Myth: Beetroot is having highest Iron content among all vegetarian sources
There is a very common belief that
Beetroot is the best vegetarian source
Of Iron. So, whether your child likes the
beetroot or not you have to force them to
eat beetroot. Even I had heard other doctors advising
to take beetroot as a good and only
vegetarian source of iron, otherwise
you will have iron deficiency. But, the fact is that
there are many other vegetarian sources from
which you can get up to 13 times more
amount of iron and are
easily available and, you &
your child will liked it.
Vegetarian sources having good amount of Iron are as follows-
MINT-
100gm of mint leaves has 15.6mg of Iron whereas
beet contains 1.19mg of iron. That
means mint leaves have 13 times
more iron then beet. You can
make mint chatni which can be
applied on your kid’s favourite sandwich. You can also
make mint paratha, mint lemon juice, mint
salads, mint curd salad…….etc.
SESAME SEED-
100g of sesame seed have
15.04mg of iron. That is
12 times more than beet root. You can
Prepare sesame seed chicki,
Sesame seed stuff paratha, you can add
roasted sesame seed in your
mouth fresheners. You can also add
sesame seed in your vegetable curries or tadka.
CURRY LEAVES-
100g of curry leaves has
8.67mg of iron. That is
7 times more than beet root. You can
make paste out of curry leaves and
add it to your stuff paratha or pakoras.
RAJGIRA-
100g of rajgira contains
7.6mg of iron. That means
6 times more than beet root. You can add
Rajgira flour to your roti flour. you can also
make roti, paratha, sheera out of rajgira flour.
In addition to iron, you will also get
many other nutrients from above sources,
Like-protein, fibre, b-vitamins, vitamin -c……. etc.
So, don’t force your child to have
beetroot if they don’t like it. There are many
other vegetarian sources which are having
much higher iron content than beet root.
These all are very easily available and,
very routinely used in Indian recipes. Unfortunately,
we underestimate their nutritive values…
That’s all for today,
See you next Tuesday,
With another Tuesday tip,
Till then,
Take care.
Providing simple solutions for the complexities of life-
Dr. Bhumita Makwana
Your dietitian and cosmetic clinician.
