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(NaturalNews) There are two controversies with eating fruits: Should you eat them and if so, when? Those who reject fruit consumption point to glycemic indices and claim fruit's sugar spikes could lead to diabetes while pointing out that fruit sugar is fructose, and fructose is hard on the liver.

Those who regard eating fruit as a healthy habit caution against mixing fruit with other foods. Their concerns are solely digestive. Both viewpoints have their interesting points that should be compared to one's own experience.

A little discourse on the matter may help one reach a healthy decision for eating fruit without concerns.

Fructose and sugar spike concerns

Pure fructose is worse than plain sugar, although sugar does also contain fructose. Table sugar (sucrose) is generally 50 percent glucose and 50 percent fructose. Fructose goes to the liver directly to be metabolized, and the metabolic product is fat and toxic byproducts rather than the instant energy that sucrose provides.

The stuff added to processed foods and beverages, high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), is anywhere from 55 percent to 90 percent fructose. A study at The University of Southern California (USC) concluded that most popular sweet beverages are 65 percent pure fructose.

You may think what the heck, that's only 15 percent more than table sugar. But according to USC professor of preventive medicine and The Childhood Obesity Research Center, Michael Goran who led the research mentioned above, the 15 percent differential amounts to 30 percent more extracted fructose.

Goran points to the main source of obesity among the young with the intrusion of HFCS into their diets. Breast milk contains lactose, which is not a sugar problem for infants. But baby formulas, baby foods, children's cereals, juices, sodas and other foods often contain HFCS to create a liver shock among the young. (Goran's site link below)

Professor Goran is quick to point out that fruit's fiber and other nutritional aspects inhibit rapid fructose assimilation and minimize fructose's negative effects. You would need to eat a heck of a lot of fruit to endanger your health in any way. (Science 20, source below)

Okay then, let's eat some fruit

Many nutritional experts agree that fruit should be eaten alone, away from other foods. One assertion maintains that enzymes created to break down specific foods can be confused by putting starchy carbohydrates and proteins down the pipe together.

But some disagree, pointing out that every time you eat anything, all enzymes are produced. Additionally, many foods considered starches also contain protein.

But the sticky issue is what happens with fruit when it is combined with other foods. Fruit is digested quickly alone. Fruit combined with other food sticks in the digestive system along with the other slower digesting foods and begins to ferment, disrupting digestion of all the foods in the gut.

Examining these different perspectives was a bit dizzying. So the decision to look into the premier diet based therapy of India's Ayurvedic medicine came to mind for settling any controversy. Ayurveda has been determining body type diets for centuries.

Ayurvedic practitioner Dr. Vasant Lad shares most of the current food mixing principles of not eating fruit with other foods for the fruit fermentation reason. He even confirms that melons shouldn't be eaten with other fruits because they normally digest even faster.

He explains how Ayurvedic principles differ from biochemical based western medicine, and at the bottom of this linked pdf he offers a simple fruit/food mixing graphic. (http://www.ayurveda.com/pdf/food_combining.pdf)

He also points out that some of us may have adapted to mixtures such as apples and cheese, which Ayurveda normally prohibits. So some common sense tempered by experience is in order.

Sources for this article include:

Science 20 article http://www.science20.com/michael_goran/issue_fructose_period-90840

Goran's site www.GoranLab.com

Dr. Lad on food combining http://www.ayurveda.com/pdf/food_combining.pdf

http://www.mindbodygreen.com

http://renegadehealth.com/blog/2011/07/08/kevs-5-food-combining-rules

http://www.trustedhands.com/content/fcbeg.pdf

http://voices.yahoo.com

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