"How Much Do You Know About Food Nutrition" Series | Potatoes are a high-quality staple food for fat loss? Please check the truth about potatoes

I believe that many friends who see the title will immediately have questions: French fries, potato chips, potato wedges, potato grids... Aren't these all high-calorie foods that people often say? Why is there a saying that "potatoes are a high-quality staple food during the fat loss period"? Don't worry, let's read on with questions.

First of all, let me conclude that potatoes are indeed a very high-quality staple food, and are very suitable for consumption as a staple food during the fat loss period. Compared with other common vegetables, potatoes have four significant advantages: low calories, high fiber, low fat, and high nutrition. Compared with other similar staple foods, such as rice, bread, etc., potatoes usually contain lower calories. This means that if you use potatoes as a staple food, you can eat more in quantity without taking in too many calories, which helps control the total calorie intake of the meal.

Potatoes are rich in dietary fiber, which helps increase satiety and helps you control your total food intake. At the same time, rich dietary fiber can promote intestinal digestion, improve constipation problems, and bring better physical condition. The fat content in potatoes is extremely low, with only 0.2g of fat per 100g of potatoes. At the same time, potatoes have high nutritional value. Potatoes are rich in vitamin C, potassium, vitamin B and other important nutrients, which help maintain the health of the body.

As early as 2015, potatoes were listed as one of the "four major staple foods" in my country by the Ministry of Agriculture of my country. So why did my country list it as one of the four major staple foods? Yu Xinrong, then Vice Minister of the Ministry of Agriculture, said at the Strategic Seminar on Potato Staple Food: In addition to its high nutritional value, potatoes meet the needs of people to eat well, eat well and be healthy, and also meet the needs of my country's structural optimization and resource development, and the needs of the changing pace of life of urban and rural residents in my country. In today's world, many countries are facing the practical problems of resource shortages and increasing ecological pressure, and my country is no exception. The production process of potatoes has the advantages of saving water, land, fertilizer and pesticides, and is very suitable as a major substitute in agricultural structural adjustment. At the same time, potatoes are easy to process, taste good and have complete nutrition, and are very popular both in fast food restaurants and ordinary people's homes.

Finally, let's go back to the question raised at the beginning. Why are foods like French fries and potato chips called "high-calorie" foods? This is because these products are fried and cooked, and the cooking process greatly increases the calories of the food. "Fried" and "carbohydrate" are a very classic "high-calorie" combination. Take potatoes as an example. Under normal circumstances, the calories of potatoes are only 76 calories per 100g, while the calories of fried potato chips can reach 612 calories per 100g, and the calorie increase is very large. So if you eat potatoes as a staple food, you need to avoid frying as a cooking method. It is recommended to choose steaming or boiling for cooking. This can minimize the total number of calories consumed per meal and help you lose fat efficiently.

Author: Cui Jingpei, Zhengzhou University of Finance and Economics

Review expert: Zhang Juanmei, associate professor of the School of Pharmacy, Henan University