Fruits are good for you right? Why not eat 5 to 6 fruits a day and pack your body with all of the vitamins, fiber, and antioxidants. The truth is fruits are packed with a sugar called fructose which should be consumed in moderation. We recommend eating 2 servings of fruits per day or 2 fists full. Your body needs nutrients that come with fruits to a certain extent, but anything in excess will raise your chance for type 2 diabetes. When consuming fruits, you should wait at least 3 hours between servings so that your body does not suffer from a sugar spike. Also combining your fruit with a protein will limit the sugar spike in your bloodstream.
Another important fact, is a lot of a fruits’ nutrients come from the skin. If you’re discarding the skin, you’re losing out on a lot of fiber, so drinking fruit juice is not as healthy as drinking a smoothie as most smoothies include the skin of the fruit. Here is a list of fruits and their sugar content:
Raspberries, blackberries, strawberries (7-8g per serving)
Watermelon (10g per serving)
Cherries (13g per serving)
Apples (13g per serving)
Mangos (14g per serving)
Banana (18g per serving)
Grapes (23g per serving)
If you are having trouble keeping track of your fruit consumption, download the Body Breakthrough APP and enter in your fruit servings in the nutrition section. Remember, fruits are good in moderation!