Most of us love to have fruits; particularly the seasonal ones and it’s good to have them because nature has provided us with plenty of nutrients in this form to load our body’s immune system and to prepare it for the next season. Fruits are the most natural and nutritious food available because they contain good amounts of fruit sugars like sucrose, fructose and glucose and our body uses these sugars for energy to energise different body cells. Seasonal fruits also help us to have a better and stronger immunity and they improve digestive enzymes while also keeping the body alkaline.
So, how do fruits help our body and its immune system?
Apart from fruit sugars they also contain a variety of vitamins, minerals and enzymes that all contribute to a stronger immunity, better gut health and also help your body run its vital functions every day. Fruits are highly beneficial for us and that’s why we have seen many people just live on fruits. They may not eat a proper meal but prefer having only fruits, all day long. But, there’s always a right way and a wrong way to eat any healthy food and the same applies to fruits, as well. Here are instances where we’re eating these highly beneficial fruits in the wrong way:
● Since it is mango season, we see many people eating mangoes with their meal or immediately after a meal. When you do this, the fruit reaches the stomach and starts decomposing with food which is already in your stomach from your previous meal. In this process, your stomach has to produce more acids to digest the new food and the fruits on top of your food that are already there, start decomposing. As the fruits stay in this acidic medium they lose most of their good properties as well as, including vitamins and nutrients. To avoid any kind of indigestion we have to understand that the correct time to eat a fruit is on an empty stomach to make our body alkaline or during the mid morning or at least an hour before your meal during the day. Doing so ensures that your fruit digests and reaches your intestines by the time you eat your next meal, keeping your stomach clean and clear to digest and produce the digestive acids required for digesting your next meal.
● The correct way to eat any fruit is in its whole form. We have seen many people bragging about drinking fruit juices daily but we need to understand that when we juice a fruit we remove most of it fibre and the blending or juicing process also destroys most of the vitamins, minerals and enzymes. Also, the fruit in its juiced form reaches our stomach too quickly, because we often gulp it down. When we eat a whole fruit it mixes with our saliva that contains digestive enzymes which further help to break down fruit sugars like sucrose, glucose and fructose in the right way. Whereas, if we just have a glass of juice, the saliva doesn’t have enough time to break down to sucrose, fructose and glucose and in many cases, people have an overload of fructose or sugar in their body and sometimes that can lead to hyperglycaemia, high uric acid etc. So, always eat a fruit in its whole form, because you need the fibre for digestion, to prevent constipation, to maintain your probiotics etc.
● Fruits have antioxidants, alkaline and detoxifying effects on the body, and that can only be felt if it’s had on an empty stomach. The alkaline dose of fruits helps keeps our pH balance in check. But when it’s mixed with food, it becomes highly acidic and putrefies in the stomach. And that’s one of the reasons why many people bloat up or they have feelings of flatulence and indigestion if they follow a meal immediately with a fruit.
● It’s very important to savour fruits that are local to your geography, that are local to your country and that are local to the state that you live in. Given that fruits that are imported, are exotic or don’t come from your country, they are plucked from the tree much before they ripen, so, they don’t have the complete nutrition as they are intended to have. They are then sprayed with chemicals and pesticides to quickly and unnaturally ripen the fruit and you end up consuming a fruit with fewer nutrients and more pesticides. A way to escape this is by sticking to your local produce and most importantly, during the right season.
You can surely have other fruits as well in moderation, but stick to local and seasonal fruits to get maximum benefits. Eat your fruit, but eat it the right way!
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