Ice water with lemon! Ah, lemon water. The tonic used by so many to “cure” what ails you. In fact, there are reports of the Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans using lemons for medicinal purposes. Lemons contain a good amount of Vitamin C as well as trace amounts of folate and potassium. Some suggest that lemon water promotes healthier skin, some say it helps with weight loss and others swear by it as an excellent way to detox.
Lemon juice, in its natural state, is acidic. It’s about a 3 on the pH scale (your tap water hovers at around 7 pH). In spite of its low pH, some say that lemon water is alkaline.
Lemon water (water with a bit of lemon juice) is not alkaline, but rather, it has an alkaline effect on your body.
Whether food has an acidic or alkaline effect on the body has little to do with the food’s pH before it is digested. Something called the PRAL (Potential Renal Acid Load) Score calculates the amount of acid expected to reach your kidneys after your body metabolizes that food. Your kidneys help to regulate blood pH by removing excess acidic or alkaline substances through your urine.
Foods with a positive PRAL score are acid-forming, foods with a negative PRAL score are alkaline-forming. Lemon has a negative PRAL score because it produces alkaline byproducts once it’s been metabolized.
Other foods that have a negative PRAL score include:
– Asparagus
– Broccoli
– Zucchini
– Spinach
– Carrots
– Celery
– Tomatoes
– Potatoes
– Apricots
– Pears
– Pineapple
– … and more
Bottom line? Lemon water, in itself, is not alkaline. However, it has an alkalizing effect on the body once it’s metabolized. Be careful with the type of water you mix lemon juice with. You should be using water that’s free of contaminants. The best way to get clean, alkaline water is from a water ionizer, right at your countertop.
That being said, pH in drinking water is in the ideal range of 9 – 9.5 on the pH scale, something that lemon water alone cannot achieve.
A water ionizer (ideally with a footprint the size of a toaster) is an electronic water filter that can create alkaline water with the desired pH range. Connect it to your kitchen water supply to perform controlled low voltage electrolysis on tap water before you drink it or use it in the kitchen for cooking or cleaning.
A special attachment redirects tap water out of the faucet through a plastic hose into the water ionizer unit. Inside the unit, the water is first filtered. which helps to remove common pollutants found in city water. Then this filtered water passes into a chamber equipped with platinum-coated titanium electrodes. Here is where the electrolysis takes place.
Cations, positive ions, gather at the negative electrodes creating cathodic or reduced water (alkaline water). Anions, negatively charged ions, gather at the positive electrode to make anodic or oxidized water (acidic water).
The reduced alkaline ionized water comes out of the water ionizer faucet, and the oxidized water comes out of a separate hose leading into the sink. You can use alkaline water for drinking or cooking. The oxidation potential of the acidic water makes it a good sterilizing agent, helpful for washing your hands, cleaning food or kitchen utensils, and treating minor wounds and eczema. There are many uses for acidic water as well. AlkaViva water ionizers ionize the water and add health-giving hydrogen (or H2) to the water. The process of ionization makes the water more bio-available and you’ll notice the water is light, great-tasting and easily absorbed. No more of that ‘lead balloon’ feeling in the stomach after drinking water.