06-04-2008, 10:03 PM
It depends a bit on your vegetable and the type of nutrition, but in general: no. Most vegetables will keep their nutritional value if you leave them in water for a few hours. Adding a small pinch of salt to the water can help to keep the vitamins inside the vegetable (by preventing osmosis). As always, there are exceptions. Green coffee beans, for example, are known to loose caffeine if you keep them in water before roasting them. However, cooking vegetables will most likely dilute more nutrients than the effect that keeping them in water had, especially if you cook them too long.
A good rule of thumb is: if the vegetable keeps its taste, it will keep its vitamins.
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