Particularly useful to people trying to maintain diets with low acidity aka alkaline diets:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/07/tired-of-feeling-the-burn-low-acid-diet-may-help/

http://besthealthmag.ca/best-eats/nutrition/low-acid-eating-101/

http://everydayhealth.com/gerd-pictures/low-acid-foods-to-add-to-your-reflux-diet.aspx

http://health.com/health/gallery/0,,20440834,00.html

http://greenopedia.com/alkaline-acid-food-chart/

http://webmd.com/diet/a-z/alkaline-diets

Woo another bullshit diet to sell books and generate ad revenues!

Here it explains all the bullshit about acidity/alkaline diets : http://lepharmachien.com/acidite/

For now it's only in French, but he makes English versions later.

Some elements for bullshit destruction:

- Stomach produces chloric acid, it's 3 times more acidic than lemon. So your stomach doesn't give a fuck about how acidic is your food.

- What you eat does change the pH of your urine, but it has no influence on the other fluids of your body, it's a waste that is eliminated.

Conclusion, unless you have a specific condition, like diabetes, you don't have to worry about the acidity of your food.

It's pretty much the same thing than for gluten. Here's one in English about gluten: http://www.thepharmafist.com/gluten/

Ah, thank you for those, my scientist friend. 

It's still useful to reduce acid in coffee if you have acid reflux or ulcers right?

I guess it can be useful for specific conditions, best is always to ask your physician.

Well said. Btw see Three Pipe's comment below. 

Apparently this technique is well documented:

http://lifehacker.com/5680565/add-baking-soda-to-make-acidic-coffee-stomach-friendly

http://livestrong.com/article/511107-how-to-neutralize-the-acid-in-coffee/

https://quora.com/What-are-the-best-ways-to-reduce-the-acidity-of-coffee-without-totally-affecting-taste

"Function

Baking soda provides the brittle texture in your peanut brittle. When baking soda interacts with the sugar acids present in your brittle, it creates carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide produces the airy, lacy texture you see when you snap apart a piece of peanut brittle. While you can produce brittle by slow-cooking sugar in a cast iron pan, adding baking soda is the most effective way to achieve the desired texture.

Adding the Baking Soda

If you've never made peanut brittle, you may find the reaction between the baking soda and melted sugar mixture to be quite surprising. As soon as you add the baking soda, the peanut brittle will begin to foam, often reaching two to three times its original volume. Prepare brittle in a relatively large saucepan and protect your hands with potholders to avoid potential burns from the melted sugar mixture."

(I say use a stock pot, not a saucepan. You need depth for the foam and for stirring rapidly before the mixture cools.)

http://www.livestrong.com/article/515873-purpose-of-baking-soda-in-peanut-brittle/

Huh, I never realized it was good for texture. 

"Conclusion, unless you have a specific condition, like diabetes, you don't have to worry about the acidity of your food."

Oce, if you put some thought to I'm sure you'll realize why this conclusion does not actually follow from the premises you gave.  Correspondingly, there are numerous studies linking overall dietary acid-base load to various health outcomes.  Here's one of them, "High Dietary Acid Load Score Is Associated with Increased Risk of Type 2 Diabetes in Japanese Men"Just because some people have taken the idea too far doesn't justify denouncing it in any form.

Another reason to care about acid in drinks is the effect on enamel.  Coffee is acidic enough to cause some tooth erosion with regular use... but if she had just used real cream, instead of that creamer stuff it alone would bring the coffee enough towards neutral.  See http://healthcorrelator.blogspot.com/2011/12/want-to-make-coffee-less-acidic-add.html

I didn't realize coffee erodes teeth. Makes sense that real cream would bring it neutral.

You're mentioning a study on diabetes, it's exactly the case of a specific condition that would justify it. Same with teeth if a dentist recommends it to you.

That study relates to diabetes -- which yes, "only" 9.3% of Americans have in the latest unprecedented figures (US) --  but as I mentioned, there are numerous published papers linking acid base load to a variety health outcomes.  Are you suggesting that people should wait until they have a disease to assess the evidence linking net acid load to their particular disease. 

It seems clear you haven't really reviewed the literature on this... we wouldn't have time to discuss all the examples here. 

Here is another one for you.  From the Journal of Environmental Health and Public Safety a meta-review of multiple studies that concludes, "There may be some value in considering an alkaline diet in reducing morbidity and mortality from chronic diseases and further studies are warranted in this area of medicine." http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3195546/ 

You probably realize that there are some modern diseases -- like diabetes, osteoporosis and cancer -- for which there is pretty decent evidence that we have a modern SURGE whereas our ancestors didn't experience nearly the levels we do.  (Now even the levels of *juvenile* diabetes, osteoporosis and cancer are becoming alarmingly high.)  It doesn't take a rocket scientist to suppose that uniquely modern conditions might have uniquely modern causes, and one of the things that is markedly different about the modern diet versus what is known about past diets is a higher net acid load.  This is one reason to consider the hypothesis seriously, rather than brushing it off:

Oce, you stated

"Some elements for bullshit destruction:

- Stomach produces chloric acid, it's 3 times more acidic than lemon. So your stomach doesn't give a fuck about how acidic is your food.

- What you eat does change the pH of your urine, but it has no influence on the other fluids of your body, it's a waste that is eliminated.

Conclusion, unless you have a specific condition, like diabetes, you don't have to worry about the acidity of your food."

You can see this argument is invalid by using the exact same reasoning in a different situation.  For example, this line of reasoning would suggest that since our body maintains a (nearly) constant internal temperature that heat/cold exposure to the body cannot have any important effect.  It doesn't withstand scrutiny, as the body must expend energy to maintain that homeostasis (just as it does in maintaining pH). 

In any case I'm willing to believe lower acidity is better for the stomach and intestines. 

What is really interesting Adam is that while there are many of people who take bases (which is basically what "antacid" tablets are) or avoid high-acid foods because of stomach upset, for many of them the problem may actually be insufficient production of stomach acid.  I have read about people drinking apple cider vinegar to address acid reflux etc.  And after a friend had a long time problem with it, I pointed that out to him... he tried it and it worked for him. 

I don't think we need to worry dramatically (and I think Oce would agree) about the acidity of any particular food item unless it causes upset, but the net acidic load of the modern diet may be still an issue.  For example it isn't the most popular theory but some people think this is WHY osteoporosis rates may be jumping so high. 

The net intake of acidic versus basic chemistry also pertains more to the acid/base status after digestion than before... I think this would be equivalent to the acid or base status of the ash of the food after burning it.  With many foods it's different, e.g. lemons are acidic but I believe that after burning the ash will be basic. 

Vinegar is good for the microbiome, too, so taking it seems like a serviceable solution.