Healthy Tips

With so many health drinks on the market, it can be difficult to know the difference between alkaline drinks and other unhealthy choices. While many of the health drinks you find are useful in some ways, alkaline drinks have added benefits that their counterparts do not.

Alkaline drinks are special health drinks that utilize natural ingredients registering a pH higher than 7.0, after consumption. The various benefits in these alkaline drinks are reached through the inclusion of specific ingredients that are processed very carefully. Ingredients may include real fruits and herbs, which are naturally alkaline. These ingredients must not be overheated in the packaging process, thereby maintaining the completely natural structure of the plants.

Because there are so many health drinks available, it can be helpful to determine just what effect you’re looking for with your purchase. For example, some health drinks are high in antioxidants and Vitamin C and are therefore geared toward improving the immune system. Other health drinks contain a high protein content in an effort to help an individual build lean muscle mass. Unfortunately, most protein drinks are highly acidic.

Why Choose Alkaline Drinks?

The importance of maintaining an alkaline state in the body is becoming more widely accepted as research points to the benefits. Generally speaking, the body has a pH of about 7.4, or slightly alkaline. Many of the bacteria and other organisms that would harm the body are unable to survive in this alkaline environment. This is why health drinks with naturally alkaline ingredients are helpful in assisting the body to maintain that delicate pH balance. If human blood changes just two tenths in pH level, death is imminent. The body will do whatever is necessary to stay in balance, even if that means extracting calcium from bones to alkalize the acid forming foods and drinks consumed.

Unfortunately, much of the typical twenty-first century diet is made up of acid forming foods. By utilizing alkaline drinks, we are able to help the body maintain its natural balance. The result is better overall health, as well as more energy. With the consumption of alkaline health drinks, the body won’t have to work as hard in order to manage a proper pH balance.

Alkaline drinks are almost always made with whole food ingredients. Fruits, such as lemons and peaches and herbs like jasmine or cinnamon are alkaline ingredients that you might find in these types of health drinks. Keep in mind that many convenience store sport drinks and enhanced waters are made with acid forming ingredients, which are just the opposite.

In most cases, alkaline health drinks also offer a more natural energy boost without a sugar crash or a caffeine buzz. This is because the whole food ingredients provide elements such as antioxidants, live enzymes, and chlorophyll for enhanced oxygen flow.

When you take the time to find out how your health drinks are processed and what they are made with you can make a huge difference in how effective they are for your body. By shopping for naturally alkaline drinks, you are able to support your life support systems in a way that most so-called health drinks can’t possibly equal.

Look at the ingredients in most commercially advertised sport drinks and vitamin waters, and you will quickly see they are far from being health drinks. If you are trying to stick to a diet high in alkaline foods, then these drinks are even more detrimental to your health.

Here are a few things to avoid the next time you are shopping for health drinks, especially for those on an alkaline food diet.

· High Fructose Corn Syrup – This is concentrated sugar that contributes to weight gain and abnormal blood sugar levels, which can also lead to diabetes. Excess sugars have no place in health drinks, and you certainly won’t find processed sugar in any alkaline foods.

· Phosphoric Acid is just what it says it is – acid. It is often defined as, “A clear colorless liquid used in fertilizers, detergents, pharmaceuticals and food flavoring, irritating to the skin and eyes and moderately toxic if ingested.” When your diet is supposed to be 80% alkaline foods and only 20% acid forming foods for proper pH balance, this really puts you upside down quickly.

· Artificial Flavors – Some experts call them, “Excito-toxins!” When artificial flavorings are in health drinks, they begin to resemble soft drinks and candy. These artificial substances interfere with your pH balance and force you to consume more alkaline foods to neutralize the acid from the toxins in your blood.

· Artificial Sweeteners – These are so unnecessary in health drinks today. In addition to the acid forming properties of artificial sweeteners, nutritionists express concerns about their effects on the human body. Many consumers now believe that artificial sweeteners may play a factor in diseases of the brain, such as Alzheimer’s. That is one reason why corporations such as Pepsico and Coca Cola are beginning to market health drinks and other products containing Stevia, an all natural sweetener that is actually beneficial. You can learn more about Stevia Sweetener and discover alkaline foods for pH balance by taking the Alkaline Food Test at BestHealthFoodStore.net.

· Isolated Vitamins – When isolated, processed, heated, liquefied and bottled, vitamins and minerals break down before your body can use them. You need vitamins and minerals from whole foods, not from so called health drinks that are really bottled, heated, highly processed waters with colorful dyes and artifical ingredients.

Someone showed me a well-known sport drink the other day and I couldn’t believe the ingredients! This tropical mango flavored health drink didn’t mention mango anywhere in the ingredients, but let’s take a look at what it did list, along with some things to think about when choosing health drinks:

· Sucrose Syrup (this is sugar)

· High Fructose Corn Syrup (more sugar) – A total of 56 gms of sugar

· Phosphoric Acid (the opposite of alkaline foods)

· Glycerol ester of wood rosin (acid forming)

· Modified Food Starch (how was it modified?)

· Natural and Artificial Flavors (your guess is as good as mine)

· Yellow 6, Yellow 5 and Red 40 (artificial dyes)

Another bottle of this not so healthy drink says “Specially Formulated for Tiger Woods” with the same ingredients, but blue dye instead of yellow. I guess that secret blue stuff is what makes Tiger play so well. In fact, experts could argue that Tiger’s recent knee problems are because of too many acid forming foods and not enough alkaline foods in his diet. Many medical and health specialists now believe that an acid/alkaline imbalance can contribute to weak bones and damaged joints.

When shopping for a good health drink, here are some important considerations to keep in mind.

· Is it liquefied, pasteurized or otherwise heated in the bottling process? If so then the enzymes have been destroyed and the nutrients will not easily be absorbed by the body.

· Does it give you chlorophyll from plants to help your cells absorb more oxygen?

· Does it provide natural antioxidants to destroy free radicals? Natural antioxidants are essential for anti-aging.

· Is it made with whole food ingredients like real fruit or other alkaline foods?

Now, let’s take a different look at health drinks on the market today that are not advertised with flashy TV ads or filled with colorful dyes: Here are some of the characteristics of these truly healthy drinks:

· Not liquefied or bottled, but in powder form

· Processed at low temperatures

· Contain live enzymes from whole alkaline foods and chlorophyll from plants

· Complex structures of the whole food ingredients are fully intact

· Loaded with natural antioxidants to combat free radicals

If you buy your health drinks in a convenience store, a grocery store, or in the health food store at the mall, then you are falling short of a truly beneficial alkaline food diet. You will find far better choices online by Googling all natural health drinks.

Recently, a controversy has developed over antioxidants and alkaline fruits and their effects on cancer. Specifically, some believe that cancer can be treated by consuming alkaline fruits and vegetables.

Many web merchants claim that an alkaline body may be able to significantly fight the pH of malignant cancer cells until they die. According to doctors, the claims of such merchants are false. Doctors from the Mayo Clinic, one of the world’s most renowned medical treatment and diagnostic centers, say this cancer rumor is untrue.

According to the Mayo Clinic, “A diet rich in certain alkaline foods, meaning foods that aren’t acidic, won’t cure cancer. Proponents of this diet claim foods such as soft drinks and meats make your body acidic, allowing cancer to flourish” (2005). Unfortunately, cancer, like many other serious illnesses, isn’t that simple.

The Mayo Clinic elaborated about proponents of an anti-acid and anti-cancer diet stating, “The theory that acid causes cancer isn’t true, and it isn’t clear that what you eat has any impact on your body’s overall acidity or alkalinity.”

Free radicals have also been linked to cancerous cell growth. Many doctors confirm this fact. “Free radicals have long been known to be mutagenic,” stated Dr. Tamer Fouhad (2002). “Animal and cell culture studies have suggested that antioxidants may slow or even prevent the development of cancer,” according to the National Cancer Institute.

Antioxidants are chemicals found in several food sources, like dark chocolate, green tea, red wine, vegetables, and fruits such as sour cherries, acaiberries, blueberries, mangosteen, and the noni fruit. Examples of antioxidants include beta carotene, lycopene, vitamin A, vitamin E, and vitamin C. Not only do antioxidant vitamins benefit your body with health benefits; they may also combat cancer according to reputable medical sources.

But, the American Cancer Society thinks more research is needed on the subject. They point out that different studies have had mixed results. Their official statement is that “too little is known about how antioxidant supplements actually act against disease.” They do not, however, refute the claim.

Antioxidants are thought to bind with free radicals and thereby protect cellular DNA from harm, since free radicals are highly reactive and mutations in DNA can lead to cancer if flawed cells reproduce in large numbers. But, until more research is done, the ACS thinks the jury’s still out on antioxidants.

Even if it is too soon for some organizations to endorse the beneficial effects of antioxidants in cancer prevention, a substantial body of evidence indicates its success. Incorporating antioxidants into your diet with fruit juices from mangosteen, pineapple, blueberries, pomegranate, star fruit and many other fruits is certainly worth a try when it comes to cancer prevention.

While the myth of an alkaline diet helping to prevent cancer is unclear, antioxidants have been found to help prevent cancer in certain studies. A healthy diet should include fresh fruits. Even the American Cancer Society states that the best way to reduce your cancer risk is to have a healthy diet that includes five servings of fruits and vegetables a day, so choose fruits rich in antioxidants to help tip the anti-cancer scales in your favor.