Eating nitrate-rich foods might seem to protect against stomach cancer, but it's probably not the nitrates themselves. When researchers accounted for vitamins and other healthy stuff in vegetables, the protection disappeared—so the real benefit likely comes from other nutrients in those foods.

Eating more nitrate-rich foods might lower your chances of getting stomach cancer by about 20%, based on a big review of many studies, especially in European countries.

Researchers followed nearly 10,000 Finnish adults for 24 years and found that eating foods with nitrates or nitrites didn't increase their chances of getting stomach or intestinal cancers.

Eating a lot of pickled veggies (more than a half-pound per week) might triple the risk of stomach cancer in Chinese adults from certain areas, even when considering how much fresh fruits and veggies they eat.

Eating more than a small amount of pickled veggies each week might make Chinese adults over 6 times more likely to get stomach cancer, and the more you eat, the higher the risk.

Eating a lot of foods with nitrites might raise your chances of getting stomach cancer by about one-third, according to a big review of many studies.