The Dealer Joe’s product web page presents a quick but informative description of jicama, a tuberous root vegetable that’s the key ingredient in these scrumptious wraps: “Native to Mexico and South America, Jicama (HICK-ah-mah) has been a staple in sure cuisines for hundreds of years. Texturally, this tuber resembles a crunchy cross between a water chestnut and an apple. When it comes to taste, it is a bit like a radish—minus the spice. Some people even say it is barely nutty. On the entire, nevertheless, jicama is delicate and impartial.”
Now that we’ve got its roots (pun meant) and style profile lined, what are jicama’s key well being advantages? Furthermore, except for shopping for these wraps in your subsequent Dealer Joe’s run, how else can you utilize the entire veggie in recipes? These questions, answered beneath.
Jicama’s key vitamins and advantages
Earlier than we dive into the important thing well being advantages of jicama, Los Angeles–based mostly dietitian Gaby Vaca-Flores, RDN, shares a couple of highlights of the veggie’s nutrient content material. “Jicama is loaded with complicated carbohydrates. Because of this, it is a good source of fiber with one serving offering a little bit over six grams,” she says.
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Subsequent up, it’s additionally a superb supply of vitamin C—or extra particularly, it presents a “significant amount of ascorbic acid,” per an evaluation revealed in Meals Chemistry. “In reality, a cup of jicama may help you meet greater than 40 p.c of the Really helpful Dietary Consumption for vitamin C,” Vaca-Flores provides. However that’s not all. “As with most root greens, jicama additionally delivers small quantities of many nutritional vitamins and minerals together with nutritional vitamins B6 and E, calcium, folate, iron, potassium, manganese, and zinc.”
Each figuratively and actually, I’m consuming this all up—and that’s even earlier than dives into how these vitamins all stand to profit your well being. Right here’s a have a look at a number of the largest wellness wins you’ll be able to count on by including jicama to your weight loss program:
1. Jicama is gut-friendly
Jicama contains inulin, a particular kind of prebiotic fiber. “Prebiotics like inulin promote a balanced intestine microbiome by serving to to develop the nice micro organism (aka probiotics) within the intestine,” says Vaca-Flores. A balanced gut is a happy gut, which promotes a cascade of advantages to your digestion, pores and skin well being, and extra.
2. It presents much-needed fiber for digestive well being and past
Fiber is the present that retains on giving—and almost all of us might use extra of it. In line with a 2021 examine by the American Society of Diet, a mere seven percent of adults in the U.S. meet fiber recommendations (which at the moment stand at 31 to 34 grams per day for males and 22 to twenty-eight grams per day for girls, per the present Dietary Guidelines for Americans). In line with the USDA’s nutrient database, one medium jicama contains a whopping 32 grams of fiber, which suggests you may greater than exceed your every day consumption with simply considered one of these tubers. “Jicama’s excessive fiber content material may help promote regularity and regular functioning digestion. As well as, consuming sufficient fiber may help with blood sugar administration, amongst different advantages,” Vaca-Flores says.
3. Jicama helps immune perform
Once more, jicama is wealthy in vitamin C, aka the antioxidant we all know and love for its immunity-boosting powers. “Vitamin C helps to help the wholesome perform of cells that make up each the innate and adaptive immune programs,” Vaca-Flores says. So the following time you are feeling like you would use an immune enhance, contemplate switching issues up from the usual OJ and including jicama to your cart as an alternative.
3 jicama recipes to spice up your consumption of fiber and micronutrients
Certain, you’ll be able to slice and cube your jicama and luxuriate in it uncooked by itself, or just sub jicama wraps (from Dealer Joe’s or elsewhere) for tortillas on taco night time. However if you wish to get a bit extra inventive, acquire inspo with these tasty jicama recipes.
1. Baked jicama fries
In the event you love French fries and are open to nutrient-dense options, jicama fries are the way in which to go. In her recipe for baked jicama fries, Michelle Blackwood, RN, the blogger and recipe developer behind More healthy Steps, mentions that whereas outer crispiness shouldn’t be a problem, the important thing to creating them mushy on the within is to boil them earlier than baking. And whereas it’s greatest to eat them freshly ready, you’ll be able to edit the recipe to your liking—whether or not you wish to add in cayenne for further warmth, use butter in lieu of olive oil, or desire to air fry them.
Get the recipe: Baked jicama fries
2. Jicama and citrus salad (Xec)
In her jicama and citrus salad (Xec) recipe, Mely Martinez of Mexico in My Kitchen shares that this basic Yucatan aspect dish is very in style on the Day of the Lifeless. Though conventional recipes name for bitter/Seville orange—which can be tougher to search out stateside—she shares that a mixture of orange and grapefruit plus a contact of lime juice will suffice to construct out the flavour profiles of this wholesome and refreshing salad.
Get the recipe: Jicama and citrus salad (Xec)
3. Black bean tacos with spiralized jicama and avocado mash
Really feel like your meals selections are *spiraling* uncontrolled? Take cues from cookbook writer Ali Maffucci of Inspiralized who—you guessed it—makes use of a spiralizer to make spaghetti-like jicama slices in her plant-based recipe for black bean tacos topped with jicama salsa and avocado mash. She provides that you could substitute lettuce wraps instead of tortillas… however if you wish to double down on the well being advantages of jicama, you may as effectively go wild through the use of jicama wraps as an alternative.
Get the recipe: Black bean tacos with spiralized jicama and avocado mash
