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Effect Of Microwaves On Nutrients In Food
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Modernization and scientific revolution has influenced every moment of life. It has its own effect even on cooking. One such effect is microwave cooking. Microwaves are really convenient and energy-efficient devices in comparison with conventional ovens.
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Over 90 percent of homes in the US have microwave ovens that are used for regular meal preparation. But, the question is whether cooking in a microwave oven is really safe for health or not.
In a recent research conducted on studying the effects of microwave cooking on food nutrients, researchers have found that microwave cooking of raw broccoli destroys almost 97 percent all the available nutrients. Some of these are natural health-promoting chemicals known as flavonoids. These flavonoids are present in all bright-colored vegetables and are found to reduce the risk of coronary heart diseases and also cancer. In contrast, 66 percent of flavonoids get eliminated due to cooking and 47 percent percent due to pressure cooking. Microwave generates unexpectedly high temperatures inside the foods. The entire chemical structure of the nutrients gets destroyed in case of microwave cooking. As a result, they are not properly retained inside the foods and are leached out.
Another risk of using microwaves is the leaching out of carcinogenic toxins from the plastic or paper plates that are used to cover and mix the food. In case of vegetables and fruits, microwave cooking causes destruction of several disease-preventing nutrients. Baby bottles should never be boiled using a microwave. The bottles might seem to be cold outside. But, inside they may be extremely hot and can burn the tongue of the baby. All the constituents in breast milk are heat labile. This means they get easily destroyed at high temperatures. Hence, microwave cooking is not recommended for breast milk.
Microwave cooking also results in the formation of free radicals. These free radicals can interact with a variety of enzymes and disrupt various biological processes.
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