Emma Miller
Fried foods are much more harmful than steamed, oven-cooked, or boiled foods. Experts unanimously say that eating fried foods is harmful.
Nutritionist Svetlana Fus says that there are several reasons why fans of fried chicken or other dishes in oil should be concerned:
- The first and most well-known: is fat content! Frying is traditionally done with vegetable oil or animal fat. Accordingly, a fried dish is fatter than a boiled one, for example. The frying process changes the quality of the food and increases its caloric content many times over, resulting in excess fat in the food. What can we do? The simplest and most radical thing is to use other cooking methods. ⠀⠀
- Point two: charring. A delicious crispy crust has a very low nutritional value. The deeper the frying and the thicker the crust, the less protein your body will absorb from such food. It’s unpleasant and unhealthy. ⠀⠀
- Point three, the key one: carcinogens. The carcinogenic substances that can be formed from fat during frying are really very toxic. How do they occur? Each fat/oil has its own “smoke point”. This is the temperature at which the oil literally smokes. You’ve probably seen it with your own eyes. It is after the smoke point that carcinogens are formed in the fat in an avalanche-like manner. Spoiled oil in the pan? Pour it out, now it’s poisonous!!!!
It’s all about the oil
The usual refined sunflower oil has a boiling point of about 230 degrees. But, for example, the popular extra virgin olive oil has a boiling point of 160 to 216 degrees. Animal fats smoke at 150 to 250 degrees.
A crust forms at a temperature of about 140-160 degrees Celsius. However, on the stove, the pan can get up to 300 degrees, so any fat can be overheated. The darker the color of the crust of your food, the more harmful substances (carcinogens) it contains.
“Hearties”, don’t eat fried foods
Harvard University emphasizes that fried foods pose a risk to the heart, in part because they provoke inflammation. But how many servings of crispy fries do you need to increase your risk of cardiovascular disease?
Scientists have combined the results of 17 studies on fried foods and problems such as heart attacks, blocked coronary arteries, heart failure, and stroke. More than half a million people took part in the studies.
The researchers also examined data from six other studies evaluating the link between fried food consumption and premature death. These studies involved more than 750,000 people. People who ate the most fried foods each week were 28% more likely to have heart problems compared to people who ate the least.
Each additional 114 grams of fried food per week increases the overall risk by 3%. But the analysis did not show that people who ate a lot of fried food were more likely to die prematurely.
In addition to provoking inflammation, fried foods often also contain a lot of sodium and unhealthy saturated fat. If you decide to indulge in them, do so sparingly. And avoid foods fried in animal fats; instead, choose foods fried in vegetable oils.
