Title says all. Plant cells are covered by cell wall made of cellulose. The human body doesn’t have the enzyme cellulase to digest it, so why do we eat them? Do they just pass through us? If so, why are they ‘healthy’?
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Just because we can’t digest cellulose doesn’t mean it isn’t healthy for us. Herbivorous animals like cows produce cellulase to break down cellulose into sugar, because that’s how they sustain themselves on nothing but grass and other leafy plants all day long.
We, however, are omnivores and are adapted to have a much more diverse diet, so we don’t really need to digest cellulose. Cellulose still plays a role in our digestion precisely because it doesn’t get broken down, and because it is very absorbent. We rely on the presence of cellulose in our diet to retain water in our stool. Without it, you’ll tend to get extremely constipated because your intestines will extract too much water from your stool and it will become rigid.
Besides that, cellulose is only one form of carbohydrate in plants. There are also simple sugars and starches which we can digest, but in today’s society, getting enough carbs is usually the least of our concerns. That’s the real reason why vegetables that are low in carbs and high in other vital nutrients are generally considered the healthiest foods.
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