A nutritionist on Thursday said that cut fruit kept in the refrigerator for a day does not lose any significant nutritional value.
A study published in an agriculture and food chemistry journal showed that six types of fresh fruit cut according to hygienic standards, put in containers and refrigerated at 5oC had not lost nutrients the next day, Chi Mei Medical Center’s Chu En-chi (朱恩琪) said.
The study showed that there were only significant losses of Vitamin C and carotenoid — responsible for colors in some fruit — after the fruits were refrigerated for six days, but the decreases were no more than 25 percent, Chu said.
No significant amount of polyphenols was lost, she said.
However, Chu said that freshly cut fruit should be kept in sealed containers when refrigerated, because fruit exposed to air can be contaminated by bacteria and recommended that fruit be eaten within three days of being cut.
Chu also said there is no clear scientific evidence to show that eating meals that have been refrigerated overnight leads to a higher risk of cancer.
Some vegetables, such as amaranth, bok choy, lettuce and rape, as well as processed meat and seafood, have concentrations of nitrates, Chu said.
Nitrates can become sodium nitrite, which might be carcinogenic, but meals do not usually have excessive amounts of nitrates, so there is no need to be overly concerned, she added.
Meat and seafood should be cooked thoroughly, while cold-dressed dishes are not recommended for meals that are kept overnight, as they are more prone to bacterial contamination if they are not stored properly, Chu said.
Eating a reheated meal might not taste as good as a freshly cooked dish and some antioxidant nutrients might be lost during the heating process, so it is best to finish a meal within two days of it being cooked, she said.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS