Despite the multiple health benefits of cereals, legumes, and nuts, it is best not to consume them raw, as this might lead to Anemia.

Soaking grains, seeds, and cereals in water before cooking should be a common practice among home cooks. Few people are aware that this technique can help avoid anemia.

According to experts who Revyuh talked to, soaking these foods isn’t just important for cooking. It’s also important for health, because the human body doesn’t have any protection against phytic acid, an organic acid that stops the body from getting iron, zinc, calcium, phosphorus, and other important minerals, proteins, and fats.

Animals, unlike humans, have no issues with these products. In birds, for example, the grain is digested following fermentation in the goiter. Ruminants’ stomachs contain the enzymes required to digest grains and cereals. Rodents, on the other hand, bury their food first and then eat their reserves.

Phytic acid is one of the primary causes of iron deficiency anemia in vegans, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Hazelnuts, almonds, walnuts, beans, peas, lentils, soybeans, peanuts, oats, rice, wheat, sunflower seeds, sesame, flax, and other foods are high in this chemical.

Experts said that this should not stop people from eating these foods, which are good sources of useful substances and micronutrients, because the risk can be avoided by cooking them right.

To begin with, phytic acid can be eliminated using heat treatment, which can remove 30% to 35% of the material. Furthermore, food can be soaked. Oatmeal, for example, should be left in water for 10-12 hours, white rice for nine hours, brown rice for twelve hours, pearl barley for six hours, buckwheat for five hours, and quinoa for three hours.

You can add lemon juice or vinegar to the water when soaking these foods. Buttermilk is another option for soaking produce to help eliminate as much phytic acid as possible. Finally, you can roast the beans to eliminate around 40% of the acid.

To maximize the loss of phytic acid, soak, sprout, then roast your grain. To get rid of most of the phytic acid, you have to soak it in buttermilk and then boil it for 20 minutes, according to experts.

Where is a lot of phytic acid:

• Nuts – hazelnuts, almonds, walnuts, pecans.

• Legumes – beans, peas, lentils, soybeans, peanuts.

• Cereals – oats, rice, wheat, all cereals.

• Seeds – sunflower, pumpkin, sesame, poppy, flax.

Image Credit: Getty

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