Antinutrients are plant compounds that reduce the body’s ability to absorb essential nutrients.
They are not a major concern for most people, but may become a problem during periods of malnutrition, or among people who base their diets almost solely on grains and legumes.
However, antinutrients aren’t always “bad.” Under some circumstances, antinutrients like phytate and tannins may have some beneficial health effects as well.
The most widely studied antinutrients include:
Phytate (phytic acid): Mainly found in seeds, grains and legumes, phytate reduces the absorption of minerals from a meal. These include iron, zinc, magnesium and calcium.
Tannins: A class of antioxidant polyphenols that may impair the digestion of various nutrients.
Lectins: Found in all food plants, especially in seeds, legumes and grains. Some lectins may be harmful in high amounts, and interfere with the absorption of nutrients.
Protease inhibitors: Widely distributed among plants, especially in seeds, grains and legumes. They interfere with protein digestion by inhibiting digestive enzymes.
Calcium oxalate: The primary form of calcium in many vegetables, such as spinach. The calcium bound to oxalate is poorly absorbed (8Trusted Source, 9Trusted Source).
Beans and other legumes are often soaked in water overnight to improve their nutritional value.
Most of the antinutrients in these foods are found in the skin. Since many antinutrients are water-soluble, they simply dissolve when foods are soaked. In legumes, soaking has been found to decrease phytate, protease inhibitors, lectins, tannins and calcium oxalate.
For example, a 12-hour soak reduced the phytate content of peas by up to 9%.
Another study found that soaking pigeon peas for 6-18 hours decreased lectins by 38-50%, tannins by 13-25% and protease inhibitors by 28-30%.
However, the reduction of antinutrients may depend on the type of legume. In kidney beans, soybeans and faba beans, soaking reduces protease inhibitors only very slightly (13, 14, 15).
Not only is soaking useful for legumes, leafy vegetables can also be soaked to reduce some of their calcium oxalate.
Soaking is typically used in combination with other methods, such as sprouting, fermenting and cooking.
src - https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/how-to-reduce-antinutrients
Phytic acid has a strong binding affinity to minerals such as
calcium
magnesium
iron
copper
zinc
This results in precipitation, making the minerals unavailable for absorption in the intestines. Phytic acids are common in the hulls of nuts, seeds and grains and of great importance in agriculture animal nutrition and eutrophication-wise due to the mineral chelation and bound phosphates released into the environment. Without the need to use milling to reduce phytate (including nutrient), the amount of phytic acid is commonly reduced in animal feeds by adding histidine acid phosphate type of phytases to them.
src - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antinutrient
Millet
Despite millet’s multiple health benefits, it also contains antinutrients — compounds that block or reduce your body’s absorption of other nutrients and may lead to deficiencies. One of these compounds phytic acid interferes with -potassium -calcium -iron -zinc -magnesium
Other antinutrients called goitrogenic polyphenols may impair thyroid function, causing goiter — an enlargement of your thyroid gland that results in neck swelling, nevertheless, this effect is associated only with excess polyphenol intake. src
How to Soak Grains for Optimal Nutrition
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