October 11, 2024

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Sweet potatoes are good for health and longevity

Sweet potatoes are good for health and longevity

Sweet potatoes are good for health and longevity. What do people in the longest-lived areas in the world eat as their staple food? The answer is SWEET POTATO.


Okinawa, Japan, is geographically remote, almost isolated from the world for a long time in the past, and very backward, but it is such a humble place with a dense long-lived population.

Sweet potatoes are good for health and longevity


Research data from the Okinawa Centenarian Research Center (OCS) shows that there are 68 centenarians for every 100,000 inhabitants in Okinawa, which is more than three times the number of centenarians in the same population in the United States.

Not only that, compared with the elderly in other regions, Okinawa residents are also much less likely to suffer from cancer, cardiovascular disease and dementia.


Open the Okinawa food collection, a kind of soil bumps that are also very common in China is impressive. It is eaten as a staple food by Okinawa people, and that is the sweet potato that is rated as the top ten anti-cancer food by the World Health Organization.



Prevent disease

Sweet Potato chunks are rich and special vitamin C, vitamin E and potassium. Among them, vitamin C can significantly enhance the body’s resistance to colds and other viruses; vitamin E can delay aging. Potassium can effectively prevent the occurrence of hypertension, stroke and cardiovascular disease.

Japanese scientists have discovered that sweet potato chips contain a collagen mucus protein that cannot be obtained from chicken, duck, and fish meat. This substance can maintain the elasticity of the body’s arterial walls and effectively prevent atherosclerosis.

Good “medicine”


Ancient Chinese medical scientists have long discussed the efficacy of sweet potato chunks in curing diseases. “Golden Sweet Potato Biography” says: “It can cure dysentery, drunken fever, damp heat, malnutrition in children” and many other diseases. The milky white serum in raw sweet potato chunks is a good medicine for laxative, invigorating blood circulation, and inhibiting muscle spasm; it has special effects on treating eczema, centipede bites, shingles and other diseases. The method is to mash the raw sweet potato pieces, squeeze the juice, apply to the affected area, and heal several times.


In recent years, sweet potato leaves have also been paid attention to. Studies have shown that sweet potato leaves can enhance immune function, improve body resistance to diseases, promote metabolism, delay aging, lower blood sugar, facilitate urine, increase platelets, stop bleeding, prevent arteriosclerosis, and block cells. It is a good health function for cancer, protecting eyesight, and preventing night blindness, so those who are interested may also try to taste the fried sweet potato leaves, which are green and tender, smooth and refreshing~ Okinawa people also have the habit of adding sweet potato leaves to miso soup Make vegetables.


Can people with diabetes eat it?

Winter is the time when sweet potatoes are on the market in large quantities, which makes many people with diabetes very greedy. Especially the roasted sweet potatoes on the street in winter, few people can resist the smell!


In fact, although sweet potatoes are very sweet, for people with diabetes, it’s okay to eat something to relieve gluttony.

Of course, people who have the disease can eat sweet potatoes, but it does not mean that the more you eat, the better. During the eating process, you still need to pay attention to dietary taboos, and you must not eat it wrong.

01 Reduce the amount of other staple foods

Diabetics should not exceed 200g of sweet potatoes per day. After eating sweet potatoes, reduce the intake of other staple foods and control the total amount of calories. For example, if you reduce 50 grams of rice and white flour, you can eat 150 grams of sweet potatoes, but you must remember to eat them in moderation.

People with diabetes may also have heard this statement. Some dietary fiber contained in sweet potatoes can control blood sugar, so eat hard. In fact, this approach is not scientific enough. The average 100g sweet potato only has 9.56g dietary fiber, depending on the variety.

This dietary fiber content does make it relatively slower than white rice and steamed buns to raise blood sugar, but if you want to control blood sugar, you can only eat sweet potatoes. After all, there are still a lot of sugar and starch. There will be one or two catties of sweet potatoes, and the blood sugar will definitely be rubbed after eating the whole!


02 Match vegetables reasonably

Don’t learn from longevity. Elderly people often eat sweet potatoes, just eat a proper meal every week. It is best to match some fresh fruits and vegetables with low glycemic index when eating sweet potatoes. The sweet potato vines mentioned above are also a good choice. You can try them in your free time.


03 Cook and eat, can eat cold sweet potatoes but not hot sweet potatoes

Sweet potatoes are best cooked and eaten, because they are easily digested and absorbed by the body when they are cooked and steamed.

In addition, you can eat cold sweet potatoes but not hot sweet potatoes. Freshly cooked sweet potatoes have a glycemic index of 77. Sweet potatoes at this time also rise quickly, which is not conducive to blood sugar control. However, the glycemic index of sweet potatoes after cooling is 53, which means that you eat cold sweet potatoes during meals, which is helpful for blood sugar control.


Generally speaking, you can eat some sweet potatoes appropriately for diabetes, but don’t eat a lot. If you want to supplement dietary fiber to control sugar, sweet potatoes are not enough. If the weather is cold recently, diabetic patients with poor digestion should try not to eat them. It’s cold.

 

 

How can people without diabetes eat sweet potatoes to live long?


If healthy people want to replace the staple food with sweet potatoes, remember to add an extra egg or a few bites of fish tofu. Because the protein content of sweet potatoes is lower than that of rice and white noodles, if you eat sweet potatoes for a long time without matching other foods, it is easy to cause protein deficiency.

You can also cut the sweet potato into pieces and cook the rice together into porridge. In fact, this is more scientific.

People harvest sweet potatoes in the early winter. Maybe there are a lot of sweet potatoes accumulated in your home at this moment. You should be aware that sometimes because of improper storage of sweet potatoes, you find that they are rotten, or even because of the low temperature, the sweet potatoes are frozen and eaten. When the sweet potato has a bitter taste, don’t eat it.


Aflatoxin is present in rotten sweet potatoes. Once eaten, it will induce cancer, which is even more dangerous.


In addition, it is said that sweet potatoes are rich in dietary fiber and can be laxative. Not to mention that the dietary fiber content of sweet potatoes is not much. It is not reliable to only rely on sweet potatoes to supplement dietary fiber because of the poor stomachs of nine people in some countries. .

 


Don’t eat sweet potatoes

Sweet potatoes are greasy and damp, which can easily hinder the stomach and stagnation. Therefore, people with poor spleen and stomach should not eat sweet potatoes raw. Those with a lot of stomach acid should not eat more. Eating too much can cause acid reflux, even causing abdominal distension, heartburn, and acidity. Stomach pain, etc.


This is actually because sweet potatoes contain an oxidase, which is easy to produce a large amount of carbon dioxide gas in the human gastrointestinal tract. If sweet potatoes are eaten too much, it is easy to cause symptoms such as bloating and hiccups. Excessive consumption of sweet potatoes can also stimulate the production of gastric acid and make people feel heartburn.

Therefore, sweet potatoes should not be consumed in excess, especially for people with gastric ulcers and excessive stomach acid, and sweet potatoes should not be consumed on an empty stomach.


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