Its not just about having eating veggies every day, but keeping it rotated with different class/groups of groceries. Below are reasons why you should expand your list of greens.
1 – DIFFERENCE IN NUTRITIONAL VALUE
Greens don’t have them same taste and likewise their nutritional value. By eating a variety of leafy greens, you’ll get a more balanced amount of vitamins and minerals which you wouldn’t get by just consuming two types of leafy green. Go for veggies that have higher levels of calcium, iron and protein. Branch out and diversify!
2 – LIMIT THE RATE OF ANTI-PROTEIN OVERDOSE
It is good to know what kind of nutrients your greens contain, some of them have toxins that protect them from predators. For example, , goitrogens in kale and other brassicas can interfere with thyroid hormone function in susceptible individuals. oxalic acid in spinach can be problematic for people who are prone to kidney stone formation. When you consume a handful of this greens every day, it is safe when you have no health condition.
The problem, however, arises if you currently have a medical condition that may be exacerbated by certain compounds found in some leafy greens. Or if you go all crazy about the amount of leafy greens you eat. And by crazy, I’m talking about consuming three or more bunches of greens every single day.
How To Rotate Your Greens
Firstly, try making greens a part of your diet and make sure you get used to it. Then get your diet balanced to avoid nutritional imbalance. For example, I might have leaf lettuce and spinach for a few days, and then I’ll switch to beet greens and kale for a couple weeks, , I might eat dandelion greens and romaine lettuce every day for two weeks. Also it is important to rotate greens that belong to different plant families, for example, rotating one brassica-type vegetable like kale with another brassica like bok choy isn’t a good rotation because you are still getting the same anti-nutrients that are in all brassicas. What you should rotate for kale would be a non-brassica like beet green, lettuce or chard.
Should fruits also be rotated?
The toxicity of fruits can be found in its seed so its safe to say fruits aren’t so dangerous. Now, that being said, some species of edible fruits do have small amounts of toxic compounds that aren’t acutely poisonous when eaten in normal amounts, but could build up over time and cause a problem. For example, soursop and cherimoya both contain annonacin which accumulation of it could lead to brain lesions. Of course, there are also wild fruits and berries that are highly toxic to humans.
In summary, rotation your greens and fruits in your smoothies would promote your health in a positive way but having the same kind of fruits and greens over a period of time could lead to nutritional imbalances and in some cases, toxicity. Get creative, try new food stuffs.
Image courtesy of: suesplantbasedhealth.com.
