The Alkaline Diet

The Alkaline diet helps your body control pH through diet and in turn the body eliminate acid and toxin waste much easily, leading to a healthy life

One of the best ways to see the results of decision-making in our lives is by going on a diet. At least once in our lives, everyone has tried it; even the “Monday promisers.” There is something to keep in mind, though. Going on a diet does not automatically ensure healthy nutrition, which must be learned.

There are more and more ways to lose weight nowadays, with books outlining the “best” diet plan for weight loss and reaching the tops of best-seller lists in bookstores worldwide. To see more weight-conscious people around, some books make worth sharing diet tips and tricks, while reading others are just a waste of time. One of the new breakthroughs in dieting is known as the “alkaline diet,” which has characteristics unlike other diets and a range of benefits to consider.

It is important to keep in mind that the human body is an anatomically similar entity yet its functionality differs from individual to individual. To put it simply, diet plans and dietary recommendations can fail if they are not catered to the individual. Despite sounding cliché, being aware of your bodily needs is crucial to developing your ideal diet plan. The recommendations of a physician may not always suit your taste, but tend to yield better, long-term results.

Basics of the ‘alkaline diet’

One word is enough to describe the alkaline diet – “balance.” Alternatively named the “acid-alkaline balance diet,” this approach to weight loss can have a profound impact on your health. A solution that eliminates acid consumed by the body through food, alkaline is a differentiation between acidic and alkali foods that can be misleading, at times. For example, consuming acidic fruit such as lemon results in alkaline waste being left behind in the body after consumption of the acidic fruit.

The theory behind the alkaline diet is that it redresses the acid-alkaline balance in the body by reducing the acid amount and triggering the acidic components in fat cells to turn into energy, thereby supporting weight loss. To maintain the alkaline balance, your meals should be made up of 80 percent alkaline-forming foods, like vegetables, with 20 percent acid-forming foods like meat.

The alkaline diet sustains the body’s pH balance. Another advantage of the alkaline diet is that it helps to burn abdominal fat and fat on the hips.

Body waste: Acid and toxins

It is common knowledge that energy is as important as oxygen in terms of longevity. Every cell in the body requires energy to function properly; energy that we get from the foods we eat. When foods are converted to energy, they leave behind acidic waste which builds up as quickly as the hectic schedules of our daily lives. Thinking that 24 hours are not enough to live well due to never-ending working schedules, late night meals, eating fast food while watching TV and buying ready-made food at supermarkets becomes inevitable.

These poor eating habits harm our bodies by increasing the level of acid in the body and bringing toxins into our bodies.

Every day, the body rids itself of waste. However, when the level of acidic waste exceeds our body’s digestive capacity, the waste is stored in fat cells, making it much harder to burn calories.

Both acid and toxins are components that the human body cannot entirely cleanse itself of. Through sweating, breathing and excretion the body cleanses itself of the waste, but only to a certain extent. Excess waste can lead to the development of disease in different parts of the body, resulting in diseases like gout and renal calculi. A number of scientists say that the excessive acid amount can be an underlying reason for many diseases including cancer. To what extent the thesis is true is not known yet but acid and toxins obviously harm the body.

Acid and toxin-forming foods

It is not easy to separate foods with high acid and toxin content. The basic list contains processed food, junk food, coffee, white flour, salt, sugar, processed eat and sweets. Indeed, the food that is mostly harmful to your body leaves acid or toxins behind.

Foods that reduce acidity in your body

It is important to regularly detoxify the body and help the elimination of waste products through certain foods and drinks. You can start doing this by drinking around 2 liters of water every day. To enrich the level of alkaline in your water, add lemon, apple cider vinegar or carbonate. Consuming raw green vegetables is a second option. Olive oil, fish oil and linseed oil are also helpful. Another choice would be eating mint, dates, spinach, radish, ginger and black sesame seeds as well as legumes and various spices.

Here is an example of an alkaline diet plan:

Breakfast:

cottage cheese
black olives
buckwheat bread
grape molasses, tahini
egg
lemon
green vegetables

Lunch or dinner:

raw or steamed veggies
soup
main course cooked with olive oil
legumes
fish
turkey
organic chicken
gluten-free pasta
fresh salad
boiled potatoes
Himalayan salt (optional)