Fruits And Vegetables

A diet rich in vegetables and fruits can lower blood pressure, reduce the risk of heart disease and stroke, prevent some types of cancer, lower risk of eye and digestive problems, and have a positive effect upon blood sugar, which can help keep appetite in check. Eating non-starchy vegetables and fruits like apples, pears, and green leafy vegetables may even promote weight loss. [1] Their low glycemic loads prevent blood sugar spikes that can increase hunger.

At least nine different families of fruits and vegetables exist, each with potentially hundreds of different plant compounds that are beneficial to health. Eat a variety of types and colors of produce in order to give your body the mix of nutrients it needs. This not only ensures a greater diversity of beneficial plant chemicals but also creates eye-appealing meals.

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Fruits and vegetables contain indigestible fiber, which absorbs water and expands as it passes through the digestive system. This can calm symptoms of an irritable bowel and, by triggering regular bowel movements, can relieve or prevent constipation. [18] The bulking and softening action of insoluble fiber also decreases pressure inside the intestinal tract and may help prevent diverticulosis. [19]

Fruit and vegetables should be an important part of your daily diet. They are naturally good and contain vitamins and minerals that can help to keep you healthy. They can also help protect against some diseases.

Most Australians will benefit from eating more fruit and vegetables as part of a well-balanced, healthy diet and an active lifestyle. There are many varieties of fruit and vegetables available and many ways to prepare, cook and serve them.

Fruits and vegetables are low in fat, salt and sugar. They are a good source of dietary fibre, which can make you feel fuller for longer and prevent overconsumption of food. As part of a well-balanced, healthy diet and an active lifestyle, a high intake of fruit and vegetables can help you to:

Fruit is the sweet, fleshy, edible part of a plant. It generally contains seeds. Fruits are usually eaten raw, although some varieties can be cooked. They come in a wide variety of colours, shapes and flavours. Common types of fruits that are readily available include:

Vegetables are often cooked, although some kinds are eaten raw. Cooking and processing can damage some nutrients and phytochemicals in plant foods.

Suggestions to get the best out of your fruit and vegetables include:

The World Health Organisation (WHO)External Link recommends that adults eat at least 400g, or 5 portions, of fruit and vegetables (excluding potatoes, sweet potatoes and other starchy roots) per day to reduce the risk of disease. This amount of fruits and vegetables also ensures adequate fibre intake and can also reduce total sugar intake.

A national nutrition survey conducted by the Australian Government showed only 6.8% of Australians eat the recommended amount of vegetables, whilst just over half (54%) met the recommendations for usual serves of fruit.

Children and teenagers have special food needs because they are growing and developing. They also need extra energy for playing and being more active. Even though they need more energy, children have a smaller stomach capacity than adults and cannot eat the same serving sizes. However, you should encourage your children to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables.

Most countries have dietary recommendations that include fruits and vegetables. Table 1 summarizes the recommendations for 3 countries: Canada (1), the United Kingdom (2), and the United States (3). Although dietary recommendations have many similarities, different countries choose different strategies to separate fruits and vegetables into groups. Orange fruits and vegetables are often high in carotenoids and are placed in a separate category. Yet many dark green vegetables (i.e., spinach) are also high in carotenoids. Dividing fruit and vegetables into color categories makes sense for menu planning but does not correspond with nutrient content.

Certain fruits and vegetables are rich sources of vitamin C, but these rich sources (citrus fruits, strawberries, green peppers, white potatoes) are spread over many fruit and vegetable categories. Other fruits and vegetables, including avocado, corn, potatoes, and dried beans, are rich in starch, whereas sweet potatoes are mostly sucrose, not starch. Fruits (except bananas) and dark green vegetables contain little or no starch. Often, dietary guidance rules place fruit juices and potatoes in separate categories, because of dietary directives to eat whole fruits and minimize consumption of foods high in fat and sodium, i.e., French fries. The vegetable and fruit categories in the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans (3) are listed in Table 2. These categories are important, because they drive policy for programs such as school lunch and other supplemental feeding programs.

According to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2010, nutrients of concern in the American diet include potassium, dietary fiber, calcium, and vitamin D. Energy density and intake are also important issues in the American diet. Fruits and vegetables are generally low in energy density and often are good sources of fiber and potassium, but the nutritional contribution of standard servings of fruits and vegetables varies widely (4). The content of phytochemicals, such as polyphenolics, also varies greatly (5) and is not listed in nutrient databases.

We have provided a nutritional comparison of the 10 most commonly consumed fruits and vegetables (Table 3). It should be noted that fruits and vegetables are often not consumed in the raw form but may be cooked, fried, or combined with other ingredients prior to consumption. Thus, whereas a boiled potato is a nutrient-dense food, a fried potato may contribute a substantial amount of fat and sodium to the diet. Fiber concentrations range from 0.6 to 5.1 g/serving and potassium concentrations range from 76 to 468 mg/serving (Table 3). Bananas and potatoes, although technically belonging to different families, have strikingly similar compositions for energy, fiber, and potassium per standard serving. A standard serving of iceberg lettuce contains 8 kcal, whereas a potato contains 144 kcal and a banana 105 kcal. Of course, iceberg lettuce is seldom eaten alone.

Determining the solubility of fiber was an attempt to relate physiological effects to chemical types of fiber (9). Soluble fibers were considered to have beneficial effects on serum lipids and insoluble fibers were linked with laxation benefits. This division of soluble and insoluble fiber is still used in nutrition labeling. However, despite these commonly used generalizations, scientific evidence supporting that soluble fibers lower cholesterol and insoluble fibers increase stool weight is inconsistent. Many fiber sources are mostly soluble but still enlarge stool weight, such as oat bran and psyllium. Also, soluble fibers such as inulin do not lower blood lipids. Most fruits and vegetables are concentrated in insoluble fiber, not soluble fiber (Table 3). Exceptions to this generalization include cooked potatoes, oranges, and grapefruit. The USDA Nutrient Database includes only total fiber; there are no official databases that include soluble and insoluble fiber. Lists of content of total, insoluble, and soluble fibers are compilations of data from the USDA, the published literature, and estimated values (10). Often, the values for soluble and insoluble fiber do not add to total fiber or the values for soluble fiber were estimated by subtracting a literature value for insoluble fiber from a USDA value for total fiber. Not surprisingly, there is much discrepancy in the fiber concentrations for fruits and vegetables.

Processing can either increase or decrease the fiber content of a fruit or vegetable. Peeling fruits or vegetables will lower the fiber content (11). A serving of grapefruit without any associated membrane contains much less fiber than a grapefruit serving with membranes (0.4 vs. 1.4 g/serving). Home cooking generally has a negligible effect on fiber content. Cooking, in general, may even increase the fiber content of a product if water is driven out in the cooking process. Baking or other heat treatments (e.g., extruding) used in food processing will also increase the fiber content of the product, either by concentrating the fiber by removal of water or producing Maillard products that are captured as fiber in gravimetric methods. Fruit juices are not devoid of fiber (Table 4).

Southgate (16) described the nature and variability of human food consumption and the role of plant foods in these relationships. A wide range of plant foods is consumed, including most parts of the plant, such as fruits, seeds, leaves, roots, and tubers. Studies of hunter-gathers have shown that many plant species were collected; >130 species were consumed by North American Indians (17). The compositional features of plant foods are summarized (Table 6 )(16). Fruits have a high water content and low levels of protein and fat. The protein is concentrated in the seeds and is resistant to digestion in the small intestine and bacterial degradation in the large intestine.

Fruits contain mostly sugars and fibers, such as pectin, that are extensively fermented in the large intestine. Certain fruits, especially apples and pears, are concentrated in fructose (18). Apples contain 6% fructose and 3% sucrose and pears are 6.5% fructose and 1.3% sucrose; these values would be consistent in apple and pear juices. Free fructose is poorly absorbed and would function similar to dietary fiber, escaping absorption in the small intestine while being fermented in the large intestine. This results in SCFA production, which is linked to small amounts of energy being absorbed in the colon. Additionally, it explains why apple and pear juices are used to treat constipation in children. 17dc91bb1f