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How to remove nitrates from zucchini. Nitrates in vegetables, how to remove them? What foods contain the most nitrates?

Ever since mankind invented chemical fertilizers, agricultural cultivation vegetable crops changed a lot. This circumstance was also reflected in the quality of agricultural products. After all, if ordinary gardeners try to use chemicals in a dosed manner, without exceeding the permissible norms, then in large farms, in the pursuit of profit, this opportunity is sometimes abused. As a result, vegetables harvested from the beds contain too many undesirable substances, among which Nitrates are considered the most harmful to health.

Nitrates are salts of nitric acid.. By and large, such compounds are always present in vegetables, but only if certain concentrations are exceeded do they pose a danger to humans. Unfortunately, at home it is impossible to determine the level of nitrates in products purchased on the market. There is also no need to rely on the control of the relevant authorities. Therefore, for those who care about their own health, there is only one way out - to learn how to remove nitrates from vegetables.

Know the enemy by sight

To successfully deal with nitrates, first of all, it is necessary to know the basic properties of such compounds. This will help to more effectively apply some of the methods that will be described below. So, for example, vegetables grown in greenhouses and greenhouses, in terms of nitrate content, are noticeably superior to their relatives from open ground. The conclusion is simple, if there is a choice, preference should always be given to products that were cultivated in ordinary beds.

Most readily, nitrates accumulate in leaf crops. These are the various green salads that have become so popular. recent times, as well as traditional for our tables dill, parsley and green onion. Slightly behind them are root crops with a short ripening period. Mainly, these are radishes and early carrots.

However, this does not mean at all that you can not worry about how to remove nitrates from vegetables when eating fruits of other crops. They also contain harmful substances, and, as a rule, we consume them in much larger quantities compared to the same spinach or radish. So, hardly anyone eats a kilogram of lettuce per day, but 0.5 kg of a tomato is quite possible. At the same time, the amount of nitrates that have entered the body in both cases will be approximately comparable.

Scientists have also reliably established that nitrates are distributed differently in different vegetables. For example, in cucumbers, potatoes and eggplants, they accumulate near the surface, in the peel and layers immediately adjacent to it. But in tomatoes or cabbage, nitrates prefer the central parts of the fruit, concentrating mainly in the core and stalk. In root crops, the largest amount of harmful chemicals is found in the leaf cuttings.

Vegetable processing

In many cases, processing vegetables helps to remove nitrates from vegetables. For example, when pickling with vinegar, the concentration of harmful substances is reduced by 20-25% already on the first day, and after a week their content approaches zero. It is characteristic that the process of removing nitrates is accelerated if the vegetables are cut.

The strongest enemy of nitrates is an acidic environment, so salting or pickling helps to minimize the harm of chemicals. Sauerkraut does not contain nitrates at all, even if cabbages taken from richly fertilized beds were used for cooking. However, in this case great importance takes on the time factor, since long-term storage salty foods, the concentration of chemicals in them begins to increase. So, if in salted cucumbers the concentration of nitrates is normal, then after a couple of weeks of open storage it returns to its previous levels.

Helps get rid of nitrates traditional way processing, such as boiling. It is permissible to apply it to any root crops, which will later be used in various dishes: salads, soups, dressings, etc. In this case, it is recommended to pre-boil the vegetables in a significant amount of water.

Protection of fresh vegetables

The methods described above are very effective, but how to remove nitrates from vegetables that are supposed to be consumed fresh, not processed. Given the peculiarities of the accumulation of harmful substances in some vegetables, experts recommend that they be cleaned before use. So, it is imperative to remove the skin from cucumbers, cut off a thicker layer when peeling potatoes, and for tomatoes, it is enough to cut the core around the stalk. You should not eat the central part of the carrot, but in the case of onions, chemicals accumulate in the upper and lower parts of the head, so it is better to cut them off after cleaning.

If we are talking about vegetables such as leaf lettuce, green onions, radishes or spinach, it is recommended to keep them in water before use. To do this, the products are placed in a large bowl, the volume of which is several times greater than the volume of the vegetables themselves, pour cold water and left at room temperature. When the water becomes warm, it is changed. After this processing, it is better to store vegetables in the refrigerator, otherwise they will deteriorate very quickly.

Neutralization of nitrates

If none of the above recommendations on how to remove nitrates from vegetables work, you can go the other way. The fact is that some vitamins can neutralize the effect of nitrates. For example, vitamin C has the ability to reduce the effect of harmful chemicals on the human body by several times, and vitamins E and A do not allow nitrates to react and form nitrites, that is, the very substances that harm our internal organs.

When buying fresh vegetables and fruits, especially early ones, there is always the possibility of poisoning with nitrates and pesticides. How can you get rid of harmful substances in products?

Proper food cleaning will help get rid of pesticides and nitrates. You just need to know what, how and with what vegetable or fruit to do.

in cabbage most of nitrates are found in the upper leaves and stalk, which is why they must be thrown away.

In potatoes, nitrates are collected under the skin and in the core of the tubers. To get rid of nitrates, after boiling the potatoes, drain the water and collect fresh water.

The first eggplants and zucchini must be cut off the peel. Also cut off the stalk area, as this is the most poisonous place.

Cucumbers should be the color of the grass. If the cucumbers are too dark, then they are “overfed” with nitrates.

In lettuce, parsley, dill and other herbs, most of the nitrates accumulate in the veins and petioles. Since greens absorb nitrates very quickly, be sure to soak them in water for an hour before adding them to dishes.

The easiest way to determine how much nitrate a tomato contains is by looking at its skin. The thicker the peel - the more chemistry. Don't buy orange-red tomatoes that look unripe. A signal for high levels of pesticides and nitrates will be white flesh and thick veins on the cut. If you still come across such tomatoes, then soak them for an hour in cold water.

In carrots, radishes and beets, nitrates accumulate in the tops and tips, so they must be cut out before use. Never buy beetroot with a twisted tail. Carrots must be cut off 1 cm of the tail and the green part.

Grapes are treated with fungicides, which allows the berries to be stored for a long time. Be sure to rinse the grapes well to get rid of the fungicides.

Don't buy watermelons cut in half and wrapped in cling film. Look at the veins of a watermelon in the cut. If they are yellowish, then the berry was fertilized. You can also do a little test. Put a piece of watermelon pulp into a glass of water. If the water has changed color, then the watermelon was fed. If the water just turns cloudy, then the watermelons are safe.

When purchasing pears and apples, be sure to take the fruits in your hands. If they are slippery and sticky, then they are treated with biphenyl, which increases their shelf life. Biphenyl is banned in Europe and the US as it is highly carcinogenic and allergenic. Diphenyl-treated fruits must be peeled.

Please note that the most nitrate-contaminated vegetables and fruits are brought to us from Egypt, Israel, Holland and Turkey. These countries have very poor land, so it cannot have a large crop without the use of fertilizers.

We know from childhood that vegetables and fruits are of great benefit to our health. Moms and grandmothers were forced to eat carrots for "eyes" and fruits, as a source of all vitamins.

All this is certainly true, but there is one condition if these miraculous vegetables and fruits do not do more harm than good.

We are talking about pesticides and nitrates that come to our table through the gifts of nature, which we buy in the market or in the store. Every year, the amount of plant food without harmful chemical trace elements decreases.

Even if you grow cucumbers and potatoes in your garden, there is a high chance of encountering nitrates and pesticides.

Today we will talk about the dangers of nitrates in vegetables and fruits and how to get rid of them in order to avoid harm to health.

Nitrates are nothing more than salts of nitric acid. For growth and development, plants take a large amount of nitrates from the soil fertilized with chemistry. Nitrates artificially added to the ground are also absorbed by plants, but are not used in the metabolic process, but remain unchanged.

In part, the human body is able to remove nitrates naturally, but some of the harmful substances still remain and interact with our cells and with other chemical compounds that enter from the external environment. By other chemical compounds, we mean: pesticides, medicinal substances, chemical compounds coming from water and air into our bodies.

Nitrates turn into nitrites, and they just have a detrimental effect on human health. The fact is that nitrates under the action of an enzyme called nitrate reductase are converted into nitrites.

Nitrite is a toxic substance for hemoglobin, which in turn carries oxygen to the cells of the body. Nitrites act on hemoglobin to convert it to methemoglobin. As a result, oxygen does not enter each cell at the proper level, and carbon dioxide is not removed from it.

If the allowable amount of nitrites within 0.2 mg/kg of body weight arrives, approximately 2% of methemoglobin is formed, and another reductase enzyme is able to convert it back to normal hemoglobin. The only exception is babies. For young children, the intake of nitrites is much less.

With such imperceptible poisoning in the human body, metabolic processes fail:

The development of anemia of varying severity.
Memory impairment and intellectual decline.
Reducing the body's resistance to microorganisms and viruses.
Damage to the mucous membrane of the stomach and intestines, which leads to inflammatory processes and exacerbations.
Violation of the balance of microflora in the small and large intestines with the subsequent development of dysbaacteriosis.
Settling in the body of harmful fungi and the development of candidiasis.
Damage to the liver parenchyma with the possible development of liver failure.
Violation of the vasomotor center with a tendency to decrease blood pressure.
Decreased humoral immunity and increased likelihood of developing malignant neoplasms.

Of course, all these conditions can appear for other reasons, and are not isolated, but nitrates can accelerate their manifestation.

spinach;
parsley;
radish;
dill;
Chinese cabbage;
green onions;
beet;
celery.

These products contain about 4000 microns/kg of nitrates. They usually appear first. in early spring on store shelves and in the market. In order to please buyers with bright greenery on March 8, manufacturers do not spare fertilizers and chemicals, thinking about their own benefit and not thinking about our health, because early greenery is expensive and promises good earnings.

In second place with a content of up to 1500 mg / kg are such plants:

early white cabbage;
radish;
swede;
root celery;
rhubarb;
cauliflower;
broccoli;
horseradish.

In third place and the average amount of nitrates are the following products with an average content of up to 700 mg / kg of nitrates:

zucchini;
pumpkin;
cucumbers;
sorrel;
early carrots;
late autumn cabbage;
leek;
squash.

The smallest amount of the nitro group from the soil is obtained by such products:

tomatoes;
Bell pepper;
potato;
late carrot;
peas;
garlic;
onion.

But how can we, ordinary buyers, determine whether there is an excess of nitrates in the purchased product or not?

There are several valid methods.

Portable nitrate testers. It should be noted that such an apparatus is not cheap, but it is possible to determine the content of harmful substances without leaving the counter.

Test strips. It acts like a litmus test that changes color depending on the content of nitrates in the product. You can arrange a test at home, just by attaching a tester to a cut vegetable or fruit.

And finally, there is another way based on the observation of experienced chefs and vegetable growers:

Ideal appearance in color and shape. If all the apples on the counter look like the picture without flaws and with a uniform color, there is a high probability that such miracle apples are saturated with nitrates.
Unripe seeds and lack of rich sweet taste, such as in watermelons and melons, with an ideal bright color and aroma.
Yellowing of the outer surface on cucumbers and their rapid withering.
Hard whitish-gray streaks in the tomato flesh and a relatively light middle in relation to the peel.
Unnaturally long stems and the same unnatural green color. Fast rotting greens at room temperature.
Oversized carrots. Light stem and pale color of the vegetable itself.
Fragile lettuce leaves with brownish tips.
Lack of sweet taste in fruits and grapes. Too big.
Friability of potatoes. In the absence of nitrates, the potato is elastic and makes a crunch when pressed with a fingernail.

What are pesticides and their effect on the body

Pesticides are chemical compounds that have been used in agriculture since the early twentieth century. Growers of vegetables and fruits fight pests and diseases, weeds and other plant scourges in order to increase yields and productivity.

Pesticides are a generic name for a group of substances:

herbicides - substances that destroy weeds in the fields;
insecticides - substances that kill insects;
fungicides - substances that destroy harmful fungi;
zoocides - exterminators of harmful warm-blooded animals.

Most pesticides are designed to kill their targets, but some can cause inability to reproduce and grow. Pesticides are able to penetrate into all plant tissues and cause the desired effect, this is a systemic effect.

Use pesticides, forcing workers Agriculture exclusively for commercial purposes and aimed at achieving extremely simple indicators.

Namely, sustainability environment, high yield, increased possibility of storing vegetables and fruits in long-term transportation.

But, unfortunately, against the backdrop of these useful properties, pesticides neutralize others, not less than important indicators plants. With the constant and uncontrolled use of pesticides, the useful composition vegetables and fruits, the level of vitamins and microelements content inevitably falls, and most importantly, the safety for human consumption of products is reduced.

However, one should not think that pesticides are pure evil, of course not. At the beginning of the twentieth century, when the first chemicals began their fight against pests and deadly disease-carrying insects, it saved the lives of millions of people.

But over time, the uncontrolled use of pesticides by agricultural workers and owners of private household plots has led to the fact that harmful substances simply did not have time to be processed into simple components, and this began to harm the environment and human health.

Therefore, pesticides are classified according to chemical composition for inorganic and organic substances. Organic pesticides are used most often and they are called:

Phosphorus organic.
Chloroorganic.
organometallic.
Alkaloids (in particular nicotinic derivatives and neonicotinoids).

Above all, pesticides have a deadly effect on many animals and birds. Birds are particularly affected by these poisons. Pesticides affect the processes of calcium metabolism, and this affects the condition of the egg shell. Some pesticides have the ability to drift. So traces of DDT were found in the body of Antarctic penguins, and there pesticides were not used at all.

Pesticides are found in us, not only in vegetables and fruits, but also in water, and, accordingly, in fish and algae.

Scientists still found out how pesticides common in the environment affect human health:

Certain levels of pesticides in the blood cause tissues to stop responding to insulin, which in turn leads to diabetes second type. These harmful compounds tend to accumulate in adipose tissue. Some types of chemicals disrupt metabolic processes at all levels and lead to obesity. The body is not able to regulate the production of hormones and normalize metabolism.
Pesticides can cause malignant neoplasms of the blood and lymph, brain, breast, thyroid, lung and intestinal cancer.
The effect on the fetus is expressed in the occurrence of lung diseases in children in the postnatal period.
Authoritative scientific researchers in the US and Canada have proven that pesticides found in vegetables and fruits cause hyperactivity syndrome in children. Moreover, in violation nervous system and the manifestation of autism in children, for the first years of a child's life, pesticides are also to blame.
Poisonous substances designed to kill weeds and insects increase the risk of Parkinson's disease by several times. Approximately seven million people worldwide suffer from this disease. This applies to both agricultural workers and those who like to poison beetles in their garden.
Some experts believe that pesticides will manifest themselves in the future in a permanent violation of the reproductive system, both men and women. The number of miscarriages and congenital deformities will increase. The inability of women to fertilize, and male body will be deprived of the hormone testosterone. Children who are conceived during the period of active use of pesticides will increase the number of children born with congenital anomalies.

It takes a very small amount of pesticides in the eaten vegetable to get poisoned. Among all people, there are categories that can be especially susceptible to this. These are, first of all, small children, pregnant women, elderly people.

A special category includes people who already have diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, immune system or serious violations of the hematopoietic system. Also, do not forget about people who are in direct contact with pesticides and nitrates due to their work responsibilities. These are employees of warehouses and shops, agricultural workers caring for plants.

But even in ordinary life, it is enough to consume at least a kilogram of vegetables or fruits saturated with chemicals to get poisoned.

Symptoms of poisoning:

Unusual or diviant behavior - if a person screams, shows aggression, or vice versa, fell into a stupor, etc.
Nausea and vomiting.
Pain in the abdomen, in the region of the pancreas.
Headache or dizziness.
Decreased performance and severe weakness.
Drowsiness or agitation.
Staggering gait, loss of orientation.
A sharp drop in blood pressure.
Paleness of the skin and cyanosis in the area of the nasolabial triangle, fingertips.
Yellowness of the whites of the eyes and skin.
Loss of consciousness, convulsions.
Diarrhea.

If you notice similar signs in yourself or your loved ones, and the symptoms may be combined, or only one of them may appear. Immediately call an ambulance or take the victim to the nearest hospital. Before receiving qualified assistance and the arrival of an ambulance, you can independently perform several important actions to save a person.

First, gastric lavage. This can be done by giving several glasses of salted water and inducing a gag reflex from the root of the tongue.
Secondly, dilute magnesia powder for oral administration in a glass. This substance has a high osmotic pressure and causes diarrhea. Be aware that oral magnesia has an extremely unpleasant taste.
Give sorbent if possible. It can be ordinary black or white activated carbon, Atoxil, Enterosgel.
If a person is unconscious, lay him with raised legs on his side, so that in case of vomiting, to prevent aspiration of vomit.

How to get rid of pesticides and nitrates

How to get rid of chemistry in vegetables and fruits, if it is present there, in order to prevent poisoning.

It is important to understand that thanks to the systemic and widespread use of pesticides and nitrates, literally every vegetable or fruit that hits your table has one or another degree of contamination. The exception is not even made up of products grown in their own garden. The only difference is that people who grow their vegetables know when and what they add to the ground, or how they water the plants.

The rest of the consumers can only blindly rely on the integrity of sellers and manufacturers, on whom it is better not to rely. And yet, following some rules, you can get rid of nitrates and pesticides in fruits and vegetables and reduce the concentration of harmful substances in products.

But each type of vegetables and fruits in its own way specifically accumulates substances harmful to us in different parts plants, so they need to be cleaned in different ways.

Potato

Drain the first water after boiling potatoes, pour again clean water and continue cooking. Good for peeling.

Cabbage

In any type of cabbage, the main part of nitrates is collected in the upper leaves and stalk. Remove the topmost leaves and do not eat the stalk.

Tomatoes

In this vegetable, the coarser and thicker the peel, the more stuffed it is. harmful substances. Do not buy unripe vegetables with a yellow tint. Put the tomatoes in cold water for an hour.

Zucchini, cucumbers and eggplants

Cut off the "butt" and peel and stalks of these vegetables - this is the most dangerous place for pesticides to accumulate.

On each side, additionally cut off one centimeter of the vegetable. Soak in cold water for thirty minutes.

Parsley, dill, lettuce

The maximum accumulation of chemistry in the veins and petioles, they must be removed. Soak in lightly salted water or soda solution for forty minutes.

Wash well, but rather soak for thirty minutes in water. For better storage, grapes are treated with fungicidal solutions.

Pears and apples

If the fruits are sticky and unpleasant to the touch, then they must be treated with diphenyl. This is a substance to prevent rotting of fruit. Wash under running warm water with a brush, but rather cut off the peel.

By the way, difinil has long been banned by WHO - the World Health Organization, as a dangerous carcinogen.

Large berries cut in half for convenience can become a source of microbial infection. In its composition, watermelon contains the maximum amount of glucose, and this, in turn, is an excellent nutrient medium for many bacteria.

Yellow streaks in the pulp of a watermelon indicate an overabundance of fertilizers in it. Do a simple and quick test. Place a piece of watermelon pulp in a glass of cold water. If the water has become just cloudy - everything is in order, but if the water in the glass has changed its color, be sure that there are pesticides.

Carrots, beets, radishes

Early radishes contain the highest levels of pesticides of any vegetable. Just that, we buy first of all, in early spring. Cut off the ends and tops of the radishes.

Beets with twisted ends are likely to have a lot of chemicals that can do a lot of harm. For beets and carrots, be sure to cut off at least one centimeter from the tip and the greenish stalk.

Getting rid of chemistry in vegetables and fruits - useful tips

Any vegetables and fruits get rid of harmful impurities if they are soaked in water.

And proper heat treatment, halves the risk of eating a serving of nitrates. Place vegetables in boiling water without salt, then after a few minutes add salt and drain. At the same time, 80% of pesticides go away, but vitamins also go with them.

Choose vegetables that grow in your climate zone.

All overseas and Exotic fruits just stuffed with chemistry. Manufacturers are forced to do this, otherwise they simply would not have arrived in their original form.

In European countries and in Asian countries, chemicals do not hesitate to add to the ground and water the plants with an extremely large amount of preservative fertilizers and other chemicals.

The dirtiest plants come to us from Turkey, Holland and Egypt. In these countries bright sun but very infertile soil.

Conclusion

Fruits, vegetables, greens, root vegetables - all this is an integral part of the diet of all people who want to be healthy and beautiful. But, as you know, when there is demand, there will be supply, so farmers try to grow plants as much as possible and spend as little money as possible and lose goods. As a result, we suffer.

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To avoid eating vegetables saturated with nitrates, you need to know some features. For example, the most nitrates are found in early radishes - due to the fact that it is this vegetable that draws nitrates themselves out of the ground along with water. Sometimes the level of nitrates in radishes reaches 80%! In principle, this applies not only to radishes, but also to other root vegetables.

You can avoid nitrate poisoning if you choose and process vegetables correctly:

1) Choose ripe vegetables - they have much less nitrates. However, do not jump on large fruits, because if a vegetable has unusual dimensions, then this only means that they were used to grow it different kind fertilizers.

2) Before cooking, place the vegetables in a container of cold water for half an hour so that the water completely covers them. This will help reduce the nitrate content by about 15%.

3) If you are going to eat raw vegetables, then they need to be cleaned properly. For carrots, radishes and tomatoes, cut off the top and bottom, and for cabbage, cut the stalk and remove the first 2-3 leaves.

4) Greens have the lowest amount of nitrates, but you should still avoid eating the stems, preferring only the leaves.

5) When boiling vegetables, choose any cookware other than aluminum, because it helps convert nitrates into nitrites that are hazardous to health.

6) During cooking, part of the nitrates is destroyed, and the rest goes into a decoction. Therefore, when boiling potatoes, it is better to drain the broth, which contains about 30-40% nitrates. It is advisable to drain the broth from carrots, potatoes and beets immediately, as the nitrates are absorbed back as they cool. It is necessary to avoid the use of vegetable broths or cook them from pre-fried or stewed vegetables on a small fire.

The main ways to remove nitrates:

Peel the potatoes with a thick layer, then soak for several hours in a 1% solution of ascorbic acid and salt. Approximately 1:100. Drain the first water after boiling, this will significantly reduce the amount of nitrates.

Radishes, like potatoes, peel and soak in a solution.

Before eating raw beets, pour boiling water over them.

Soak any greens (dill, parsley, lettuce, etc.) for an hour in cold water.

At and watermelon, cut the peel as thick as possible.

Tomatoes are the hardest to get rid of nitrates, so try to choose ripe fruits of medium size.

Store vegetables only in the refrigerator: at room temperature, the amount of nitrates increases significantly.

Also, do not store chopped vegetable salads for a long time. In chopped vegetables, the formation of nitrates is accelerated by the activity of microorganisms.

When cooking vegetables, do not cover the pot with a lid. Part of the nitrates will leave with the steam.

Undoubtedly, the heat treatment of vegetables reduces not only the number of nitrates, but also the amount of vitamins, but if you really choose from two evils, then, of course, the lesser.

In the season of mass harvesting of fruits and vegetables, their consumption increases sharply. And we are always afraid of the threat of poisoning. Or, at best, a disorder of the stomach associated with the ingestion of dysentery sticks or an excessive content of nitrates and nitrites, especially in vegetables. In the first case, you can avoid health troubles and thoroughly wash your hands and vegetables, but with nitrates, the situation is more complicated. Even vegetables grown in your own garden can be high in nitrates. This is due to improper use of fertilizers. Even this organic fertilizer how bird droppings can become a source of increased nitrates if they are abused and the dosage is not respected, because this is an organic fertilizer with a high nitrogen content. Nitrogen fertilizers must be applied together with potash and phosphorus, then their effect will be balanced. The introduction of microelements, such as silicon, cobalt, manganese and others, reduces the deposition of nitrates in plants. You can replenish the soil with microelements by introducing ash into it, which contains all the components necessary for the transformation of nitrates.

And yet it’s good if all the vegetables are homemade from our garden, and we can say with confidence that there are no excess nitrates in them, but we grow them for our own use, and we cannot risk our health. It’s another matter if some vegetables don’t grow in our garden or don’t grow for some reason, then we also go to the market.

There are a lot of products on the market grown specifically for sale, during the cultivation of which the planters spared no effort to bring in a huge amount of saltpeter. You know that saltpeter is a mineral fertilizer containing nitrogen, which causes intensive plant growth. In addition, there are many other drugs that help accelerate the formation of the ovary, the growth of fruits and accelerate their ripening and even regulate the color of vegetables and fruits. All these drugs, in excess of the permissible norms of use, have a very negative effect on the human body. In addition, products manufactured using chemicals protection of plants from diseases in unacceptable periods also leads to serious poisoning.

Fruits and vegetables removed from the plant still remain living organisms and vital processes take place in them. However, after harvesting, processes with the decay of organic substances are more observed in vegetables. Vegetables contain up to 90% of water and therefore, with the evaporation of water from them, losses in the mass and appearance of vegetables are associated, and the more they contain nitrates and other chemical compounds, the faster they deteriorate, become stained and rot. It should be noted that in vegetable products there is a possibility of the presence of nitrates, but apples, plums, raspberries and other fruits are not subject to the accumulation of nitrates.

It is possible to recognize the increased content of nitrates in vegetables only with the help of a special device, but since the devices are made in China, they are tuned to certain indicators of the norms of nitrates in vegetables. Sometimes the quality of vegetable products can be determined by their appearance. Vegetables with an excess of nitrates are not stored well, we observe not only a change in the color of the fruit, but also the aroma, they quickly lose their appearance and, of course, quality. They become soft, with a jelly-like pulp and, of course, their taste qualities deteriorate. When purchasing vegetables, preference should be given to vegetables grown in open ground. High temperature when growing vegetables in greenhouses and insufficient supply of fresh air, lack of ventilation contributes to the accumulation of nitrates in vegetables. Therefore, even in the conditions of home greenhouses and hotbeds on warm days, it is imperative to open transoms and frames for ventilation. Inadequate lighting leads to the accumulation of nitrates in the leaves and stems of plants. This happens not only in greenhouse conditions, but also in thickened plantings in open ground.

Many people are afraid to buy early vegetables and especially watermelons because of the threat of poisoning with nitrates and other substances. How to reduce the content of nitrates in vegetables at home? If, when buying vegetables, you are not sure that they have passed sanitary control to detect nitrates, then vegetables such as cabbage, beets, carrots and should be boiled in plenty of water. Before cooking, peel the vegetables and leave them in cold water for 1-2 hours. Moreover, it should be noted that the smaller the vegetables are cut, the better they are freed from nitrates.

An effective method of getting rid of nitrates is pickling with vinegar. Experts conducted a study that in pickled cucumbers, after a day, the nitrate content decreased to 21% of the original content. After seven days, there were no nitrates in canned cucumbers at all. This method of reducing the nitrate content can be applied to tomatoes.

The amount of nitrates is greatly reduced in an acidic environment, when pickling and pickling vegetables. Least of all nitrates in salted cucumbers, but with long-term storage, the amount of nitrates increases again. Nitrates are well destroyed in sauerkraut, they are not detected already after the first ten days after pickling.

You need to know that nitrates are unevenly distributed in vegetables. For example, in potatoes and cucumbers, they accumulate most close to the surface of the peel. Therefore, if the vegetables are not from the home garden and there is no confidence in their quality, fresh cucumbers must be peeled, the middle must be cut out of the tomatoes before use, and the peel of the potatoes must be removed with a thicker layer. But in cabbage and carrots, nitrates accumulate inside. Therefore, if earlier, when pickling cabbage, the stalks were eaten raw, they were tasty and sweet, but now it’s better, even if you don’t use your own cabbage at home, do not use the stalks and the leaves adjacent to it. For carrots, try not to use the core. In onions, nitrates accumulate in the upper and lower parts of the bulb; in watermelon, nitrates are distributed evenly throughout the fruit.

The good quality of vegetables is that they can be stored for a long time, during long storage they almost completely lose nitrates, although, of course, vitamins are also mostly lost.

Increased doses of nitrates can contain vegetables grown in winter and early vegetables grown in greenhouses, because all the evaporation from the soil has no way out and settles on the plants. Vegetables such as lettuce, spinach, radishes, green onions and others are best kept for two hours in cold water, changing it several times. Harmful compounds will be released into the water. These vegetables should only be stored in the refrigerator.

It is believed that the critical dose of nitrates is 5 mg per kilogram of human weight, in order to obtain such a dose, one kilogram of spinach, five kilograms of green onions must be consumed at a time.

Another way to neutralize the effects of nitrates is to use a large number vitamins. It has been established that it is vitamin C and, to some extent, vitamins E and A that are inhibitors that inhibit and prevent the processes of converting nitrates into toxic compounds in our body. Therefore, it is recommended to include more vitamins and foods containing vitamins in the diet. A healthy body with good immunity will be able to resist all nitrates.