Just add mushrooms: make meals more nutritious

February 1, 2021 – Researchers have found another good reason to eat more mushrooms. New research, published in Food Science & Nutrition (January 2021) found that adding a serving of mushroom to the diet increased the absorption of various micronutrients, including deficiencies in nutrients such as vitamin D, without any increase in calories, sodium or fat.

Dr. Victor L. Fulgoni III and Dr. ratio; one scenario including mushrooms exposed to UV light; and one oyster mushroom scenario for both 9-18 years and 19+ years based on an 84 g serving or ½ cup equivalent.

The main findings are:

• Adding an 84 g serving of mushrooms increased several nutrient deficiencies, including potassium and fiber. This applied to the white, crimini and portabella 1: 1: 1 mix and the oyster mushrooms.
• The addition of a serving (84 g) of mushrooms to the diet resulted in an increase in dietary fiber (5% -6%), copper (24% -32%), phosphorus (6%), potassium (12% -14%) %), selenium (13% -14%), zinc (5% -6%), riboflavin (13% -15%), niacin (13% -14%) and choline (5% -6%) in both adolescents and adults; but did not affect calories, carbohydrates, fat or sodium.
• When commonly consumed mushrooms are exposed to UV light to provide 5 mcg of vitamin D per serving, vitamin D intake can reach the recommended daily value (98% – 104%) for both the 9-18 year old and 19+ – year-old group and exceed something. as well as reducing the inadequacy of this nutrient deficiency in the population.
• A serving of UV-exposed, commonly used mushrooms reduced the population’s inadequacy for vitamin D from 95.3% to 52.8% for the 9-18 age group and from 94.9% to 63.6% for the age group 19+ years.

“This study confirmed what we already knew that adding mushrooms to your plate is an effective way to achieve the nutritional goals set by the DGA,” said Mary Jo Feeney, MS, RD, FADA and nutrition research coordinator at the Mushroom Council. “Data from surveys such as NHANES is used to assess nutritional status and links to health promotion and disease prevention and help formulate national standards and public health policies (CDC, 2020).”

Mushrooms are fungi – a member of the third nutrient rich – biologically different from plant and animal foods that contain the USDA food patterns, yet have a unique nutrient profile that provides nutrients that exist for both plant and animal foods. Although they are classified into food grouping systems based on their use as a vegetable, the increasing use of mushrooms in main dishes is growing in plant-based diets, supporting consumers’ efforts to follow food-based nutritional advice to reduce calorie, saturated fat, and fat intake. sodium, while increasing the absorption of underutilized nutrients, including fiber, potassium and vitamin D. Mushrooms, often grouped with vegetables, provide many of the nutritional characteristics of products, as well as properties more commonly found in meat, beans, or grains.

According to the USDA’s FoodData Central, 5 medium raw white mushrooms (90 g) contain 20 calories, 0 g fat, 3 g protein and are very low in sodium (0 mg /

Mushrooms are one of the best dietary sources of sulfur-containing antioxidant amino acid ergothioneine and tripeptide glutathione Ergothionein and glutathione levels in mushrooms depend on the mushroom varieties, and oyster mushrooms contain higher amounts of these sulfur-containing antioxidants than common mushrooms: white button, crimini, or portabella mushrooms. The addition of a serving of commonly used mushrooms and oyster mushrooms was expected to add 2.24 and 24.0 mg ergothioneine and 3.53 and 12.3 mg glutathione, respectively, to the NHANES 2011-2016 diets based on published literature values.

Currently, the USDA FoodData Central database does not contain analytical data on ergothioneine. However, the Mushroom Council is currently supporting research to analyze mushrooms for bioactive compounds / ergothioneine for possible inclusion in the USDA FoodData Central database.

More research from the Mushroom Council is yet to come

With mushrooms growing in awareness and attention among consumers across the country, the Mushroom Council made a multi-year $ 1.5 million investment in research in 2019 to increase understanding of the food’s nutritional value and overall health benefits.

In addition to the bioactive compound / ergothioneine analysis of mushrooms for inclusion in the USDA FoodData Central database, additional research projects approved include:

• Health-promoting effects of including mushrooms as part of a healthy diet.
• The relationship of mushrooms with cognitive health in older adults.
• The impact of mushrooms on brain health in an animal model.
• Nutritional Impact of Adding a Serving of Mushrooms to USDA Food Patterns.

Since 2002, the Council has been conducting research supporting increased demand for mushrooms by discovering the nutritional and health benefits of mushrooms. Published results from these projects are the basis for communicating these benefits to consumers and health influencers.

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For more nutritional information, recipes, and links to other Mushroom Council-funded studies, visit mushroomcouncil.org.

NHANES ingestion data is self-reported which is memory dependent and therefore subject to reporting bias. The results presented are based on modeling to evaluate the maximum effect of adding mushrooms and may not reflect actual individual feeding behavior; However, such models provide a technique to test the potential nutritional impact of nutritional advice.

About the Mushroom Council

The Mushroom Council is made up of fresh market producers or importers who produce or import more than 500,000 pounds of mushrooms per year on average. The mushroom program is authorized by the Mushroom Promotion, Research and Consumer Information Act of 1990 and is administered by the Mushroom Council under the supervision of the Agricultural Marketing Service. Research and promotion programs help expand, maintain and develop markets for individual agricultural products in the United States and abroad. These industry self-help programs are applied for and funded by the industry groups they serve. Visit mushroomcouncil.org for more information.