Spinach

Spinach is a plant which flowers once a year. It allows the cartoon caracter Popeye the sailor man becoming phisically stronger after eating it!

Beneficial properties of spinach

There are three main types of spinach: savoy, semi-savoy and smooth-leaf spinach (or flat); they can be sold packed fresh in bags, bunched, frozen or packaged in air.

In general the leaves are ovate to triangular-based, while the flowers are incospicuous, yellow-green of 3-4 centimeter of diameter; if leaves look fully alive means they have a great concentration of vitamin C. Please don’t worry about the probable loosing of it if spinaches are placed in plastic bags or containers at the greengrocer’s! Furthermore, consider spinach a significant protector against the aggressive form of prostrate cancer, even though its carotenoids can’t be absorbed as other ones like beta-carotene or lutein.

Spinach has a high nutritional value and most of all when fresh, steamed or boiled is rich in:

• antioxidants;
• vitamin A, C, E,K;
• magnesium;
• manganese;
• folate (microwaving doesn’t affect its content);
• iron;
• calcium;
• phosphorus;
• zinc;
• selenium.

History of spinach, quick lesson

The etimology of the word Spinach probably comes from the Persian aspanakh which means approssimatively “green hand”. Arab traders spread spinach across India, where it was known and appreciated as “Persian vegetable” and “the captain of leafy green”. It reached Europe, most of all France and Germany in 1552 gaining popularity because it appeared when other vegetables were less abundant than others, in early spring.

A curiosity: in Caterina de Medici’s period, meals made by spinach were known as “Florentine” regarding Catherin’s birth in Florence, the capital city of the northern Italian region, Tuscany.