pH value
The pH balance in our body is very essential for a healthy life. pH stands for power of hydrogen, which is the value of the hydrogen ion concentration in our body. The pH scale ranges from 1 to 14, with 7 considered to be neutral. A pH value less than 7 is called acidic and a pH value greater than 7 is alkaline. Our ideal pH value is slightly alkaline - 7.30 to 7.45.
A healthy and balanced diet should consist of 70 - 80% alkaline forming food and of 20 - 30% acid forming food. Most of us are eating to acidic which leads to an acidification of our body. To prevent this from happening, we have to first understand which food is alkaline forming and which is acid forming. But it is not that easy. Acidic food doesn't necessarily taste acidic to recognise it as acidic. It becomes even more complicated; e.g. one of the most acidic fruits, the lemon (pH 2.0), is actually one of the most powerful alkaline forming foods.
alkaline diet or pizza with coke?
Let's suppose you have a meal consisting of salami pizza and cola - a tough example of a very acid-forming meal. The pizza consists mainly of flour, cheese, sausage/salami and tomato paste and the cola has high amounts of carbonic acids and a lot of sugar. In addition pizza and cola contain a considerable number of artificial additives such as taste enhancers, stabilisers, preservatives, acid regulators, etc.. All these ingredients are extremely acidic.
This means that during their digestion in our body, a lot of acids are formed, that have to be neutralised before the caustic properties of the acid can damage our cells. This is done with the help of alkaline minerals such as Calcium, Potassium and Magnesium. In the case of the acid-forming salami pizza with cola, many of these valuable minerals must be sacrificed for the neutralisation of these acids. The more meals and drinks, like the acidic pizza with cola, we eat or drink daily, the more minerals are needed for our body to maintain its pH balance. Pizza & Cola alone do not contain enough of the minerals our organism needs to neutralise the acids. The result is, our body must plunder its own mineral deposits, such as our bones, teeth, hair roots, blood vessels or other organs.
long term consequences
Eating too much acidic foods has long-term consequences. So, we don't recognise these consequences at first because our health condition worsens slowly and in small steps. We slowly start gaining weight, because our body builds fat cells to stores the excess acid and related substances in there. If we keep these acidic substances in our body we will age faster. Our immune system gets disturbed and we fall sick or come down with a flu more often. We start suffering from caries, varicose veins, hair loss, osteoporosis, brittle fingernails, arteriosclerosis, kidney stones, arthritis, gout and rheumatism, etc.
Many of us start using optical aid and glasses when we get older. We are not aware that the reason is mostly too much acid forming food, and not our age. Acids and its related substances are able to settle down between our skin cells, which makes us look older and wrinkled. So, if you want to look younger, change your diet to more alkaline forming food.
In order to help you understand which food forms alkaline and which forms acids in our body, I have prepared this simple pH balance common food chart below. It took me some time to research this but I enjoyed the study a lot. It helped me to understand what had happened to me over many years. I'm now much more careful in my food selection and I enjoy my health conditions since I "crossed the rubicon" and changed my diet to more alkaline forming food.
