Cucumber is an important part of a dish called a salad, There are many people that include a salad in their diet and prefer to eat at night as cucumber is part of the dish you might wonder what are the health benefits of eating cucumber at night.
The cucumber is a type of edible plant that comes from the gourd family. In every diet around the world, cucumber has said to be a very good nutrition addition to one’s diet. You have heard of this question is tomato fruit or vegetable, its same with cucumber but because of its use in the culinary world cucumber is considered as a vegetable however cucumber is grown through flower and contains seed its botanic classification is fruit.
Cucumber does not only contain a good nutritional value like high in vitamin K, Vitamin B along with minerals like phosphorus, copper, potassium, and magnesium along with all that it is a great cooling snack. Before we start talking about the benefits of eating cucumber at night we should get some myths out of the way.
Myths
There are some rumors about a cucumber, that consumption of cucumber at night can lead to your health downfall so let us look into the point that these rumors advocate.
There is a belief that eating cucumber at night can cause indigestion. The only reason people think cucumber can cause indigestion is due to the presence of cucurbitacin.
Cucurbitacin is an important phytonutrient (Natural compound found in plants) It has various health benefits such as protecting your liver, anti-cancer properties which can help in reducing tumors, anti-inflammation, improving cardiovascular health, and help in preventing diabetes. It is hard to believe knowing all the health benefits that cucurbitacin has to offer so if you think eating a little bit of cucumber can cause indigestion so can pizza or burgers yet people don’t have any problem munching on them. Further studies are needed on this topic to prove this till then its all just a matter of choice.
Cucurbitacin can only cause indigestion if you have a sensitive digestive system and it can trigger bloating and flatulence that our body tries to eliminate from our body by the mean of fart or burps so if you have a weak digestive system you should avoid eating cucumber at night.
It is also said that having cucumbers at night can disturb your sleep cycle because when you eat heavy calories dense food it takes time to digest can disturb your sleep cycle but a 100 gram of cucumber consist of only 15 calories. Around 96% of cucumber is made out of water thus known as a cooling snack, this is another reason cucumber might interrupt your sleep as you may need to urinate.
These are reasons people avoid eating cucumber at night so now let us look at all the benefits of eating cucumber at night can have.
Benefits of eating cucumber at night
- Promotes weight loss
A simple equation to weight loss is burning more calories than the calories you have consumed. Adding cucumber to your diet can help you reduce your calories intake and that, in turn, will make it easier for you to burn calories because cucumbers are low in calories a 100 gram of cucumber consists of only 15 calories and it will also make you feel full longer that can help you avoid unnecessary calories intake. There are other fruits that are low in calories like avocados, oranges, etc, or filling food with low calories that can promote weight loss.
The positive side of achieving weight loss through eating fewer calories is that you aren’t starving yourself your body is getting all the essential nutrients.
2. Helps with blood pressure
You will have high blood pressure problem when your kidneys are having a tough time flushing out the water and the negative effects of the salt. Now cucumber can come to aid your kidney due to its high water content and potassium.
The more potassium you eat the more sodium your flush out through your kidneys also potassium can help ease tension in the walls of your blood vessels. To maintain a healthy level of blood pressure your body’s potassium level should be more than sodium. A 100 gram of cucumber will provide your body with 150mg of potassium and 2 mg of sodium so the potassium and sodium ratio in cucumber makes it good for your blood pressure.
Further studies have been conducted on this to know the relation between sodium and potassium and the effects it has on blood pressure (1). That’s why when you have high blood pressure doctor suggests reducing sodium intake.
3. Good for your eyes & skin
The cucumber is also a good source of beta-carotene, Lutein, and Zeaxanthin these are responsible for the good health of your eye. The purpose of lutein and zeaxanthin is to block the harmful high-energy light waves like ultraviolet rays from reaching the retina that in turn reducing the oxidizing damage that can be caused by light. In addition to this, lutein and zeaxanthin are also known for being powerful anti-oxidants that protects your body from free radical(unstable molecules). If you have an excess free radical in your body it can lead to aging also progressing diseases like diabetes, cancer, and Alzheimer’s.
Some studies have also suggested having a good amount of lutein and zeaxanthin in both eye tissues can lead you to better vision.
The beta-carotene in our body gets converted into vitamin A and both layers of our skin need vitamin A, this layer act as a shield preventing sun ray from entering your body also vitamin A helps speeding up healing, supports skin immune system, and promotes natural moisturizing.
All these benefits are in the seed and peels of cucumber so if you want to improve the health of your skin and eye, make sure to eat cucumber without peeling and removing seeds. Consuming a single cucumber might not fulfill your daily requirement of beta-carotene, Lutein, and Zeaxanthin but will help you along with other food in your diet to hit the target.
4. Improves sleep
Magnesium helps us sleep better and reduce our chances of facing insomnia making cucumber a good addition to your diet if you have trouble sleeping.
A study was conducted with 46 elderly subjects for 8 weeks, some subjects were given supplements with magnesium and others weren’t the group that had an intake of magnesium supplement had a noticeable improvement in their sleep quality, sleep time, and other aspects when compared with the group that wasn’t given magnesium supplement with these results study came to the conclusion that magnesium plays an important role in improving our sleep (2).
A 100 grams of unpeeled cucumber contains approx 145mg of magnesium, RDA (Recommended Dietary Allowance) for adults 19-50+ years is 400-420 mg daily for men and 310-320 mg for women. so you can count on the cucumber to fulfill your daily magnesium requirement. It is helping you sleep another reason for you to enjoy the benefits of eating cucumber at night.
5. Good for kidneys
Having excesses of uric acid in your body can be harmful to your health and can lead you to painful diseases like arthritis, deposition of chalk-stones, etc. To counter the effect of excess uric acid you need to consume food that is alkaline in nature like cucumber. Eating cucumber can help you with removing uric acid crystallization in your joints not only it will help you with the uric acid level it will also keep away some other problems like indigestion and stomach acidity.
A study was conducted in which people were given an alkaline diet to know its effect on uric acid and the study came to the conclusion that uric acid can be removed from your body with the help of a high alkaline diet (3).
Plus, as cucumber is alkaline in nature you will also be getting alkalizing effect (Increasing your body’s PH level) on your body. Cucumber can also help people with poor kidney function to flush out toxins from their body while restoring poor kidneys health.
6. Good for liver
A healthy liver is important for a healthy life, we all know that and our liver is responsible for flushing out toxins from our body so we need our liver to perform its best and cucumber can help to increase the performance of liver we need to increase our intake of raw and organic food like cucumber.
With an increased intake of raw and organic food for a week, you will notice many positive health changes like liver function, improved bowel movement, improvement in stool quality, your sleep quality will be improved, and an increase in your energy level.
Cucucmber is also loaded with antioxidants, vitamin K, and other essential minerals that will give a good boost to your liver functionality, and other benefits of eating cucumber at night would be that your liver can go easy as it will be working less to digest it.
7. Good for bones, hair, and teeth
Silica is an important trace of mineral that helps provide strength and flexibility to the connective tissues in your body like bones, teeth, tendons, hair, and blood vessels. Silica controls the in and out of calcium in our bones and assisting with regular bone maintenance so the great benefits of silica would be its ability to strengthen our bones. if you’re suffering from a bone-related disease like osteoporosis then you should include cucumber in your diet.
If you have a deficiency of silica in your body then it can lead to bone disorder, hair fall issues, and poorly formed joints. Cucumber can be a good way for you to increase your intake of silica.
8. Heart health
Cucumber has low-fat content, low in magnesium as well as sodium but high in potassium, magnesium, and vitamins due to all these nutritional values cucumbers can be qualified as a food that’s good for your heart. The main reason it’s good for your heart is due to the level of potassium and sodium in it. High intake of potassium has been linked to the betterment of heart health, if you’re able to fulfill your daily requirement of potassium you are likely to reduce your chances of getting a stroke.
9. Autophagy
Autophagy is the body’s natural way to destroy the damaged or not properly functioning cells out of your body. If this function is not performed or gets disrupted it can lead to life-threatening diseases like cancer, more than 20% of the population is eventually diagnosed with cancer when the autophagy process in their body stops working.
To keep the autophagy process running your body requires nitric oxide, while there is no artificial supplement that can boost the nitric acid in your body it can be only increased naturally and that is when cucumber comes to your aid. Regular consumption of cucumber can help you boost nitric acid in your body.
10. Good for diabetes
Cucumber is good for people suffering from diabetes because of silica because silica in cucumber helps with the release of the insulin in our body and another reason is that it helps the pancreas for producing insulin and the hormones needed to do so are present in cucumber.
A study was conducted on a group of mice, first mice were induced with diabetes and then were fed cucumber peel at the end of the test. The study founded out that eating cucumber peel helps mice with diabetes reverse it and reduce the level of sugar in their blood (4). More studies are needed to be sure that the results will be the same in the case of humans.
Cucumber is a food that has a low glycemic index making it a good addition to the diet of people suffering from diabetes.
Final words
All these are benefits of eating cucumber at night, cucumber is a good food it doesn’t matter the time of consumption it can be morning, evening, or night. The nutritional value and benefits of cucumber will remain the same. There is no scientific proof to back up the claim that eating cucumber at night is bad for your health so without worry enjoy the benefits of eating cucumber at night.
So when enjoying the benefits of eating cucumber at night don’t drink water right away like 95% of cucumber is already made up of water, drinking water will dilute the nutrients in it and it won’t have much effect on your health. Don’t just depend upon cucumber for your health incorporate some of the physical activities in your life like walking, jumping ropes, etc. This brings an end to the benefits of eating cucumber at night I hope all your questions got answered.