Fruit
Fruit is good for us and fruit forms part of UK governmental advice to eat 5 pieces fruit or vegetables are day. In my lecture I show you table that details the antioxidants in certain fruit (please see the ‘Antioxidants’ lecture, if you are unsure of what an antioxidant is).
Studies that look at fruit and vegetables together show that there is a lower risk of dying from all causes including heart disease and cancers.
I am often intrigued that once science pronounces that a particular food is good for us, we in general think that we should be eating lots of that particular food. Just because something is good for us, doesn’t mean that we should be eating lots of it. The same is likely to be true for fruit. A closer look at the studies gives a more fuller picture concerning fruit.
The studies appear to show that eating more than 2 pieces of fruit per day may be detrimental to our health. Eating canned and frozen fruit also seemed to be detrimental to our health. I can understand why canned fruit might be bad for us.
As I child I used to love the canned peaches, so much so that I wouldn’t eat normal peaches. This, of course, was because the canned variety contained so much sugar. At the time of writing, I don’t know why frozen fruit should present a thumbs down for our health. Is it because the worst fruit is the stuff chosen to get frozen. In my toxins lecture, I mention that mould can grow on the outside of fruit and mould toxins can permeate into the inside of the fruit. Is this the reason?
What is intriguing to me is that although the studies show that eating more than 2 pieces of fruit may be to our detriment, historical data show that the nutrients in our fruit have declined by between 5-40%. The higher the yield of the crop, the lower the nutrient value. This means that although growers produce bumper crops, they are not as nutritious as they used to be.
One of the other considerations to make about fruit is the amount of sugar in each portion. It could be that the production of higher yield crops gives us more sugar and less nutrient. Fructose sugar can be particularly damaging to the liver. Fructose is also responsible for increasing our desire to overeat. Fruit such as rhubarb and berries can also be high in oxalates.
Oxalates are a normal by-product of metabolism. In those with a healthy gut, the good gut microbes use oxalate as fuel which prevents excessive absorption into the body. Oxalates can combine with calcium to form kidney stones. They also can be deposited in joints to form a type of gout (pseudogout).
I often ask my patients if they or a first degree family relative has had kidney stones, as this alerts me to the fact that there may a genetic predisposition to higher than usual levels of oxalates. In patients with gut dysbiosis (leaky gut), there is an abnormal balance of gut microbes with more bad than good microbes.
Yeasts like Candida albicans produce lots of oxalates. If the body has no way of dealing with these oxalates, because the good microbes are missing, the oxalates are absorbed and may deposited in the tissues or excreted as stones.
Fermenting fruit and vegetables is a way of reducing the oxalate load as the good bugs in the ferment will consume the oxalates and the sugar. A good way to combine fermentation and fruit is by making Kombucha. Kombucha is traditional made with sugar and green or black tea. This mixture is then fermented using a SCOBY (symbiotic combination of bacteria and yeast). One study found that in Iran, Kombucha that is made using sour cherry is particularly high in glucuronic acid which is a useful detoxifying agent.
Summary
- Fruit provides antioxidants
- Fruit: Eat no more than 2 pieces per day
- Fructose in fruit may make leaky gut worse
- Oxalates from juicing may (in susceptible individuals) be associated with kidney stones. Fermenting helps deal with sugars and oxalates