When To Eat Fruits: Before or After Meals?
Published in Action & Fitness Magazine 2009 issue
A fruit is the world’s most perfectly packed food. Everything you could possibly need for growth and nourishment is present—vitamins, minerals, fiber, fatty acids and amino acids, and carbohydrates. The bulk of fruits you consume in a day won’t affect your weight. However, eating fruits after heavy meals can throw off your digestion into mid-frenzy, leaving you with a heavy feeling and a rumbling stomach.
The science is simple: when you eat raw fruits on an empty stomach, they break down easily in as fast as 30 minutes and pass through the intestines wherein the nutrients are distributed. Cooked and canned fruits that are heavy with fruit concentrate ferment in the stomach, leaving you with more toxins to deal with later. Raw fruits should be eaten as a snack, preferably 15 -30 minutes before meals.
When your stomach is full, the fruits and its digestive juices will ferment along with the full meal you ate. The food will begin to spoil and turn to acid, resulting in a burping fury or mega trips to the nearest bathroom. It’s also the reason why you get constipated after eating a bunch of bananas after meals.
Another benefit of eating fruits prior to meal times is that the sweetness can make you feel full and satisfied. As a result, you will start to eat less during lunch or dinner.
Fruits, when eaten at the right time, can be the most powerful way of getting rid of your belly fat. It can give you an energy boost much stronger than caffeine and can promote better digestion than whole grains.
Take note, of course, that we are talking about raw fruits. Cooked and processed fruits come with fewer nutrients compared to the fresh ones, especially the canned fruits that contain too many artificial sweeteners and preservatives. Unfortunately, with today’s lifestyle, preparing fresh fruits in the morning can be such a hassle, so people resort to the commercial ones sold in grocery aisles. Even fresh juices that claim to be 100% pure do not carry the same health benefits.
This, of course, shouldn’t stop you from grabbing an apple in the morning or opting for an orange for your 3 pm snack. If you really want to enjoy the nutrients that come from the world’s most nutritious foods, you should work you way around it.
Ergo, those colorful fruit platters at the end of the buffet table are big, juicy traps. That’s the reason why people who go to buffets leave with a bloated stomach and a need to rush to the nearest bathroom. Even if the caterers do something about the arrangement of food at their buffet tables, it would take years to educate the people on the proper way of eating fruits because as far as the majority is concerned, they think that fruits are desserts.
So think of yourself as one of the chosen few who are in on the secret to a slimmer body and a flat tummy without having the need to diet. If you can practice the proper way to eating this delectable fresh produce, then you won’t need to starve yourself to detox, skimp on a few meals as part of your diet regimen, spend thousands of money on gym memberships, or God forbid, a bagful of laxatives every time you overeat.
Remember, an apple a day can make you slimmer in its own way.
