Tomatoes, potatoes, peppers: are nightshades good for you?

I love eggplant, or rather, I adore it, and when choosing recipes for my app, I often had to exclude certain dishes so that there wasn't too much eggplant 🙂 Lately, I've often heard that nightshade vegetables, which include eggplant, are recommended to avoid. I decided to look into why and who should heed these recommendations.

What are nightshades

The most common members of the nightshade family include potatoes, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers (chili, jalapeño and sweet bell peppers, as well as paprika and cayenne pepper). There are many other plants in the nightshade family, more than two thousand, and many of them are toxic to humans, the most famous being the common belladonna, also called sleepyhead herb. It has gained its "historical recognition" as a poison.

Who needs to avoid nightshades

Solanaceous vegetables should be wary of people who have intestinal and immune system problems, as well as suffer from rheumatoid arthritis, high intestinal permeability syndrome, autoimmune diseases, joint and muscle pain and other related conditions.

The fact is that nightshade vegetables contain alkaloids - chemical compounds that are natural pesticides and fungicides. These substances are concentrated mostly in the leaves and stems, much less in the edible parts of the plants, which are generally harmless.

If you have a healthy immune system and do not have intestinal problems, these compounds are harmless to you and will not cause any adverse effects; moreover, these vegetables are good for you. However, in people who have a sensitivity to nightshades, these compounds can cause irritation in the gut and provoke an increased inflammatory response.

One 20-year study on the connection between nightshades and arthritis found that 74 to 90 percent of people who suffer from pain and inflammation may have sensitivity to nightshades.

Another study found that alkaloids in potato peels had an irritant effect on mice with inflammatory bowel disease, an autoimmune disease that hits both the gut and the immune system at once. These mice showed significant deterioration in the intestinal mucosa. Alkaloids tend to concentrate in the rind, and scientists have found that the higher the alkaloid content, the worse the aggravation.

Here are a few more facts about the specific effects of nightshades on the body.

The alkaloids in nightshades inhibit the enzyme cholinesterase, which helps regulate muscle flexibility. This can then lead to muscle spasms, pain, breakdown, inflammation and muscle stiffness.

Solanine, a type of alkaloid found in potatoes and tomatoes, can accumulate in the body and be released into the bloodstream during times of stress, thus stimulating inflammation in sensitive people.

Solanaceae contain calcitriol, an excess of which increases calcium levels in the blood, thereby contributing to calcium deposits in soft tissues and provoking inflammation. This has been linked to excessive consumption of potatoes.

Solanaceae are rich in saponins and lectins, which are contraindicated in case of intestinal irritation in sensitive people and can be detrimental to their digestive system.

Peppers and tomatoes can irritate the stomach and esophagus in some people, provoking heartburn.

If you suspect that eating nightshades is aggravating your arthritis or autoimmune disease, try to avoid them for two to four weeks and then reintroduce them into your diet one by one every 3 days and watch closely for body reactions, especially for possible pain.

What is a substitute for nightshades?

If you are not sensitive to nightshades, these are very good for you foods that contain many important nutrients, compounds and valuable antioxidants. But if you find that these vegetables provoke or aggravate your painful condition, it is better to replace them.

Tomatoes - red cabbage, red grapes, beets, plums, mushrooms;

tomato sauce or pepper sauce - seasoning, marinade, sauerkraut, mustard, horseradish, ginger, ground pepper.

Potatoes - sweet potatoes, parsnips, turnips, carrots, yams, cauliflower.

peppers - radishes, daikon, green onions, red onions, celery.

I often cook nightshades, and we are not talking primarily about potatoes, but eggplants, tomatoes, bell peppers. However, potatoes are perfect for some of my favorite soups, fish chowder such as broccoli puree soup or lentil soup. But many nightshade substitutes are frequent guests in my kitchen, too. For example, ginger, yams (sweet potatoes), cauliflower, and parsnips.

In my Live up! recipe app, you'll find even more dishes with both nightshades and their analogues.

By the way, to reduce the amount of alkaloids consumed along with nightshades, which are most often the cause of problems, I recommend:

Peel potatoes and avoid green tubers or tubers with sprouts;

Use only ripe solanaceous vegetables, avoid green tomatoes;

Cook solanaceous vegetables at high temperatures to reduce their negative effects.