After cooking fortified foods retain carotenoids required to prevent blindness

Fortified foods, or foods that contain extra nutrients like vitamin A, are used to fight against vitamin A deficiency. A study reported in ACS Omega says that these nutrients don’t get washed away with cooking, but a lot depends on how they are being prepared.

Deficiency of vitamin A is a common health problem in Southeast Asia and Africa. Every year, around 3-5 lacks children get permanent blindness due to vitamin A deficiency. Supplementation of the vitamin helps in such cases. Researchers and scientists are finding ways to produce hybrid crops like corn, which contains carotenoids that produce the vitamin. Eggs are also a source of carotenoids and researchers are attempting to enhance the number of carotenoids in egg yolks.

Researchers conducted an experiment to find out whether cooking alters the levels of carotenoids in fortified foods. They cooked corn flour and eggs fortified with carotenoids. Boiled porridge had the highest percentage of these compounds, while cornmeal puffs had the least concentration. Carotenoids were preserved after pan-frying, microwaving and hard-boiling eggs. However, scrambled eggs did not retain much of the nutrients. It was eventually found that most cooking methods preserved carotenoids.

Source: sciencedaily.com