Nutritional Ingredients Of Balsamic Vinegar

Don't look to balsamic vinegar to add macronutrients or vitamins to your meal. Balsamic vinegar does have ingredients that will make your meal healthier, but these are limited almost entirely to minerals. Perhaps as important as the nutrients this potentially quite expensive vinegar provides are those it lacks. People on low-fat diets can feel free to use this vinegar for flavoring in recipes and salads.

Calories, Cholesterol and Fat

You will add just 88 calories to your meal with a 100-gram serving of balsamic vinegar. Cholesterol totals are even lower: zero grams even for a full 255-gram cup of balsamic vinegar. The low cholesterol total for this product is matched by the lack of fat. Balsamic vinegar does not contain any saturated fat to raise levels of bad cholesterol; but neither does it contain any omega-3 fatty acids, which can reduce inflammation and help prevent excessive blood clotting.

Manganese

The nutritional ingredient most abundant in balsamic vinegar, in terms of the greatest percentage of the recommended daily intake, is manganese. One cup, or 255 grams, of balsamic vinegar provides you with .334 milligrams manganese, or 17 percent of the amount you should get in a day. The body uses manganese to make connective tissue in skin, bone and cartilage. Regular consumption of balsamic vinegar by people with manganese deficiency may help prevent osteoporosis.

Iron

Adding that cup of balsamic vinegar to your meal will deliver 1.84 milligrams of iron to your body. This may sound like a small amount, but it's 10 percent of the recommended daily intake. Iron is necessary for the body to produce proteins like hemoglobin in blood cells and myoglobin in muscle cells.

Potassium and Magnesium

The next two most abundant minerals in balsamic vinegar are potassium and magnesium, which are tied for third place. The 100-gram serving provides 112 milligrams potassium and 12 milligrams magnesium, giving you 3 percent of the recommended daily intake for both of these minerals. According to the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University, potassium may play a role in preventing strokes, while magnesium is required for efficiently metabolizing carbohydrates and fat into energy.