Unhealthy Veggies?

    Because I’m growing so many fruits and vegetables, I went online to read about food and nutrition, and how my diet affects me.  I found out some interesting facts about some vegetables that I didn’t know.
    The first vegetable or vegetable group of concern is the chenopods or the Chenopodiaceae family (sometimes listed as a subfamily within the Amaranthaceae family) which includes spinach, Swiss chard, beets, and rhubarb.  All of these plants contain varying amounts of oxalic acid, which gives them their sour taste.  In the body, I’ve read, oxalic acid or oxalate chemically binds with calcium in the blood creating calcium oxalate, forming crystals or precipitate (better known as kidney stones) which accumulate and obstruct kidney tubules.  According to Coe FL, Evan A, Worcester E. (2005). "Kidney stone disease". J Clin Invest. 115 (10): 2598–608. doi:10.1172/JCI26662, an estimated 80% of kidney stones are formed from calcium oxalate.  According to Wikipedia, other edible plants have significant amounts of oxalic acid:  star fruit, black pepper, parsley, poppy seeds, cocoa, chocolate, most nuts, most berries, beans, and tea. 
    Well, I’m not going to stop eating berries and nuts; I’m easing into a vegan diet, and nuts and berries are staples for me.  It would be no problem for me to avoid all those other foods to decrease whatever risk there might be.  But tea?  I love tea.  Why tea?  Even green tea?  I don’t know.  I also don’t know which berries and nuts contain significant amounts of oxalic acid.  Ah, well… there’s plenty of other plants to make hot water infusions from.
    Another group of foods I was reading about was goitrogenic foods.  In their raw state, these foods naturally contain goitrogens, chemicals which suppress the function of the thyroid gland by interfering with iodine uptake in individuals with low iodine intake in their diet (this can enlarge the thyroid into a goitre).

Lightly goitrogenic foods include strawberries, pears, peaches, soy, peanuts, pine nuts, spinach, bamboo shoots, sweet potatoes, and members of the plant genus Brassica, including bok choy, collard greens, horseradish, kohlrabi, radishes, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, kale, broccoli, and cauliflower.  Cooking inactivates these goitrogens, and if there is enough iodine in the diet, it might not even be an issue.
    As a result of what I’ve read about oxalic foods, I’m going to remove the Swiss chard from the garden and replace it with kale.  Kale is quite the nutritious vegetable.  Check it out on Nutritiondata.com.  I’ve only just started eating it, and it’s pretty bitter, but I will say that the taste is growing on me.  I made a salad the other day with kale, carrot, celery, and sprouted sunflower seeds.  It was great, it tasted so healthy.