VITAMINS – EATING VEGETABLES AND FRUIT AT THE SAME MEAL (STICKING TO ONE VARIETY OF FOOD)
All things considered, what does this account emphasise? It is good to serve a dish of raw food before the main meal, but be careful to stick to one variety of food. Before a vegetable meal eat raw vegetables, never fruit, and before a meal composed of sweet dishes, you may eat fruit. Dr Bircher-Benner’s theory may apply to healthy people whose organs function properly, but if there is a tendency to dysfunction of one or more organs, especially the liver and pancreas, the consumption of fruit and vegetables as part of the same meal can encourage further disturbances.
A urinalysis disclosed that the writer of the above letter had trouble with her liver and pancreas, and it was no doubt for this reason that she suffered from flatulence when she ate fruit and vegetables at the same meal. Where the liver and pancreas are working efficiently, the digestive juices are able to break down fruit and Dr Bircher-Benner’s theory would be correct. It would then do no harm to eat fruit before a vegetable meal. However, if the organic mechanism is impaired, the enzymes will clearly be unable to digest the fruit acids, resulting in a reaction between the fruit acids and the alkaline vegetable components. The unpleasant consequences are excessive fermentation and flatulence.
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