(and not frozen fruit)
How many of us buy frozen fruit drinks, add water to the pitcher, smile and drink? It must be big business because there are huge choices in all of the frozen food sections in your neighborhood grocery stores right? How do they do it, and is it good for us?
The Fruit Juice Process
We hope that they pick fruits, like oranges at their ripening point before being
prepared for the juice extraction process. Research says that most large companies
use machines (not people) to allow for fast peeling and coring and then the fruit is pressed and squeezed through filters into large containers .
This liquid usually gets pasteurized, just so you are aware, that means boiled! And
the fruit juice Concentrate has both added and subtracted chemicals and natural
fruit byproducts in order to provide a more condensed version of natural fruit
juice. So this is not a very obvious process, and takes many steps and manipulations.
The Concentration Process involves heat treatment that evaporates nearly all of the water from the naturally squeezed juice. This concentrated juice gets packaged and frozen.
What you didn’t know, the Store bought fruit juice concentrates will almost always contain additives that work to maintain color, flavor and nutritional content within the juice. They call this the ‘flavor pack’. The industry says that the concentration process occurs to extend the life of the fruit juice. One may ask; what chemicals and for how long?? DO we ever really know when the fruit was harvested?
So is Fruit Juice that we don’t squeeze ourselves in general good for us?
According to most parents, the media and how we grew up, juice is healthy for us! But did you know that calorie-wise drop for drop, Juice is the same as Soft Drinks but greater in sugar content, according to Ottawa based family doctor, University of Ottawa prof and blogger Yoni Freedhoff. According to an Australian study and an article by Joshua Ostroff, Senior editor, Huffington Post Canada, “juice can double the risk of obesity in children 4 to 12.”
It is generally known that excessive sugar can lead to Type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease in adults (Kimber Stanhope, scientist at U of California Davis) Your body will gain the same amount of weight with sodas or juice, it doesn’t distinguish between the sources of sugar. Eating whole fruit is a different story because fructose trickles to the liver where it is processed at a healthy pace, whereas drinking juice is like having 6 whole (apples, oranges) at one time!
“The Globe & Mail found a cup of orange juice had 23 grams of sugar while a can of Coke had 26 grams of sugar, if fewer total calories. But because juice is considered healthy, it's an even bigger danger as the American Association of Pediatricians found in their study, "The Use and Misuse of Fruit Juice, it is interesting " that parents don't restrict its consumption in the way they would with pop.”
Another issue is High Acidity (any of us with acid reflux will be concerned about this)! When we consume fruit or natural fruit juices, they have an alkalizing effect, which promotes healthy biochemical reactions, the pH level is important, especially for our blood, but added sugars leave us with Acidity, which reduces our immune system’s ability to fight and gives us acid!
So, if you want juice, make it a treat in moderation! Frozen is Okay, but it is processed! The good points; it’s easy to store in the freezer, it’s less expensive and it has lots of vitamin C. Not so good points; way too much sugar, acid forming, lots of ‘stuff’ added and not fresh!
Sources:
http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/fruits-and-fruit-juices/1975/2
ttp://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/fruits-and-fruit-juices/1975/2#ixzz2fNPqiARA
http://www.livestrong.com/article/451317-what-nutritional-value-is-there-in-juice-made-from-concentrate/
http://www.livestrong.com/article/451317-what-nutritional-value-is-there-in-juice-made-from-concentrate/
Read
more: http://www.livestrong.com/article/531526-health-risks-for-juice-from-concentrate/#ixzz2fNRvVoY9