Let’s talk standardization of nutrients in health fruit drinks- is it important or not important?
Well think of it like this – would you buy a bottle of multi-vitamins, where the label read Calcium, Magnesium, Vitamin C, Vitamin E etc but listed no amounts for each of these ingredients? Well this is exactly what you’re doing when you’re buying a non-standardized health fruit drink.
One of the reasons these functional health juices have become so popular is because they’re so much easier to take than a handful of vitamin pills and because they are a whole food they can provide certain health and nutrition benefits often not available in a typical multi-vitamin pill. However, there is also the potential to get an inferior juice due to a number of various factors like the following:
First it’s ridiculous to assume all fruits and berries are created equal.
Also some fruits and berries can be largely one-dimensional in other words they may be an antioxidant but not much else. Obviously the most valuable of these fruits and berries are multi-dimensional or sometimes called a super tonic. In other words they increase antioxidant activity, boost the immune system, balance body functions and provide a number of other important functions. Of all the leading health fruits substances the only one listed as a super tonic is the goji berry.
A standardized product is one where the ingredients, amounts, and the development process is all done in a certain and specific way that will maximize potency and ensure reproducible quality. Creating this formula and process can be very difficult and often takes many years, but it creates a reliable product and gives the company a way to guarantee quality. In health drinks, standardization means to the customer that every bottle is the exact same as every other bottle.
Standardization is usually necessary to ensure the quality of food products. This is because the ingredients that go into foods – such as the fruits in health drinks – vary greatly in quality. Depending on growing conditions, soil nutrition and genetic variation one crop of fruit may be completely different in terms of quality and potency than another.
Here’s more on analyzing Nutrition Health Fruit Drinks
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