Peanut butter is a commonly used and versatile ingredient for making snacks and meals.
Conversely, iron is a crucial nutrient for keeping energy levels up and promoting healthy pregnancy and overall health.
So, determining is peanut butter a good source of iron or not can be beneficial in plenty of ways.
It’ll let you enjoy creamy and smooth snacks while delivering health benefits.
Read on to learn about the existence of iron in peanut butter and helpful ways to get iron from peanut butter.
Is Peanut Butter a Good Source of Iron?
Peanut butter is a high source of iron, even if it is in small servings. Despite this, peanut butter contains non-heme iron.
The other sources of nonheme iron are meat, animal food, and plant foods. However, the human body can’t absorb this form of iron.
Later, we’ll discuss the way to absorb iron. And if you don’t prefer the peanut butter taste, consider eating roasted peanuts to fight anemia.
Including peanut butter is helpful for health. However, one needs to follow a healthy and balanced diet to help prevent iron deficiency.
Apart from iron, peanut butter has lots of other nutrients like protein, niacin, magnesium, phosphorus, omega-3 fatty acids, manganese, and antioxidants.
How Much Iron is in Peanut Butter?
Typically, the amount of iron contained in peanut butter varies depending on the brand. However, you can get 0.56 mg of iron per tablespoon.
And a serving of peanut butter delivers 7.5% of the total daily suggested amount for an adult male.
Though it’s not huge, it’s still richer than other spreads. So, consuming peanut butter can be a helpful way to increase the intake of iron and control the stable level.
No matter if it is smooth or crunchy peanut butter; both have the same amount of iron. So you can consume either of these types to supply iron to the body.
If you want to get a large amount of iron, consume peanut butter fortified with vitamins and minerals, as this type contains 5.3 mg of iron.
And it provides around 30% of the daily necessity in a single serving.
However, fortified peanut butter contains more copper, zinc, vitamin E, magnesium, and folate. These ingredients make it convenient to absorb iron.
Fortified peanut butter is commonly available in various health stores and grocery stores, but costs a bit more than regular peanut butter.
Ways to Get Enough Iron from Peanut Butter?
Peanut butter has a decent amount of iron, and it can be a good part of a diet to increase mineral intake and treat iron deficiency. It can also prevent iron deficiency anemia.
Hence, peanut butter is also rich in fats and calories, and should be consumed moderately.
If you want to get more iron out of peanut butter, you can use this ingredient with whole wheat bread.
Alternatively, eating peanut butter with a source of vitamin C can help absorb iron.
In this case, you can eat peanut butter with oranges or apples. Instead, make a sandwich and eat it with a glass of orange juice to improve the absorption of iron.
Final Words
In the end, peanut butter is a good source of iron and delivers a decent amount of minerals. Including peanut butter in a diet is a great way to increase the intake of iron.
However, you should follow those tips to aid the absorption of iron and enjoy its benefits.
Along with iron, peanut butter contains lots of nutrients, making it an overall healthy ingredient to prepare snacks or quick meals.