Always eat your fruit & vegetables!
Do you want to have bleeding teeth? You think that looks cute? What about small purple dots all over your body as your veins pop? Or just random pain in your joints, and too weak to climb on the toilet? hmm no? Then eat your damn veggies!
Scurvy
Scurvy, Sorbutus in scientific fancy Latin, is a disease caused by a vitamin-C deficiency, which is the result of a bad diet. Untreated scurvy is deadly in the long run. Well known from the Age-of-Sail where many sailors were suffering from this on their long journeys around the world. Where their food supply consisted of dried biscuits and salted meat, because of the inability to keep fresh food a long time.
Cure
The cure for scurvy is simple. Make sure you get vitamin-c into your human system. This is done by eating fruits and vegetables. Fresh is better, as cooking may lower the vitamin content, but cooking will not remove it entirely.
Mangez des fruits! Évitez le scorbut!
Lemons
Why do lemons have the name of being high in vitamin-C, when it's clear from the list in the sidebar other fruits and vegetables have more vitamin-c content? This is because of history. In 1601 Captain James Lancaster took a whole load of oranges and lemons onboard in Madagascar, and experimented on his crew. Of the four ships only one received daily rations of lemon juice. Non of the crew got scurvy, while on the other three ships many died of the disease. The idea that lemons and citrus fruits are the cure for scurvy is still persistent to this day.
Vitamin-C content
per 100 gram
Camu Camu
Amla
Urtica
Guava
Blackcurrant
Kiwifruit
Chili pepper
Parsley
Green kiwifruit
Broccoli
Brussels sprout
Bell pepper
Papaya
Strawberry
Orange
Lemon
Cabbage
Spinach
Turnip
Potato
in mg
2000.00
610.00
333.00
228.30
181.00
161.30
144.00
133.00
92.70
89.20
85.00
80.40
62.00
58.80
53.20
53.00
36.30
28.00
27.40
19.70
Great article, I love both quotes (though one is clearly better :p) and the "fancy Latin"! Nice bits about the lemons at the end, I remember hearing about it before :D Such a relief not to have to eat lemons :p
Thank you Amélie. You can eat all the Brussel sprouts instead!
Whaat?! Lemons and limes are so tasty, especially compared to brussel sprouts. Unless you bathe them in butter and garlic, then they're fine :)
I'd put lemons above brussel sprouts too. Lemon icecream is a-ma-zing !
Lemons are absolutely terrible!!!! I've come to the terrible realisation that I like Brussel sprouts better...
Whahahahaha