Are pickles cleansing?

[marnie]

Shelley, I've read where you advocate eating fermented foods such as saurkraut, etc. Do pickles fall into this category? Where I work there are limited menu items, but we do have pickles. What is your take on them?

Marnie

[shelley]

Dill Pickles are especially good for Vata people, because sour foods soothe them and they do okay with salt so they can regularly enjoy them in their diet.

They're not so good for Kapha people because of the salt, kapha people are much too prone to retain fluids and so just one pickle now and again is all they should have unless they are otherwise careful with their salt intake.

I think Pitta people tend to do okay with them.

As an infrequent snack, any dosha can take advantage of the fact that they really have no calories. It takes more calories to digest them then they provide to the body.

But are they cleansing? well, cucumbers are a bit cleansing, but mostly when raw. Saurkraut gives you lots of lactic acid from the cabbage juice and that's what makes them so special and powerful, but cucumber juices don't react the same way to the fermentation process.