Saponins In Food

uhnjoo

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Why Potatoes Are Not Paleo: Adverse Health Effects | The Paleo Diet

I suspect numerous bad effects from potatoes in myself, and others here often do too.

I have found out from this blog post that it is high in SAPONINS, which directly increase intestinal permeability, increasing endotoxemia. It appears as though they are particularly concentrated in the skins, so anyone with gut issues should at the very least avoid those, but consider avoiding potatoes entirely as well. This could apply to other tubers skins. An aside: quinoa is also high in saponins, and Ive had terrible reactions to that.
 

Fractality

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I thought most if not all of the irritating things in potatoes were found in the skin? I was planning on making a big batch of mashed potatoes in my slow cooker.
 

Fractality

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Some claim that since plant saponins are not absorbed, they work to keep the intestines clear of gram positive bacteria which love fat.
 
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You trust what Loren Cordain says? He’s one of the worst in the nutrition industry. None of the 27 references he put in that article show saponins effects on humans in a controlled setting. Only reference number 6 talks about saponins but it’s not relevant human data.

He says “In the United States we eat a lot of potatoes. The figure below shows the per capita consumption (126 lbs) of potato foods for every person in the U.S. in 2007. If we contrast this total to all refined sugars (137 lbs per capita) in the other figure below, you can see that as a country, we eat nearly as many potatoes as we do refined sugars.”

The problem with that is he’s ignoring the fact that people eat potatoes in the form of french fries and potato chips which are high fat. Nobody eats potatoes McDougall style.

Also, the glyciymic index that is talked about in the post is meaningless. Your blood glucose is supposed to rise after eating. That is the whole point of eating; low blood glucose. High fat diets in combination with having excess body fat result in excess free fatty acids and intramyocellular lipids in the blood which block glucose from being transported properly resulting in high blood glucose.
 
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Giraffe

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Saponin Synthesis and Function - Springer

"Saponins are one of the most numerous and diverse groups of plant natural products. They serve a range of ecological roles including plant defence against disease and herbivores and possibly as allelopathic agents in competitive interactions between plants."


Saponins - Reference Module in Food Science/Encyclopedia of Food and Health

"Quantitative thin layer chromatography was used to estimate the saponin content of 20 common food plants and also of foods prepared from some of them. The food plants found to be richest in saponins were chickpeas (Cicer arietinum), soya beans (Glycine max), lucerne (alfalfa) sprouts (Medicago sativa) and varieties of Phaseolus vulgaris (navy beans, haricot beans, kidney beans). Saponins were not destroyed by processing or cooking. They were present in falafels (prepared from chickpeas), canned baked beans, canned broad beans and protein isolate from faba beans."

it is high in SAPONINS,
How much saponins do potatoes contain compared to other foods?

which directly increase intestinal permeability
In vitro?
 

Giraffe

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The problem with that is he’s ignoring the fact that people eat potatoes in the form of french fries and potato chips which are high fat. Nobody eats potatoes McDougall style except for a select few highly motivated people

Wouldn't I want to have some bile around when eating food containing saponins? Thus better eat potatoes with a good amount of saturated fat as Peat advises?

Ray Peat said:
Cholesterol also protect against radiation damage, and many forms of toxin (saponins, cobra venom, chloroform--W.G. MacCallum, A Text-book of Pathology, 1937, Saunders Co.; many more recent studies show that it protects blood cells against hemolysis--breakdown of red blood cells--caused by heat and other harmful agents; e.g., Dumas, et al., 2002, Velardi, et al., 1991).

Cholesterol, longevity, intelligence, and health.
 

bobbybobbob

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Saponins and other problematic stuff are adequately degraded by pressure cooking. Just pressure cook potatoes for a half hour and then they're fine. Pressure cooking breaks down toxins in rice and lentils, too.

Potato quality is a problem. I think they leave the storage facilities fine but the grocery store supply chains do not take proper care of the spuds. They have to be kept cool and moist and dark. They should really be sold from a special darkened refrigerated section in the grocery store, but that's not done. Mistreated spuds have a distinctive smell. Pick up the bag or the individual spud and give it a sniff. If it's odorless it is probably good. I've left the store empty handed a couple times because *all* the spuds were clearly off.
 

B-styles

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Peat does advise to limit potato consumption. Many reasons I'm sure. Saponins probably being one of them. However, for myself I feel EXCEPTIONALLY good after consuming potatoes. Energized, calm, clear headed, etc. Also helps me sleep. I usually try to eat the purple ones as these have beneficial compounds in them.
 

Giraffe

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Saponins and other problematic stuff are adequately degraded by pressure cooking. Just pressure cook potatoes for a half hour and then they're fine. Pressure cooking breaks down toxins in rice and lentils, too.

A study done with navy beans shows that the saponin B content (the main component in the saponins group present in navy beans) was reduced by 100%.

saponins cooking method.GIF


Kinetic study of saponins B stability in navy beans under different processing conditions
 

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