REFRIGERATED FOOD
Refrigerated food is very commonly used these days. Refrigerators are not just used for storing the excess food but for freezing some of it as well. Specially in today’s fast life people take options of cooking on weekends only for the week ahead. Does this really help us in our health matters? Let’s have a look at it
1) Nutrition
Refrigerator stores food because of its low temperature. But does that actually maintain the quality of food? NO, it doesn’t. Every food stuff has its own shelf life but it doesn’t mean that it gives same nutrition on first day as well as last day before expiring. It slowly changes its colour, taste, smell and even texture. Thus, eating a stale foodstuff say any Curry doesn’t actually give you same nutrition same as your fresh curry. When we eat for nutrition, our body growth then why go for such options?
2) Cold
Food from freezer is colder than room temperature. According to Ayurved, cold food is heavy to digest, and dry in nature (dry nature denotes devoid of moisture. It may be liquid but doesn’t have the moisture to soften your body tissues). Thus eating such kind of food on regular basis puts a lot of load on our digestive fire and increases the dry quality in our body which doesn’t assist your body functions.
3) Reheating
People usually end up with a solution of reheating food before serving. According to Ayurved reheating food stuff again and again reduces its quality, freshness and makes it difficult to digest. Also sudden temperature changes (Freezing cold to Piping hot in microwave/oven/gas) is considered to be a very wrong method in terms of cooking. Regular consumption of such type of food hampers your digestion and nutrition.
4) Seasonal food.
Due to provisions of having frozen food, it is very easy to use food which is not local (coming from miles away of your place) or even not seasonal. For example, Green peas are best found in winter seasons. The quantity is also more and quality is also the best. But people tend to store peas in this season so as to use is in coming seasons. Such stored peas are having above qualities for sure, along with that it might create digestion issues when consumed in wrong season.
Nature gives our body natural strength to digest the naturally available food stuff. Thus, stomach upsets are common when you consume frozen peas or Mango juices in rainy season.
Also storing such kind of food takes certain preservation methods and preservatives which are indirectly introduced to your body.
5) Rotten food
It is common to note that in a refrigerator, some foodstuffs start emitting an odour after storing for a while. Before we are even aware of this smell, it spreads to neighbouring food stuffs, thus destroying other foodstuff’s quality as well. This might not be the situation every time but this is not an uncommon issue. Sometimes even the use of smell absorbents or fresheners is made to eliminate the smell/odour but they really don’t help in removing the bacteria, which in turn affects the other food material.
6) In long-run
When consuming stale food becomes a habit, it not only affects digestion and growth but also helps in toxin saturation in our body. Ayurved has described ways to consume food where fresh warm moist food plays a very major role. After all we are what we eat. So, we slowly become lethargic as our stale food in no time.
I need not say after all these points how are we affecting ourselves by excessively and in a wrong manner using the boons of science. You can change habits by introducing small things one at a time to avoid the damage you might be doing (though unknowingly) to your body.
Try and prepare the quantity of food according to your meal or maximum one day’s meal. If you are in a hurry for any particular day you can go for one dish meal which is prepared fresh rather than the one which is frozen. Also every culture has got few dishes of their own which can be consumed for two days by storing at room temperature (Example Theplas, Dashmis etc are common from India). Using these for some of your busy days is also a good habit rather than using other stale food stuffs.
Maybe you can cut out your veggies for curries and salad or soak certain food stuff a night before you are going to prepare.
If at all you must use the leftover food, consume it with next meal. Before reheating the foodstuff let it come to room temperature naturally. Also use of steaming is beneficial than microwave heating.
Consume local and seasonal food. This reduces the need of freezing and helps to maintain the food pyramid in nature. It also gives your body a chance to get tastes of all-natural foods which is important to maintain health
Lastly but not the least, keep a regular eye on your refrigerator compartment and clean it regularly
Slowly you can adopt the habit of cooking on daily basis with fresh food.
With this article, I don’t support the wastage of food. I do reckon the importance and need of refrigerators in today’s era but that use should not be at the cost of our health. Today it may not be possible in our living style to grow our own fresh food or get fresh food from markets daily. But yes, we can make way to markets every 3 or 4 days to suffice our needs. We don’t need to pack up the freezer for 10 or 15 days. If we are to get health benefits then making time for health is always possible. We can use some small tips and slowly remove our dependency on refrigerators and use them for what they are made.