Fried nuts are almost an essential snack for every household, and they are also a source of nutrition supplement in the diet. Recent studies have found that proper consumption of nuts and oilseeds has many health effects. For example, lowering blood lipids, reducing the risk of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases and diabetes, and helping to reduce postprandial blood glucose. Replacing some meat foods with nuts and oilseeds also helps to reduce all-cause mortality. However, for nut and oilseed foods, whether to eat, which kind to eat and how much to eat need to be considered from many aspects. Take a look at these common problems of eating nuts and oilseeds. Have you noticed them?
Question 1: eat too much
Consequence: getting fat
Although some studies say eating nuts doesn’t make you fat, this conclusion is largely based on replacing snacks such as biscuits, cookies and potato chips with nuts. After all, nuts and oilseeds are high in calories. If it affects the amount of dinner, the nutrition is unbalanced; If you don’t affect the amount of dinner and eat more, you will have too much calories and can’t consume them, resulting in obesity, which is unfavorable to the prevention of hyperlipidemia and fatty liver.
Question 2: eat discontinuously
Consequence: no health benefits
Compared with sometimes eating a lot and sometimes not eating at all, eating a little every day is more conducive to health. In some intervention studies, subjects were given 90 grams or more at a time, and individuals did not think it was beneficial. Epidemiological studies suggest that 50-70 grams per week can produce health effects, with an average of 10 grams per day. If you use less cooking oil, you can eat more, but an average of 20 or 30 grams is enough (shelling weight).
Question 3: the product is not fresh
Consequence: fat oxidation has peculiar smell
It should be noted that many nuts and oilseeds sold as snacks are not fresh enough. It is common for fat oxidation to produce stale taste after they are kept for two or three months after they are bought home. It’s better to buy vacuum packed or nitrogen filled products in a small number of times, or directly buy Nuts without shelling, so as to avoid buying crushed and powdered products in large quantities.
Question 4: unreasonable cooking
Consequence: damage mucous membrane and digestive tract
Nuts and oilseeds are often eaten after frying; Make snacks, and usually add salt and sugar. In contrast, if you add some spices and cook it soft, cut it directly with cold vegetables, or eat it with steamed bread, it is delicious and healthier. If you eat it fried, over dried, and add a lot of oil and sugar seasoning, there will be more trouble. Over dried nuts absorb water from the mouth and digestive tract, which is easy to cause mucosal inflammation. If you add a lot of salt, it will be more serious.
Question 5: wrong meal
Consequence: nutritional imbalance of three meals
Nuts and oilseeds are best eaten in the morning. This is because breakfast is in a hurry and many people often eat too little. Adding nuts and oilseeds can strengthen the quality of breakfast and make it more delicious and hungry. At the same time, using nuts and oilseeds with foods with high glycemic index such as bread and steamed bread can reduce postprandial blood glucose response. If you eat it at night, the food is often very rich and the oil in the dishes is also a lot. Eating a lot of nuts and oilseeds will obviously make the dinner more caloric and heavier digestive burden.
Question 6: wrong varieties
Consequence: fatty acid imbalance
Since nuts and oilseeds are the source of fat, fatty acid balance needs to be considered. What fatty acids are lacking and what fatty acids are surplus can be adjusted with nuts and oilseeds. For example, people who fry vegetables with peanut oil do not have to eat peanuts. People who fry vegetables with sunflower seed oil do not have to eat sunflower seeds. Otherwise, fatty acids will be more biased in the same direction.
Problem 7: digestion can’t keep up
Consequence: stomach blockage, abdominal distension and diarrhea
Nuts and oilseeds contain a large number of anti nutritional components, such as phytic acid, oxalic acid and polyphenols, which inhibit digestive enzymes. At the same time, nuts are hard and tight, so they are difficult to chew thoroughly, and it is also difficult to contact digestive enzymes. Indigestion may be prone to stomach blockage and abdominal distention after eating too many nuts and oilseeds, and some people may even have diarrhea.
Therefore, people with weak digestion should avoid eating a large number of fried or roasted nuts and oilseeds. You can consider using a pressure cooker to cook soft, or put it in a soybean milk machine or wall breaking machine and beat it into milk to eat, which will reduce the burden on the digestive system.
Question 8: not fit for one’s own constitution
Consequences: allergies, acne and inflammation
Due to the wrong proportion of fatty acids in nuts and oilseeds, omega-6 fatty acids are too high, which may not be conducive to controlling inflammatory response, inducing acne, or making acne more serious. For example, sunflower seeds and watermelon seeds belong to the type of ultra-high omega-6, which is very unfriendly to skin problems; The varieties dominated by oleic acid such as Macadamia fruit, almond and Padan wood are much better; Cashew nuts and peanuts are in between.
Many people have chronic allergies to nuts and oilseeds, and a few even have acute allergies to nuts and oilseeds. People with inflammation of skin and mucous membrane are not suitable to eat more.
Reasonable eating method of nuts
In short, although nuts and oilseeds are rich in protein, a variety of trace elements, vitamin E and dietary fiber, they also need to be eaten correctly in order to really get their health benefits. Based on the above problems, the reasonable eating method is:
try to eat in the morning. Strengthen breakfast nutrition, and it is not easy to eat too much.
Eat with carbohydrate food. It is suitable to match with dried fruit, staple food, or put it in pasta.
Nuts can be added to cold dishes. If they are used for cooking, try to avoid frying and over baking.
If you want to eat more nuts, cooking oil and fatty snacks should be moderately reduced.
Select nuts with fresh smell, and vacuum and nitrogen filled packaging are relatively safe for products with long shelf life.
When selecting nut varieties, consider the overall fatty acid balance of the diet to avoid duplication with cooking oil.
People with dyspepsia can moderately control the consumption of nuts and oilseeds, and it is more appropriate to beat nuts into soybean milk with a wall breaking machine.
People with inflammation and acne problems should avoid nut oilseed varieties containing too many omega-6 fatty acids.
Text / fan Zhihong (director of China Nutrition Society and chief expert of science communication employed by China Association for science and Technology)