Does microwave affect the nutritional value of food?

Yes. Yes to some foods.

For example, if you heat milk in the microwave, the protein in the milk will change from a sol state to a gel state due to high temperature, resulting in deposits and affecting the quality of dairy products. The longer the milk is heated and the higher the temperature, the more severe the loss of nutrients, with vitamin C being the most lost, followed by lactose.

When the microwave is absorbed by the food, the polar molecules in the food (such as water, fat, protein, sugar, etc.) are attracted to oscillate rapidly at a speed of 2.45 billion times per second, so that the molecules collide with each other and produce a large amount of frictional heat.

In this process, some nutrients will be physically changed, chemically reacted, or biologically affected, and their structures will be destroyed. So for some foods, microwave heating will affect its nutritional value.

Any way of cooking will affect the nutritional value of the food, only the difference in size. Generally speaking, the impact of Weibo cooking is still relatively small, the cooking time is short, no frying, the most influential frying, followed by frying, generally speaking, the impact of hot and rapid frying is smaller, the longer the cooking time, the greater the loss of nutrients. Of course, various nutrients are different, and generally high-temperature vitamins are lost the most.

Yes, I usually reheat it in the pot.

According to current data, microwave cooking shortens the heating time, so the vitamin preservation rate is higher than that of ordinary cooking methods. If you use a casserole to stew chicken broth, then if it is simmered for more than an hour, the rate of vitamin loss will be higher. In terms of protein, whether it is boiled or microwaved, the two can be digested and absorbed normally, and there is not much difference.

However, there are pros and cons to everything, and microwave cooking may reduce the amount of unsaturated fatty acids in meat, which is a noteworthy thing.

In a new study, researchers measured the changes in fatty acids in beef after heating. Some samples are microwaved, while others are heated by traditional cooking until the middle temperature of the beef reaches the same temperature. The results showed that compared with the cooking method, microwave heating had a greater adverse effect on omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, and the proportion of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids was significantly reduced.

Cooking at lower temperatures not only has less effect on unsaturated fatty acids, but even slightly increases the content of polyunsaturated fatty acids. There are similar reports abroad that after cooking fish with microwaves, the proportion of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids decreases, while saturated fatty acids increase.

Microwave ovens are now widely used in kitchens, dormitories, and various eating places, but there is still a suspicion that their radiation can be harmful to food, depleting various vitamins and nutrients.

Take a break and search your brain for all things related to words like "nuclear matter" and "radiation." Power lines and cancer, cell phones and brain tumors, nuclear reactors and extinctions. Therefore, we will naturally give the same "courtesy" to microwaves.

I've been asked countless times if standing in front of a microwave is enough to cause cancer (the answer, of course, is "no."

In a well-known **, it is written that eating microwave-cooked food regularly will raise cholesterol, lower hemoglobin, and destroy cells.

It sounds like a microwave oven that heats food by causing the molecules in the food to vibrate, and is essentially the same as an oven, but just speeds it up. However, anyone with a modicum of scientific knowledge knows that microwaves have little or no effect on nutritional value.

There is no doubt that every cooking method can damage the vitamins and other nutrients in the food. The degree of damage is determined by how long the food was cooked, how much liquid was used, and the temperature at which it was cooked. Since the microwave uses less heat and takes less time to cook than regular cooking methods, it stands to reason that it should be the least nutrient-damaging cookware.

The most heat-sensitive nutrients are water-soluble vitamins such as B vitamins and vitamin C, which are commonly found in vegetables.

In a study conducted at Cornell University, scientists studied the effects of cooking methods on water-soluble vitamins in vegetables. They found that spinach cooked in the microwave retained almost all of the folate, but if it was cooked on a regular stovetop, it would lose about 77 percent. They were also surprised to find that bacon cured meat cooked in the microwave was cooked in the same way as the usual method.

In comparison, the levels of nitrosamines, a carcinogen, were significantly reduced.

As for vegetables, if there is only one problem with microwaving cooking, it is that if you add water, it will greatly accelerate the loss of nutrients. A 2003 study published in the Journal of Food and Agricultural Sciences found that if kale was soaked in watery socks while cooking in the microwave, 74% to 97% of its antioxidants were lost. But if cooked without water, most of the nutrients contained in kale will be "unscathed."

Yes, in fact, as long as you heat the food again, it will destroy the nutrients, not just the microwave.

When heating food, whether it is steaming, boiling or baking, there will be water vapor, some water-soluble vitamins in the food, it will run away along the water vapor, the longer the time, the more it runs. But all the ways of heating food are wasted and this nutrient loss is not just in the microwave.

Is microwave food harmful?

There is no harm. The amount of radiation in the microwave oven is safe, but it is still recommended to leave more than 20 cm when heating, and the heated food will not be harmful to the human body, but the nutrients will be reduced, such as yogurt and VC-rich foods are best not to heat it.

In addition, microwaving water does not produce bubbles, which may cause the water to become overheated beyond the boiling point. Overheated water can boil when stirred or when tea is added, so be careful.

The loss is negligible. Even if you put it in the pot for the second time, it will lose a little bit. So it's better to eat when the food is still fresh.

When we use the microwave oven, it will still destroy the nutrition of the food. Because the food generated by the microwave oven is to quickly mature the food, so in general, the microwave oven will destroy the nutrients in the food if it is heated by the microwave oven, I recommend that you choose an induction cooker or a special woks when heating the food, which will help preserve the nutrients in the food. So I don't recommend everyone to use a microwave oven to heat up the food here.

The China Household Electrical Appliances Research Institute, together with experts from national food professional testing institutions, compared the nutritional content of food cooked with microwave and open flame, including vitamins, fats, proteins, minerals, etc. The results showed that microwave cooking did not result in faster and more severe nutrient loss than conventional cooking.

Studies have proved that when vegetables and fruits are cooked in the microwave, because of the short heating time, when reaching the same core temperature, the loss of vitamin C, flavonoids and chlorophyll is smaller. The loss of water-soluble vitamins, such as vitamin C and vitamin B, is related to the amount of water added in the cooking method, and microwave cooking can better retain the water-soluble vitamins in food because it does not need to add water or only adds a small amount of water.