What are Nightshades?
The nightshades are members of an enormous family of plants called Solanaceae, represent a huge family of plants. The nightshades are members of an enormous family of plants called Solanaceae, represent a huge family of plants.
A particular group of substances in these foods, called alkaloids, can impact nerve-muscle function and digestive function in animals and humans, and may also be able to compromise joint function. Because the amount of alkaloids is very low in nightshade foods when compared with other nightshade plants, health problems from nightshade foods may only occur in individuals who are especially sensitive to these alkaloid substances. Since cooking only lowers alkaloid content of nightshade foods by about 40-50%, highly sensitive individuals may want to avoid this category of food altogether.
A particular group of substances in these foods, called alkaloids, can impact nerve-muscle function and digestive function in animals and humans, and may also be able to compromise joint function. Because the amount of alkaloids is very low in nightshade foods when compared with other nightshade plants, health problems from nightshade foods may only occur in individuals who are especially sensitive to these alkaloid substances. Since cooking only lowers alkaloid content of nightshade foods by about 40-50%, highly sensitive individuals may want to avoid this category of food altogether.
Nightshades are a diverse group of foods, herbs, shrubs, and trees that have fascinated scientists, doctors, and nutritionists for centuries. To give you an idea of the diversity associated with this group of plants, consider the fact that tobacco, morning glory, potato, and tomato are all classified as nightshades.
Which One Should We be Concerned With?
The ones that concern us in the Western diet mainly include: Potatoes, tomatoes, sweet and hot peppers, eggplant, tomatillos, tamarios, pepinos, pimentos, paprika, cayenne, and Tabasco sauce are classified as nightshade foods. The ones that concern us in the Western diet mainly include tomatoes, potatoes (not sweet potatoes or yams), eggplant and peppers—this means all peppers including chili peppers, habenero, cayenne pepper and paprika (not peppercorns, see sidebar). Paprika is a sneaky one, showing up in lots of flavoring mixes and often under “spices” on ingredient labels. Other nightshades include goji berries (the new darling of the antioxidant crowd), ashwagandha (an adaptogenic herb from Ayurvedic medicine), Cape gooseberries (not normal gooseberries), ground cherries and garden huckleberries (not blueberries).
I will admit right off the bat that I am biased against nightshades now that I am feeling the benefits of eliminating them from my diet. I used to eat a ton of foods in the nightshade family, but now I avoid them as much as possible. I am one of those who is very sensitive to these foods. My goal in pain is pain relief. So, I look for the cause and eliminate it. In my opinion, pain management—that is, long-term painkillers, without a goal of true pain relief—gets you nowhere. I was stuck in a vicious cycle of pain, infections and drug dependency, I felt like a dog chasing my own tail for many years. For me and many of people, nightshade avoidance has been one of the key components in relief from chronic pain.
It’s likely that you enjoy eating these foods and can’t imagine that they are bad for you in any way. Well, if you suffer from any type of inflammation and joint, avoiding nightshades will lessen your pain, whether or not the nightshades are the true source of the pain.
Are you sensitive to weather changes?
Which One Should We be Concerned With?
The ones that concern us in the Western diet mainly include: Potatoes, tomatoes, sweet and hot peppers, eggplant, tomatillos, tamarios, pepinos, pimentos, paprika, cayenne, and Tabasco sauce are classified as nightshade foods. The ones that concern us in the Western diet mainly include tomatoes, potatoes (not sweet potatoes or yams), eggplant and peppers—this means all peppers including chili peppers, habenero, cayenne pepper and paprika (not peppercorns, see sidebar). Paprika is a sneaky one, showing up in lots of flavoring mixes and often under “spices” on ingredient labels. Other nightshades include goji berries (the new darling of the antioxidant crowd), ashwagandha (an adaptogenic herb from Ayurvedic medicine), Cape gooseberries (not normal gooseberries), ground cherries and garden huckleberries (not blueberries).
I will admit right off the bat that I am biased against nightshades now that I am feeling the benefits of eliminating them from my diet. I used to eat a ton of foods in the nightshade family, but now I avoid them as much as possible. I am one of those who is very sensitive to these foods. My goal in pain is pain relief. So, I look for the cause and eliminate it. In my opinion, pain management—that is, long-term painkillers, without a goal of true pain relief—gets you nowhere. I was stuck in a vicious cycle of pain, infections and drug dependency, I felt like a dog chasing my own tail for many years. For me and many of people, nightshade avoidance has been one of the key components in relief from chronic pain.
It’s likely that you enjoy eating these foods and can’t imagine that they are bad for you in any way. Well, if you suffer from any type of inflammation and joint, avoiding nightshades will lessen your pain, whether or not the nightshades are the true source of the pain.
Are you sensitive to weather changes?
This can be an indication of nightshade sensitivity. Muscle pain and tightness, morning stiffness, poor healing, arthritis, insomnia and gall bladder problems—these can all be caused by nightshades. Nightshades can also cause heart burn or GERD—a lot of people already know they react this way when they eat peppers or tomatoes. It’s extremely easy to overdose on nightshades in Western culture, especially if you are a foodie. Let’s say you have salsa on your eggs at breakfast, potato salad at lunch, and eggplant with peppers along with other spicy dishes at dinner. This is a large amount of nightshades, eaten three times per day, in multiple combination's. It’s very hard to avoid the nightshades, believe me, it’s a lot of work! This can be easily demonstrated by reading the menu at any restaurant— nightshades have become ubiquitous. Nightshade sensitivity, in terms of the vigilance needed to keep them out of the diet, is almost as bad as gluten sensitivity!
For those of you who think you have tried “everything” for your "itis" pain, tried this and tried that but haven’t tried avoiding nightshades— in my opinion, it’s something you do need to try. I can tell you as someone who has suffered for years with chronic pain, I have tried many different remedies for my pain. Nightshade avoidance definitely decreased a percent of it. If you’re one of those people whose pain treatments (be it chiropractic, acupuncture, physical therapy, massage,, energy medicine, whatever!) provides only a day or two of relief, you’re quite possibly nightshade sensitive. The only way to find out try the elimination diet! A physical therapist once told me that if a patient isn’t responding to treatment, one of the first things to consider is nightshade sensitivity— there is simply nothing else that anyone can do to help somebody in pain when nightshade sensitivity is the cause—because once they eat some nightshades again, their pain will return as it was before. Elimination Diet A dietary approach to managing food allergies is the safest and most sensible step you can take for testing and for treatment. Eliminate entirely the allergens in your environment, whether in air, or drinks, or foods. Most people will resolve their food allergies by using the elimination diet. Start by eliminating the leading causes of food allergies, which are as follows: Animal products that are pasteurized and pumped full of antibiotics, steroids and hormones, (including eggs), chocolate, nuts, shellfish, fish, wheat, corn, citrus, processed foods, table salt, nightshades. The elimination diet allows you to eat the foods that are least likely to cause your allergic reaction. When you begin this diet, allow 14 days in order to completely clear the body of foods that were eaten before starting the diet. By the end of the 14 days, if their trouble was indeed due to their foods, most people will be relieved of symptoms. Foods to eat on an elimination diet:
And, for those of you with curious minds here is a bit of nightshades history.
For those of you who think you have tried “everything” for your "itis" pain, tried this and tried that but haven’t tried avoiding nightshades— in my opinion, it’s something you do need to try. I can tell you as someone who has suffered for years with chronic pain, I have tried many different remedies for my pain. Nightshade avoidance definitely decreased a percent of it. If you’re one of those people whose pain treatments (be it chiropractic, acupuncture, physical therapy, massage,, energy medicine, whatever!) provides only a day or two of relief, you’re quite possibly nightshade sensitive. The only way to find out try the elimination diet! A physical therapist once told me that if a patient isn’t responding to treatment, one of the first things to consider is nightshade sensitivity— there is simply nothing else that anyone can do to help somebody in pain when nightshade sensitivity is the cause—because once they eat some nightshades again, their pain will return as it was before. Elimination Diet A dietary approach to managing food allergies is the safest and most sensible step you can take for testing and for treatment. Eliminate entirely the allergens in your environment, whether in air, or drinks, or foods. Most people will resolve their food allergies by using the elimination diet. Start by eliminating the leading causes of food allergies, which are as follows: Animal products that are pasteurized and pumped full of antibiotics, steroids and hormones, (including eggs), chocolate, nuts, shellfish, fish, wheat, corn, citrus, processed foods, table salt, nightshades. The elimination diet allows you to eat the foods that are least likely to cause your allergic reaction. When you begin this diet, allow 14 days in order to completely clear the body of foods that were eaten before starting the diet. By the end of the 14 days, if their trouble was indeed due to their foods, most people will be relieved of symptoms. Foods to eat on an elimination diet:
- Starches - Sprout grains if you can tolerate them. I personal cannot tolerate most grains with the exception of brown basmati rice, buckwheat and quinoa.
- Most Green, Yellow, or Orange Vegetables with the exception of bell peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, and eggplant
- Fruits, with the exception of cranberries and citrus
- Beverages - water only, decaffeinated herbal teas, fresh vegetable juice (we recommend distilled drinking water)
- Raw dairy products and grass feed animal products
And, for those of you with curious minds here is a bit of nightshades history.
Like soy, most nightshades are relative newcomers to European/Western diets. The tomato came to North America in the very early eighteenth century. It was termed the “love apple” and grown first as an ornamental. That means people grew it because it is pretty, yet they did not eat it. Why did they not eat it? They thought the tomato was poisonous. The leaves of the nightshade family are indeed overtly poisonous (livestock farmers know this well) and people avoided the fruit as well.
During a famine in 1782, Scottish highlanders complained of dropsy (an old term for edema or swelling, often associated with congestive heart failure) when they ate abundantly of potatoes.1 Russian prisoners of World War II returned with advanced cases of dropsy, which was blamed on heavy potato consumption.2 An old saying in New Hampshire in 1719 was that the white potato shortened men’s lives.
Eggplant was also first grown as an ornamental, a decorative plant. It was not eaten until relatively recent years in North America. According to Dr. Norman Childers, author of The Arthritis Diet, peoples of the Mediterranean area previously believed that the eggplant would cause insanity if it was eaten daily for a month, in fact, it had the nickname of “mad apple.”3 How many foods that you eat have a reputation like that?
1. Famine, Mortality, and Epidemic Disease in the Process of Modernization, by John D. Post © 1976 Economic History Society, http://www.jstor.org/ pss/2594505.
2. Childers NF. Arthritis-Childer’s Diet to Stop It. Nightshades, Aging, and Ill Health, 4th ed. Florida: Horticultural Publications, 1993; 19-21.
World Health Organization, Toxicological Evaluation of Certain Food Additives and naturally Occuring Toxicants, Thirty-ninth Meeting of the Joint FAO/ WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) WHO Food Additives Series, No 30; http://apps.who.int/bookorders/anglais/detart1.jsp Visit Our Website @
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