Spinach is one of the most nutritious veggies out there. It’s loaded with minerals, vitamins, essential plant compounds, and antioxidants – all beneficial for good health.
One of the minerals that spinach contains is magnesium. Unfortunately, many people following Western diets don’t get enough essential minerals from their diets, including magnesium.
So it’s a good idea to add more magnesium-rich foods to your diet. But is spinach high in magnesium? How much does it contain?
Is Spinach High In Magnesium?
Just like all other leafy greens, spinach is a wonderful source of magnesium. All varieties of this vegetable are rich in magnesium as well as other essential vitamins and minerals. Spinach also contains a wide variety of plant compounds that have excellent health benefits. So, adding this leafy green to your diet is only beneficial.
How much magnesium is in spinach?
Two cups of raw spinach contain around 50 mg of magnesium. This mineral contributes to various biochemical reactions in your body, such as maintaining genes, contracting the muscles, and even regulating your nervous system.
Magnesium supplements are very common for athletes and workout fans as this mineral boosts exercise performance and help your muscles heal after working out.
But if you want to get the most out of the magnesium you take in, it’s best to choose natural sources, such as spinach.
Another way to prepare spinach is by cooking it. This doesn’t necessarily increase its magnesium content, but cooked spinach wilts, which means that you’re more likely to consume more of it.
One cup of cooked spinach contains 157 mg of magnesium, which is around 39% of your daily need. Because of that, eating cooked spinach might not only help you get more magnesium but also other vitamins and minerals.
Is spinach healthy?
Spinach is incredibly nutritionally balanced. Most of its calories come from carbs, including fiber. The fiber in spinach is insoluble, which improves digestion by helping food pass through your digestive system.
This can prevent constipation and other digestive issues. This type of fiber also feeds the ‘good’ gut bacteria in your stomach that benefit your immune system, healthy weight, and other health aspects.
Both raw and cooked spinach are loaded with vitamins K and A. In fact, a cup of cooked spinach provides you with way more than your daily need for these two fat-soluble vitamins.
Vitamin A helps protect your eyes and supports a healthy immune system. Vitamin K, on the other hand, plays a crucial role in blood clotting and regulating blood calcium levels.
These two micronutrients are fat-soluble, which means that you should consume them along with some healthy fats to ensure good absorption. Because of that, it might be a good idea to cook spinach with olive oil.
Along with other leafy greens, spinach can help you stock up on iron. This mineral helps create hemoglobin – a protein that carries oxygen throughout your body. Iron also helps treat the symptoms of anemia.
So having enough of it in your diet is important, especially since the benefits of iron are only evident while you’re already suffering from its deficiency. As a result, it’s crucial to prevent that from happening.
While spinach is especially rich in these nutrients, it’s actually an excellent source of almost all essential minerals that your body needs, like calcium, phosphorus, potassium, manganese, copper, and many others.
Because of that, adding spinach to your diet can help you reap a lot more benefits than just one nutrient. It’s also easy to incorporate into any dietary plan without problem, making it that much easier.
Spinach contains several plant compounds, such as lutein, which improves the health of your eyes. It may even enhance the sharpness of your vision and reduce cell loss related to eye disease.
Lutein also fights inflammation, which causes various chronic conditions, including many digestive system problems. The best lutein sources are dark leafy greens, such as spinach, so it’s a great food to add to your diet.
Spinach is also high in antioxidants, which help flush out harmful chemicals from your body, such as free radicals.
These substances increase your risk of cancer and diabetes and even accelerate the aging process.
Because of that, adding antioxidant-rich foods to your diet is incredibly beneficial in fighting oxidative damage.
Is mustard spinach high in magnesium?
Mustard spinach is nutritionally similar to traditional spinach, but it’s lower in magnesium. A one-cup serving of raw mustard spinach packs around 16.5 mg of magnesium.
On the other hand, one cup of cooked mustard spinach contains just around 12.6 mg of magnesium.
This variety tastes different than other spinach types, but it’s still highly nutritious, containing calcium, vitamin A, and vitamin C.
Is New Zealand spinach high in magnesium?
New Zealand spinach is similar to regular spinach, but its leaves are shaped slightly differently.
A cup of cooked New Zealand spinach contains 57.6 mg of magnesium. One cup of cooked spinach of the same variety contains 21.8 mg of magnesium. As you can see, it’s lower in magnesium than traditional spinach, but it still includes a lot of other nutrients.
So, it can be a great alternative to regular spinach from time to time.
Can you take in too much magnesium from spinach?
While spinach is a great source of magnesium, it’s nearly impossible to take in too much of this mineral by just eating spinach.
Firstly, spinach is low in calories, so people often consume it as a side dish with some protein and healthy fats. If you do that, you get all other essential nutrients and not just magnesium.
What’s more, not all dietary magnesium gets absorbed, so you don’t have to worry about taking too much from spinach.
Spinach is an incredibly nutritious leafy green that’s often considered a superfood. It’s loaded with an abundance of minerals and vitamins, including a great amount of magnesium.
Because of that, adding magnesium to your diet can help you increase your magnesium intake and prevent various health conditions from developing. Spinach is also easy to prepare, making for a quick addition to any meal.