When you want to transition to a healthier alkaline diet, it is critical to know which foods are alkaline and which are acidic so that you can make the right choices about what you put into your body for a healthy acid alkaline balance.
But what’s important about you acid alkaline balance is not just what happens when you test you foods with a pH strip, but what happens inside your body after you eat them … whether they’re “acid-forming” or “alkaline-forming.” In other words, what happens in your body after you eat or drink something … and that isn’t always obvious to most people!
For example, many people think all citrus fruits are acidic. In fact, when you test them with a pH strip … but once you eat them, they are actually alkaline-forming in your body. There are two components in your food that determine this, the mineral content and the sugar content. Take vegetables for example. They are mostly alkaline because the majority of them are high in minerals and low in sugar. Sugar is always high in acid foods. But just because a food is classified as “acidic” doesn’t necessarily mean that is is acidic for your body. Many fruits are low in sugar content and so are actually alkaline forming.
You see, when you consume sugar in any form it ferments in your digestive system just like beer and wine, turning into acid and alcohol which then clogs up your digestive system. Sugar also feeds bacteria and makes it harder for you to fight infections. Bacteria, viruses, molds, fungus and parasites thrive in an acidic environment but have a hard time surviving in an alkaline environment.
What about fruit juice?
Though fruits are alkaline-forming, keep in mind that juicing fruits dramatically increases the fructose … and that can be acid-forming and cause problems. Also, fruit sugar is not metabolized by your pancreas like glucose, it’s metabolized by your liver just like alcohol. This produces many of the same problems as chronic alcoholism, from chronic mineral depletion and hardening of the arteries to high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, obesity, cancer, arthritis and much more.
The big problem today is that all the big companies making commercial food products use some form of fructose in their junk food. They have different names on the labels just to confuse you. All day long you are probably consuming fructose in various forms without knowing it! Many things have added fructose that you would never expect because they never needed any extra sweetness top begin with — like ketchup, for example. Does ketchup need added sugar? These ruthless companies actually promote fructose as an alternative for diabetics – but that doesn’t actually make it a healthy choice for diabetics!
Food companies do all this because fructose doesn’t spike your blood glucose levels. In a standard blood test like a CBC (complete blood count), fructose doesn’t even show up. Breath tests are the best for various sugars including fructose. When was the last time your doctor gave you a breath test?
If you want something sweet, just eat a piece of whole fruit. Even the organic snack bars you see in supermarkets now are loaded with all kinds of sugars. So today, after decades of all this, most people are addicted to everything tasting sweeter than it really needs to. Also, your body has probably adapted to an emergency form of cellular metabolism that relies more on sugar since that is all you have been eating for decades.
A Poor Acid Alkaline Balance can Lead to Many Health Problems.
Tumors, bacteria and virus’s thrive in an acidic environment. Also, your body neutralizes acid-forming foods is by leaching calcium and magnesium from your bones leading to osteoporosis. Energy production in your cells is reduced in an acidic environment causing fatigue. Acidic blood is thicker, slower moving and less effective at taking nutrients and oxygen to your cells … and in removing toxins. And it can lead to many other problems as well.
Instead, here are a few alternatives — though eliminating your need for sweet things is really the best long term strategy. For raw food recipes try using raw honey or dates (yes, honey is not strictly vegan). For cooked dishes try organic maple syrup. For an occasional desert use dehydrated cane sugar juice or maple sugar in moderation. Freshly made apple juice or orange juice can also provide plenty of sweetness – but remember, juicing sweet fruits is also a form of processing that concentrates sugars so should be used in moderation. If you must use agave, look for traditional raw, organic agave, though its very hard to find these days. Most agave products these days are extremely high in fructose.
Here is the bottom line — ultimately all added sweeteners are bad for you and acidic-forming just like cooked food. You see, processing is actually form of cooking! Healthy raw, live food actually taste wonderful naturally once you get used to the natural taste of real food. When you artificially alter the way food tastes, you confuse your instinctive ability to know intuitively what’s good for you — and what’s not.
With a raw, live food diet, after a period of cleansing and healing at the cellular level, your natural ability to taste real food begins to return. That’s when live, fresh foods begin to taste wonderful without any enhancement or artificial additives. After that, if you have a craving its no longer your addictions calling — it’s your body actually asking for something it really needs nutritionally. Then your body naturally returns to a healthy acid alkaline balance!
The Raw Food Answer – No Processing, No Labels, No Lies
When you eat fresh, organic raw food it doesn’t come with fine print on the label that can be distorted and twisted by corporate greed. Every single new sweetener introduced into the market was invented to do just one thing – make profits for a corporation. Since the FDA doesn’t enforce food-labeling laws, you cannot be sure that what you’re eating is what is on the label, so please don’t eat that junk! And reduce Your Consumption of ALL processed and artificial sweeteners, including fructose.
