Alkaline vs Acidic Foods: Does It Affect Your Body’s pH Balance?

What is the alkaline diet?

Popeye isn’t the only one who can enjoy spinach on a daily basis! spinach is packed with essential vitamins and minerals, making it the most alkaline food on our list. It’s low in saturated fats and cholesterol and is an amazing source of niacin, dietary fibre, protein, and vitamin a, c, e, and k. Not sold yet? it’s also high in thiamin, riboflavin, vitamin b6, folate, calcium, iron, and magnesium. (all alkaline-forming minerals!) studies show that spinach is a powerful antioxidant and aids in different types of cancer prevention.

The alkaline diet is also known as the acid-alkaline diet or alkaline ash diet. Its premise is that your diet can alter the ph value — the measurement of acidity or alkalinity — of your body. Your metabolism — the conversion of food into energy — is sometimes compared to fire. Both involve a chemical reaction that breaks down a solid mass.

Now that you know what to look out for as you make your way down the aisles of the grocery store and what to do with these foods once you bring them home, it’s time to make an action plan. If you’re trying to help your body neutralize acidity and stay alkaline, you don’t need to cut out all acidic foods all at once. In fact, part of a healthy, alkaline lifestyle is maintaining balance. At santevia, we like to follow an 80/20 alkaline diet rule; we do our best to consume 80% alkaline foods and only 20% acidic foods. Most of us don’t feel any pressure to cut out very many foods, because we can still enjoy our favourite snacks and treats in moderation.

Regular pH levels in your body

The good news is changing from an acidic eating plan to a more alkaline one is simple. Start to maintain a more alkaline ph in your body through diet by:

• improving your intake of vitamins and minerals through food choices and supplements
• planning nutritious meals and snacks
• reducing sugar and caffeine
• keeping regular meal times—an important factor for maintaining blood sugar levels
• drinking a lot of water.

How much or how little do acid- or alkaline-based foods impact our overall health?

This is a difficult question to answer because it is impossible to separate one characteristic of food from the rest of the food. We like to place foods into simple categories for the sake of comparison in order to determine what is “good” or “healthy” or “better. ” this kind of thinking neglects the complexity of foods and the impact that the hundreds of constituents of a whole food can have on our bodies. With that framework, the answer is that acid- and alkaline-based foods have a great impact on our bodies, but not necessarily as a result of how one might think they can induce ph changes in our bodies.

The alkaline diet is based on the premise that the acid or the alkaline load of the food you eat can impact your health — poorly if you’re eating a higher acid load and positively if you’re consuming foods that promote a more alkaline environment. Fruits, veggies and seeds promote body-wide alkalinity whereas meats, fish, grains, eggs and dairy are considered acid-forming foods. Drinks, like alcohol, coffee, and even your favorite carbonated water (like la Croix) are also said to promote acid formation in your body. Organic produce is often recommended because the soil is said to be richer in alkaline-forming compounds.

Alkaline vs. Acidic Foods

However, the chemical reactions in your body happen in a slow and controlled manner. When things burn, and ash residue is left behind, the foods you eat leave an “ash” residue known as metabolic waste. This metabolic waste can be alkaline, neutral, or acidic. Proponents of this diet claim that metabolic waste can directly affect your body’s acidity. In other words, if you eat foods that leave acidic ash, it makes your blood more acidic. If you eat foods that leave alkaline ash, it makes your blood more alkaline.

According to the acid-ash hypothesis, acidic ash is thought to make you vulnerable to illness and disease, whereas alkaline ash is considered protective. By choosing more alkaline foods, you should be able to “alkalize” your body and improve your health. Food components that leave acidic ash include protein, phosphate, and sulfur, while alkaline components include calcium, magnesium, and potassium (.

The alkaline diet: What you need to know

When discussing the alkaline diet, it’s important to understand ph. Put simply, ph is a measurement of how acidic or alkaline something is.

The ph value ranges from 0–14:
acidic: 0. 0–6. 9neutral: 7. 0alkaline (or basic): 7. 1–14. 0many proponents of this diet suggest that people monitor the ph of their urine to ensure that it is alkaline (over 7) and not acidic (below 7). However, it’s important to note that ph varies greatly within your body. While some parts are acidic, others are alkaline — there is no set level.

Our lungs and kidneys are largely responsible for controlling the ph of our blood, and it is imperative that they remain between 7. 3 and 7. 4 for survival. The ph of our urine can vary, with the kidney orchestrating what is eliminated to help maintain the balance. The rationale behind the alkaline diet is this: based on the types of foods we eat, our body (and the kidneys in particular) needs to do more or less compensating for optimal ph. However, the actual ph in food doesn’t determine a net effect on the body. Rather, the effect food has on the kidney, called the “potential renal acid load” or (pral) determines where they fit in the context of the acid-alkaline diet.

Diet & Weight Management

The premise that by following an ‘alkaline’ diet, you will promote a preferential blood ph, which helps your body maintain a healthy weight and optimise your well-being is fundamentally flawed. This is because your body is designed to do this anyway, aiming to keep the blood ph at a constant slightly alkaline level of between 7. 35 and 7. 45. That said, the foods recommended by the alkaline diet are good for you and in fact largely those promoted for healthy weight management. So if you are cutting down on meat, swapping fatty, processed foods, refined sugars, caffeine and alcohol for more plant-based foods like fruit, vegetables, nuts and seeds and drinking water, you are more than likely going to experience some weight loss.

Health & Diet Guide

It’s easy for people to become confused by ever-changing diet trends and nutritional advice. It feels like rough seas for people who are trying to do their best to follow a healthy diet. However, if you look at the top seven dietary guidelines from 1980 to 2015, they have remained steadfast. It is unfortunate that nutrition has become so confusing but the basics are still as sound today as they were 35 years ago.

Pd: eating as our hunter-gatherer ancestors did with a focus on lean meats, seafood, eggs, nuts and seeds, fruit and vegetables. If cavemen didn’t eat it, neither should you. “by following these nutritional guidelines, we put our diet more in line with the evolutionary pressures that shaped our current genetics, which in turn positively influences health and well being,” says Loren Cordain, professor of health and exercise science at colorado state university and author of the paleo diet. It doesn’t always translate easily to the weekly supermarket shop – grass-fed and organic foods are recommended to limit exposure to pesticides, antibiotics, and other chemicals that didn’t exist in stone age times.

The U.S. Department of agriculture (USDA) dietary guidelines include calorie recommendations and tips for a healthy, balanced diet. The following nutrient-dense foods are recommended as part of a healthy diet:

• vegetables and dark, leafy greens (kale, spinach, broccoli, swiss chard, green beans)
• fruits (apples, berries, melon)
• grains (quinoa, brown rice, oats)
• lean meats (chicken breast, fish, turkey breast)
• beans and legumes (all beans, lentils, peas)

What does the ph level mean? well, ph is actually a spectrum, measured from 0 to 14. On the one end (0. 0-6. 9), you have “acidic”. On the other (7. 0-14. 0), you have “alkaline” or “base”. But what does this have to do with your diet?
related: experts say this is the best food for reducing belly fat
when you eat something and digest it, your body doesn’t absorb everything. You produce what is called “metabolic waste”, or as proponents of the alkaline diet plan call it, “ash”. If you eat high acid foods, the ash will be acidic. If you eat high alkaline foods, the ash will be alkaline.

The post Alkaline vs Acidic Foods: Does It Affect Your Body’s pH Balance? appeared first on EZi Domains.