Best diet for Acid Alkali Balance

Apart from stress levels, exercise and other aspects of lifestyle, your diet can profoundly influence this delicate acid-alkali balance.

What to Eat, What to Avoid!

Acidosis can be prevented by increasing intake of alkaline based foods. Some foods leave an acidic residue thus increasing the acidity of the blood. Here is a list of foods which lead to increased acidity levels.

• Refined foods (sugars and maida)
• Most grains, (including wheat, oats, rye, barley)
• Oily & fried food
• Spicy food
• Coffee

Some foods leave an alkaline residue. These contain higher levels of calcium, magnesium, potassium, and sodium. Such foods reduce the acidity and help in maintaining the alkalinity of the blood. For example, citrus fruits (like oranges, sweet lime, grapefruit) are acidic in taste, but become alkaline when digested and help restore the alkaline balance in the body. However, it is important to note that when the citrus juice is canned or bottled it becomes acid-forming. Most fruits except plums are alkaline. Most vegetables are also alkaline in nature especially root vegetables like yam, beetroot, carrots, sweet potatoes, radish etc.

Thus, in order to maintain the right acid-alkali balance, our diet should contain one-fifth ( 20%) acid-forming foods such as grains (like wheat, rye, oat, white rice, maida, barley), bread, fish, eggs, pulses, and four-fifths (80%) alkaline foods such as fruits, skimmed milk, curd, jowar, bajra, brown rice, vegetable juices and potatoes, pumpkins, almost all vegetables like peas, radish, mushrooms, beetroot, cucumber, turi, dudhi, bhindi, fresh green beans, onions, cabbage, carrot, cauliflower, etc. Most nuts are acid forming except almonds.

When a person is suffering from acidosis (you can test saliva, blood & urine to find PH levels) the best way of alkalizing the blood is with citrus fruits, fruit juices, and vegetable juices. Acid states can be neutralized by alkaline foods.