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Are these trendy oils really worth it? So today we’re actually going to dive into the fascinating world of health oils, specifically those oils that seem to hover between traditional remedies and modern-day wellness trends.
We’ll discuss three oils with a long history and a growing fan base. Are they miracles in a bottle or just another wellness fad? So stick around. And don’t forget to hit subscribe on YouTube or follow the podcast if you’re listening.
Let’s explore. Part one, castor oil and the belly button trend. Now, castor oil has been a household staple for centuries. It’s often associated with use as a laxative. And, boy, does it work as a laxative. But lately it’s been popping up on TikTok videos and wellness blogs for a much less conventional use, applying it to your belly button. Yes, your belly button.
The practice, often referred to as the Pachadi method in Ayurvedic circles, is based on the idea that the navel is the central hub for absorbing nutrients and delivering them to the rest of the body.
So as a historical use, believe it or not, castor oil has roots in Ancient Egypt, where it was used from everything, for skin care to digestive health. But advocates of applying castor oil to your navel say it can help with digestion, reduce inflammation, and even alleviating menstrual cramps. The reasoning is that the belly button connects to 72,000 nerves in the body, acting as a superhighway for benefit.
Now, is this science or hype? Well, while there is no hard science behind the belly button method, castor oil is known for having anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial properties. And when applied topically, it can improve skin hydration and possibly aid in localized relief.
I have one patient who did the castor oil gallbladder cleanse, and assures me that she passed very large gallstones after using the castor oil gallbladder cleanse. Having heard that, as a surgeon who has operated on many gallbladders in my past life, the pictures she was showing of these giant gallstones, and she took pictures, could not have passed out of her gallbladder through the duct that takes the gallbladder and connects it to the intestines, because the stones she were showing me were about the size of a shooter marble, and the gallbladder bile duct is smaller than the tip of this pen. So unless some other miracle happened, those gallstones did not come from her gallbladder. But didn’t hurt her.
How about part two, black seed oil, the oil that cures everything but death? Well, it might even cure death. But black seed oil is derived from the Nigella sativa seed, which is even older than the history of castor oil. It’s been hailed as a cure-all in Middle Eastern and South Asian medicine for a very long time. It’s so revered that it was reportedly found in King Tut’s tomb, and it’s also mentioned in Islamic texts.
Now, there are interesting active compounds in black seed oil, and quite frankly, I’m a fan of it, but its action actually has to do with the active components. And that’s one of them is thymoquinone. It’s an antioxidant, it’s anti-inflammatory, and it actually has antimicrobial properties.
Now, modern claims are that this will promote immunity, improve respiratory health, aid in weight management, and even support hair growth. Now, is there scientific backing? Well, yeah. Some studies do suggest that black seed oil may help manage asthma, high blood pressure and type two diabetes, but much of this evidence actually comes from small-scale research.
Still, it’s potential for reducing inflammation and oxidative stress make it a promising area for further study. But just remember, we’ve isolated the active ingredients. And so if you’re looking at black seed oil, you really want to look for the percentage of thymoquinone in that product. And you’ll notice when you go on the internet, the percentage of this agent varies wildly between product to product. My personal recommendation is get more of the active ingredient. That’s actually what you’re looking for.
How about part three, algae oil, the chef’s secret weapon. Now, once known mainly for its use in biofuels, this oil has recently gained attention as a healthy and versatile cooking oil. Food & Wine magazine and top chefs are raving about its benefits.
So first of all, is algae oil good for you? And if so, why not? And are algae supplements better? And if it’s not bad for you, does it have any health promoting qualities?
Well, first of all, algae oil is made by the fermentation of algae. And then the algae convert food, if you will, into primarily monounsaturated fats. Now, you’ve probably heard the word monounsaturated fat before, because olive oil is mostly a monounsaturated fat. And through the years people have associated the benefits of olive oil with the monounsaturated fat oleic acid.
A few years ago in a meeting, a nutrition meeting in Europe where I was speaking, I had the pleasure of speaking with the head of the Italian olive oil commission, a physician. And discussing the health benefits of olive oil, which are many. He made the point, and I think he’s correct, that oleic acid, that monounsaturated fat, really has no health benefiting properties. Yeah, you heard that right from the minister, no health promoting properties.
But it’s the polyphenols the olive oil carries that are the beneficial part. And of course you’ve heard me say over and over that the more polyphenols in olive oil the better. So let’s not mistake that even though olive oil is mostly monounsaturated fat, oleic acid, that oleic acid is therefore good for you. It’s not. It’s just a carrier for the polyphenols. Just like black seed oil is just the carrier for these polyphenols. So just because it sounds like it’s a great oil, monounsaturated fat, doesn’t mean it’s having any health benefits for you.
Now, is it going to hurt you? Absolutely not. But it doesn’t carry any additional benefit. So if you’re going to cook with an oil, you’re much better off cooking with an oil that’s going to deliver an additional benefit. And that is olive oil.
Part four, beef tallow on your face. Yeah, you heard me right. Paul Saladino, the famous carnivore diet MD, has long recommended this as a natural beauty treatment for your skin. Fans say it helps keep skin moisturized, reduces acne, and even rivals retinol as an anti-wrinkle treatment.
So what’s in it exactly? Well, largely it’s beef fat. And yeah, there’s a lot of interesting fats in beef fat. There is steric acid, which is the big component of beef fat. And fun fact, steric acid won’t raise your cholesterol, but it’s not going to do any wonders for your face.
Here’s the bad side of putting beef tallow on your face. If you like waking up thinking that somebody’s cooking hamburgers in the next room, then beef tallow on your face is for you. Again, what you’re really looking for in something to put on your face is something with active ingredients that’s going to improve your complexion. And that takes me right back to olive oil.
Olive oil has been used for 5,000 years on people’s skin and face, and so, because it contains a delivery device for polyphenols. So if you’re going to put something on your face to improve your complexion, you don’t have to go, “Where’s the beef?” You have to go, “Where’s the olive oil?”
Finally, let’s talk about one other trending oil as a supplement, oregano oil. I’ve talked about this on a previous video, but oregano oil has a number of interesting components that I’ve used and others have used for treating parasitic infections of the gut. And quite frankly, it’s worked remarkably well in my practice.
Oregano oil has gotten a hype for being an immune booster, an anti-inflammatory, and an anti-microbial. And it is all of those things. The benefit of oregano oil is that it will work for all of these conditions. But as I’ve said before, because it has very strong antibacterial properties, I have a worry and others have a worry that long-term use of oregano oil will change your gut microbiome diversity.
Again, we should look at this as a short-term treatment for an acute problem, but not as a long-term I’m going to take it every day for the rest of my life to improve my health. Oregano oil, great stuff, but use sparingly for a short period of time.
Finally, let me talk about all the hate and fear-mongering going on for seed oils. Now, not all seed oils are bad for you, and I really want you to reconsider several seed oils.
First of all, non-GMO canola oil. Now, don’t go, “Oh my gosh, canola oil is the most poisonous thing out there.” Let me remind you that one of the most famous heart studies ever done, a randomized control trial called the Lyon Heart Diet. Most people call it the Lion Heart Diet, but it was in Lyon, France. Where people with known heart disease were given either a diet that contained a margarine made from rapeseed oil. Rape not grape, R-A-P-E seed oil. That is canola oil. Canola oil is one improvement hybridized over rapeseed oil.
That group had a 30% reduction in new events compared to an American Heart Association low-fat diet. And in fact, the study was supposed to go five years, and it was stopped after three years because the results were so different it was unethical to continue.
Now, I’ve written a lot about this study and a lot about what’s in rapeseed oil and canola oil that’s so special. And it’s a short-chain omega-3 fat called alpha-linolenic acid, ALA. Interestingly enough, when everything was broken down in that study, the only difference in outcome between the two groups was the amount of ALA in the body blood of the people who took it.
We’ve subsequently seen that ALA in canola oil dramatically lowers these LPSs, these little pieces of bacteria that get through the wall of our gut, in animal studies. And I see it in my own patient population.
So yes, canola oil is a seed oil. I was against it because most canola was sprayed with glyphosate, but there is now organic canola oil available. So there are really good studies about its benefit.
Now remember, rapeseed oil and grape seed oil are totally different. Grape seed oil is totally different than grape seed extract. Grape seed oil is mostly omega-6 fat and I’m absolutely against it. But rape seed and canola oil, good stuff.
Finally, as you know, I’m a huge fan of perilla oil. Why? It’s also a seed, perilla seed. But perilla oil is almost all ALA, alpha-linolenic acid. And the studies of perilla oil in preventing heart disease and modifying heart disease, just like rape seed oil, dramatic. And I’ve written about it in several books, including Gut Check. And I’ve seen its use in my patients in lowering these LPSs in people’s bloodstream. So just because it’s a seed oil doesn’t mean it’s bad for you.
Finally, my top three oils to use; olive oil, perilla oil and organic canola oil right up there. Interestingly enough, macadamia nut oil also has some really interesting health-promoting and cardiovascular properties.
Let’s talk about cottage cheese. Wow, cottage cheese is everywhere right now. People are blending it into wraps, turning it into bagels, even making ice cream out of it. And why? Because it’s being hailed as a low-calorie protein powerhouse. But is it really the health food everyone claims it to be? Let’s get into it.
All right, what is cottage cheese? What causes all those lumps? Well, cottage cheese starts with milk. And it’s coming from usually cows, but every now and then we do see cottage cheese from goat and sheep milks. What happens is the milk is lightly heated and then it’s combined with in most cases an acid or rennet, which, believe it or not, comes from the inside of cow’s stomachs, which then causes it to curdle.
Now, the curdling process separates out the solid curds from the liquid whey. Most of us learn the expression curds and whey. So the curds are primarily casein. And the whey, as you might expect, is the other main component of milk, which is whey protein. The whey is also in the water. And the curds, the reason they’re kind of solid is they’re pretty much solid casein.
The curds are then cut into small pieces, they’re heated further, and then they’re stirred even more to expel more whey. Now they’re drained. The curds are then rinsed in cool water, usually lightly salted, and that creates that signature texture.
Now, why does cottage cheese have lumps? Well, those lumps are the actual curds. They’re clumps of coagulated milk proteins, casein. Now, unlike smooth cheeses, cottage cheese curds aren’t pressed together, so they retain their loose bouncy texture. The final texture depends on how much the curds are broken up during processing. Some varieties have smaller finer curds while others are larger and chunkier.
Okay, this is trendy, but this trend isn’t new. It was big in the Atkins diet in the ’70s, and it’s coming around again. There’s usually nothing new, it just becomes a new fun thing to talk about.
So let’s talk about cottage cheese. Is it really healthy? Well, at first glance, cottage cheese seems like a great option. It’s high in protein, low in calories, and packed with calcium, but there are a few major concerns most people overlook.
In the United States cottage cheese, for the most part, is made with A1 casein. Casein A1 is a really interesting inflammatory trigger that can trigger inflammation, can cause leaky gut, and even autoimmune problems in many people. If you’ve ever felt bloated after eating dairy, A1 casein is likely to be the culprit, not lactose. Now, there is such a thing as goat cheese or sheep cheese cottage cheese. I haven’t seen it in America, but this would be a much better option.
But here’s my big problem with cottage cheese. Cottage cheese, any milk from a cow, from a goat, from a sheep is very high in a sugar molecule that I’ve talked a lot about, that I’ve written a lot about, called Neu5Gc. Neu5Gc causes inflammation. And it correlates with an elevated risk of chronic diseases such as heart disease, joint disease, neurodegeneration, and it’s even associated with cancer.
When you eat Neu5Gc, and this has been proven in human beings, you make antibodies to Neu5Gc as a foreign invader. Which leads to long-term inflammatory responses. Does that sound like a good idea? I don’t think so.
Well, what can you do about that? As I’ve written about and talked a lot about, the fermentation product of cow’s milk, goat milk and sheep milk, bacterial fermentation eats Neu5Gc. They love it, it’s a sugar molecule. And so fermented cheeses, traditionally prepared fermented cheeses don’t have Neu5Gc.
There are fermented cultured cottage cheeses. And if you’re going to use one, I really ask you to find them. In my opinion, it’s the only safe cottage cheese.
Now, cottage cheese does contain saturated fat. Now, while some fat is good, conventional cottage cheese can often contain a lot of unhealthy saturated fats from grain-fed cows, which may contribute more to inflammation. Now, it usually depends on how creamy the cottage cheese is. And let’s face it, we kind of like creamy cottage cheese. And that usually indicates how much residual fat is in that cottage cheese.
Now, it actually may have added sugars. Many flavored or low-fat cottage cheese brands actually add sugar to enhance the taste, which can spike your blood sugar levels and negate its health benefits.
All right, number two, is cottage cheese actually a good source of protein? Yes, it contains protein. But folks, we in America are over-proteinized. Now, many people don’t believe me and Valter Longo from USC about the fact that we eat far too much protein, but I urge you to watch Professor Christopher Gardner’s videos from Stanford, who’s the head of nutrition at Stanford. I urge you to watch one of his short videos about how the USDA protein requirements came about.
It turns out that our USDA recommended daily protein is actually two times what the normal person would need on a daily basis to meet their protein requirements. Why? Because they want to make sure that 95% of all Americans would actually meet their protein requirements, but most of us don’t need that. Now, the sad thing is Americans eat twice the recommended amount, so most Americans are actually eating four times the amount of protein that they actually need.
And just remember, protein is only needed for tissue repair work, for bone work, and if you’re actively building muscle to actively build muscle. In fact, again, look at some of Professor Gardner’s work, and we can quibble about this, about 82% of the protein that you consume is actually converted into sugar through what’s called gluconeogenesis.
Why? We do not have a storage system for protein. We have a storage system for glucose, which is not very big, but it’s called glycogen, and it’s in your liver and also in your muscles. But we have an unlimited storage system for sugar if we convert it into fat.
And we do not waste calories. So if we’re not building muscles, if we’re not repairing bones, and quite honestly we’re not doing that very much, then any extra protein is converted to sugar, which we can burn as calories, or store as glycogen, or store as fat. And that’s why most of the protein we eat isn’t becoming what you think it is.
Now, if you’re looking for protein, one of the things I urge you to realize is that many years ago our ancestors, our great-great-great-grandparents ate whole food. And they ate the whole food whole. They had a piece of beef, as an example of protein, and it took them quite a long time for their digestive enzymes to break down that piece of meat into individual amino acids to absorb. Which means that that protein actually trickled into your system.
Now, imagine if you have cottage cheese. Let’s make sure you’re getting cultured cottage cheese. You’re still going to have some time to break down those lumps of protein into amino acids. That’s fine with me. But that’s very different if you then blend that cottage cheese into a protein shake, or worse yet blend it with more protein, powdered protein. Your body then instantly has these proteins literally pre-digested. And your body is hit with a wham of protein, with, quite frankly, no place to put it except to turn it into sugar for storage. And that’s one of the big problems with all of these other sources of protein.
Are there better protein alternatives? Certainly pasture-raised eggs are a good source. They’re actually a complete protein with added choline, and, believe it or not, arachidonic acid for your brain health. Most people find this hard to believe, but your brain is about 60% to 70% fat. And the two main fats in your brain are DHA, the long-chain omega-3 fat, and, spoiler alert, the long-chain evil omega-6 fat arachidonic acid.
Why is it evil? Because it’s the inflammatory omega-6 fat. If it’s so evil, then how come half of your brain is made up of this evil omega-6 fat? The reason, it’s essential for brain health. And one of the greatest sources of this arachidonic acid is an egg yolk, so go for it.
How about wild-caught salmon? It’s got plenty of protein, it’s got plenty of DHA. How about wild shellfish? Shrimp are a phenomenal source of arachidonic acid. Now, there are plant-based options, like hemp seeds, like sacha inchi seeds for example. And sardines, you can do the boneless skinless if you’ll start to eat them, and there’s plenty of places to get it.
All right, number three, how about all these viral cottage cheese recipes? A cottage cheese wrap? Number one, it’s not approved. If it’s made with casein A1 dairy, and excess sodium, and possible added sugars, why would you do that? I mean, try a cassava or an almond flour wrap. Or imagine this, how about a lettuce wrap?
Even better, a cottage cheese bagel. Again, if it’s A1 based, it’s a no-go. There are plenty of alternative ways of wrapping something in a bread-like substance. And just check out my books for more examples.
The other thing is check out Jamie Maitland’s unicorn buns. They’re made with egg whites and allulose. They’re a hamburger bun. And you can also eat them kind of as a dessert, they have a slightly sweet taste. And you know I love allulose.
How about cottage cheese ice cream? I mean, come on, really? A1 dairy plus added sugar, this is not a health food. Try blending frozen avocado allulose. I mean, check out my recipes on this YouTube channel for the best chocolate avocado ice cream you’ll ever have.
Number four, the best cottage cheese alternatives. Okay, if you love the taste and texture of cottage cheese, but you want to avoid the hidden health risks, here are some better options. Just use fermented cottage cheese. It will be fine. Get some Parmesan cheese to make crackers, to make wraps. You just shred it, and you can do most things you can do with any cottage cheese. And remember, just because a food is trending doesn’t mean it’s truly healthy.
What the heck is an ultra-processed food? And where did that term come from? Well, it actually started by researchers in Brazil in 2014, who were concerned that primarily Brazilians were eating a lot of foods that didn’t exist one or two generations before. And the amounting research about how much a food is broken down from its original components, and made to, quite frankly, maybe easier and tastier to eat was concerning. So the Brazilian ultra-processed food index was developed.
And I think it’s so important that I want to actually read you what constitutes an unprocessed food, minimally processed, processed, and then ultra-processed is. And I think it’s a great starting point.
Number one. So scale one is unprocessed or minimally processed foods. In other words, fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, fresh legumes, fresh eggs, nuts. Basically nothing was done to them except cook them.
Second level, processed culinary ingredients. Cooking ingredients like salt, like butter, like sugar, like oils. That’s processed culinary ingredients.
Three, processed foods. In other words, canned fruits and vegetables or processed meats.
Then ultra-processed food and drink products. So ultra-process means, well, you didn’t just take that fruit, chop it up, put it in a can and preserve it. You actually took, let’s just say, wheat. Took off the hull, took off all the soluble fiber, turned it into a white powder. Or you took a glass of milk, took the whey protein out of it or the casein protein out of it. Dried it out, powdered it into a fine powder, broke it down into its individual amino acids, and then reconstituted it into something that looks like nothing, that could possibly resemble a piece of steak or even a piece of cheese, but has those components in it without all the good stuff.
So the more you kind of break down a natural food into its individual components, throw away the good stuff and then remake it into a tasty product, that usually uses oils like hydrogenated oils, and usually has to have preservatives to make it not go rancid or bad. That’s how an ultra-processed food comes about.
I like the story, we lost our home in Santa Barbara seven years ago to the mudslides and lost all of our furnishings and possessions. And we were lucky after a year to find another house that my wife actually likes better. But it came fully furnished, which was great for us because we had no furniture. And it was so furnished that in the kitchen it had two large glass jars, one of which contained beautifully arranged Oreo cookies, and the other glass jar had beautifully arranged large pretzels.
Now, for fun I have left those jars there. And it’s now [inaudible 00:32:57] seven year anniversary of the mudslide. And those Oreo cookies and ultra-processed food, those pretzels and ultra-processed food look identical to seven years ago. They have not shrunk, they have not changed. No mold, insect, bacteria has any interest in them. They are perfectly preserved. And that’s what you don’t want to put in your mouth, because if even a bacteria or a self-respecting bug isn’t interested in them, then you know that these things are poisonous to an advanced creature like us.
And in fact, Brazilian researchers have published the results of eating ultra-processed foods and processed foods on the human diet. For instance, a study published in November of 2022 in the American Journal of Preventative Medicine concluded that these foods contributed to about 10% of deaths among people 30 to 69 years old in Brazil in 2019. And a published study in Neurology in 2022 showed that a 10% increase in ultra-processed food consumption raises the risk of dementia. Just a 10% increase in ultra-processed foods.
So as I mentioned before, one of the issues with most ultra-processed foods is they add oils to, among other things, stabilize the texture. But as anyone hopefully knows, most oils when exposed to air go rancid, they literally oxidize. And it’s the oxidation that’s the dangerous part of these oils.
So scientists have two ways around it. The easiest way is to partially hydrogenate the oil. That means basically putting a chemical hydrogen bond in several places in the oil. A totally hydrogenated oil is solid at room temperature, a non-hydrogenated oil is liquid at room temperature. So adding some hydrogen bonds can stabilize the oil so it quite honestly takes a longer time to go rancid.
The problem with that is that is really changing the basic character of how that oil behaves. And our body is constantly using oils as fats in the membranes of our cells, in the membranes of our mitochondria, the energy producing organelles in all of our cells. And it’s kind of using looks like what they need. It’s not quite the same. So it’s using kind of bad material as a building block. And the problem is those oils don’t flex properly. Looks like what they need, they’ll use it because that’s all they have to work with, but you end up with a rickety, damaged building.
Now, how vegetable oils came about is fascinating in itself. And I’ve written about it, there’s plenty of YouTube videos about it from me. They literally started out as soap, not food. And if you like the idea of eating soap, then go for it.
So just remember that these oils in processed foods, even though they sound natural, even though they sound like, “Oh, they’re from plants,” buyer beware, there’s a stipulation that you cannot have trans fats in ultra-processed foods anymore. The problem is there’s a loophole. If the trans fats are less than a gram per serving, then you don’t have to list it and you can say zero trans fats. So many clever companies continue to produce these partially hydrogenated food products, they have trans fats, but the serving size now is low enough that they don’t have to put trans fats on the label even though they’re there. So please, buyer beware.
Another big issue in the ultra-processed food world is that these foods in general have been stripped of all the dietary fiber, because, quite frankly, we associate fiber with not tasting very good, with not having a consistency that we like. The sad thing is dietary fiber is what our healthy bacteria, which I call our gut buddies, actually have to have. Not only to survive, but they also take those foods and they produce hormones like GLP-1 agonists that tell your brain that they are happy, they’ve been well-fed, and that you don’t have to go looking for anything else to eat.
Probably the most impressive experiment that I know of to prove the gut centric concept of hunger is a Chinese study where they asked volunteers to go on a 7 to 14 day water fast. Where they drank, ate nothing but water. Half of the group were given 100 calories a day of prebiotic fiber. Now, spoiler alert, we cannot absorb prebiotic fiber. We cannot digest prebiotic fiber. Only bacteria can use prebiotic fiber.
So no, they weren’t given 100 calories of food. They were given 100 calories of food that could only be used by their gut buddies. And lo and behold, the group that went on a water fast without the prebiotic fiber, you guessed it, were really hungry. The group that got only 100 calories of prebiotic fiber a day had absolutely no hunger for 14 days.
So what does that tell you? That hunger that you experience, that hunger that all these GLP-1 products bait, would normally be produced by your gut microbiome getting what they wanted to eat. And the bad news is ever since the advent of processed and ultra-processed foods, which is a modern thing, they’re starving to death. And isn’t it interesting that the more ultra-processed foods you eat, the hungrier you get, because they’re literally saying, “What the heck? I hear you chewing up there, but nothing’s coming down the line to me. Go find some more food.”
As I teach my patients about artificial sweeteners, the same thing happens with your tongue. Your tongue doesn’t have any sugar receptors, it has sweet receptors. Back in the old days, the only time you tasted something sweet was fruit or honey. That was it. That contained sugar. When you tasted something sweet, you sent messages to your brain that, “Guess what? Sugar is on the way. Make some insulin to handle it.” The brain calls down to the pancreas, “Sugar is on the way.” When sugar doesn’t arrive to the brain, the brain says, “What the heck? I know sugar was on the way. You got cheated, because I didn’t get any, go get some more.”
And that’s why when I was 70 pounds overweight, despite exercising a whole lot and eating, quote, healthy, I drank eight Diet Cokes a day. I joked, if they could sterilize Diet Coke I’d have one during heart surgery. But I was constantly being told by my brain that I wasn’t getting the good stuff and go find some more. So that’s why I was constantly hungry.
And that’s why when you eat constantly ultra-processed foods, you want more. Because your gut buddies and your brain says, “I didn’t get any.”
So what are the worst defenders out there? Some of them might surprise you. Believe it or not, deli meats, those kinds you get at the delicatessen. In 2015, deli meats were classified as carcinogenic. Now, most of them, unfortunately, are made from beef or pork, and these contain that nasty sugar molecule called Neu5Gc. Plus they have nitrates, they’re loaded with sodium, usually a lot of sugar.
Now on the other hand, if you can actually find a traditionally fermented sausage, that’s totally different than what you’re going to find at the deli counter. In fact, my good friend James Beard award-winning chef Jimmy Schmidt has recently introduced Neu5Gc safely removed beef in forms of ground beef, in brisket, in sausages, and in hot dogs. And I have no relationship economically with this company, but I’m a huge fan of JR Ranch Foods dotcom.
Fruit juice. Well, fruit juice is an ultra-processed food. I joke that we could take a trip to the San Diego Zoo and look in all the cages, and we will not find a juicer. Juicing removes all the prebiotic fiber. Animals eat whole fruit, and they eat it whole. A gorilla is not having a fruit smoothie which has been processed. You have broken down all of the things that your digestion was supposed to do.
Just last week, the new pandas were introduced to the National Zoo in Washington DC. And they showed this cute panda casually munching on a whole apple. They didn’t give the panda a juice sippy cup of apple juice. They wouldn’t be that stupid. And yet that’s what we do every day with ultra-processed fruit juices, or fruit smoothies.
Granola bars. They claim to be made with nuts, seeds, et cetera. But most of them have at least 15 grams of sugar per bar, sometimes up to 44, 50 grams of sugar. That’s more sugar than a giant candy bar.
Electrolyte drinks, like for instance some of the Gatorades have sugar, like 34 grams of sugar in a bottle. You can drink LMNT instead.
Plant-based meat replacements, these are ultra-processed foods. Just look at the label. These have been plant materials that have been broken down and then reassembled the very definition of ultra-processed. Yet because they look and have the texture of what we like, like a burger, these are passed off as plant-based and natural. Nothing could be further from the truth, this is an ultimate ultra-processed food.
There is a plant-based food that I actually do recommend, certain cuts of a product called Quorn, Q-U-O-R-N, and I have no relationship, uses mycelium, basically mushroom roots, to build meat-based products. And I have my patients on them. They’re not vegan because they have a little bit of egg white as a binder, but they really will work well as a not-so-processed food.
Well, what can you do? Well, first of all, if you’re looking at an ingredient list, the odds are it’s already an ultra-processed food. There isn’t an ingredient list on a head of broccoli. There isn’t an ingredient list on a wild-caught shrimp. There isn’t an ingredient list on a head of lettuce. If there’s an ingredient list, it’s in one way or another processed.
Now remember, the terms all-natural and healthy mean absolutely nothing. Even organic isn’t always organic. The federal government allows 15% of the product in an organic label to be non-organic, and it still qualifies as organic. Huh? How does that happen?
Food companies spend an average of $7.5 billion a year on advertising ultra-processed foods to us. Why do they spend that much money? Guess what, advertising works. Just ask any pharmaceutical company. Don’t be fooled.
Finally, researchers at Northwestern University have created a tool for comparing packaged foods in the same category in order to figure out which one is the least amount in processing. For instance, let me just read this off. In the yogurt category, one plain organic yogurt scored a four out of 100. Now, while [inaudible 00:47:40] Petit by Yoplait received a maximally processed score of 100. They’re both yogurts. Now, I would say away from both these yogurts because they have casein A1, but that’s a different story. The lowest score wins, the highest score loses.
And if you don’t like those scores, the Brazilian score, which is available online, really helps you understand what’s not processed, what’s minimally processed, what’s processed and what’s ultra-processed. The farther you stay away from ultra-processed and go back down to what your great-great-grandparents ate, the better off we’re all going to be.
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