Eating Fruit On An Empty Stomach

Recently, a friend asked me about an email she received concerning eating fruit on an empty stomach.  The information she’d been sent informed her that if she didn’t eat her fruit on an empty stomach, horrible things would happen and she would die, die, die.

For some reason, this rumor about eating fruit in this way became associated with Dr. Oz, the medical doctor who became famous on Oprah’s TV show.  I’m not really sure why this is, since Dr. Oz didn’t come up with this, and my bet is, he disagrees with this concept as much as I do.

Eating Fruit On An Empty Stomach- A Myth?

The idea behind this old wives’ tale is, if you eat fruit with other foods, it somehow sits in the stomach and “rots” there, causing all kinds of problems.  On the other hand, if you eat only fruit, well then, it slides through your belly like greased owl poop and directly into your bloodstream, leading to your becoming nearly superhuman in strength due to the vast amount of nutrients in your body.

Sorry, but it doesn’t work that way.  Gastric emptying is the term used for the stomach releasing its contents into the small intestine (where most of the heavy-duty nutrient absorbtion occurs).  The rate of gastric emptying relies on a number of factors, mostly:

• how liquid the stomach contents are
• how nutrient dense the contents are
• how much volume of food is stretching out the stomach

Typically, even a solid meal is emptied out within a few hours, and no, mixing fruit in with other foods does NOT lead to putrefication.  While fruit does tend to break down more quickly all on its own (due to the high water content), if it’s mixed in with other food, it simply stirs into the liquid mix (called chyme).  It’s not chemically altered due to the presence of other foods.

Actually, for some people, mixing fruits with other foods is a good idea.  For example, diabetics or those with insulin resistance will react poorly to the rapid spike of sugar in their bloodstream from the quick digestion of a meal of only fruit, so mixing in some other sorts of foods with a lower glycemic index (that’s a measure of how sugary a food is) will actually slow down how quickly the sugar  is released into the body.

Don’t fall for this silly myth about eating fruit on an empty stomach.  It was made up out of thin air by some wacko trying to sell his “special” diet plan based on only eating certain foods in certain combinations.  There’s no evidence that he was remotely accurate.

Here are some REAL guidelines on eating fruit:

• First off, actually eat fruit.  This sounds like a self-evident statement, but studies show Americans rarely eat fruit at all.  Fruits are packed with nutrients and antioxidants that keep your body working correctly, slow the aging process, and generally keep you alive.  So for God’s sake, actually eat some!
• Second, eat ACTUAL fruit, not fruit bars, fruit chews, fruit drink, or any other processed fabrication that pretends to be fruit.  Usually, what you get is a glorified piece of plastic painted pretty colors and stuffed full of artifical sweeteners.  In fact, a whisteblower organization recently found that the “fruit” in many cereal boxes was anything BUT actual fruit.
• Finally, drink fruit juice sparingly.  You’re far, far better off eating the entire fruit.  The whole fruit contains fiber, and there’s about a million studies showing that fiber helps keep you alive in many, many ways… too many to discuss here.  When you juice a fruit, you cheat yourself out of the fiber.  Another result of this is an increase in that glycemic index I mentioned earlier… without the fiber to slow the digestion of the fruit down, you end up dumping a lot of sugar into the bloodstream at once.  Read my article about insulin and weight gain to see why you don’t want that.

Keep things simple and natural, and you really can’t go wrong.  Don’t worry about silly little fads or tricks.  Stick to the basics.  A whole foods diet of fruits, vegetables, nuts, eggs, and lean meats will keep you alive and vital in the long term.

Stay healthy!