carotenoids in peppers that are enhanced by cooking.
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However, steaming or boiling has been shown to reduce rather than increase the vitamin C content, so roasting is the best option.
7. Broccoli
Cooking broccoli increases the intake of indoles, which are cancer-fighting compounds. Broccoli also contains glucosinolates and sulforaphane that require the activation of the enzyme myrosinase to be converted into cancer-fighting compounds.
Steaming broccoli has been shown to preserve its myrosinase content and also its vitamin C content better than other cooking methods.
8. Kale
Kale is well-known as a superfood and certainly has many health benefits when eaten raw, but cooked kale also has its own unique benefits.
Cooking kale reduces the amount of isothiocyanates and goitrogens that can negatively affect thyroid function, and it also helps you absorb the iron and calcium it contains, but raw kale is harder to digest than cooked kale.
9. Sweet potato
Cooking sweet potatoes makes the beta-carotene more available to your body, and this carotenoid is essential for maintaining healthy vision and immune function.
Boiling, baking, or roasting potatoes helps break down the starch and prevent the digestive problems that can occur when eating potatoes raw.
But that’s not all: Cooking sweet potatoes (and other potatoes) inactivates the anti-nutrients found in them, so you can absorb the beneficial minerals and vitamins they contain.
10. Kidney beans
If you want to reap the eye health benefits of kidney beans, cook them.
Why? Cooking green beans increases their content of antioxidants such as lutein and zeaxanthin, which are important nutrients for the eyes.
Research suggests that steaming kidney beans may enhance their cholesterol-lowering effects, but you should be careful with how you cook this veggie: Baking, microwaving, grilling or pan-frying beans has been shown to boost antioxidants, but boiling or pressure cooking them doesn’t seem to do the same.
11. Zucchini
Like many foods that are more nutritious when cooked than raw, cooking zucchini provides more carotenoid antioxidants, which help prevent cell damage, and also makes it easier to digest.
12. Cauliflower
Cooking cauliflower increases the availability of indoles and sulforaphane, compounds that may have anti-cancer properties, and steaming is the best way to preserve the nutrients in cauliflower, including vitamin C.
13. Eggplant
A study published in Nutrition Research Research has shown that steaming eggplant helps compounds in eggplant bind with bile acids, helping the liver break down cholesterol. Cooked eggplant also contains more antioxidants, including nasunin, which helps protect brain cell membranes from damage.
Cooking eggplant’s fiber makes it easier to digest, and a 2016 study found that baking eggplant preserves chlorogenic acid, which helps slow the release of glucose, potentially helping to prevent diabetes.
On the other hand, boiling eggplant retains more of its delphinidin content, another health-promoting antioxidant, and cooking eggplant also removes the solanine content, a toxin found in raw eggplant.
Additionally, cooking eggplant makes it softer, easier to eat, and reduces its bitterness.
14. Pumpkin
Pumpkin is another food whose beta-carotene is better absorbed when cooked. As mentioned above, beta-carotene has a variety of benefits, including maintaining healthy skin and eyesight.
15. Cabbage
Cabbage is another vegetable that contains goitrogens, which can be problematic for people with thyroid problems. Thankfully, cooking cabbage reduces the goitrogens it contains while also increasing the availability of antioxidants.
16. Beets
Cooking beets increases levels of antioxidants, especially betalains, which have anti-inflammatory properties and aid in detoxification. Cooking beets also has the added benefit of reducing their oxalic acid content and increasing mineral absorption.
17. Artichoke
Cooking artichokes increases levels of antioxidants such as quercetin and rutin, which may help prevent heart disease and cancer. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry It was found that steaming artichokes increased their antioxidant content by 15 times, while boiling increased their antioxidant capacity by 8 times.
Additionally, microwaving can increase antioxidants, but boiling can cause the loss of water-soluble vitamins, so it’s best to avoid this cooking method.
18. Onion
Cooking onions increases their flavonoid content, especially quercetin, an antioxidant that has anti-inflammatory and immune-boosting properties.
19. Garlic
Cooked garlic contains more allicin, a compound with powerful antibacterial, antiviral, and antifungal properties. Cooking garlic also enhances its benefits to the cardiovascular system.
20. Celery
Cooking celery can increase its antioxidant content, including apigenin and luteolin, which have anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer properties. Cooked celery is also easier to digest.
However, it’s important to note that only a few cooking techniques can actually help increase the nutritional value of celery compared to eating it raw: Microwaving, baking, pressure cooking, deep frying and grilling all increase celery’s antioxidant capacity, while boiling decreases it.
In addition to the 20 foods mentioned above, the following foods also offer increased specific benefits when cooked rather than eaten raw, reducing anti-nutrients and releasing powerful vitamins and minerals.
