I believe that when I began this blog I promised not to simply list everything I ate. So let’s pretend this is coming out of nowhere.
My family knows that I eat a lot of spinach. I like spinach because it tastes the same as lettuce and is way better for you. I’m not sure what’s in iceberg lettuce, but I’m guessing it’s a lot of nothing. You know, the way ice is a lot of nothing. Exactly. I understand, though, that some people barely like salad at all, and eating something that looks so leaf-like is troubling, so scraps of iceberg lettuce floating in ranch dressing is about as close as they dare to come. I commend these people for making the effort. Other people contend that spinach does too have a taste. They might be right. Some people even think shredded iceberg lettuce has a taste, which it apparently leaves behind after you pick it off your taco. I’m really not in a position to criticize anyone else’s food idiosyncrasies.
Anyway, once or twice a day, I go to the kitchen to fix myself a nice spinach salad (and I say it that way too. “How about a nice spinach salad?” I ask, and everyone rolls their eyes, the same way they do when my father asks if anyone would like “some tasty little cabbages”). Sometimes I glance at the nutrition facts, but I don’t look super closely or anything because it’s just spinach after all. If it’s not good for you then what is? But today when I was waiting for ramen noodles to rehydrate, I found myself reading the nutrition facts clear down to the bottom. Here is what I discovered and wished I hadn’t.
A serving of raw spinach (4 cups) has 510 percent of my daily value of vitamin K. 510% I could eat spinach only once or twice a week and still be set on vitamin K. But I eat spinach once or twice a day, so now I’m a little freaked out. How much vitamin K is too much? Can you overdose on vitamin K? Did any of the Gilligan’s Island characters eat radioactive spinach? I know Mrs. Thurston Howell III had the sugar beets… What’s vitamin K even for?
Well, I looked it up in the Oxford Dictionary of Food and Nutrition and found that deficiencies of vitamin K “are unknown.” That’s right. No one suffers from too little vitamin K, except people who are already malnourished, and some people who are born that way. Infants are pumped full of the stuff right after they’re born just in case, but then I guess you never have to have any, ever again if you don’t want to. So here we have the only vitamin that I habitually get more than enough of, and it doesn’t even matter. Here I sit with 1000% of the daily recommended amount of vitamin K floating around in my system, while my bones cry out for calcium and who knows what else. Sorry, guys, but I’m so full of vitamin K I can barely see straight.
Filed under: Commentary | Tagged: food, Gilligan's Island
“Vitamin K is a necessary participant in synthesis of several proteins that mediate both coagulation and anticoagulation.”
Of course, I say this mainly because “coagulation” is fun to say (or type), and “anticoagulation” is even better. However, if we want an actual meaning, it would appear that vitamin K prevents hemorrhaging. It also seems that a vitamin K deficiency can lead to an increased risk of fractures or a loss of bone density.
Right. I did leave all that factual stuff out.
“Vitamin K is heat-stable and water soluble; therefore no inactivation or leeching of the vitamin into the water occurs during cooking. It is destroyed by strong acids or alkalis. ”
Perhaps instead of the standard oil and vinegar dressing, you could use pure acetic acid.* Granted, there might be some side effects, but it would de-activate the vitamin K.
On a more serious note, I have wondered that before. Is it okay to go around consuming orders of magnitude over the recommended daily allowance of a vitamin? In the case of vitamin K, it’s apparently not stored well by the body, so you’re okay. If you feel some “thrombosis, vomiting, [or] kidney tubule degeneration” coming on, maybe skip the salad for dinner.
*Don’t do that. I doubt you could get your hands on any, but you don’t want to.