Thursday, March 12th 2009

By sehr tejpar

Can’t shake the feeling that your stomach is on acid after a satisfying steak and potatoes? According to the acid/alkaline diet, this is because your stomach actually is on the lower end of the pH scale. 

The theory behind this diet is pretty straightforward, but before the details, here is a basic chemistry review. Acidity is measured on a scale of one to 14 and is expressed as a pH value. A pH of one is highly acidic, a pH of seven is neutral and a pH of 14 is very weakly acidic (or very basic/alkaline).  Our blood is slightly basic with a normal pH level of between 7.35 and 7.45. The idea is that our diet too should reflect this pH level. 

Where does alkaline come into play? Alkaline is a common term for a dissolvable base, or in other words something that once dissolved has a pH value above seven. Almost all foods that we eat, after being digested, absorbed and metabolized, release either an acid (pH < seven) or an alkaline base (pH > seven) into our blood. In our bodies, alkaline plays an important role in neutralizing excess acid so that we can maintain our blood’s normal pH level. 

When our alkaline levels are low, the body naturally depletes its resources of essential nutrients — from our organs — in an effort to continue neutralizing the excess acid. These other nutrients can include potassium, magnesium, calcium and sodium.

But losing essential nutrients isn’t the worst that can happen when your body’s alkaline levels are low. Once your body runs out of alternative ways to neutralize the acid and your blood’s pH falls below 7.35, acidosis occurs. Acidosis is a condition that can lead to irreversible cell damage, and which proponents of the alkaline diet believe is the common factor to most diseases and illnesses. While conventional medicine doesn’t support that last claim, there is evidence that alkaline diets may help prevent the formation of calcium kidney stones, osteoporosis, and age-related muscle wasting. While there may be a lack of clinical studies proving the relationship between an alkaline diet and decreased chance of chronic disease, most conventional doctors would support the general health benefits of a pH balanced diet.

So how does one become more alkaline, so that your body, like an (alkaline) energizer battery keeps going and going? According to the theory, an alkaline diet is based on eating foods which, once metabolized, leave an alkaline residue (ash). Important ash minerals are calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc and copper. 

Examples of alkalizing foods include asparagus, broccoli, ginger, watercress, coconut, grapefruit and goat milk. On the other hand, chicken, beef, eggs, cheese, milk, potatoes, oranges and mangoes are some examples of acidifying foods. 

According to its proponents, the ideal alkaline diet includes 70-80 per cent alkalizing foods, complemented by 20-30 per cent acidifying foods. In advocating this ratio, they bring to mind that evolutionarily speaking, the diet of our hunter-gatherer ancestors was much different than our modern diets. They relied primarily on unprocessed plants and ate minimal meat. However, with the advent of agriculture, domestication of livestock and use of technology to make the food production process more efficient, our consumption of grains, poultry, fish, meat, salt, cheese and milk significantly increased. All of this has contributed to making food easily accessible, but has also made our diet much more acid- producing. 

Dr. William Hay, founder of the Hay Diet (circa 1930) also advocates this idea of learning from the diet of our ancestors. According to Hay, our ancestors ate only one or two foods at a time, as they came across them. Agriculture increased the variety in our diet and allowed us to mix many different types of foods at the same time. Hay’s Diet promotes combining foods based on the principles of digestion.

He gives the example of the enzymes needed to breakdown carbohydrates and proteins, both of which require two very different environments. The enzyme for carbohydrates is destroyed by a mildly acidic environment, which is exactly what is necessary to breakdown protein. What this means is that if protein and carbs are eaten at the same time, one of the foods ends up fermenting in the digestive tract for a while, until it can be digested properly. Hay believes that incorrect food combining is what causes, 90 per cent of digestive problems. 

Because they require an alkaline environment, Hay recommends eating starches, fats and green veggies together. Similarly, he suggests eating protein, sugars and acidic fruits together, all of which require an acidic medium for digestion. 

So, the next time you sit down for a meal, give some thought to alkaline/acid proportions and try to eat your steak before your potatoes.

Tags: Alkaline diet, Health, stomach acid