Vegetables out of a bag unhealthy?

jennybearlv wrote: »

cmtigger wrote: »

mom22dogs wrote: »

CafeRacer808 wrote: »

jennybearlv wrote: »

I haven't had frozen veggies in 15 years. Have they gotten any better? My mom always bought frozen and they were limp and soggy.

Most all frozen fruit and veg are flash frozen now, but cooking method plays a huge factor in whether or not frozen veg ends up limp or soggy. Very high heat stir frying, for example, results in frozen veg that maintains its crispness.

Exactly. Sounds like your mom just overcooked them. My mom does that with fresh green beans. Cooks them to mush and thinks they're great.

Yeah, my mom was pretty good with fresh, but usually with frozen she'd stick it in the microwave and overcook it. But my dad is the better cook in their house.

That is exactly how my mom cooked them, in a bowl with plastic wrap over it in the microwave. I don't recall ever seeing a steamer insert in our kitchen or eating any vegetable roasted. She microwaved canned as well, but you really can't make those any mushier.

I live two hours from the Central Valley, so there is always something fresh and quality all year. I think I'll keep avoiding the frozen, but I can see how useful they would be for someone up north or living far from a grocery store.

To not completely hijack your thread, OP, sorry. I think frozen veggies would be acceptable. Canned as well as long as you aren't watching sodium. I think cut up bagged veggies are overpriced, but I've got more time than money. Just make sure you wash them before eating them! Remember when all those people got sick from E. coli in bagged "prewashed" organic spinach?

This is how I remember frozen veg being prepared also, which I think is why I tend to stay away from it. Unless i'm making Broccoli soup, then I love it!

I found something gross in my packaged zucchini spaghetti the other night. I reckon it's animal poo - which is probably less healthy than if I'd chosen a zucchini off the shelf an thoroughly inspected it.



Australia also recently (end of 2016 if I think) had a nation wide recall of 'prewashed' bagged vegetables due to wide spread salmonella poisoning. I don't think those bagged veggies were particularly 'healthy' either.

Famof72015 wrote: »

I'm trying to stay away from anything in a bag or box but I really am unsure if vegetables in a bag are unhealthy for you?

They're only unhealthy if they have some sort of sauce on them. They're just flash frozen.

I buy frozen broccoli because it's easier to toss into recipes. I also buy it fresh and roast it. Both ways are good.

Christine_72 wrote: »

mom22dogs wrote: »

CafeRacer808 wrote: »

jennybearlv wrote: »

I haven't had frozen veggies in 15 years. Have they gotten any better? My mom always bought frozen and they were limp and soggy.

Most all frozen fruit and veg are flash frozen now, but cooking method plays a huge factor in whether or not frozen veg ends up limp or soggy. Very high heat stir frying, for example, results in frozen veg that maintains its crispness.

Exactly. Sounds like your mom just overcooked them. My mom does that with fresh green beans. Cooks them to mush and thinks they're great.

Blaahhh i bet plenty of adults won't eat veggies because of the way their parents cooked them when they were young, and they assume that's what vegetables are meant to be like. Boiled to death veggies taste terrible, and so do canned veggies, if this is what they were fed growing up, I can't blame them for disliking them.

Yeah, exactly this. I knew vegetables were okay from a few ones my mom cooked in more appealing ways (at some point she started sauteeing summer squash with mushrooms and butter, which wasn't low cal but whatever), in the summer we'd have good salads with raw cauliflower and broccoli and tomatoes and cucumber, and she steamed broccoli okay, I think, but mostly boiled and awful and some terrible canned stuff (green beans, which I hated then and now love since I get the fresh ones). Frozen peas, I think. Raw carrots and celery was always a staple and I always liked them -- I remember pulling carrots from my grandparents' garden with my cousin and thinking they were the most delicious thing ever.

Anyway, I knew my mom was generally not a good cook and her parents had a huge garden (they'd had a farm when younger) so visiting them we got good fresh produce, so maybe that helped me have an open mind for vegetables despite some bad examples. Of course, we also always had them with meals, so I just grew up thinking they were an essential part of meals.

(Oddly enough I never realized people microwaved vegetables much later, until I learned from someone else that it actually could be a good way to quick cook asparagus (in a bit of water). I think we only used the microwave for reheating and might have been late adopters even to that. Or I'm just old, of course!) ;-)

I'm not sure whether this has been mentioned, but I can think of one actual health-related reason not to buy prepackaged produce: there have been multiple outbreaks of foodborne illnesses from contaminated bagged salad mix. (Here's a non-jargony overview: http://vitals.lifehacker.com/it-s-time-to-stop-eating-bagged-salads-1756895605, and here's a more detailed discussion of a recent Listeria outbreak: https://www.cdc.gov/listeria/outbreaks/bagged-salads-01-16/, and an E. coli outbreak: https://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2012/O157H7-11-12/index.html)

You are very unlikely to get sick from eating prepackaged produce, and it is also possible to have pathogens on unpackaged produce (take a look here for foods linked to recent outbreaks: https://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/outbreaks/multistate-outbreaks/outbreaks-list.html), but there is evidence to suggest that bagged salad may be a bit more hospitable to dangerous organisms than unpackaged produce is. I took a food microbiology class in undergrad, so that's the first thing I thought of when I saw OP's question. (Trust me, that class really changed the way I think about food!) I don't think that's what they meant, but it's worth noting that there's some scientific basis to the question.

lizery wrote: »

I found something gross in my packaged zucchini spaghetti the other night. I reckon it's animal poo - which is probably less healthy than if I'd chosen a zucchini off the shelf an thoroughly inspected it.



Australia also recently (end of 2016 if I think) had a nation wide recall of 'prewashed' bagged vegetables due to wide spread salmonella poisoning. I don't think those bagged veggies were particularly 'healthy' either.

It's probably just the photo quality, but it looks like a tadpole to me. Good source of protein, right?!?

comptonelizabeth wrote: »

That picture makes me gag every time I come back to this thread

I know. We need to fill this page up so that it rolls over and I can stop looking at it.

WinoGelato wrote: »

comptonelizabeth wrote: »

That picture makes me gag every time I come back to this thread

I know. We need to fill this page up so that it rolls over and I can stop looking at it.

Yup,me too. I need to keep my lunch down.

Sabine_Stroehm wrote: »

Famof72015 wrote: »

I honestly wasn't looking for smart *kitten* responses, so thank you to those who answered my question and didn't make fun of it. I teach my my children to not make fun of people to everyone who just made fun of my question, thanks it made me feel great for asking.

I sincerely hope you don't feel that my response was feline. I was not trying to be snarky.

LOLOLOLOLOLOL

<<< Maybe mine is?