Do cut vegetables lose vitamin C?
Yes, it’s true that vitamin C is destroyed when it comes into contact with air. The process of cutting vegetables into smaller pieces increases the surface area exposed to air, causing a greater amount of vitamin C to be destroyed. Moreover, the length of time the cut vegetables are exposed to air before they are eaten also impacts the amount of vitamin C remaining. The longer they are left in the air, the more the vitamin C decreases.
What are the implications of this? It means that a small, chopped salad prepared the previous day is likely to have lost all its vitamin C content. However, if you prepare a box of cut vegetables for yourself a day in advance, the situation is different. For example, if you cut red and orange peppers into strips, prepare carrot sticks and cucumbers, add some cherry tomatoes and even include some low nutritional value items like dwarf corn (which is indeed a vegetable and is virtually calorie-free), even if half the vitamin C in these vegetables was destroyed overnight, there would still be more than enough vitamin C left.
The importance of eating fresh vegetables
From this, we can conclude that despite some loss of vitamin C, it is still very important to eat and prepare fresh vegetables, even in winter. I also recommend preparing your meals the day before. It’s worth taking a moment to think about where we are going to be the next day and what we’re going to eat. Making sandwiches, or packing a box of fruit or vegetables, or whatever else suits us for that day, is a good idea because relying on luck when we leave the house doesn’t always work out for the best, especially when it comes to maintaining a healthy diet.
The dangers of impromptu meals
Often, when people are out and about and get hungry, they stop for a coffee and are tempted by a croissant, which contains 700 calories of empty carbohydrates, or a bought sandwich that, despite appearing healthy, can contain over 500 calories – the equivalent of 5 light bread sandwiches. Planning and preparing our meals in advance can help us avoid these dietary pitfalls.
