How Safe is Your Food? Your Cookware Determines This!

What determines if your food is safe? The way it is grown, harvested and packaged is important but one factor plays a key role in determining how safe and healthy your food is in its edible state – and that is the cookware you use. How is that possible, isn’t cookware meant to just cook your food, how can it influence the safety and purity of the food? 

The cookware you use affects the health of your food in 2 ways: 

1. It ultimately determines how toxic your food is, and
2. How much nutrients are preserved post cooking 

Is Your Cookware Toxic? 

All metals are reactive, they leach into food while cooking and form toxic compounds with the nutrients in food — a biochemical substance, for example: 

Iron with Oxygen and Hydrogen in food: 3Fe(s) + 4H₂O(g) > Fe₃O₄(s) + 4H₂(g), Fe₃O₄ = FeO.Fe₂O, 3Fe(s) + 2O₂(g) = Fe₃O₄(s) 

Titanium with Oxygen and Hydrogen in food: Ti(s) + 2H₂O(g) → TiO₂(s) + 2H₂(g) 

Ceramics contains metal and chemical compounds that leach the same way. 

There is a simple home test that can determine the toxicity of your cookware in a matter of minutes – the alkaline baking soda test. This is how it is done: 

1. Boil 1 glass of water in any pot, when it starts boiling add 1/2 tsp of baking soda.  Boil for 5-7 more mins. Turn stove off. 
2. Wait till cool enough to taste then taste the water (take a sip).  If you taste metals (the taste of metals will be evident as an after taste) that’s what you’re eating! If water has a rubber/paint after taste it’s the chemicals from enamel/glaze. 
3. As a control, stir 1/2 of baking soda to 1 glass of water take a sip — you will taste just the baking soda.  When done in MEC Pure Clay Cookware, taste of water will be similar to the taste of water in glass cup. 

Baking soda is high on the pH scale (alkaline), with a pH value of 8. Most of the foods we eat are alkaline — an ideal diet is said to be at least 80% alkaline. If your pot leaches while cooking baking soda, it does the same with most of the food you cook in it. 

Can a pot that leaches its own elements into your food be considered safe and healthy? 

Can Your Cookware Preserve Nutrients? 

The harsh near-infrared heat from metals and ceramics destroys most essential nutrients like complex carbs, flavonoids, phytonutrients etc. The water-soluble nutrients are lost as steam when it is released freely while cooking in conventional cookware. As a result, the food is left nutritionally depleted. 

On the other hand, MEC pure clay cookware cooks food with gentle far infrared heat. This food friendly heat preserves nutrients which is evident from the fact that the natural taste and color of the ingredients stays intact. 

Its unique steam management properties ensure all the water-soluble nutrients stay in the food. The lid being cooler than the pot causes steam rising from food to condense on the inner surface of lid and fall back into food. 

The food cooked in pure clay is highly nutritious. When you consistently eat food cooked in pure clay, your immunity and stamina improve significantly, as testified by those using it for years now. 

These factors make MEC pots and pans the safest cookware out there and there is no reason you shouldn’t start cooking in MEC today.