Eating fruit is a good habit in life. We can supplement our body with the necessary vitamins and help us maintain balance in our body by eating enough fruit. However, you should pay attention to the eating time of fruit. Otherwise, it will not only be bad for our bodies but also may have a harmful effect. So can you eat fruit after dinner? Let’s have a detailed view.

Can you eat fruit after dinner?

How about eating fruit after dinner? Eating fruit right after dinner is actually a bad habit.

Fruits are rich in vitamins, and all kinds of fruits have different tastes. They are sweet and delicious. Especially now, fruits are considered to be a good product for beauty.

Pursue beauty some people even misunderstand, thinking that fruit is beneficial without harm. The more you eat, the better. You can eat it at any time. Some people choose to eat some fruits after dinner, thinking that a fruit platter after dinner will help digestion and make them more nutritious and healthy. But this is not the case.

Two Glass Fruit cups

Why we shouldn’t eat fruits after meal

Eating fruit after dinner is a very unscientific bad habit that absolutely harms health. This is because the main component of fruit is fructose, which is quickly digested in the human body and directly absorbed by the small intestine.

However, other foods contain starch and protein. These things need to stay in the stomach for one or two hours or more to produce a chemical reaction with digestive juice and then enter the small intestine for absorption after decomposition.

Just after eating, starch, protein, lipids, and other substances in the stomach have not yet been digested. If you eat the fruit directly after meals, it will be blocked and stagnate in the stomach, and the fruit will rot if it is not digested in time.

Any food that spoils the stomach will turn into alcohol and toxins, causing various diseases, including heartburn, indigestion, and abdominal pain.

Therefore, if people eat fruit immediately after meals, they will be left in the stomach by the fat and protein that arrive first and are not easy to digest. On the other hand, if the fruit stays in the stomach for too long, it will affect the digestive function.

Can eating fruits increase blood sugar?

After drinking and eating enough, eating more fruits will increase the blood sugar concentration because the fruit mainly contains fructose, which is bound to increase the burden on the pancreas. If it goes on for a long time, it can become one of the incentives for diabetes.

Although fruit is good for health and rich in vitamin content, its sweet and delicious taste are the reasons why we like it. But only when we eat fruit at the right time can we give full play to its role and thus benefit our health.

Fruits and juice glases

Best time to eat fruit after dinner

Nutritionists say it is the best time to eat fruits one hour before meals or two hours after meals.

People are usually used to eating some fruits after dinner, whether it is the serving procedure of the banquet or most people’s daily diet. It is generally believed that eating fruit is refreshing and cleans the mouth, stomach, and intestines. However, facts have proved that this is unscientific.

Food takes 1-2 hours to enter the stomach after a full meal before it can be slowly discharged from the stomach. Eating a lot of fruit immediately after a meal is not good. It will block the stomach with food.

If fruits stay in the stomach for too long, it will cause symptoms such as abdominal distension, diarrhea, or constipation, leading to digestive dysfunction over time.

Nutrition experts believe that eating fruit after meals is a dietary mistake. This habit is actually harmful to health and easily leads to overweight and obesity. Experts point out that the correct time to eat fruit is 1 hour before meals and 2 hours after meals.

Eating fruits one hour before meals is most beneficial because fruits are raw food. If you eat raw food and then eat cooked food, the body will not produce reactions such as increased white blood cells. It is conducive to protecting the human immune system and thus enhancing the ability to prevent diseases and fight cancer. If you eat fruit after meals, it is most appropriate to wait for two hours.

Fruits contain a lot of sugar, such as glucose, fructose, sucrose, starch, etc. eating fruits immediately after meals will definitely increase the burden of digestion and absorption of the stomach and the burden of the pancreas, especially for less mature fruits, where the starch content is high, and it is not easy to digest.

Fruits are rich in cellulose, hemicellulose, pectin, and other components with strong water absorption. After water absorption, they expand, increasing the feeling of fullness after meals and making people uncomfortable.

Fruits in basket

In addition, when the amount of fibronectin is high, it can capture and absorb electrolytes, trace elements, and organic acids in the intestine and delay and reduce the absorption of certain nutrients and vitamins, such as iron, zinc, copper, carotene, and nicotinic acid.

Moreover, there is a certain amount of tannic acid in immature fruits, which can also combine with trace elements in food, such as iron and calcium, to form insoluble substances and hinder the absorption and utilization of the human body.

Therefore, eating fruits for two hours after meals is most appropriate. At this time, it is not only conducive to absorbing nutrients in fruits but will not cause other physical burdens. Therefore, we must pay attention to the time of eating fruit.

Author

Sam Perera, Founder of Stethostalk, is a food safety follower and organic food lover. He has completed the PLANT-BASED NUTRITION Cornell Certificate Program, Cornell University, US. Before this, he worked for a few years in IT services. A dedicated follower of nature, he believes in healing with natural foods. In his free time, he loves Gardening, Blogging, and traveling.