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The Art of Food Combining
Overview
Basic Principle - Teaches that the human body is not designed to digest more than one concentrated food in the stomach at the same time. A concentrated food is any food that is not a fruit and a vegetable.
Food combining - Based on the revelation that certain combinations of food may be digested with greater ease and efficiency than others.
Physiological Chemistry - The successful results obtained through the principles of food combining can be explained and substantiated by the facts of physiological chemistry, particularly the chemistry of digestion.
Chemistry of Digestion
Scientific Facts of Western Medicine:
The stomach must secrete pepsin to digest any concentrated animal protein.
Pepsin can only function in a highly acidic medium, which must be maintained for several hours for complete digestion of proteins.
Chewing a piece or bread or potato or any other carbohydrate/starch, produces ptyalin and other alkaline juices are immediately secreted into the food by the saliva in the mouth.
When swallowed, the alkalized starches require an alkaline medium in the stomach in order to complete digestion.
Symptoms of Poor Food Combining/Poor Digestion
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BLOATING
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ACID REFLUX
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GAS
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ABDOMINAL CRAMPS
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HEARTBURN
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FOOD ALLERGIES
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BOWEL PROBLEMS
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WEIGHT GAIN
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INDIGESTION
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CONSTIPATION
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FATIGUE AFTER A MEAL
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PREMATURE AGING
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Definitions and Terms
Acidic - Having a pH less than 7
Alkaline - Having a pH greater than 7
Amylase - a pancreatic enzyme that converts starch to sugar.
Mastication - Chewing of food
Pepsin - A digestive enzyme that breaks down proteins.
Ptyalin - An amylase secreted in saliva. Converts starch to sugar.
Putrefaction - The process of decomposition by rotting and decay.
pH (potential of hydrogen) - Is a measure of the acidity or alkalinity of a solution. It is measured on a scale of 0 to 14-the lower the pH the more acidic the solution, the higher the pH the more alkaline (or base) the solution. When a solution is neither acid nor alkaline it has a pH of 7 which is neutral.
Food Combining Rules
Rule 1 - Change your paradigm about food and apply simplified guideline. Combine and consume food according to natural laws of food combining.
Rule 2 - Eat concentrated proteins such as meat, fish, eggs and cheese separately from concentrated starches such as bread, potatoes and rice.
Rule 3 - Eat only major type of protein at a single meal.
Rule 4 - Eat acids and starches at separate meals.
Rule 5 - Avoid combining concentrated proteins and acids at the same meal.
Rule 6 - Eat starches and sugars separately.
Rule 7 - Eat melons alone or leave them alone.
Rule 8 - Avoid sweet starchy desserts, as well as fruits, after large meals of protein or carbohydrates.
Rule 9 - Eliminate pasteurized and homogenized milk entirely from your diet.
Rule # 1 - Incorporate a Simple Food Combining Guideline
Forget everything you've ever learned about calories, cholesterol, food charts, food ladders and portion control in food.
Instead, remember one simple guideline when selecting items of food to eat... favor the fresh over the stale; chose enzyme-active over enzyme-dead food; select more raw food and less cooked food.
To benefit fully from raw foods, they must comprise at least 50% of your diet.
Rule # 2 - Protein and Starch
Eat concentrated proteins such as meat, fish, eggs and cheese separately from concentrated starches such as bread, potatoes and rice.
Example: Eat toast or eggs for breakfast, the hamburger patty or the bun for lunch, meat or potatoes for dinner.
Rule # 2 Details - Protein and Starch
This is the worst possible combination of foods to mix together at a single meal, and yet it is the mainstay of modern Western diets: meat and potatoes, hamburgers and fries, eggs and toast, etc.
When one consumes protein and starch together, the alkaline enzyme ptyalin pours into the food as it's chewed in the mouth.
When the masticated food reaches the stomach, digestion of starch by alkaline enzymes continues unopposed, thereby preventing the digestion of protein by pepsin and other acid secretions.
Rule # 3 - Protein and Protein
Eat only one major type of protein at a single meal. Avoid combinations such as meat and eggs, meat and milk, fish and cheese.
Ensure the assimilation of the full range of vital amino acids by varying the types of concentrated proteins taken at different meals.
Rule # 3 Details - Protein and Protein
Different proteins have different digestive requirements.
Example: The strongest enzymatic action on milk occurs during the last hour of digestion, whereas on meat it occurs during the first hour and on eggs somewhere in between.
It is wise to recall the ancient dietary law which Moses imposed on his people [the Jewish people], forbidding the simultaneous consumption of milk and flesh.
Two similar meats such as beef and lamb, or two types of fish such as salmon and shrimp, are not sufficiently different in nature to cause digestive conflict in the stomach and may be consumed
Rule # 4 Acid and Starch
Eat acids and starch at separate meals.
Example: If you eat toast and cereal for breakfast (starches), skip the orange juice (acid) as well as the eggs (concentrated protein).
Rule #4 Details - Acid and Starch
Any acid taken together with starch suspends secretion of ptyalin, a biochemical fact of life upon which all physicians agree.
Therefore, if you consume oranges, lemons and other acid fruits, or acids such as vinegar, along with starch, no ptyalin is secreted in the mouth to initiate the first stage if digestion. Consequently, the starch hits the stomach without vital alkaline juices it needs to digest properly, permitting bacteria to ferment it instead.
Rule # 5 - Acid and Protein
Avoid combining concentrated proteins and acids at the same meal.
Rule # 5 Details - Acid and Proteins
Since protein requires an acid medium for proper digestion, you would think that acid foods would facilitate protein digestion, but it does not work that way.
When acid foods enter the stomach they inhibit the secretion of hydrochloric acid and the protein-digesting enzyme pepsin can work only in the presence of hydrochloric acid, not just any acid.
Therefore, orange juice inhibits the proper digestion of eggs and a strong vinegar dressing on salads inhibits the digestion of steak.
Rule # 6 - Starch and Sugar
Eat starches and sugars separately.
Rule #6 Details - Starch and Sugar
It has been confirmed that when sugar enters the mouth along with starch, the saliva secreted during mastication contains no ptyalin, thereby sabotaging starch digestion before it reaches the stomach.
In addition such a combination blocks the passage of sugar through the stomach until the starch is digested, causing it to ferment.
When you apply sugar to a breakfast cereal you introduce sugars to the starch which interferes with the digestion of the cereal.
Rule # 7 - Melon
Eat melons alone or leave them alone.
Rule # 7 Details - Melons
Melons are such a perfect food for humans that they require no digestion whatsoever in the stomach. Instead, they pass quickly through the stomach and move into the small intestine for digestion and assimilation.
However, this can only happen when the stomach is empty and melons are eaten alone, or in combination only with other fresh raw fruits.
When consumed with or after other foods that require complex digestion in the stomach, melons cannot pass into the small intestine until digestion of other foods in the stomach is complete.
The result of this mixture is sitting and stagnation of these foods in the stomach. This quickly ferments and causes all sorts of gastric distress.
Rule # 8 - Desserts
Avoid sweet starchy desserts, as well as fruits, after large meals of proteins or carbohydrates.
Rule #8 Details - Desserts
Avoid any sort of sweet dessert after a big meal, for this type of food combines poorly with everything.
Even fresh fruit should be avoided right after a big meal because it will back up in the stomach and ferment instead of digest.
If you really have a 'sweet tooth' and crave cakes, pies and pastries, indulge your habit occasionally by making a whole meal of them.
Rule # 9 - Milk and Dairy
Eliminate pasteurized and homogenized milk entirely from your diet.
If raw certified milk is available consume it as a whole food in itself, not in combination with other foods.
Rule # 9 Details - Milk and Dairy
This is the most controversial and misunderstood topic in the Western diet.
If we look at nature, we see that the young feed exclusively on milk until weaned away from it with other foods. The natural disappearance of the milk-digesting enzyme lactase from the human system upon reaching maturity proves that adult humans have no more nutritional need for milk than adult tigers or chimpanzees.
Although milk is a complete protein food when consumed raw, it also contains fat, which means that it combines poorly with any other food except itself. Yet adults today routinely 'wash down' other foods with cold milk. Milk curdles immediately upon entering the stomach, so if there is other food present the curds coagulate around other food particles and insulate them from exposure to gastric juices, delaying digestion long enough to permit the onset of putrefaction.
Therefore, the first and foremost rule of milk consumption is, 'Drink it alone, or leave it alone.'
Today, milk is made even more indigestible by the universal practice of pasteurization, which destroys its natural enzymes and alters its delicate proteins.
Raw milk contains the active enzymes lactase and lipase, which permit raw milk to digest itself.
Pasteurized milk, which is devitalized of lactase and other active enzymes, simply can not be properly digested by adult stomachs, and even infants have trouble with it, as evidenced by colic, rashes, respiratory ailments, gas and other common ailments of bottle-fed babies.
The lack of enzymes and alteration of vital proteins also renders the calcium and other mineral elements in milk largely impossible to digest.
Summary
Correctly combining foods makes all the difference in the world to proper digestion and metabolism. Without complete digestion, the nutrients in even the most wholesome food cannot be fully extracted and assimilated by the body.
Furthermore, incomplete digestion and inefficient metabolism are the prime causes of fat and cholesterol accumulation in the body. A low calorie diet of overcooked, processed and improperly combined foods will still make you fat and leave sticky deposits in your arteries, just as the wrong mix of fuels will leave carbon deposits on the spark plugs of an engine, clog the pistons, and create foul gaseous exhaust.
On the other hand, if foods are properly combined for consumption, then regardless of how many calories or how much cholesterol they contain they will not make you fat or clog up your veins and organs, especially if at least half your daily food intake is taken raw.
Sources
http://www.hps-online.com/food/
Diamond, Harvey and Marilyn. Fit for Life. New York: Warner Brothers, Inc.
Haas , Elson M., M.D . Staying Healthy with Nutrition, The Complete Guide to Diet and Nutritional Medicine. Celestial Arts
Thibodeau, Gary A. and Patton, Kevin T. Structure & Function of the Body, 11th edition, Mosby, Inc.
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