Chewing your food completely is an often overlooked part of maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
If you are like most people, you lead such a busy life that meal time
is cut down to a fraction of what it should be. Have you ever timed
yourself when eating? How long does it take you to finish a meal? Is it
ten minutes? Twenty minutes? Five minutes? If you fall into these time
frames, chances are you are not chewing your food properly. Read on to
uncover the reasons why chewing your food completely is so important to
good health.
Most people think that digestion begins in the stomach. This is not
true. Digestion actually starts in the mouth. Saliva in your mouth
contains enzymes that are important to food digestion. One of the
enzymes that your saliva contains is called alpha amylase. This enzyme
is responsible for breaking down the starches that you eat into smaller
molecules that the cells in your body can use for energy.
When your food is not chewed properly, the alpha
amylase in your saliva does not have the opportunity to break down these
starches, leaving body cells starved.
Another important enzyme in your saliva is lingual lipase. This enzyme
is secreted by glands located under the tongue. Lingual lipase starts
digesting the fat content found in the food that you eat.
Do you find yourself feeling bloated and gassy after eating? You are not
chewing your food properly. When you do not chew your food thoroughly,
this will result in incomplete digestion. Large particles of food will
pass into the colon and become a breeding ground for bacteria. This can
lead to bacterial overgrowth, indigestion and flatulence. Not chewing
your food completely will also result in just a portion of the nutrients
being released from your food.
Properly chewed food is important for a healthy lower GI tract. There is a muscle
that sits at the bottom of your stomach. This muscle must relax to
enable food to pass from the stomach and into the small intestine. When
your food contains large amounts of saliva, this will help the muscle to
relax and the food can pass into the small intestine easily.
So how many times should you chew a bite of food? It is impossible to
give an definitive answer to this question. There are plenty of
variables that would come into play. For example, you would need to chew
a piece of meat a lot more than you would need to chew a piece of
bread. A good way to tell if your food has been chewed properly is to
chew until you can no longer recognize the food by the texture. If you
are chewing a carrot and are still able to tell it is a carrot by the
texture in your mouth, then you need to chew it a lot more before you
swallow.
Not only does chewing your food completely lead to a healthier
lifestyle, it will also bring out the flavor in the foods that you eat.
Chewing your food completely will make all of your meals more
enjoyable."
http://www.articlebase.com What To Do: Chew your food until it is nearly a liquid or paste; that may mean 20 to 50 bites per mouthful, depending on the food.
Use minimal amounts of fluids while you are eating your meal.
Fluids dilute digestive juices and make digestion less efficient.
Drink your fluids between meals.
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Posted By: Esther Pinkston
Sunday, November 21st 2010 at 5:56PM
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