Q&A: Apple Cider Vinegar and Body Cleanses

Question: Is raw apple cider vinegar a good thing to dilute and drink daily? I don’t know anything about cleanses and feel I should start here.

Answer: Apple Cider Vinegar is a great source of trace minerals and beneficial acids that encourage digestion and remove waste acids from muscle tissue. Any “cleansing” that occurs is because of those two changes, period, which is not a bad thing, but not a big secret. Very few people actually need the kind of dramatic cleanses being marketed; if the body is functioning correctly it will cleanse itself, even of a significant backlog of matter. Our typical diets don’t offer enough nutrition, so I see far more people who need to be built up; traditional herbalism always promotes using at least two builders to every cleansing herb. Cider vinegar supports stomach and muscle function (remember the colon is a muscle), and trace minerals enhance proper nerve conductivity so the organs get the message of what they are supposed to be doing. Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar also contains the “mother”, the live culture that will produce a lovely kombucha if you keep the bottle in a warm place, and which supplies live cultures for beneficial intestinal flora. Check out the “Pioneer Medicine” audio or DVD for more on cider vinegar and other folk remedies.