I knew since forever that I should not warm up food in PLASTIC [in a microwave of course] . But still I did . Call it ignorance or carelessness. Now suddenly it dawned upon me that it is our health at stake so why not research about this matter and put an end to it . While reasearching , I came to a conclusion that “Not only we should not warm food in plastic , we should throw away our Microwaves as well ” . Is it really a hoax or is it true may be a long discussion with a set of experts . But for now , I am giving some rest to my Microwave. Did you know that the use of Microwave Oven was banned in Russia for several years for the same underlying reasons. Microwaves crept up the Russian system again due to consumerism and marketing waves. Microwaves are also gaining popularity in countries that never had them just a few years back.
Here’s What I found:
1. Microwaving Changes the Basic Food Constitution : Basically , Microwaves work by heating up the water molecules inside our food. The water molecules in the food vibrate violently at extremely high frequencies like millions of times per second creating molecular friction, which heats up the food. Contrary to popular belief, microwaved foods don’t cook “from the inside out.” When thicker foods are cooked, microwaves heat the outer layers, and the inner layers are cooked mostly by the conduction of heat from the hot outer layers, inward. Additionally, microwaving creates new compounds that are not found in humans or in nature, called radiolytic compounds. We don’t yet know what these compounds are doing to your body.
2. Microwaves Strip Food Of Nutrition : For example If you microwave broccoli with a little water , it loses up to 97 percent of its beneficial antioxidants in comparison to steamed broccoli which loses about 11 percent or fewer of its antioxidants. Allinase is lost completely from garlic.Turns B12 in milk to an inert form. Microwaving turns some amino acids in baby formulas into poisonous substances which are harmful for nervous system.
3. MicroWaving Plastic Adds Harmful Chemicals To the Food : Chemicals like Pthalates and BPA can leech into your food if food is touching plastics while you warm it up in microwave . http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/03/08/study-even-bpa-free-plastics-leach-endrocrine-disrupting-chemicals/
4. Microwaved Food Lowers Immunity : Microwaving alters the basic constitution of food which along with many other side effects , affects the lymphatic nodes and our immunity adversely.
5. Microwaved Food May Contain Carcinogens: According to a lot of Russian researches which caused Microwave to get banned in Russia in 1976 , Microwaving converts some of the amino acids in milk and grains to carcinogens.
http://www.naturalnews.com/030665_microwaved_food_cancer.html
6. Microwaved food causes a decrease in hemoglobin: in a Swiss clinical study , the same food was given to a set of people divided in to two sets . 1 set received the same food microwaved. Hemoglobin was found to be at a significantly decreased level for the ones getting microwaved food every time after a few hours of eating microwaved food .
7. Microwaved food causes increased LDL (bad) cholesterol: Same research showed to increase LDL in the volunteer subjects.
8. Microwaved Food never Tastes like Oven/Gas made food: You know this one already , right ! I have never liked the extremely heated up microwaved food or the microwaved food extremely hot on the outside layer and freezing cold on the inside layers. The taste changes for sure. No one will deny that. While re-heating food on the gas does not change the actual taste of food.
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And we are living without our Microwave for about 2 months now. For some reason , I am feeling just too good about it. It is a big step towards going more natural and less processed in our food choices. I am just using my pans and pots more often now ! It was a matter of just a few days to make that habit of not opening the microwave door every time I wanted to heat up something.
P.S. I heard about the Microwave hazards about 2 months back and I jumped right in to research the facts and figures. Even small researches are enough for me to stop using microwave. Here are the articles from where I picked up these facts :
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/05/18/microwave-hazards.aspx
http://www.health-science.com/microwave_hazards.html
http://www.cancersalves.com/articles/Microwave.html
http://www.relfe.com/microwave.html
http://www.halexandria.org/dward078.htm
http://www.naturalnews.com/023011_microwave_food_oven.html
http://www.whale.to/b/m.html
http://guide.thesoftlanding.com/2008/11/16/is-it-safe-to-microwave-plastic/
http://www.execonn.com/sf/
http://english.eastday.com/e/110813/u1a6051143.html
What do you think ?
