Origionally posted by Jeff Novick, a long time raw food nutritionist from
Florida:

@ http://www.rawfoodsupport.com/read.php?f=1&i=36038&t=36037

Food combining was based on a very limited science and understanding
of how the digestive system works. Today we know much more and now
know that while food combining may work for some people, it works for
different reason then first assumed, and is not as essential as once
thought.

Sheltons writing were written for people following the tradional diet
and his food combining rules were basically to prevent them from
overeating "unhealthy" food and overeating period. Check his books
out and the menus and you will see what i mean. They were not written
for the raw fooder. Also, he admitted in several of the rules that
he "knows no physiological reason" supporting his ideas. In other
word, there was no science behind them,.

Some of the problems with the basic concepts.

1) food combining is based on the concept that most of the digestion
takes place in the stomach and different foods need different "ph's"
to digest properly. this is incorrect. First, only about 1-10% of
digestion takes place in the stomach. 90-99% of all digestion takes
place in the small intestine and it all takes place in an akaline
environment. All digestive enzymes in the small intestine work in a
alkaline medium. Second, the stomach is always acidic (and not
akaline when we eat a starch meal) and can break down both protein and
carbs and thier is no "conflicting" phs.

2) the enzymes that are in food are in food for the benefit of the
food and not us. When they hit the stomach, these enzymes (which are
small protein molecules) are broken down into their amino acid
components and do not act as enzymes. We secrete our own enzymes.
Also, by the time they hit the Small intestine, where most digestion
takes place, they have been completely inactivated.

3) many foods in nature have compostitions of fat, carb and protein
that would in and of themselves violate food combingin rules, yet we
digest them just fine. For instance, dark green leafies are about
20-30% protein (high protein food) and also about 60-70 carbohydrate
(high carb food). Food combining says you can digest high carb foods
with high protein foods. Yet we digest green leafies just fine.

So, why does food combining "appear" to work for some many people?
Well for most, they are already eating a very poor, highly mixed,
high fat diet and mos tpeople overeat. So when they start following
food combining, they have made a vast improvement in their dietary
compostion, less variety, and less fat and less tenedency to overeat.
Many people get well on healthy diets that dont teach food combining.

What are the main causes of poor digestion?
1) Overeating
2) High Fat foods (we dont digest fat very well)
3) too much Variety of foods at one meal
4) Stress

So, see why food combinging "appeared" to work. By the following the
rules, you eliminated at least 3 of the above 4 major reasons of
digestive problems.

You can do you own experiment. Try mixing some meals, violate food
combining rules but dont over eat, over do the fat, or over do the
variety at any one time and you will be fine. and do NOT overeat.

Many long term advocates of food combining have long abandoned their
strict adherence to it as they have also learned that it is not as
important for the reasons once beleived. Even Harvey Diamond did at
the last ANHS conference he spoke out, when he downplayed the
importance of food combining saying that when he was younger in his
zealousness he may have overemphasized some things that are not as
important as he once thought they were.

Relax, eat simple, and enjoy your food.