Simple Foods To Superfoods

So what does James do that is so different? He tells you how to choose and store your produce in ways which help improve it. Some of this stuff you may know already. other things maybe are not 'common knowledge' 

Choose apples -we all know one a day keeps the Dr away - but Braeburns come top of any other usual variety, in terms of polyphenols and antioxidants. 1½ times the polyphs of Fuji. 

Serve skin on - 50% of the fibre is in the peel

Potatoes - again, avoid peeling if you can. Dietwise, the waxy new potatoes like Charlotte  have a lower GI than floury baking potatoes like Maris Piper

Store potatoes - this is quite crazy - but if you slice your potatoes into 5mm rounds and store them in the fridge, they will double their antioxidants in just 2 days. But you have to have your meal plan sorted  nd be organised!

Lots of the benefits appear to come from 'damaging' the produce. If you 'wound' your greens [ie slice or tear your lettuce leaves] the protective antioxidants at the edge of the tear will increase, to shield the tissues from further damage. Just a couple of days in the fridge and your lettuce will be a superfood!

Serve those greens dressed with a dressing of monounsaturated fats [eg olive oil] and your body will absorb up to 5 times more of the nutrients.  Add a squirt of lemon juice, and the iron in spinach and watercress is significantly improved. 

Store I've been cutting salad leaves as I need them - but it seems that salad leaves do not lose polyphenol and vitamin content if bagged and refrigerated [apart from a little Vitamin C] and can be kept for up to 10 days.Given the fondness of the caterpillars for my leaves still in the raised bed, this is definitely worth considering!

Onions are good raw [for the allinase blood thinning agent] or cooked[which releases the quercetin which is cholesterol lowering] To get the best of both worlds, begin your recipe prep by chopping the onion and that 'wounding' will up the allinase and more will survive the cooking process. 

Shallots have up to 6x more polyphenols than regular onions {and I have a lovely crop of them this year]

Yes, I am already keeping tomatoes on the windowsill to ripen and develop more lycopene - but did you know that mushrooms [gill side up] on the worktop will develop 100 times more Vitamin D in just 2 hours?

 

Lycopene, the important phytonutrient in tomatoes is deep in the cells of the fruit - but cooking releases it into soluble form. Spaghetti sauce, tomato soup, and good old Ketchup are great ways to get this stuff into your system

Surprisingly it is the cheaper robusta coffee beans which contain more antioxidants than the classy, expensive arabica. And cheap 'comminuted' orange juice, has 3x the antioxidants and 7x the flavonoids of traditionally squeezed juice [because the former blitzes up the whole orange and then strains the pulp. But goodness from zest and skin leach into the juice]

Chill out! I love this one - if you cook and chill a starch based dish [mac and cheese, cottage pie, spag bol etc] this will initiate a reaction converting some of the carbs into 'resistant starch', which lowers the GI value of the dish. And when you reheat, that can lower it even further [one trial at University of Surrey says up to 50%, but James stresses that was a small trial] I love to batch cook - and we have always felt that 'second day casserole' tastes better. Now we know why.

This is such a long post, sorry! and I couldn't share all his ideas here - or the 80+ recipes for sauces, salads and sundaes, desserts, drinks and donuts. [I forgot to mention that he sweetens things with baking blend Stevia, the plant based alternative to regular sugar] For a newbie gardener like me it is a fabulous book- I have grown these veg, and now I can better prepare them for more nutritious meals. 

Lots of information, lots of ideas, not just for fruit and veg but also grains, beans and pulses - and finally "tea, coffee, chocolate and booze"!

I am in no way decrying CVTs warning about UPFs [the man maybe a Zealot but much of what he says is true, and somewhat disturbing] - but I have found this book a delightful counterbalance with inspiring ways to ensure that even my 'common or garden' veg crop can be extra nutritious.He's honest about his lapses [he admits to loving eating canned peaches in syrup straight from the tin - even though he knows they have lost half their polyphenols and are loaded with extra sugar] 

And the book is so attractive and colourful. Yes, I know that our bodies will excrete superfluous vitamins - I cannot eat 7 oranges on Sunday and consider that my week's worth of Vit C sorted. But I also know that the school dinner cabbage boiled for hours was neither tasty nor particularly nutritious. 

I'm not going overboard with his ideas. Our village has a problem with flies - so food on countertops needs monitoring carefully. But I will chop the onions first, and cut my salad leaves more, and be more mindful of my choices with fruit and veg. It may not make much of a difference, but every little helps [and I do want to try the donut recipe] 

James Wong's "How to Eat Better" definitely gets *****
Borrow it from the library and see what you think!