Today's Topic: Cooked Carrots More Nutritious Most of us know that fresh fruits and vegetables are better for us than cooked. Well, that is not exactly correct. It has been known for some time that cooking, especially in the presence of a small amount of fat, actually makes some antioxidants more available for absorption. A study in the August 2000 edition of the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry reports that cooked, pureed carrots have higher levels of two antioxidants: beta-carotene and phenolic acids. The antioxidants increase with heating by a third, with inclusion of the peel and increased during storage at high temperature for up to a week. After that they declined, but never to the levels for raw carrots. <A HREF="http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/jafcau/jtext.cgi?jafcau/48/i04/a bs/jf9910178.html">http://pubs.acs.org/isubscribe/journals/jafcau/jtext.cgi?ja fcau/48/i04/abs/jf9910178.html</A> . HERE'S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: Much general wisdom about nutrition is not only not supported by facts, it is sometimes opposite of what is generally accepted. Cooking probably breaks the plant cells open so antioxidants and other plant chemicals can be better absorbed. Adding fat allows carotenoids to be absorbed much better. Cooking and added fat also increase absorption of lycopene from tomatoes, a carotenoid structurally related to beta-carotene. [from NNF]