Effects of different cooking methods on health-promoting compounds of broccoli

The effects of five domestic cooking methods, including steaming, microwaving, boiling, stir-frying, and stir-frying followed by boiling (stir-frying/boiling), on the nutrients and health-promoting compounds of broccoli were investigated. The results show that all cooking treatments, except steaming, caused significant losses of chlorophyll and vitamin C and significant decreases of total soluble proteins and soluble sugars. Total aliphatic and indole glucosinolates were significantly modified by all cooking treatments but not by steaming. In general, the steaming led to the lowest loss of total glucosinolates, while stir-frying and stir-frying/boiling presented the highest loss. Stir-frying and stir-frying/boiling, the two most popular methods for most homemade dishes in China, cause great losses of chlorophyll, soluble protein, soluble sugar, vitamin C, and glucosinolates, but the steaming method appears the best in retention of the nutrients in cooking broccoli. Project supported by the High-Tech R&D Program (863) of China (No. 2008AA10Z111), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 30320974), the Fok Ying Tong Education Foundation of China (No. 104034), and the Program for New Century Excellent Talents in the University of China (No. NCET-05-0516)