{"id":283045,"date":"2025-07-22T17:17:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T17:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/283045\/"},"modified":"2025-07-22T17:17:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T17:17:11","slug":"is-it-safe-to-eat-raw-potatoes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/283045\/","title":{"rendered":"Is It Safe to Eat Raw Potatoes?"},"content":{"rendered":"

According<\/a> to the USDA, potatoes are the most heavily-consumed vegetable in America: The average person downs roughly 50 pounds of them annually. If you weigh 200 pounds, you\u2019re consuming a quarter of your body weight in spuds each year.<\/p>\n

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  1. The Danger of Eating Raw Potatoes<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. Why People Eat Raw Potatoes<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    That statistic includes French fries<\/a> and potato chips. What it doesn\u2019t measure is whether anyone actually eats potatoes raw and unprepared. While that option is common for other vegetables like tomatoes and broccoli, chomping down on a potato like it\u2019s an apple seems a bit perverse. But is it actually dangerous?<\/p>\n

    The Danger of Eating Raw Potatoes<\/p>\n

    Unlike raw meat, which can harbor dangerous bacteria like E. coli<\/a> or salmonella, a raw potato is unlikely to be a source of catastrophic illness. But it\u2019s still not a great idea to eat one uncooked.<\/p>\n

    A raw potato contains<\/a> solanine and chaconine, two glycoalkaloids, as well as a protein known as lectin. When ingested, all of them can cause digestive upset ranging from gas and bloating to stomach cramps. In larger amounts, solanine and lectins can lead to headaches and vomiting. In really large amounts, you might get into some serious neurological symptoms.<\/p>\n

    Surprisingly, exposure to sunlight can actually cause a potato to produce more solanine<\/a> as it turns green. In theory, a raw potato sitting on a windowsill could ruin your day (and your guts).<\/p>\n

    \"CuisineHopefully destined for a heat source. | Capelle.r\/GettyImages<\/p>\n

    Outside of that, you would need to eat a lot of potatoes\u2014pounds and pounds\u2014before risking solanine poisoning. Once cooked, some of these compounds are virtually eradicated<\/a>, as are any lingering bacteria or contaminants from the soil. (Solanine, however, tends to remain<\/a> on or near the skin.) Cooking a potato also breaks down the resistant starches that are difficult for the body to absorb and wind up acting as prebiotics to aid in digestion. While beneficial in small amounts, these starches are likely to prompt stomach issues unless they\u2019re broken down into simple sugars through heat.<\/p>\n

    There\u2019s another reason to avoid consuming potatoes raw: Uncooked, they tend to be bitter and simply don\u2019t taste very good.<\/p>\n

    Why People Eat Raw Potatoes<\/p>\n

    Advocates of consuming potatoes raw\u2014and there are some\u2014point<\/a> to a more favorable nutritional profile when a potato is left uncooked. A raw potato contains up to twice as much vitamin C as a baked potato, for example. Others point to the resistant starches being beneficial for gut and overall digestive health.<\/p>\n

    But there are plenty of ways to up your vitamin C intake and consume prebiotics other than eating uncooked potatoes. Worse, the lectins found in raw potatoes are considered<\/a> an antinutrient, meaning they can interfere with the absorption of other nutrients in the body.<\/p>\n

    So what if you take a bite of a raw potato by accident? Most likely, there\u2019s nothing to worry about. But as a rule, if you\u2019re going to meet the average quota, make sure your 50 pounds of annual potatoes are cooked.<\/p>\n

    Get Answers to More Big Questions:<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"According to the USDA, potatoes are the most heavily-consumed vegetable in America: The average person downs roughly 50…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4318],"tags":[105,4434,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-283045","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nutrition","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-nutrition","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114898026073115304","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}