Overheating/overcooking foods

by Bryane
(United States)

Burnt foods become carcinogenic (cancer-causing).

Hello, I just read thru most of your information on this website and found an area that raised my curiosity. In the section relating to healthy eating, it was stated that it is harmful to over heat foods when cooking.

Is there a way to learn the proper way to correctly cook foods to avoid over cooking or is it as simple as don't burn the food and your fine i.e. barbecuing, etc? It seems it may apply to searing food and roasting vegetables as well.

I cook regularly and would really appreciate your response. I learned a lot from your website - thank you for sharing this information and helping people get educated about nutrition.

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From Sara:

Bryane, the method of cooking plays a major role in either preserving/destroying the vitamins and minerals of your food. Where possible, always try to keep your foods as close to their original state as possible.

There are a few things you'll need to consider, and this is just a short list:

1) While meat needs to be well cooked to kill the bacteria, vegetables should only be lightly cooked by blanching, saute or steam. Overcooked vegetables cause the vitamins and minerals to be destroyed and are also harder to digest, causing them to stay in the gut where it becomes toxic and leading to a host of digestive problems later on. (This applies to other overcooked foods as well, not just vegetables.)

2) Phytonutrients in vegetables, however, cannot be destroyed by heat. When boiling vegetable soup, the phytonutrients will leak into the boiling water, making the soup very nutritious, although you lose the vitamins, minerals and enzymes. Discard the overcooked vegetables for the same reason stated in #1 above.

3) The type of oil used for cooking plays a big part in determining your health too. Most cooking oil (even vegetable oil) when used in high heat cooking will turn into transfat that causes high LDL cholesterol. Read more about harmful oil here.

4) Grilling your vegetables is fine but avoid overcooking that they become so limp. Also avoid eating burnt foods as the carbon can become carcinogenic (cancer-causing).

5) Never use microwave oven for heating or reheating food. It is one of the most dangerous methods of cooking. Read about the danger of microwave oven here.