That's Why You Should Never Eat Green Potatoes

Video: That's Why You Should Never Eat Green Potatoes

Video: That's Why You Should Never Eat Green Potatoes
Video: What happens if you eat green potatoes? 2024, November
That's Why You Should Never Eat Green Potatoes
That's Why You Should Never Eat Green Potatoes
Anonim

Did you know that green potatoes should not be consumed. Even those that are abundantly covered with sprouts should be avoided. While one might think that we should avoid them because of their unpleasant taste, the truth is that they can be extremely harmful. A recent study by Dr. Carolyn Wright of the University of Nottingham Trent found that unripe potatoes can cause irreparable damage to the stomach.

Many people think that potatoes are root vegetables, such as carrots, parsnips and other root crops that grow underground. In fact, potatoes are a type of modified stem plant and are a type of tuber. The vegetables themselves are swollen stems formed underground and grown from the mother potato that is planted.

This allows the plants to survive the cold winter because the tubers are deep below the soil surface, where they are protected from frost.

Most of us are aware that potatoes are high in carbohydrates. This is because they need enough stored food to survive the winter.

Food in the form of sugars is created by photosynthesis - a process by which plants use energy from sunlight to produce glucose from carbon dioxide and water.

While this energy is used by some plants immediately, perennials - those that live for more than two growing seasons - will store energy for the start of growth next spring. They need this food to be able to generate enough energy to grow to the soil surface, where new leaves can grow to photosynthesize. In other words, potatoes contain a kind of packaged lunch in them.

Potatoes
Potatoes

If you look closely at a potato, you will notice small spots on it. These are actually the nodes of the stem. If the potato is planted, the plant will grow from it. If you leave it in the cupboard for too long, the sprouts will sprout from there.

Sprouts begin to grow if they are warm. The process will speed up if the potatoes are exposed to sunlight. That is why they should be stored in a cool, dark place. Exposure to light triggers certain physiological reactions within the tuber.

Why you shouldn't eat green potatoes though. The production of chlorophyll triggers the color green - this is not harmful at all and really contains high amounts of useful minerals and substances such as iron.

But light and heat also lead to the production of solanine, a chemical that can cause symptoms of poisoning in humans if ingested in large quantities.

Symptoms include nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, stomach cramps, sore throat, headache and dizziness.

This chemical tends to concentrate under the skin of potatoes along with chlorophyll, as well as in new growing shoots. So it is advisable not to eat green potatoes or those on which shoots have begun to grow.

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