How to Cook Food Without Losing Nutrients

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1Choosing Nutrient-Hardy Foods

2Minimizing Nutrient Loss During Preparation

3Using Nutrient-Friendly Cooking Methods

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Prolonged exposure to water, heat, and light may cause some foods to lose nutritional value. While this isn’t a big problem for sources of proteins and carbohydrates, it’s a definite concern when cooking vegetables and fruits rich in water-soluble or heat-sensitive vitamins and minerals. To address this problem, stick with cooking methods that are quick and rely on very little moisture, while also picking and storing foods in the most appropriate manner.

Steps

Part 1

Part 1 of 3:

Choosing Nutrient-Hardy Foods

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   Include more nutrient-dense foods in your diet. Simply put, foods that have a higher nutritional value can usually afford to lose more nutrients than those that have low nutritional content to begin with. Try to include more fruits and vegetables that are dark green or orange, since these typically have more vitamins than produce pale in color. Similarly, lean meats and fish offer more nutrient per bite than fatty cuts of meat.

   • It can also be a good idea to note which vitamins and nutrients are naturally more sensitive to air, light, and heat so that you can be more careful when preparing foods that have them. Proteins, carbohydrates, biotin, and niacin are relatively stable. On the other hand, vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin K, vitamin B-6, riboflavin, and carotenes are somewhat sensitive; vitamin C, folic acid, and thiamin are especially sensitive.
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   Buy fresh and local. Prolonged storage can cause produce to lose nutritional value before you ever get a chance to cook it. Buy fresh produce when possible, and try to use it within a day or two of purchase.

   • Buying produce that's locally grown and in season can also help. Food that has to be shipped across the country may not be properly refrigerated the entire way, causing it to lose nutrients before it even reaches you.
   • One way to ensure that you're getting fresh produce is to buy unripened fruits and vegetables. Most produce will have maximum nutritional value as soon as it ripens, so ripening produce at home can be beneficial. Keep produce out at room temperature until it ripens, then use it as quickly as possible.
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   Opt for heirloom varieties. Heirloom fruits and vegetables can be a little more expensive, but they'll usually be denser in nutrients than their hybrid counterparts. Hybrid crops are grown with an emphasis on yield, rather than nutrition, so they may not contain as many vitamins and minerals.
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   Buy only what you need. Try to only purchase what you expect to use within two days. Since fruits and vegetables can lose nutrients evenly when properly stored, it's best to limit the amount of storage time altogether.

   • If you do find yourself with more fresh food than you can use within a few days, freeze what you can't eat. Freezing will preserve more nutrients than refrigeration.
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   Stock up on frozen vegetables. Loosely packed frozen vegetables are usually prepared when the produce is at its peak nutritional value, and the freezing process does a fairly good job of retaining those nutrients. If you don't think you can use fresh vegetables within a few days, it might actually be better to opt for their frozen counterparts.

   • Avoid using canned vegetables, however, since nutrients can leech out into the water they're packed in. Most canned vegetables also contain added sodium.
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Part 2

Part 2 of 3:

Minimizing Nutrient Loss During Preparation

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   Store foods in cool, dark places. Ripe produce, meats, and dairy should all be stored in your refrigerator. Light and air can destroy nutrients, so you should avoid exposing food to these elements unnecessarily.

   • Keep your refrigerator at or below 40 degrees Fahrenheit (4 degrees Celsius).
   • Store vegetables in the crisper drawer of your refrigerator.
   • Buy milk and juice in opaque containers, or transfer these liquids into opaque containers if their original containers are transparent.
   • If you do happen to have canned goods, store them in a cellar kept between 50 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit (10 and 21 degrees Celsius) to prevent nutrient loss.
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   Use fresh foods quickly. As noted previously, you should purchase fresh produce, dairy, and meat, and use these fresh ingredients as quickly as possible to minimize the nutrient loss that occurs in storage. Keep fresh food you can’t use within a couple of days in a freezer set at or below 0 degrees Fahrenheit (-18 degrees Celsius).
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   Rinse instead of soaking. When cleaning produce, thoroughly wash away dirt, bacteria, pests, and pesticides under cool, running water. Do not soak the vegetables, however, since valuable water-soluble nutrients, like vitamin C, can leech out into the water.
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   Maximize surface area. Avoid cutting vegetables into small pieces prior to cooking. Instead, cook them whole or in large chunks.

   • When vegetables are finely chopped, more of the vegetable is exposed to air and water, making water-soluble and light-sensitive nutrients more likely to leech out.
   • Furthermore, it can be a good idea to let vegetables rest for about 10 minutes after cutting them before cooking or eating them. Some studies suggest that the additional time allows more nutrients to be activated, making them easier for your body to absorb
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   Keep the skin. Resist the temptation to peel your vegetables. In many cases, the flesh just beneath the skin contains more nutrients than the inner portions. Removing the skins can cause you to either peel away these nutrient-dense layers or expose them to air and water that can dissolve those nutrients away.
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Part 3

Part 3 of 3:

Using Nutrient-Friendly Cooking Methods

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   Microwave vegetables. The microwave can be one of the best ways to retain vitamins and nutrients in vegetables. As a general rule, the best way to prevent nutrient loss is to cook vegetables quickly, with minimum heat and minimum liquid, and the microwave can accomplish this.

   • Consider microwaving vegetables with a small amount of water. While some nutrients can be lost when exposed to large amounts of liquid, adding a little water will steam the vegetables in addition to microwaving them, thereby cooking them faster and exposing sensitive nutrients to less heat.
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   Steam or blanch vegetables. Aside from microwaving, steaming and blanching are probably the best ways to cook your vegetables. These methods use minimal water, minimal time, and minimal heat--minimizing nutrient loss as a result.

   • Cook your vegetables until they are tender-crisp (tender enough to bite into without losing all their natural crunch). Vegetables that are tender enough to break apart when you pierce them with a fork will lose a lot of nutrients during cooking.
   • Check for color, too. Cooking methods that preserve color, like steaming and blanching, also tend to preserve more nutrients.
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   Stir-fry vegetables and meats. Since stir-frying is a quick way to cook food, you can retain a decent amount of nutrients using this method. Water-soluble vitamins won't leech into the oil like they leech into water, either, which is another benefit of this technique.

   • To limit nutrient loss when stir-frying lean meats, cut the meat into bite-sized pieces and coat the pieces in whole wheat flour. The flour acts as a barrier, protecting the meat (and protein) from the heat and moisture that could otherwise cause some loss of nutritional value.
   • Also, use as little oil as possible when cooking and choose heart-healthy oils, like canola and olive oil.
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   Bake meats and fish, but not vegetables. Baking meat, poultry, and fish is a great way to preserve the proteins and other nutrients in these foods. When baking fish, you might also consider wrapping it in tinfoil to limit the amount of contact the sensitive flesh has with the intense heats of the oven.

   • Roasting is less ideal for vegetables since the prolonged exposure to high heat can increase nutrient loss. If you like the taste of roasted vegetables, though, stick with hardier options that are more resistant to heat, like beets, onions, celery, and green beans.
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   Avoid boiling your food. Boiling is probably the worst cooking method you can use if you're concerned about maximizing the nutritional value of your food. Water-soluble nutrients will leech out of vegetables and into the cooking water.

   • The only exception to this rule is soup. Boiling vegetables in soup broth will still cause nutrients to leech out, but as long as you drink the broth, you'll still consume most of those nutrients.
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   Reheat only when necessary. Repetitive exposure to heat will cause more nutrients to disappear from your food, so minimize the amount of reheating you do. When reheating leftovers, only warm up the amount of food you can eat in one sitting instead of reheating the entire batch multiple times.
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