The more sour the fruit, the higher the vitamin C content? If you want to supplement vitamin C, read this quickly

"The more sour the fruit tastes, the higher its vitamin C content?"

Vitamin C tablets taste sour, so fruits with high vitamin C content must have high vitamin C content.

Rumor Analysis

This statement is not rigorous.

Vitamin C tablets are sour, but that doesn't mean they are necessarily vitamin C. The sour taste of fruit mainly comes from organic acids, so some fruits that taste very sour actually do not contain high levels of vitamin C.

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The sourer the fruit, the richer the vitamin C?

Vitamin C has nothing to do with taste.

Let’s first take stock of the fruits with a sour taste in our daily lives: lemon, hawthorn, passion fruit, kiwi... If we judge the vitamin C content based on the sweetness or sourness of the taste, then the vitamin C content in lemon, which ranks first in sourness, must be very high. No wonder many people slice lemons and soak them in water to supplement vitamin C!

However, by consulting the latest edition of "Chinese Food Composition Table", we can learn that the vitamin C content of lemon is 22 mg/100 g. This amount of vitamin C is not as high as that of Chinese cabbage, and is only 1/3 of the vitamin C content of Chinese cabbage (64 mg/100 g).

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Even when comparing fruits, the vitamin C content of lemons is not superior, and is not as high as the vitamin C content of oranges we usually eat (33mg/100g) . In addition, oranges are more easily accepted by the public, are more convenient to eat, and are easier to supplement vitamin C.

Lemons are so sour that they are only used to make lemonade or seasoning. I believe no one would eat them directly! I have seen videos of people trying to eat a whole lemon without any expression, but most of them failed.

The vitamin C content of other sour fruits: passion fruit, hawthorn, kiwi fruit are 32mg/100g, 53mg/100g, 62mg/100g respectively . Among them, kiwi fruit is more suitable for supplementing vitamin C. Eating two kiwi fruits a day can almost meet the vitamin C requirement for the day.

Although hawthorn seems to have a decent amount of vitamin C, it is high in calories. The calories of hawthorn per 100g are 102kcal, which is 1.7 times the calories of kiwi fruit (61kcal/100g). If you want to get enough vitamin C for a day by eating it, you need to eat 200g. Eating so much hawthorn may make you fat!

The source of fruit sourness - organic acids

In fact, the sour taste of fruit does not come from vitamin C, but is determined by the organic acids in the fruit. If the organic acid content is high and the sugar content is low, the fruit will taste sour.

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Different organic acid components in fruits have different effects on the sourness of fruits. Fruits with high citric acid content have a sour taste; fruits with high tartaric acid content have a sour and slightly astringent taste; fruits with high malic acid content have a sour and slightly bitter taste.

Which fruits supplement vitamin C and how much is appropriate to eat?

The following 5 kinds of fruits are recommended for supplementing vitamin C:

in conclusion

It is not reliable to judge the vitamin C content of fruits by their sweetness or sourness. A sour taste does not mean that the vitamin C content is high. If you want to supplement vitamin C, you can choose the above 5 fruits.

Looking in the mirror of rumors

We tend to trust our senses, but our senses are not as reliable as instruments and cannot truly measure the content of nutrients.

In addition to the unreliability of identifying vitamin C by sour taste, it is also unreliable to identify sugar content by sweet taste - there are indeed fruits that taste very sweet but are not high in calories. Knowing more about this will help us enjoy delicious food while staying healthy.

References

[1] Yang Yuexin. Chinese Food Composition Table 6th Edition Volume 1[M]. Peking University Medical Press, 2018

[2]. Zheng Lijing, Nie Jiyun, Yan Zhen. Research progress on sugar and acid components and their effects on fruit flavor[J]. Journal of Fruit Science, 2015, 32(2):304-312.

Planning and production

Author: Xue Qingxin, member of Chinese Nutrition Society, registered nutritionist, health manager, public nutritionist

Reviewer: Gao Chao, Associate Researcher, Institute of Nutrition and Health, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention

Editor: Ding Zong

Proofread by Xu Lai, Lin Lin

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