So what’s better: frozen, canned, or fresh? Well it really depends on where you live. If you live in an area where fresh produce is grown, by all means go fresh. If there aren’t a lot of farms in your area and the markets you shop at have their produce shipped in from long distances, go frozen. Frozen vegetables are frozen right after being picked. This makes sure all the vitamins and minerals are preserved. If produce is shipped a long ways it can lose those vitamins and minerals. So what about canned? They’re evil, well okay, not really, but they are pretty much useless when it comes to nutrition. Everything has been cooked out of them during the canning process. Which is something to keep in mind when cooking fresh or frozen produce, keep the vegetables slightly crisp so that as many vitamins and minerals, as possible, are kept intact. If you love too munch on raw vegetables, that’s even better.
If you find it hard to get as many vegetables as you need into your diet, try having a salad at lunch. Make it a huge salad filled with tons of different kinds of veggies. I usually buy a salad mix that has carrots, red cabbage, and iceberg lettuce, and then add mushrooms, green onions, and tomatoes. Just be careful about how much salad dressing you add. Most salad dressing is full of fat. Also try to have at least two vegetable sides with your supper. You could even incorporate veggies into your breakfast by having an omelet with peppers, onions, mushrooms or whatever you like. I would suggest using Egg Beaters or another egg substitute though because they are cholesterol free and they are just as good as eggs and still has all the health benefits of eggs but without the bad parts.
A few suggestions I have for vegetables for spring and summer are corn, tomatoes, Vidalia onions, and anything else that catches your eye. Seek out produce stands rather than grocery stores and ask where they are getting their produce. Sometimes produce stands are getting their produce from the same places as the grocery stores, most of the time though, they are getting their produce from local farmers.
Things to avoid: unless you live in a climate that is warm in the winter, do not buy tomatoes. This is one time I will suggest buying canned. When you live in an area that is cold during the winter, the tomatoes in your grocery store have been picked before they were ripe, in either
California
or
Florida
, and then gassed to make them appear ripe. This is why tomatoes are tasteless during the winter.
I have to admit that I do buy canned beans, mostly because I don’t have all day to cook dry beans, but if you do please make them from dry to get as many vitamins and minerals as possible.
A few tips: stock up on vegetables when they are in season and freeze them for later use. This works well with many vegetables. Green beans and corn freeze very well. Just prep them before you freeze them. String the beans and shuck the corn, then just pop in freezer bags and enjoy in the middle of winter.
