Sunday, May 31, 2009

Snake Oil Online: Who can you believe?

NOBODY.

Health food companies sell products that are accompanied by information about food in general that appears to be adjusted to make the products appear more valuable. Every time I try to better my diet, I do a little research online and the more I look, the more conflicting information I find.

This kind of nutritional disinformation is criminal, Nobody seems to agree on anything and it leads me to the conclusion that disinformation about food is published to be congruent with the actual product being offered.

Two companies (Separate or otherwise) that promote the Alkalinity of foods as more healthy that acidic foods, published their own lists of foods categorized by their alkaline and acid content.

Those lists are contradictory.

This first site does not even overtly identify itself. You must read carefully, and some of the language is in Spanish, however, The address is 999 Park Avenue in New York? Highly suspicious in my opinion.

Here is their list of alkaline and acid foods

http://www.alkaline-alkaline.com/ph_food_chart.html

Here's a sample: (* items that appear on the other list)

List of Alkalizing Fruits

Apple
Apricot
*Avocado
Banana (high glycemic)
Cantaloupe
Cherries
Currants
Dates/Figs
Grapes
*Grapefruit
*Lime
Honeydew Melon
Nectarine
Orange
Lemon
Peach
Pear
Pineapple
All Berries
Tangerine
*Tomato
Tropical Fruits
*Watermelon

List of Acid Fruit

All preserved or jellied
Canned: sugared
Dried, sulphured
Glazed Fruits
Raw with sugar
Bananas if green tipped
Cranberries
Olives, pickled, green

===

This next company, "Energise For Life" is located in England:

Energise (UK) Ltd T/A Energise For Life
24 Babbage House
Northampton Science Park, Northamptonshire NN3 6LG
UK - England and Wales

Here is the link to their list of Alkaline and acid foods:
http://www.energiseforlife.com/list_of_alkaline_foods.php

Here is a sample:

List of Alkaline Fruits

Lemon
Lime
Avocado
Tomato
Grapefruit
Watermelon (is neutral)
Rhubarb

List of Acid Fruits

"All fruits aside from those listed in the alkaline column."

According to the last statement, most of the fruits on the other company's list of alkaline fruits, are actually acidic. So, who do I believe? I don't know how to get this information from the FDA or USDA, or whether or not alkalinity is really important anyway.

I started eating a lot of Almonds recently and noticed that I was actually sleeping through the night, and feeling a whole lot better. This is what started the whole thing in the first place.

I guess I'll just keep eating more Almonds for now.

Sunday, May 3, 2009