13.40 Does the type of cooking pot affect iron content? Iron-deficiency anemia is the most common form of malnutrition in developing countries, affecting about 50% of children and women and 25% of men. Iron pots for cooking foods had traditionally been used in many of these countries, but they have been largely replaced by aluminum pots, which are cheaper and lighter. Some research has suggested that food cooked in iron pots will contain more iron than food cooked in other types of pots. One study designed to investigate this issue compared the iron content of some Ethiopian foods cooked in aluminum, clay, and iron pots.²⁴ Foods considered were yesiga wet’, beef cut into small pieces and prepared with several Ethiopian spices; shiro wet’, a legume-based mixture of chickpea flour and Ethiopian spiced pepper; and ye-atkilt allych’a, a lightly spiced vegetable casserole. Four samples of each food were cooked in each type of pot. The iron in the food is measured in milligrams of iron per 100 grams of cooked food. The data are shown in Table 13.1.