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Looks Can Be Deceiving

Dr. Sean P. Nikravan, MD, FACE Blog Looks Can Be Deceiving
Fruits and Vegetables

Have you ever wondered how come your local grocery store almost always has all the fruits and vegetables in stock regardless of the season!

Thanks to ethylene oxide, a flammable colorless gas with a sweet odor used primarily to produce other chemicals, including antifreeze. In smaller amounts, ethylene oxide is used as a pesticide and a sterilizing agent, which is a colorless gas at room temperature. Yes, please read on.. Thanks to global scale agriculture and chemistry, the farmers pick their crop before it ripens and during transit to its destination ethylene oxide is sprayed on the fruits and vegetables to give that ripe and shinny appearance. The seeds within in the produce never fully mature allowing for its Lectin content to remain high, which has pro-inflammatory properties. Think of Lectin as carbohydrate that binds to proteins. Lectin can easily disrupt your gut as an antinutrients, since they can reduce the body’s ability to absorb nutrients. Lectins are thought to have evolved as a natural defense in plants, essentially as a toxin that deters animals from eating the plants. This was a nature evolutionary process for plants protecting themselves from predator eating them. But now we get exposed to much higher content Lectin despite our intentions of a healthy fruit and vegetable diet! So Sad.. I will discuss the effects of lectin in your gut and most items which contain the highest amount in an another blog..

What is the take away message: Shop at your local farmers market and eat what is grown locally and lastly eat fruits and vegetables that are in season.

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