Juicing your fruit, which is when you extract the juice and throw away the fibrous bits, DOES make it basically coca-cola. But blending your fruit, which is just mashing the juice and the fibrous bits together, is essentially the same as eating a whole fruit.

Well, you need to be clear on terms.

JUICING fruit DOES "separate the sugars out and make it like drinking coca-cola"

BLENDING the fruit (in a smoothie) DOES NOT.

So it depends on if you're ordering/making "juice" or a "smoothie".

Well, to add a counterweight to his assertions, the NHS advice directly contradicts Spiller, they say only 1 smoothie OR juice counts towards your 5 a day. And they assert that it does release the sugars.

And they've actually reduced this figure, they used to say you could drink up to 2 of your five a day as a smoothie (mention of it in this article[2] for example).

[1]http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/5ADAY/Pages/FAQs.aspx#juices

[2]https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2013/ma...

If you read the NHS FAQ page though it seems bunk.

This because fruit juice and smoothies don't contain the fibre found in whole fruits and vegetables.

Fruit juices don't contain the fiber, but smoothies do. Its almost like they don't get the difference between a smoothie and fruit juice.

The sugars found naturally in whole fruit are less likely to cause tooth decay because the sugar is contained within the structure of the fruit.

That also seems like BS to me. I'm flossing more apple out of my teeth after eating an apple than after drinking a smoothie (where the fruit is going more straight down). I think they think you are swallowing whole fruit and not chewing it first.

Fiber has two effects: it slows the rate of digestion, and it provides energy for gut bacteria that can metabolize it. The objection to blending is that it loses the first benefit, but this quote talks only about the second.

>blending fruit into a smoothie separates the sugars out

One would have to perform an experiment to find out. Did the HN commenters point to any?

Likewise,does this guy have experimental evidence?

Try it both ways and measure your insulin response at 5 minute intervals.

This question comes up a lot. I really don't think there's ever been a study to confirm that the fiber stays intact after blending. Everyone is kind of citing everyone else but no one has ever tested it.

Don't the nutritional benefits from fiber happen on a microscopic level? Genuinely asking--my blender is too dull to split molecules.