Frozen Food is as Healthy as Fresh!

And sometimes frozen produce is even healthier. That fact flies in the face of the common misconception out there that fresh produce from your supermarket is somehow healthier than frozen, and that’s simply not true. In fact, two recent studies conducted in Britain found that some frozen fruits and vegetables were “…richer in health-boosting vitamins and antioxidants.” These studies found that, for example, frozen broccoli had four times the beta-carotene and frozen carrots had higher levels of vitamin C and polyphenols than their “fresh” counterparts.

So how could we all have gotten this so wrong? What the British studies, and similar studies conducted by Rice University and the University of California at Davis discovered was that “fresh” does not always equate to picked yesterday. Supermarket produce is almost always picked prior to becoming ripe and permitted to ripen in storage and during shipment. Thus, these fruits and veggies were picked weeks before they reach your kitchen and the longer they sit off the tree, bush, vine or out of the ground, the more nutrients they lose.

On the other hand, much of the produce that’s destined to be frozen is permitted to reach the peak of ripeness, which is also its time of optimum nutrition, prior to being picked. Think of this as cryogenic freezing that keeps the produce perpetually young, immortal, if you will, until it’s thawed and ultimately enjoyed.

The nutrient studies cited above also found that florescent lights, such as those in a supermarket, and the darkness of your fridge, where much of your produce sits for days prior to being consumed, can screw with the circadian clocks of the fruits and veggies. This artificial light and darkness causes the produce to “produce” (couldn’t resist) fewer cancer fighting glucosinolates.

So, unless you own an extensive fruit and vegetable garden on par with a small farm, or visit a farmer’s market on an almost daily basis (and that’s often impossible during the winter and early spring months), freshly picked and quickly frozen produce, such as the type used here at MagicKitchen.com, can more than meet your nutritional needs.