Raw vs. Cooked Tomatoes
 

My daughter is on a diet through a company called Metabolic Research. They tell her to only eat raw tomatoes, not cooked tomatoes. They say that cooked tomatoes are turned into sugar. Is this true?

Tomatoes if I recall correctly have a high natural sugar and when you cook something with a high natural sugar it does metabolize some what. It doesn't actually turn to sugar or a sugar substance.

Thanks for the info. Is there any disadvantage to cooking them?

Actually, cooking tomatoes INCREASES their nutritional value. The micronutrient lycopene only becomes available in significant amounts when a tomato is cooked.

just as an aside, you can also get lycopene from watermelon, I believe. Yum :)

I pesonally think the sugar content of tomatoes should only be an issue if someone has a diagnosed health problem, such as insulin resistance, and their doctor tells them to watch it. Added sugar is a different story, it should be limited, but the sugars that occur naturally in our fruits and vegetables shouldn't be an issue for most people.

Lycopene does seem to be the nutrient of the day. I keep reading more and more references to it and how good it is for us, but it appears to used by the body only when taken in food form, and not supplements. According to Drs. Roizen and Oz, authors of YOU: The Owner's Manual, it takes 164 raw tomatoes to equal the lycopene content of 16 cooked ones. They also say you need to consume a little fat with it for absorption, so spaghetti sauce is often a good way to get it in.