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the evidence is pretty overwhelming that
if you drink green tea regularly even a
single cup but ideally three to four
cups of green tea a day and if you you
know my great uncle who lived to
104 um he drank probably six maybe 10
cups of green tea a day um was healthy
until his very last breath and um it's
been shown that actually drinking green
tea regularly lowers the risk of colon
cancer lung cancer breast cancer brain
tumor and so there's a lot of evidence
human evidence that actually shows that
to be true um Tomatoes been shown to
lower the risk of prostate cancer we
talked about that
um uh and eating um good phytonutrient
rich green vegetables um also been shown
to be protective against a whole
flotilla of different types of cancers
and so one of the things I talk about in
my book and again it's you know this is
like a deep dive into this is well how
much should you eat how many servings do
you need to eat a week or if you eat
seafood um like what type of fish and
how often and how much fish should you
eat a day I'm I'm somebody like because
I came out of the you know the biotech
world you know like it's all about the
dose right and actually I think you know
one of the famous uh uh a Greek uh
philosopher is basically saying you know
the the poison is in a dose anything
that's too much or too little it's going
to be not enough or too much and so um
one of the things I've tried to do um
over the course of the last year here
frankly during the pandemic I spent a
lot of time thinking about how do I take
a lot of this information that's been
bottled up that like led to me to write
the book and get it out to people so I
actually created an online course and I
do master classes now to really get at
those sort of nuts and bolts of details
um of of of of things but um uh so I
would say follow the evidence there's
certain foods like green tea like tree
nuts like tomatoes like leafy greens
like seafood and and there's specific
types of seafood um you know it's not
just salmon um but even shellfish
actually and heck and hche and some of
these other things that consider so
again if you if you only listen to the
sort of the common Urban mythology you
hear the same things eat your salmon eat
your kale you know uh and and and it
goes so much deeper than that like you
you know you you prompted this a couple
of times you know is it as simple as
it's never as simple as the God is
always in the details and those details
allow us freedom to choose the things
that we might like it gives us more of a
repertoire to go into yeah I love that
speaking of details I mean we've had
we've had other researchers on the
podcast and they talk about you know
these really intricate details of our
physiology igf-1 uh mtor insulin do you
I mean do those come up at all in your
recommendations do you talk about you
know minimizing glycemic variability
with your dietary choice do you talk
about you know keeping insulin low not
spiking it with you know uh too many
eating the consumption of too many
carbohydrates added sugars and things
like that or is it more big picture for
you just you know prioritizing food
quality which is here's the thing which
is what what it sounds like to be well
here's the thing I'm a researcher so I
am into those details the glycemic inexs
the CRPS and all these other things that
a lot of people talk about but when I
actually try to communic unate to people
who are really interested in changing
their lives for the better just want to
optimize their health they don't want to
be told they don't need to know all the
they they want to feel more empowered
and so I try to kind of um up my own
game by trying to simplify the details
into things that people can use like and
if you want to have that convers you
know like if one wants to have that
conversation about the tomatoes and how
do you cook them and what happens to the
chirality the lopine molecule we can get
into that stuff but look I just told you
if you're a man and you want to lower
your risk of prostate cancer tomatoes
are great two to three servings half a
cup each time if you cook it it actually
makes it a little bit better for you and
if you asking me what's the most potent
tomato that I should choose from I would
say San Marzano Tomatoes actually have
the highest amount of lopine um and and
you know like I I like to actually
message in ways that make sense to
people that are really practical but
absolutely put me in the Olympic ring
and give me an ape and we can fence and
go into all those details I love it were
you a foodie before you became uh a
scientist like when when did those for
you
converge you know I first of all grew up
in a background my as my background is
Asian but I grew up in America I was
born here and you know I I ate a lot of
Fresh home-cooked Foods with fresh whole
plant-based Foods all the time um it was
a treat when I had a sloppy joe was a
very rare day when I had a lasagna or
whatever it was I mean I I used to covet
like you know those things like oh man
my friends are having all this great
stuff but I I really grew up eating a
plant mostly a plant-based um Whole
Foods uh diet um but I I also grew up in
a family and with friends who really
enjoyed eating and so um uh when I went
to college I Lov to explore foods and a
lot of people don't know this but um I
uh I enjoy cooking uh and
if you you in order to enjoy cooking to
in order to cook well you have to love
to eat like to eat and when I when I
finished College I did a gap year before
I went to medical school and I actually
and this is you know I hate to say it's
like 1984 I took a gap year and I went
to Europe and where did I live I lived
in Italy in Greece why specifically to
study the the culture and traditions of
food and how they related to health so
this is a long time ago before people
talking about the Mediterranean diet I
was living it by being there in in
Northern Italy and in in in traveling
all around I went over to Greece I even
went mountain climbing because that's
something that was a a hobby of mine
back then and I climbed up in the this
area called Mount AOS which is like the
Theocratic Republic of Eastern Orthodoxy
to get into monasteries to study how
monks or vegetarians live their lives
and I volunteered as a chef in a
monaster
um and you know and like was stirring
beans with this like canoe size spoon um
in this cauldron in this Monastery that
like cooked everything by fire um and so
you know like yeah I I am a foodie and I
I think that again this intimacy um is
something that's very personal to me as
it is to everybody but I love like
exploration I I just think that you know
um I would tell you I love food I
respect food I I wouldn't say I love to
eat so I'm not somebody that shovels
food down my mouth I I like to taste I
like to explore I like to understand and
I and I think that that's a a something
I like to share with people I really
appreciate that and I can I can totally
relate as well you mentioned as one of
your five pillars uh the immune system
and you know we've heard a lot about
inflammation inflammation is a feature
of the immune system uh it's not
necessarily bad it's not necessarily
good can you talk to my audience a
little bit about what inflammation is
and maybe the foods that can help dampen
inflam in the body because we know that
inflammation plays such an important
role in the ideology of chronic disease
absolutely so um first of all if we
didn't have inflammation we probably
would have died as kids because when we
cut ourselves you know on a swing set or
you know on building blocks or you know
a scuffle in the schoolyard or whatever
it is um you know that cut that you get
we fall off your bicycle you skin your
knee what's the first thing that happens
you get a little bit of redness it's
painful you get a little bit of redness
a little bit of swelling that
inflammation that's inflammation that's
our body's natural first line of defense
and inflammation uh is a is just one
part of our immune system it's the front
line and it's designed inherently to get
rid of bacteria that might enter the
body if we actually are injured so a
little inflammation is really really
important and what our body knows how to
do is to ramp up the inflammation
quickly which is why when you cut
yourself and you get that swelling
within seconds right definitely within
minutes and then what happens over the
course of a day or two days or three
days your body tones that down turns the
volume way down and then turns it off so
inflammation is a defensive part of our
immune system that our body turns on and
then turns off if you can't turn it off
you get chronic inflamation inflammation
and that's the problem that we see in
chronic diseases in diabetes we've got
chronic inflammation and heart disease
chronic inflammation cancer chronic
inflammation and chronic inflammation
triggers other diseases as well it's
kind of like um here's the analogy um we
know that when man humans made fire we
suddenly had the power to be able to
warm ourselves and cook our food okay um
and we want to keep that fire in a
little fire pit um and and that's where
fire was useful to us and we know that
you know after the evening you put the
fire out then you go out and forage or
whatever it is so turning it down at the
very end now imagine if the Fire doesn't
go out and worse imagine the fire pops
out of the fire pit and catches the
forest on fire now you got the Wildfire
right and this is what's going on in our
country right now we got these raging
wildfires going everywhere destroying
things that's what happens that's the
inflammation we were really talking
about but I I always try to point out to
people you don't want to eliminate infl
inflammation you want to kind of turn it
way down so what are some ways to turn
down inflammation using food again
here's the science um it turns out that
there's a lot of different food
substances that can turn down
inflammation green tea will turn down
inflammation um vitamin C simple vitamin
C which is found in so many foods can
also turn down inflammation so um red
bell peppers strawberries um guava uh
Tomatoes oranges citrus of course are
great sources of vitamin C I just gave
you a handful of things you could
sprinkle over the course of the day now
how do we know that vitamin c does this
again it's not theoretical like that's
one of the things that I try to bring to
the table is
you know what happens in a lab is in a
lab you know it's like Vegas you know um
stays in the lab but what happens in
people well that actually makes a
difference and you find it in the lab
and in people now you got my attention
well so Studies have been done with
people with inflammatory autoimmune
diseases where they've got like runaway
inflammation and there was a study in
Japan looking at lupus so in the Miyagi
prefecture in Japan there's like this
lupus Center where you know it's like a
lupus out of control and they found that
people women mostly with lupus who had
this chronic inflammation that if they
that those women who ate more vitamin C
containing foods like guava Tomatoes
strawberries you know all those kinds of
things bell peppers they had high levels
of vitamin C and they had lower levels
of inflamation as measured by CRP and
they had less lupus flares that's human
that's feasible and that can be
delicious as well yeah so I have to ask
um have have there been trials to look
at supplemental vitamin C and have they
seen the same results because that I
believe that that study that you just
referenced I mean it sounded to me like
like an
observational uh study right so have
they been able to tease it out and look
at and look at supplementary vitamin C
so so here's not not yet to my knowledge
and here's part of the problem once you
get to a randomized double blind Placebo
controlled clinical trial approved by an
Institutional Review Board in a hospital
and you want to get these PES with lupus
the the research um is now changing but
the old school way you're going to get
people to run away out of control lupus
at the end of their game okay uh and
then they're going to be also to be on
steroids and they're going to be on all
these monoclonal antibodies and now
you're not really studying kind of the
real world anymore you're you're taking
the train wrecks the worst of the worst
and trying to see if a vitamin is going
to make a dent I'm talking about people
that you know are living their lives
normally not in a hospital and are just
trying to get their stuff under control
right and and so that's where these
observational studies
um are to your point their important
hypothesis generation but the hypothesis
should be tested but the hypothesis is
also easily tested by people as soon as
they hear about it in their home that
night when they after they hear about it
um food has immediacy so what I would
say is that we should all be eager to
conduct our own clinical studies on
ourselves if we think that there's a
study um and good science uh that
actually points a finger towards a
Direction that we can actually get
behind yeah one of the most I think uh
typically when people think of
inflammation and and supplements that
are commonly uh talked about uh that
think fish oil omega-3 fatty acids what
are your thoughts on those as a
potential
anti-inflammatory um the the the fish
oil has been studied as a supplement um
uh and you know I think that the large
body of evidence is that it does have
good anti-inflamm fatory benefits it
lowers
CRP um it can improve arthritis symptoms
of pain and swelling and lower
medication uh needs and it also seems to
have some improvement in Dementia in
clinical trials like prospective
clinical trials and they think it's by
lowering inflammation as well so again
um yet another kind of I would say brick
to put on this wall that what we eat can
make a difference but here's what I what
I would tell you like some people um
love to take supplements I know people
who you know they that's their thing
they want to take a bunch of pills in
the morning and and they feel good about
them and I'm I'm okay with that but if
you can eat if you can get the if you
can get the same substance from a whole
food and get your protein um and get
diversity because our bodies are
designed for diversity we're not we're
not onetick ponies you know so um uh if
you can get omega-3 fatty acids from
eating salmon anchovy hake sardines
Manila clams you know I think that's
great because you're you're getting
you're testing your body you're you're
you're you're stretching your body's
repertoire of responding to the things
we're putting into it in ways that
activate your health of enses and that
that that's my own personal way of
actually trying to get Omega-3s yeah I I
would definitely have to agree with you
because you're also getting all these
other as you mentioned protein but even
on top of that there's all these
additional nutrients um that are
strengthening strengthening the the
entirety of the system you know take
salmon for example
loaded by the way here here's a cool
piece of research a lot of people don't
know um cbass which also contains
omega-3 fatty acids have been found by
researchers in Guang Joo to actually
contain a they think it's a peptide but
it actually it's in the meat itself and
and you know only recently discovered
that actually speeds up wound healing
and so like that that's a really cool
idea and and and that's to me you know
scientists get excited by the unknown a
lot of people think that scientists
spend all their time talking about all
the stuff they know the brainiacs
actually when you get a group of
scientists together like when I have
when I get together for dinner with my
my Science Buddies you know it's not
that we geek out talking about all the
stuff that we know like Engineers you
know like we scientists biology
scientists actually SP spent a lot of
time talking about what we don't know
yeah you did you know did you know what
we don't know like how do we how would
we answer this question and that's what
I would say is um so exciting about food
and health
we are really at the beginning of a new
era of really being able to truly
understand not only what's in our food
but how our body responds to what we put
inside it and metabolism is a whole
other dimension of this that is coming
down the pike as well yeah and we know
it's so important especially over the
past year metabolism and metabolic
Health has really come into the
spotlight as being something that we all
need to be ought to be conscious of
think about this aquarium that's got
fish that you want to keep these are
your pets and it's also got um
overgrowth of algae you know like that
completely overgrows the tank and that
algae is going to kill the fish right
you get enough Gunk growing in that tank
you're going to kill the fish so what
can you actually do to clean up that
tank you want to get rid of the algae
but you don't want to kill the fish
that's really probably the best analogy
of this micro environment situation in
any organ that we have in our body where
you want to get rid of the cancer cells
but you don't want to actually um kill
the healthy cells Well turns out that
cancers are exquisitly sensitive to um
uh blood vessels as I as I told you and
if you cut off the blood supply to um
cancer uh it's it's kind of like uh
lowering the bubbling uh the the air
system into the aquarium so you got
enough just for the fish but not enough
for the for the algae to grow uh and the
body knows how to make that diff diff
difference so for example blood vessels
that are feeding normal cells are really
well constructed did like a like a think
about a house that the architect really
made really strong it's got good pilings
it's got good infrastructure the frame
is really solid the windows are really
nailed down tightly and a cancer when it
grows blood vessels to it doesn't do it
really well so that's like a crappy
contractor that that cut all the corners
and so basically the house the the blood
vessel system feeding the cancer is like
a like a crappy house when the hurricane
comes
okay guarantee you that the vessels that
are feeding the cancer are going to come
flying apart but the ones that are
feeding the healthy cells the well
constructed ones are going to stick
around they're going to outlast the
storm and that's basically what we can
actually do with
anti-angiogenic drugs now foods can do
the same thing there are many things in
Foods these bioactives we talked about
that you know Mother Nature laced into
plants you know kind of like Mother
Nature's Pharmacy with an f um uh
actually can actually um help to mow the
lawn and get that tame those blood
vessels so that if they're growing
towards the cancer you can kind of prune
them back trim them back to normal and
it prevents the cancer from growing new
ones which is really really important
for cancer prevention that's just having
enough of that mure to prevent blood
vessels from overgrowing um is really
can be really important so what are some
of the things green tea um uh you know
which everybody knows as
antioxidants which can actually lower
your blood uh sugars um help to lower
your cholesterol lower your um stress
levels catac colomine actually is super
packed with these cakin egcg one the
main
polyphenol that is anti-angiogenic so
way back when when I got in this field
we had a test system where we were
testing Cancer drugs that could starve a
cancer by cutting off its blood supply
and on and one of the things that I did
is I actually dropped some green tea in
there and you it was shocking how
effective the green tea polyphenols were
in stopping those blood vessels that
were feeding the cancer uh and in fact
if I didn't tell the technician doing
the lab work that it was actually a
natural compound um and I told them it
came from a drug company they would have
like they would have been super excited
about it and started jumping up and down
and so again you know Mother Nature is
really really um good so polyphenols and
te uh egcg is one of them um Resveratrol
and red wine also another one um that's
actually really really powerful uh in
terms of uh being anti-androgenic
genestin the phytoestrogen and soy
actually can also cut off the blood
supply feeding breast cancer so it's
just the opposite of the urban legend
out there that soy is not good for you I
recently saw an article it was a cover
of a magazine that said you know soy
anti- nutrients or something like that
and I you know like I I my mind was
blown that somebody could actually say
that because most of the nutrients
including the proteins but also the
phytoestrogen and
soy again you know if you're a scientist
you take a look at this um and the
phytoestrogens look nothing like human
estrogens they're not dangerous they
actually block human estrogens and they
actually are also anti-angiogenic and
they cut off the blood supply to breast
cancers and this has been shown in human
patients breast cancer patients uh as
well um tomatoes have lopine so many of
the you know the same foods that we know
are good healthy plant-based sources of
nutrition we're now rediscovering that
many of the bioactives in them are also
powerful cancer blood vessel cutting
cutting off systems that cut off the
that starve starve a tumor you know the
really the point that I want to drive
home here is that you had this quote in
your original Ted Talk and he said as a
doctor I know that once a disease has
progressed to an advanced stage
achieving a cure can be difficult if not
impossible and the reason that you were
sharing this in the context of your
presentation and your Ted Talk was you
were helping people understand that this
is one of the main d of why you got
interested in the topic of food this is
something that we do two three times a
day and if that food could have just as
similar of an impact in some cases even
more so then it's not what's better food
or medicine they're both great but food
is something that we all have control
over and because of Education gaps in
healthcare practitioners again well
meaning they may not have the education
in food this is something where we're
empowered as consumers to start making a
difference in a dent because as most of
us know you know there's a there's this
area that's in between you know you
don't have cancer and you're diagnosed
with cancer right it's not like one day
you just show up at the doctor's office
and then cancer came out of nowhere it's
growing always sort of in the background
at least the conditions are until one
day something changes and then it has
that explosive growth so if we can make
a difference
now then we're more empowered to
actually change our health and hopefully
minimize or potentially even avoid some
of these chronic diseases later down the
path absolutely I mean you know my my uh
how I got into nutrition molecular
nutrition was was that
um you know taking care of patients who
were terribly sick what is incredibly
rewarding and giving them uh an answer
to why they're not feeling well and
helping them trying to get solutions for
that is is such an important privilege
uh to be trained and to be able to
actually do but you know um uh when I
started to see I'll tell you an
interesting story so I I was a doc at a
Veterans Hospital love taking care of
veterans most of my patients were their
50s and 60s and 70s and older uh and
many of them were um overweight uh if
not morbidly obese they had about heart
disease lung disease diabetes cancer um
uh the bone diseases I mean you name it
they there there were all the problems
that you would see in an older person
but the thing that really struck me as I
was writing prescriptions and sending
people to Specialists was the jux
deposition of these individuals who in
their second half of their lives you
know 60s and 70s terribly out of shape
riddled with disease you know and I was
trying to help them but I also looked at
these people and realize that you know
if I put on my spectacles of the time
machine the same individual going back
when they were 20 years old was cut fit
buff as a soldier in fact they couldn't
even serve in the military unless they
were in perfect shape right and so what
happened to these people over the course
of their decades over the course of
their lives is they've lost control of
their health and that's what made me
realize treating the horse out of the
barn is something worthy of doing but
why do we want to wait for that why
don't we actually prevent disease in the
first place and when you T when I was
thinking about prevention you know you
really can't think about drugs I mean
because drugs are expensive they got
side effects really difficult to develop
a preventative drug and who would want
that anyway um but food naturally lends
itself to prevention because that is
indeed the the intervention that we take
multiple times a day and in fact our
food is the intervention is the health
care that we do for ourselves between
visits to the doctor's office I mean
we've come to
regard Healthcare as what we do when we
you know make an appointment and step
into the door and get weighed by the
nurse before we sit on that you know
that cold um paper filled table exam
table but in fact most of the health
care we're doing is uh between the time
we go see the doctor it's so true and if
we're fully gonna understand the impact
that food can have to going back to that
analogy you had why is it that this cut
healthy ripped soldier at the age of 20
and then you contrast them fast forward
a few years you know 40 years they're 60
years old and their systems are starting
to fail their angiogenesis in some cases
is out of control in some cases it's
under producing where it needs to be
what happened in the interim and and in
your book you really highlight that in
addition to angiogenesis there's really
there's with angiogenesis there's five
areas there's five sort of key areas
that we have to look at these sort of
systems in the body to understand what
happens when we go from being healthy to
being in a place of disease let's walk
through them starting off with the you
know you can pick which one you want to
start off with next and and we'll give a
little bit of an overview just like we
did with
angiogenesis yeah sure Drew I mean this
is such a great question I'll tell you
how I got into it because I think that's
the best way to to to to articulate this
for your viers um you know as a doctor I
was I was always trained to W wonder why
somebody got sick what did they do what
was going on in their bodies that led to
an illness and in fact most patients
always ask me you know like well so what
happened how did I get this you know how
did I contract this condition um and
that's how I was trained to think for
for decades but reality is um and and
and as a researcher that's what I was
looking at is what is the underlying
cause of illness but I think I I
discovered there was a much more
interesting question and that more
interesting question iswh don't we get
sick more often you think about it like
kids are usually pretty healthy and
actually when you're in the prime of
your life you're generally pretty
healthy yeah you might get a flu or
might get a cold every now and then it's
only when you get older that you start
getting sick and the more interesting
question is like why don't kids get
cancer more often than they do why don't
healthy adults get more heart disease
why don't they get diabetes you know
like more often than they do I mean some
people do at a younger age and so that's
really by turning that question about
why did I get sick into why aren't I
getting sick more often that led me down
this direct path to saying what is a
body doing to prevent illness and if and
and what is health itself if you know
the the the question the way that I
would use to answer the question what is
health is like yeah well you know you're
healthy if you're not sick and I think
that's how most people would answer it
turns out health is not just the absence
of disease health is the result of our
body working firing on all cylinders to
keep us that way into and ward off
illness and um and what keeps us healthy
what Wards off illness what is firing in
all cylinders are Health defense systems
now I found five Health defense systems
and I wrote about five in my book Eat
Deb disease
because I've worked in the drug
development field in each of these areas
Andrew Jenis is one of them let's talk
about all five of them first blood
vessels i' I've done drug development in
helping to grow blood vessels and stop
blood vessels second our stem cells I'll
come back to that I've done work Decades
of work in developing regenerative
medicine to try to regenerate organs uh
that's amazing what you can actually do
in the biotech world with that third is
the microbiome I've done research on the
microbiome with colleagues at am it and
elsewhere fourth is um genes our DNA and
most people think of our DNA as sort of
the genetic code um I've done gene
therapy so I I've actually helped to
develop Gene therapies um and fifth is
our immune system and our immune system
which is hardwired this is more
important than ever before in
immunotherapy for cancer for example is
one of the most powerful breakthroughs
in in medical in the medical world today
so I've got the street cred of doing
drug development in each of these areas
but rather than thinking about using
drugs to activate these systems if we
turn the sock in side out and take a
look at okay so how do these systems
actually defend our health bar
circulation prevents um uh to feeds our
prevents Disease by feeding our healthy
cells and preventing bad diseases from
growing like cancer our stem cells by
the way um you may not know this but all
of us have about
75 million stem cells that are in our
bodies at any given time we're actually
made it of stem cells because when when
we were in our mom's wombs the only
reason our bodies were able to even form
a human figure like you know the little
Playdoh that kind forms humans in the
womb is is because of stem cells and we
retain some of those after we're born
and we lock them up in our bone marrow
and in our skin and elsewhere and our
bodies regenerate continuously that's
one of our health defense systems
because you know you know as we age we
need to repair ourselves from the inside
out like we know
um our hair regrows for most people we
know that um even our G our mucous
membranes are are are this sort of skin
in our mouth where we grow anybody who's
ever you know um had a really hot uh
something hot piece of food and you burn
your mouth and like man like it it
totally screws you up next day you're
back to normal because your your skin in
your mouth your mucous membrane
regenerated okay it's like eating a
Dorito and you scrape the top of your
mouth next stay you'll be fine because
of
regeneration um but what's amazing is
that our organs regenerated from the
inside out if I took your liver and we
cut off 2third of your liver and left
one third left it would regenerate the
rest of the 2/3 just like a starfood to
regenerate an arm um your lung if I cut
off the tip of your lung um it would
grow right back and what we're starting
to realize is that the The Playbook of
human biology is being WR is being
Rewritten because when you and I were
kids I'm sure our grade SK School
teachers taught us the same thing
starfish and salamander regenerate but
people don't wrong people regenerate and
so now we can actually try to coax this
regeneration to go faster it's one of
our defense systems but um and while
biotech people are trying to figure out
ways to make us regenerate foods can
also cause us to prompt regeneration as
well which is really cool um foods like
chocolate foods like dark cacao like
dark chocolate cacao polyphenols can
actually stimulate regeneration um
there's all kinds of other uh uh uh
biotech kind of things that can actually
do this but Mother Nature has laced um
things that can be regenerative like
ursolic acid and fruit peel can coax our
stem cells to come out of our bone
marrows to to stimulate regeneration as
well I mean imagine a future in which we
understood how to match the uh the
substance in a food that naturally
occurs
with something that we need like brain
regeneration for dementia for example
that would really be a
GameChanger and so that's where the
future of understanding our B's Hardware
self- defenses for regeneration goes
microbiome you know we've got like 39 uh
trillion bacteria in our body most of
them in our colon and we know that when
our gut bacteria is healthy it controls
our hormones it controls our cholesterol
metabolism it controls how our how our
body uses blood sugars when we screw up
our um gut bacteria it screws up
everything like literally we've got an
ecosystem inside our body that if we
don't take care of that ecosystem um it
destroy it wrecks the rest of our body
and and something that's stunning to
know for example is that um uh uh is how
vulnerable the system is artificial
sweeteners like you find in a diet soda
can in 24 hours overnight start to
destroy your gut microbiome the healthy
gut bacteria start to change they don't
like that artificial sweetener because
they're trying we don't absorb those
those calories right those are the those
are the non-caloric sweeteners so we get
the taste in the front end in the back
end we don't absorb it so we don't get
the calories but guess what our bacteria
are eating those things too and they
don't like it we're poisoning the field
when those bacteria um don't like it and
they start dying it affects our
metabolism it affects um even our
hormone our brain hormone so we want to
keep our our our gut defense system
which is tied to our immune system by
the way really really healthy um our DNA
is another defense system um people
don't realize this but we make 10,000
mistakes in our DNA every single day
that causes mutations which then can
cause cancer so fortunately our DNA
system defends us by fixing itself and
our immune system of course is um like
an our ultimate Shield um to prevent us
from bad guys coming in from the outside
whether it's covid or whether it's the
flu or whether it's you know some other
uh uh germ but also our immune system
protects us from bad guys on the inside
of our body and that's those cancers
that we started talking about our immune
system conducts surveillance to take out
those bad guys inside our skin as well I
know you're a big fan of olive oil I
want to talk about olive oil and why
it's so beneficial but before we get
olive
oil in the spirit of the kind of foods
that we should think about limiting when
we are in our Supermarket or our grocery
store and we're looking around to
purchase oils to cook food in to
sprinkle on food to pour on our salads
what kind of oils should we try and
avoid and then what sort of oil should
we try and buy in stats you know so this
like the debate about our artificial
sweeteners um is a loaded topic and so I
I want to just start you know this
component of our conversation by saying
the jury is still very much
deliberating what oils are harmful to
you and and are most harmful to you U
but I think that it's less controversial
what uh oils are better for you and good
for you I want to you know for your
listeners I want to kind of give people
some real practical things just kind
into the science of petroleum products
which is what o oils are let's talk
about this rule number one regardless of
what oil you actually have what I would
say is don't have too much of it because
oils are fats and fats can be healthier
but there really isn't such a thing as a
healthy fat that you should like drink
lots of it every single day okay so the
point is that there are healthier oils
but you should we should all limit the
amount of oil that we actually intake
into our body all right number one
number two is that and this is actually
broadly speaking is don't reuse your
oil okay most oils that are reused when
we heat them to cook whether we're
actually you know uh I mean again deep
frying is generally something that's not
very healthy the process of deep frying
actually changes the chemical the
natural chemicals that make up oil in
the oil itself and then paint it onto
the food stick it onto the food so we're
eating some of the change chemicals when
we actually eat deep Pride food now look
I mean I I've had I've had some awesome
fish and chips um when I visited England
before um and and again and again as we
talked about you know every now and then
if you're you spend most of your time
Shoring up your health defenses raising
your own bar you know having a rare
treat it's totally fine but when you fry
things in hot oil you're also changing
the chemical structure of things that
entire Browning golden Browning crisping
of food actually Chang changes the
chemical structure of the food itself
and in ways that are potentially
carcinogenic and so just need to be
careful about that the third so so I
think you know like reusing oil here's
the thing that's kind of like a little
risky you go to a restaurant to eat you
have no idea if they're reusing their
oil over and over and over again you
know um I mean think think about in uh
Asian restaurants whether it's an Indian
restaurant or a Chinese wrest they've
got these gigantic Vats where they're
frying tasty little bits up um but they
may be reusing that oil for days so um
reused oil not good for you for sure and
and the stuff that's fried in oil can
also change in time so let's start now
talking about just like the the
properties of oils themselves this is
where I think rather than kind of
walking into the quick sand of trying to
say is palm oil better than corn oil is
coconut oil dangerous for you you know
like we can weade into that jungle with
you know but I think you need a machete
to cut your way out of it and so the
best way to think about it help to give
clarity is you know are there any
healthier oils to use and how to use
them and this is where I think olive oil
really stands out number one it's part
of a healthy pattern of eating that's
been revered for thousands of years and
that's in the Mediterranean traditional
Mediterranean diet and the olives are
seasonal they're pressed the extra
virgin olive oil contains not just fat
poly monounsaturated fatty acids which
are better for your body and less
damaging for for your cardiovascular
health but there's a lot of polyphenols
that come from the olive itself now a
lot of people don't understand this but
when you look at olive oil the reason we
say extra virgin olive oil Evo you know
that's what the that's what supermarkets
and what restaurants are proud to use
now is because it's not just fat it
contains the polyphenols from the oil so
if you were to actually by the way this
is a good experiment to do for for your
listeners buy a little container of
Olives from your grocery store pitted
make it easy for yourself and literally
you know take it home and and take a a
heavy
glass or take a a board like a like a
heavy cutting board and press those
olives yourself and you'll actually see
if you press hard enough you'll see some
oil come out of it now in a in an olive
oil factory I mean that that's that's so
you can actually appreciate where your
food comes from where your olive oil
comes from now when you actually press
it you'll see that you've crushed the
olives and some of the bits from the
olives are actually in the olive oil the
reent olive oil tastes so good it's got
that you know kind of um peppery
vegetable kind of quality to it um it's
got a Umami flavor it's not because the
fat is flavorful it's because the bits
of Olives that were crushed in there are
actually in there flavoring it now those
bits and the stuff that comes from the
meat of the olives contain the
polyphenols one of which is hydroxy
tyrosol hydroxy tyrosol sounds like a
very complicated chemical name you don't
your listeners don't need to memorize it
by any means but you should know that
that comes from the olive
now olive oil will have some of it only
about 20% of the of it but if you
actually press that Olive 80% goes into
the olive water and and it's stuck in
the pulp and so one of the things that I
always say is that you know if you
really love olive oil and you want to
get the most out of it um just eat the
whole Olive you know and you can
actually cut up an olive and you'll get
a little bit of fat you'll get all that
flavor and you'll get a lot more of the
polyphenol now if you're going to cook
with ol olive oil I I I always say go
for extra virgin because of that reason
I would say don't deep fry but but you
can spr you can put put some on uh to
food you can actually sauté with it not
too much all the studies show that about
three tablespoons of olive oil that's
sort of like what you probably that's
around the max of what you'd want a day
so nobody's drinking olive oil and then
the other thing that is if you want to
choose which olive oil because I get
overwhelmed when I walk into a store and
I see all these like a whole wall full
of olive oils right everybody's
marketing here's what I do again I pick
up the Olive and oil and I look at the
ingredients what do I look for I look
for mono verial olive oil monovarietal
means it's made with just one kind of
Olive and I look for the one kind of
olive that that that oil is made from
from three different varieties of Olive
in Spain Spanish olive oil I look for p
p i c l picu olives among the highest in
in polyphenols in the oil so the olive
oil will be loaded second um Greek olive
oil um the coroni olive which is from
the pelonis it both both of pyan Cori
are very common olives so that's a good
news it's not very expensive highest
amount of poly one of the top three
polyphenols and the third for Italian
olive oil I look for um uh oil that's
been pressed from a monover varietal
called
morolo and that comes from Umbria and
there that's less common harder to find
a little pricier but I just gave you
Three Olives uh pel Cori morolo uh that
are not most of them are not good eating
olives but they're great for olive oil
they're packed with polyphenols if you
get olive oil that is monovarietal
pressed only from each of those you can
be guaranteed that you're getting sort
of the top
the sort of the coo too of the
polyphenols in the olive oil yeah I love
that I I actually in in my kitchen as we
speak now it's the PQ Olive it's a Well
I would have called it a single origin
but that's because I'm probably used to
picking coffee but as you were
describing that there was such a
wonderful energy in your voice and your
body language it reminded me of like a
wine connoisseur talking about the
different varieties of wines or a or a
coffee coniss talking about that you
know I get the single origin bean from
this particular Farm but I guess it's
not that different is it it's about
going back to where does this come from
how was it processed what is actually in
my hand right now that I'm about to
buy yeah and and you know there it's
great pride that we as humans have
always had and it's still within us to
know something about the food that is
around us I mean you know uh if you talk
to a farmer they are proud of what they
have if you talk to a villager they're
really proud of what their Community
what grows around their community and
again I think that you know something
that maybe that we're fighting against
because I I want to draw back the jargon
that you raised at the beginning that I
think is helpful to think about what are
we what are we really fighting against
you know I think we're we're fighting
against our distraction from ourselves
getting to know who we are and getting
what to know slowing down so we can
actually understand our own pace we're
getting distracted by the uh by the by
the pace of what we're expected to do
and so we've got no time for ourselves
right I mean every every young working
parent certainly feels that way you know
like man I'm so busy I don't have time
for myself and yet when it comes to Food
and Health we all need to have that time
for ourselves and I think we should take
great pride in saying what it is that we
actually love yeah a lot of people talk
about the health properties of
vegetables of course you promote all
kinds of vegetables which have different
impacts on the body but some of the time
we're told
to sprinkle or pour some olive oil onto
the vegetables because it helps us
absorb nutrients from them what's your
perspective on that in view of what
you've just said about oil and you know
perhaps not over consuming it even
though it can be
healthy yeah well there's two let's
unpack that because there's two things
that you were describing one is that in
Plants let's take a tomato as a great
example uh there are natural substances
natural chemicals like lopine lopine is
a carotenoid it helps to make the tomato
red um it has lots and lots of healthful
properties it's a powerful antioxidant
I've studied lycopene in a laboratory
and it actually can help starve cancers
by cutting off the blood supply um it
can slow the shortening of tiir to slow
cellular aging and it and it can protect
our DNA from even sunlight and
UltraViolet exposure lots of good things
about it now lopine actually is a
uh uh naturally occurs in a tomato on a
vine in a chemical form that our body
doesn't absorb that well so if you pick
a tomato off the vine and you cut it up
and you throw it into a salad it might
taste great just got some vitamin C in
it it's a great source of hydration and
great flavors okay especially if it's
like a homegrown heirloom type of
tomato but you're not going to get the
like you're not going to get as much
lycopene you're probably only going to
get maybe 20% of the lopine that's in
there but you want it like for me I want
to get as much much of the good stuff as
I can so here's what researchers found
if you wanted to convert that chemical
structure of lopine into a form that you
can absorb better your body can avidly
absorb what you want to do is you want
to heat the Tomato like in a pan and
with the heat will change the chemical
structure from a form your body doesn't
absorb that well into a form that your
body avidly absorbs loves to absorb it
now you go from 20% absorption to 80%
absorption you flip the you FP it around
completely upended that equation
completely now you're really absorbing
it now here's one additional thing
though how would you heat a tomato in a
pan you put heat it in water or nothing
no not really you put a little bit of
olive oil in it and why is that and and
it's because lycopene is a substance
that we call fat soluble it's a lipid it
loves to dissolve into fats so a little
bit of olive oil in tomatoes on a pan
sauteed so it's soft change of chemical
structure flavors are really great now
and you have that now when you uh eat
that tomato sauce sauteed in olive oil
the oil the olive oil with the lopine is
carried into your body even more
efficiently than if it were cooked in
water and so again that's an ex that's
just one example of thousands of how
oils with fat soluble Foods by the way
if you didn't want to look at olive oil
here's another common snack in the
United States anyway is kind of ter a
pagebook from Latin American Cuisine you
have these tortilla chips and then you
wind up actually having salsa and
guacamole the Salsa Salsa is often sort
of stewed down Tomatoes cooked down
Tomatoes served room temperature or
chilled and then the guacamole is just
avocado that's been smashed up now
avocado has a lot of healthy fats in it
it's it's it's a fat soluble veggie it's
actually quite nutritious remarkably uh
people eating avocado actually shrink
their waistline because
even though eating fat it actually makes
you it burns down harmful fat it's a
whole other story that be had but if you
have guacamole avocado with tomatoes you
get more lopine and so that happens to
be kind of a popular snack uh in the
United
States yeah I love that so the right
combination of foods can actually help
absorb the nutrients I think black
pepper also can do that right with s and
nutrients well right so black pepper so
this is an interesting thing we most of
us have heard that turmeric which is a
kind of a a root um when you cut it open
it's this bright beautiful bright orange
a lovely color and and turmeric is also
a dried spice used in Southeast Asian
Cuisine uh including Indian Cuisine is
where I first became acquainted with it
it um not only makes food beautiful it
actually makes food delicious it's got a
quite a lovely taste to it it's a it's a
spice inside turmeric is kirkin circumin
is one of those natural chemicals kind
of like lycopene it's one of those
mother nature's Treasure Chest Mother
Nature's Pharmacy with an F not a ph and
the the the the the circumin has a lot
of properties anti-inflammatory it's
antioxidant it cuts off the blood supply
feeding cancers um it uh actually is
helpful for your stem cells as well it's
it really activates almost all of your
body's Health defenses and it's good for
your gut microbiome so why not just you
know enjoy turmeric as a spice by itself
because it's so potent that our body
actually doesn't absorb everything that
it could in fact our body kind of it
kind of gets a lot of it gets flushed
out you know uh the tail end and so what
we want to do to improve our body's
extraction of the good um the good stuff
the the termic it turns out that if you
have fresh cracked black pepper all
right there's a substance in fresh
cracked black pepper called pepperine
pierine is one of Mother Nature's um
again you know these remarkable
chemicals that actually in influences
the body and piperine helps the body
hang on to the curcumin so if you have
fresh cracked black pepper with your
turmeric uh you you're actually creating
a onew punch that allows you to absorb
more of the curcumin sleep in cooler
temperatures helps to activate your
brown fat pet when you're sleeping
amazing yeah I have a I have a I sleep
with a um one of these mattress pads
that cools my mattress it not only
increases improves my sleep quality but
that's cool to know that it that it's
probably encouraging the proliferation
of this of this helpful fat and it also
helps you sleep better builds your
immunity there's all kinds of new things
that we're beginning to realize at
cooler temperatures when we're sleeping
which probably mimics sort of the
natural state of the outdoors at night
the temperatures drop right I mean it's
only in a house with a thermostat we
crank up to have sort of warmer
temperatures at night yeah do you have a
is there like a specific temperature
that we should aim for when setting our
thermostats at night you know people
talk about this kind of a range it's
probably between 65 67 degrees it's sort
of under 70 it's not freezing like you
you don't want to be shivering at night
right all right but it's sort of in the
high 60s H okay so sleep make sure that
you're sleeping in a cool environment
but what are what are these Foods
okay the thing that I found so amazing
that I write about my book is uh that
foods will
actually uh click on your brown fat to
burn down harmful white fat it'll
elevate your metabolism it'll also help
you lose weight and it'll shrink your
waistline by killing off off by
shrinking visceral fat that harmful gut
fat all right so before I talk about the
exact Foods I want to kind of just may
give a little more depth to
understanding how the healthy parts of
fat that we've just been talking about
because we just spent you know a little
time talking about healthy aspects of
fat don't fearure fat you don't want to
get rid of it you don't want to cut it
out burn it out like you you want it you
want your fat yeah and by the way you
don't want to poison your fat either
what do you mean by that well I mean you
know like people are developing as as
you know like in the news are talking
about it all the time ways to block
obesity and you know and can we actually
Target fat and get rid of fat that way
we have to be really careful you don't
want to interfere with these normal
healthy functions of fat the fat that
the baby has the fat that we normally
have to operate our organs so let me
explain basically a little bit about
metabolism fat and then food and then we
can talk about which foods actually will
really be helpful for ramping up your
benefit right so um think of your car H
think of your body as a car right so
what is metabolism metabolism in your
body is basically like the way that your
car transfers fuel to run its engine you
want to get from point A to point B
you're going to drive your car the
engine needs uh fuel needs gasoline and
so you're driving your car and you're
paying attention to the fuel gauge when
the fuel gauge looks like it's heading
to empty what do you do you pull over
your car go to a filling station take
out the gas pump put the nozzle into the
gas tank fill it up all right and then
when the gas tank tank is full the the
nozzle goes click no more gas put it
back and you drive off with a full tank
right now in our body our body requires
it's basically an engine our metabolism
gives our engine our body engine all the
fuel it needs the fuel that we get in
our body isn't gasoline the fuel that we
have comes from our food now people have
used the term calories to describe that
energy unit but I don't want people to
get focused on the calories because
people tend to get too fixated on how
many calories counting calories calories
in calories out I want to explain
something to you in a maybe easier to
understand way food that we eat is our
fuel when we eat uh our food our body
senses fuels loading up just like we're
at a filling station so what happens is
that our insulin levels go up because we
are having food in our body insulin is
that wonderful hormone produced by our
pancreas that draws in the energy from
the food that we just ate into our cells
so just a power up our our cells we need
to have enough energy anything extra
gets put away into the fuel tanks which
you remember in the womb our fuel tanks
are fat cells little tiny fat cells that
ring around the blood vessels they
actually get filled up um you can fill
up you can stretch a fat cell hundreds
of times wow okay um so but but if you
put in a little extra fuel it's just
there you're loading up your fuel tanks
when you're not eating your insulin
levels go down and then your body says
okay now we can switch over to fuel
burning mode it's kind of like when you
pull over to fill up your car fill up
your gas tank you turn off your engine
you're not burning any fuel right so
when you're done fueling up you can turn
on the engine and go drive and start
burning the fuel again right body's done
the same way all right so now uh when
we're done eating insulin levels go down
our body our metabolism switches into
fuel burning mode makes perfect sense
where does it get the fuel it gets the
fuel from blood anything in the cells
and then when it needs to it Taps into
the fat m all right now then you're
driving off and then what happens is
when you actually your fuel cell when
your fuel runs low our brain senses that
gas tank says is low what do we do we
don't pull over to a gas station we pull
over to the dinner table to the
restaurant to the refrigerator to The
Pantry all right so you can kind of see
this is a very very common sense way of
understanding our metabolism which which
can be very complex if you talk to a
scientist I'm trying to boil it down to
something easy now here is something
interesting remember I told you when
you're not eating you're able to burn
energy and that energy is stored in fat
cells which can get bigger and bigger
and bigger when uh you actually eat more
and more food fuel all right so when
you're not eating like sleeping we
talked about sleep you're actually
burning fuel so sleeping is a fuel
burning State our metabolism is
naturally switching into fuel burning
because insulin is low we're not eating
and we're actually burning and basically
what happens when we get up in the
morning okay it's burning burning
burning all night in morning we get up
we bre we eat breakfast we break our
fast all right so when we're sleeping
we're fasting and this is basically
where the idea of intermittent fasting
um comes from it's just describing what
we normally do yeah and it's not just a
trend or a fad or you know something
some crazy new kick that people should
get on it's actually very very natural
to our body the longer we give our body
time to burn without food to be able to
tap in to do fat burning energy sucking
shrink those fat cells the more weight
we're going to lose the more fat we're
going to burn the more fit we're
actually going to be and the more our
metabolism is actually going to rise so
basically I want to kind of give you an
example of how this might work in real
life let's say you go to bed at 11 o'
and you sleep for eight hours so you get
up at 7 okay that's pretty typical for
many people let's say that you eat
dinner so you have eight hours during
that sleeping time let's say that you
eat dinner at seven o'clock and you
finish at8 put your dishes away at 8
o'clock now no midnight snack no dessert
later on no noshing munching on chips or
whatever sweets but at 8 you're done and
then you actually just go up about your
way and you go to sleep at 11 you've
gained three extra hours to your eight
hours now you've got 11 hours of fat
burning all right that's that's to your
advantage yeah your body your metabolism
is burning now let's say you get up at
7:00 all right 8 hours of sleep and now
you rather than actually get up and do
what your mommy told you to do like
we're all conditioned this way get up
eat breakfast hurry up catch the school
bus and get off to school all right
let's say you get up and you take a
shower you get dressed you putter around
a little bit check your emails or do
whatever to scroll through the news wait
an hour okay before you eat breakfast
before you break your fast now you've
gained an extra
hour to have your body burn fat so now
that's 1 hour in the morning 8 hours in
the evening 3 hours the night before
okay that's 12 hours so you've taken
half the day to burn to up your
metabolism by burning body fat that's an
easy way to think about intermittent
fasting in a completely different way
it's not 16 and8 16 fasting eight e
eight hours eating that's pretty intense
if you want to squeeze all your eating
in eight hours yeah all right you might
not be enjoying your food and might be a
to socialize the same way way and there
is something to 16 and8 that's been
studied in animals and a lab it's also
been studied in humans but I wanted to
sh share with you that 12 and 12 12
hours of fasting not eating just like I
just described compared to 12 hours of
eating also helps you burn fat and also
helps you lose weight it works as well
so you don't have to be an
extremist to you know put the pedal to
the metal to really really go hard at
fasting just ordinary kind of patterns
will do that now this is a setup for the
food by by the way so I just told you
that the uh that the uh way you eat the
timing of the way that how you eat
actually can be uh uh very very useful
for fat burning I also told you by the
way this overload of gasoline which I
want to talk about in a second um is
important so how much you eat also makes
a difference normally yeah before we get
to the what all right so um imagine
you're filling your car with with gas
again you're back at The Filling Station
with your car you get your noil when gas
tank fills up imagine if you didn't have
the click on the nozzle right and the
gas keeps on flowing out what's going to
happen the gas goes up it f it runs out
of the tank down the side of the car
around the wheels pulls around your feet
now you are standing fire hazard is
hazardous flammable dangerous mess
because you've overloaded your fuel yeah
let's go over to the body you're eating
eating eating now our body doesn't have
a clicker on the nozzle when we sit down
to eat there's no automatic cutof off
switch so it's easy to overeat all right
the more you eat the more you eat the
more you eat now what's happening is
that your insulin's up it's using the
fuel everything extra gets stuffed in
the fat now those fat cells remember I
told you can actually expand
massively if you really overeat you're
going to stuff more fuel into the fat
cells there's a limit to how big they
can get all right so but you still have
more extra fuel extra food it's going to
make more fat cells wow okay those get
stuffed okay then they go up still not
enough storage make more fat cells Now
you kind of see how overeating creates
more and more and more and more fat yeah
that's the difference between fat cell
hypertrophy and hyperplasia correct
that's right so hypertrophy is actually
the small fat cell getting stuffed and
getting bigger and bigger bigger um uh
hyperplasia is actually when actually
more of it actually starts to to grow
and by the way those ideas of
hyperplasia hypertrophy is like what
happens in the muscle too gets bigger
yeah hyperplasia is actually a kind of a
pre- tumorous state it's like we use
hyperplasia to describe pre-cancers wow
cells are growing that should they be
growing they get bigger and bigger and
bigger and let me just tell you when fat
cells get um are just being stuffed with
fuel because you've overeaten you
actually need more more fat cells they
make your body makes more and more and
more and they get all get bigger and
bigger when fat starts to get into an
expanding Mass fat as an organ just like
any other organ needs a blood supply so
when it outgrows its blood supply it
desperately seeks to grow new blood
vessels to it this is an area I study
called
angiogenesis fat needs to be fed it
needs oxygen it needs nutrients but if
fat is so continuously overloaded the
center of the mass will start to die
doesn't have enough oxygen that's called
hypoxia hypoxia causes inflammation
and when you have inflamed fat remember
just standing in that pool of flammable
Hazard okay now you actually got the the
hazard is actually inside your body it's
not around your feet wow all right that
growing fat has this flammable
inflammation Hazard and that
inflammation in that fat basically
wrecks destroys the normal function of
the hormones in your body it wrecks um
your Fat's ability to produce leptin now
you don't know if you're hungry or not
hungry maybe you're too hungry maybe
you're not hungry it can't tell and it
destroys a dip intin so even though
you're eating there's plenty of energy
you know what maybe you're not absorbing
that energy very well now your blood
sugar start to rise and then resistant
it doesn't even know what to do anymore
when do you put on the brakes and you
can kind of see how overeating by itself
okay and we're going to get to the
quality of the fuel in a second but
overeating in itself can
easily uh your body just tries to stuff
away the fuel but can easily tip things
over the edge and that that that Tipping
Point actually is where good fat gets
deranged and turns into bad fat wow what
a story and is this the point at which
the the fatty the free fatty acids begin
spilling over and getting stored in
quote unquote nonprofessional storage
sites in the body like organs where if
you're not supposed to accumulate fat
like like your liver yeah right so
you've heard about non-alcoholic fatty
liver disease very common to very common
and it has it's it's actually tracks
along with the Obesity epidemic pandemic
that's going on around the world and
basically what happens is that you make
fat you make fat make more fat it
expands expands expands now remember I
told you your body's stuffing that fuel
using the fuel tanks all right but at
some point you've got so much fuel all
your tanks are full and now the fuel is
leaking out of the tank and when it
leaks out of the tank it's got to go
somewhere and some C certain organs
start to absorb more of it like your
liver so when your liver starts to
collect fat you are starting to be in
trouble because your liver is a
filtration system the the the cleanser
of your body detoxifier of your body now
you start to plug that organ up you
can't detoxify your blood very easily so
you can kind of see by the way it's
starting to make sense now right like
how the simple behavior of overeating or
not being mindful of the timing in which
you're eating so you're not giving your
body enough chance to burn down that
extra fuel can have unintended and very
deadly consequences yeah right and
that's where the the science of of the
metabolism actually comes into play so
before we get to the what's kind of food
what kind of fuel should we be eating
let's
say very simply put the more time you
can give your body to burn down extra
fuel the better your health is going to
be meaning if you finish dinner don't
eat anything afterwards as much as long
as you can like I mean just don't eat
after dinner put the dishes away and
don't eat no more food yeah all right
then you get then you then you go to
bedtime then take advantage the whole
evening and then don't eat breakfast
right away in fact if you occasionally
skip a breakfast that's even better
because now you're giving your body
extra um uh fat burning energy burning
time all right so rather than kind of
like become like really rigid about
intermittent fasting I think if you have
this self-awareness that your body is
natural doing this this is actually a
pretty easy way uh to actually start to
leverage your body on your own behalf
yeah I mean at the very least at the end
of the day you're skimming off a ton of
calories that generally are not the best
for you right like like the the foods
that people tend to eat when when
curling up in front of the TV to binge
watch their favorite show those tend to
be not the most nutritious calories
anyway right that's right that's right
and actually so that then get to the the
quality of the food you're eating right
so think about it let's go back to the
car because I think it's something that
everyone can understand uh you know that
if you buy a brand new car um they
always tell you to put the highest
quality of gas you can in your tank look
if you in the beginning if you actually
put crappy gas in your tank your engine
is going to be running just fine it can
take it a while but every day you
actually put poor quality fuel in your
car your engine is going to suck
guarantee you over the long run it's not
going to run as well as as somebody who
takes care of their car by putting a
higher quality of gas so for food it's
the same thing our body remember our
metabolism is really just kind of like
an engine running the engine so the food
that we eat which is our fuel really is
like the quality of our fuel you put
good quality fuel into your body your
engine's going to run longer okay that's
a longer healthier more vibrant living
okay you put four quality food in your
body look once in a while you're going
to eat something that's not so good for
you no problem if you're generally
healthy you'll rebound we're highly
resilient but what we're talking about
are the people that
Snack drink junk you know uh harmful
foods uh and don't and pay very little
attention to Quality Food mother nature
in creating Foods um have laced these
foods with natural chemicals right um
these are called bioactives and they're
called bioactives because they're
biologically active and in a plant let
look at a strawberry for example okay
the tartness of strawberries you know
there strawberries are sweet and tart
the tartness comes from an acid
unsurprisingly called elic acid okay and
so you know when a strawberry is a
little tartter because it's got more
elic acid so um electric acid is a
powerful starver of cancer so it cuts
off the blood does that actually end up
in our bloodstream like can could I eat
strawberries and then you could draw my
blood and be like you had seven
strawberries absolutely
okay now but here's here's the even more
insane part what are these what are
these bioactiv doing in the plant they
are part of the plant's Health defense
system so these natural chemicals help
the plant defend themselves when we eat
them they have another job description
they do double duty and they actually
help to activate our own body self
defenses now here's one thing that I
think is a practical um value you know
for a long time people are sort of
talking about like well you know like
you should eat more organic and don't
need pesticides and stuff like that
here's a whole new take on this okay and
this is kind of smoking hot
information um pesticides actually kill
insects so that the plants um look
better um the leaves aren't as chewed up
and usually the fruits or vegetables
look a little bit better too right
that's just agriculture makes it look
better on the product look better on the
Shelf organic doesn't use that and so a
lot of times you you have the more
natural you know the bugs are nipping at
the leaves and chewing at the stems
guess what Mother Nature created things
like elic acid As Natural insecticides
and so basically when the um the plant
strawberry plant is being chewed on it
makes more elic acid to repel the bugs
it's a wound healing response and a
defensive response so organic foods have
more bioactives as a reaction I just was
uh involved with a study uh I was
meeting about yesterday talking about
coffee organic versus con conventionally
grown coffee conventional grown coffee
with pesticides organic coffee hands
down um this is a study at the
University of Warsaw University um hands
down um a pound-for-pound of coffee
being organic coffee has more bioactives
than the pesticide treated coffee
because the insects the natural things
in the environment cause it to create
more natural health
defenses dude this yeah this gets
incredible I can't believe I'm this deep
in my joury of health and all that and I
never realized that the actual chemical
compounds from food I always thought it
was the metabolites from the the
digestive process that was making its
way into the bloodstream which I know
also happens also happens yeah that's uh
that's really intriguing so one thing we
actually haven't talked a lot about
which is your specialty is angiogenesis
so when we eat something that has an
anti-angiogenesis
benefit is it like ubiquitous across
every blood vessel in the body or is it
doing
something creating some sort of KnockOn
effect like the antibody drip that we're
getting where it's somehow selectively
targeting things that are overproducing
something great question let me kind of
um frame it in uh uh first framing about
androgenesis in general so when we were
in our mom's wombs okay and sperm met
egg and started to form a little ball of
cells that didn't look anything like a
person yet but started to create little
organs and start to create shape the
first organs that could created our
blood vessels our circulation is the
first thing that gets created so our
blood supply our circulation is very
much a part of who we are and I
mentioned that we have 60,000 miles
worth of blood vessels just to give you
a sense of how extraordinarily big that
is if you were to pull out all the blood
vessels from from you or me and line
them up end to end that would form a
thread that would go around the earth
twice huge okay it is insane now um our
every single cell in our body every
organ require um relies on just the
right amount of blood flow so they're
getting fed with oxygen and nutrients um
uh they don't need more than just the
right amount and but if they don't have
enough our body has to be able to grow
more okay this having just the right
amount I call it the Goldilocks zone so
Goldilocks remember the the the story um
you know the Bears went in there and
it's not too hot not too cold not too
hard not too soft or our health defenses
including
angiogenesis is exactly the same way not
too much and not too little but just the
right amount so this just right Zone
exists for our blood vessels our stem
cells our microbiome our DNA kind of
balance as well as our immune system
it's all about homeo stasis the term you
used earlier just the right amount now
that means our body knows how to grow
more when it's necessary and then when
there's enough it stops and if there's
too much it's kind of like a a gardener
you know that sees your lawn over
growing it mows the lawn mows it right
back down till it gets to the right
height okay our body's Health defenses
when they're working at their best is
like a perfectly manicured lawn not too
much not too little just the right
amount to be able to uh to to to go
around like playing like rounds of golf
on a perfect course now um what tumors
do is they hijack this process and so
they like a tumor is sitting on a golf
course and just grows extra weeds and
grass right just for itself so that's
what gets targeted your body tries to
fight that off but sometimes we need
some extra help for it that extra help
can be a smart bomb drug that we um
designed to Target those extra blood
vessels or we can help our body mow the
lung by eating foods that have
anti-angiogenic or blood vessel mowing
capacity you'll never be able to get rid
of them all it's just back down to the
body's set point so what's an example of
um a drug that can actually do this
there's monoclinal antibodies that are
designed like smart bombs that take out
tumor blood vessels but foods can
actually do it too now why can drugs and
Foods Target a tumor blood vessel and
not take down your aorta or the blood
vessels feeding your brain like your
cored artery it's because because when
we build the healthy blood vessels we
take our body takes great care to
construct them to be very very strong
it's like building a skyscraper okay The
Architects and the contractors and their
Craftsmen they make everything perfect
as perfect as they can but when a tumor
does it you know it doesn't it's not
careful contractor it's like a lousy
contractor just throws it the thing up
and so the blood vessels are grown are
flimsy they're fragile they're stable
and so think about you know a hurricane
like hurricane Ida sweeps through the
area and the strong sturdy structures
our healthy blood vessels are going to
stay up even when the wind is there all
the ones that are not well constructed
the wind blows them right down and
that's why a tumor blood vessel is much
more vulnerable to either food or drug
wow that that's really
incredible okay so you wrote the book
Eat to beat disease we've touched on a
little bit but now I think it's worth
what what is your sort of General I know
that there's never going to be a
one-size fits-all it's very important
for people to understand but in terms of
General uh patterns of eating to be
disease what are those General patterns
yeah well first of all um when I wrote
EB disease which became a New York Times
bestseller uh the whole point was not
about writing about a diet it's not keto
it's not South Beach it's not about
weight loss even it's really about
health and because when I was um doing
my research to look at different foods
that would activate our health defenses
here's the first thing I was surprised
by it's not like one food or two Foods
or five foods or it was more than 200
different kinds of foods and they were
fruits and they were vegetables they
were spices and they were legumes and
they were different kinds of seafood
including shellfish and they were
different kinds of fish Beyond salmon
okay um and and there's even some dairy
products that can actually have some
benefits as well including fermented
foods like yogurt and sauerkraut and
kimchi and these foods are so ubiquitous
that they are found in the traditional
cultures of every single Society but
especially Mediterranean diet which we
know is healthier for us as a pattern
and Asian food which we also know is
healthier and so what I started to
realize is that eating to beat disease
is not just picking a particular disease
and trying to figure out what the recipe
is that the one size fits off
but it's really um a journey that we
have our whole lives from the time we're
small until we get old we get older um
parents have the opportunity to actually
start feeding their children when as
soon as they're taking solid food foods
that can actually help them beat disease
in fact in fact breastfeeding is
actually helping your child um beat
Disease by uh shaping and sculpting
their microbiome right one of the health
defense systems so I came up with 200
different foods I laid them all out
According to which health defense
systems they act activate some cases
they activate all of the health defense
systems I call those grand Slammers
because man a single food will knock out
you know knock the five Health defenses
out of the park it's a home run to eat
those things and I explain all the
research that's been done by myself and
other people to show how they actually
work so what's the principle to eat to
beat disease you can love your food to
love your health love your food to love
your health that seems so contradictory
to what we used to think about healthy
food right because the old thinking is
that well you gotta eat healthy you got
to cut out everything you love you know
and and and I'm I'm turning that upside
down inside out I'm inverting the whole
equation I'm saying if you look at those
200 foods that I put down in my bookie
to be disease take them Sharpie out and
circle the ones that you love already I
like this I like that one Tomatoes I
like oh man I like this one okay that's
a great starting point because if you
start eating those Foods you're already
ahead of the game because you already
love foods that can actually eat that
can activate your health defenses now
you can explore expand your horizons by
choosing these other foods that are out
there as well if you sat in TV and watch
a food a Food Network you can find all
these people experimenting with
different ingredients if you go on to
YouTube you can look for an ingredient
you don't recognize bitter melon the
heck is a bitter melon well it's an
Asian gourd is it bitter absolutely but
there are ways of actually cooking it so
it's not so bitter and it has medicinal
value well how would I do it click on
YouTube and search on recipe cooking
bitter melon and you'll watch somebody
teach it to you so love your food to
love your health explore with your life
and just know the foods I put in the
book activate your body's Health
defenses right and some of the things I
know you've recommended um historically
mostly P
plant-based um you talk about getting
some omega-3 from Marine sources uh
whether it's from fish or whether it's
from
uh I I think you talk about seaweed
you'd have to refresh my memory um
you do personally eat some meat though I
don't know if you eat any red meat or
not I know you recommend that people cut
that down uh extra virgin olive oil um
things like that am I missing any of the
the heavy hitting
advice well I mean so here here's the
basic thing um all the research
scientific research has been done and
the epidemiological the public health
research shows that eating a plant-based
mostly plant-based diet that that's
pretty broad you know um uh fruits
vegetables legumes nuts healthy oils
good for you you should eat most of
mostly that doesn't mean and by the way
plant-based could be tricky because a
lot of ultra processed foods also have
um plant materials in it processed soy
all kinds of other things all kinds of
unhealthy oils made from Plants however
it's whole plant-based Foods it's kind
of stuff you'd find a grocery store or a
farmers market okay like I would say
mostly go for those mostly go for those
okay um Seafood has been shown to
improve survival and decrease the risk
of death if you eat two or three
servings of of seafood shell it could be
F fish or shellfish um you get healthy
omega-3 fatty acids is that per day per
week two to three servings per week and
the amount you would eat uh which I
write a whole chapter about food doses
um amount you would eat is about three
ounces so people like well wait I'm not
a human scale I have no idea what three
ounces is what I would say it's a lot
less than you think it is a piece of
fish about the size of a deck of playing
cards you can put it in your palm it's
about y it's about as thick as a deck of
playing cards not that big a deal and
you know um and and people who love
seafood can can get a lot of it that way
recently there was an interesting study
that showed if you actually increase
your level of Omega-3s by an extra
serving a week or two like from wherever
you are with your starting point you can
increase your longevity your surv surval
by 4.7 years so an extra serving of of
of of Omega-3 Rich Seafood you increase
your Survival by LifeTime Survival by
4.7 years now you can get if you're a
vegan or a vegetarian you can get
Omega-3s from plant-based Foods so chia
seeds flax seeds some of the nuts you
can get those as well but what in
plant-based Foods you get a different
kind of substrate to make your Omega-3s
so you got to eat a lot more of it so
you know um I I I I like diversity so um
plant whole plant-based Foods Seafoods
if you actually eat fish um if you don't
explore it if it's not for some ethical
reason um and then you know look uh and
dairy by the way you know when it comes
to Food and Health there's no universals
okay some dairy products you know like
honestly cheeses are good for the
microbiome because many traditionally
made cheeses not in large quantities
they've got saturated fats and a lot of
salt but some cheeses actually have
lactobacillus another healthy gut back
bacteria that we can use as a probiotic
food yogurt a dairy product probiotic
food and so I'm all about the science
wherever the science takes me is where
the evidence takes me there is a great
American novelist named elel Doo and he
had this great uh quote he once said
writing he's a novelist writing is like
driving at night um you can't uh see
beyond your headlights but you can make
the whole trip that way and that's what
science is like you just can only see
where your headlights are going and
you're focusing on the evidence and
ignoring all the darkness that's out
actually out there so what about meat
okay um I can tell you that most of the
research has been pretty convincing that
if you eat a lot of red meat okay which
was really only done for the last 70
years or so like you know since the
1950s um before that most societies
didn't have we're we're not prosperous
enough to have a ton of meat around okay
and and now we have an abundance of meat
that we've industrialized meat and all
the things that are not so good for us
but um all the studies show that eating
a lot of red meat and all the Studies
have shown that eating processed Meats
we're talking about our sausages and the
pepperonis and all kinds of other hot
dogs all that kind of stuff um that's
been classified by the World Health
Organization as a carcinogen by the way
processed meats you know once in a while
especially if that's something you
really enjoy don't worry about it knock
yourself out enjoy it but do not do it
all the time and if you can cut it down
or cut it out more power to you better
for you and so this whole idea about you
know life is for the living got to enjoy
our how we do things you know some
things we enjoy aren't that good for us
you know some people like to roll down
the windows or take the top down and
drive really fast on a on a road faster
than the speed limit just don't do it
all the time because one of these times
you're gonna actually get into an
accident right and so I think that idea
of moderation but if you're informed by
science and you can actually then listen
into your body you feel like crap after
eating something don't go for it don't
eat it the next time or eat less of it
the the science is just so rich at this
point in time in history that you know
anybody that wants to get into food as
medicine as a science not as a trend
that is a real science has a huge future
ahead of them our body is actually
hardwired with all the processes we need
to maintain our health from the day
we're born until our very last breath
and what food s do is not something
magical foods that we consume activate
our body's own hardwired health defenses
and that's actually why we don't get
sick more
often I love that and I think that's
something quite unique about your
approach when it comes to food and
medicine I want to get into some
specific Foods later on in this
conversation but just to sort of um
tease people as it were right the starts
are there a couple of kind of facts
about some specific foods that you think
would be surprising for people that a
lot of people may not be aware
of yeah well uh first of all there are a
there's a lot of Mythology about foods
and some of it's wrong and when I say
myth I'm referring to urban legends so
as a bit of a teaser um most people most
women have heard that soy should be
avoided because it's dangerous so eating
soy
can uh increase your risk for breast
cancer that is a common uh thought but
it's completely false it is an urban
legend research actually shows that
those women who are at highest risk
including women who have breast cancer
the more soy they eat the lower their
chances of death and so that's an
example of an eye-opening uh fact that
science Springs to the table about soy
uh here's another one many people have
heard that Tomatoes should be avoided
because they're a member of the
nightshade family which is poisonous and
that Tomatoes contain a deadly toxin
called uh lectins that should be avoided
and it causes inflammation in the body
well that's also completely wrong there
are thousands of lectins out there
Tomatoes happen to have some of the
non-toxic ones um and in fact the
studies of tomatoes have actually shown
in more than 30,000 people that those
men who eat just two to three servings
of cooked Tomatoes a week have a 30%
lower risk of developing prostate cancer
and so again two examples of common
foods that are surrounded by Urban
modern mythology that science cuts
through like a hot knife through butter
in order to reveal what the true health
benefits could be yeah thank you for
sharing that
and yeah later on in this conversation
I'd love to get into some more more
specifics around particular foods but I
think at the start
here just to sort of set the scene one
of the things that really struck me
about your approach is you know how you
look at health and disease so many of us
you know I'm a medical doctor I trained
in the '90s in edor medical school you
know we're trained how to diagnose
disease and then treat it and sometimes
we talk about preventing disease in the
future but you sort of refrain FR that
slightly didn't you to sort of ask
yourself well why is it that we're not
getting sick more often and I think
that's a really beautiful that's a
subtle distinction but it's but it's
such a a beautiful way of looking at the
human body so can you tell me a little
bit about you know why did you frame it
that way and by doing so what answers
did you get that can help us all with
our health and
well-being yeah so like yourself during
my education and training in
medicine you know we're all uh
responsible for digesting about 4,000
years of Western Medical knowledge in in
a few years and then to be able to in
short order turn that around into
everyday practice for our patients right
so that's a tall order just to begin
with and most of it is about D learning
how to um detect diagnose diseases
accurately as accurately as possible and
then coming up with essentially a text
book solution I mean that's what we're
taught to do uh from the very beginning
recognize the disease recognize the
solution try to match them up and then
actually deliver that as as something
that we can use to help our patients and
and uh I did that for many many years
and in fact I was so inspired by the um
unmet needs for treating diseases some
diseases successfully like cancer like
diabetes like blindness frankly I wound
up actually being starting a nonprofit
organization
called the angiogenesis foundation it's
the charity where we as a third party
set out to develop better treatments for
all of these you know kind of unbeatable
diseases looking for their disease
common denominator I'm going to come
back to common denominator in a second I
felt that although you know billions of
dollars had been spent towards cancer
research or research to prevent
blindness as just two different examples
or breast cancer or or Alzheimer's
disease progress in science was
formidable but progress in treatment was
way too slow and my thought was that if
we could actually look at what makes
diseases common and similar to one
another rather than appreciate only what
makes them different from one another so
as a researcher we tend to take a take a
study a field of study an inch wide and
then dive a mile deep into exploring it
what I wanted to do was to really upend
that idea to say well maybe what we
should do is take a look at many
diseases and see what the common threads
are because if we could find that Common
Thread we might be able to pull the bow
back and send the single Arrow more
efficiently through multiple diseases to
have an economy of scale of impact okay
so when I did that we want up becoming
enormously successful I've been involved
with 41 about to be 42 FDA approved
treatments for cancer di complications
of diabetes and vision loss and with
that kind of success one of the things
that it made me realize was the power of
science to generate evidence that
something works and the other thing that
I realized is that treating
disease was highly valuable but really
misses the mark of preventing the
disease in the first place because if
all we do as a sort of in our medical
world is invent new things to throw at
Old diseases in this NeverEnding
progression then we're chasing really
the tale of a beast that will never
catch and I wanted to be able to
actually figure out how to you know
prevent the problem in the first place
now a a short story about what actually
happened that sparked me towards
nutrition is uh I was a a doctor for
many years in a veterans hospital this
is a hospital in the US that takes care
of people who are former
soldiers and you know as a payback for
their service uh they can come to a
medical center uh and and receive
essentially free care and I I felt
compelled a duty actually when I
finished my training to be able to pay
back uh the people who helped to um
support and defend uh the country and so
I I took on a stint um at a Veterans
Hospital these were some of my favorite
patients uh they were uh they were
grateful they were uh they had Rich
lives they had amazing stories to tell
and they were just nice people and
unfortunately though they were pretty
sick so most of the people that I saw
were in their 60s and 70s and 80s were
terribly obese they had diabetes heart
disease cancer respiratory illnesses you
name it they had these terrible problems
and the thing that struck me that you
know because here I was writing
prescriptions and sending people The
Specialist and having them have surgery
and all these other interventions and I
was very excited actually at the very
beginning to be able to let them know
some of the treatments that I myself had
been involved with helping to
develop but what I realized that was the
IR
is that these soldiers who were so
terribly out of shape in the latter part
of their lives were once cut fit buff
physical specimens that couldn't have
even served in the military unless they
were in perfect shape and so I asked
myself what the hell happened to these
people yeah they were in great shape and
now they're in terrible shape and that's
what led me on sort of this um Odyssey
to think back about what must of like
what kept them from being sick in the
early days and then what actually
happened to their bodies that led them
to deteriorate and that's where I came
back to this health defense the health
defenses that are hardwired in our body
because like the so like like soldiers
that they were you know they once were
the Defenders of the country but um uh
as they got older their ability to
defend actually waned and and so too in
our body I realized there's these
biological systems that keep us fit keep
us healthy and if we're not careful to
take good care of them they too will W
in their power to defend us and that's
actually how we wind up getting sick
yeah it's very powerful what you just
shared about the veterans hospital
because I think although that's in the
latter stages of their life I'm sure
there's many people listening to this
right now or watching this who would
have resonated with that on some level
and thought hey you know what when I was
at school I used to swim or you know
maybe I was on the college or the
university squash team or the tennis
team and now in my middle age I've got a
bit of uh extra weight I don't have as
much energy so you know it's on a
Continuum isn't it and and of course the
end of that Continuum that's where we
tend to get involved as medical doctors
Western medical doctors at least and we
say oh you have this disease now but
actually I think it's a very powerful
way of just showing gradually without us
realizing as we're you know getting on
with our daily lives our health can be
deteriorating bit by bit in terms of
these defense systems you also mentioned
at the start of this conversation the
word resilience and how what you try and
do or or certainly food when used as
medicine can really help us with that
resilience perhaps could you take us
through these defense systems that
you've learned about because I know
you've identified five of them I think
that would be really interesting for my
audience what those are and then I think
we'll get to well what can we actually
do about each and every single one yeah
well let's talk a little bit about
resilience first before I talk about the
health defenses so think about how
resilient the human body is right I mean
uh we can take we can take a punch and
we can get back up on our feet pretty
easily throughout most of our Lives um
our body knows how to heal so if you
wind up getting a cold you tend to
recover from it if you get a cut on your
skin it tends to heal up um if our belly
gets upset
and we wind up uh you know uh uh feeling
we're in a toilet uh in ways that are
not comfortable for us we'll generally
rebound back to our normal health I mean
that's really most of the experiences
that we have as we're younger and that
resilience actually is quite an amazing
thing because it has to do with this
concept that we learn as doctors which
is homeostasis our body wants to stay in
a homeostatic position and that means
like a gyroscope you know or like a big
ocean liner you know sailing through you
know rough Seas there is kind of a set
point that no matter how big the waves
are we tend to kind of stay our center
of gravity is where everything wants to
get back to and that is actually
critical Health now how what's the
gyroscopes of our health how do we
actually maintain our balance how do we
how do we Veer off to the side but
rebound back to that Center Point our
own center of gravity and that's where
these Health defenses actually come into
play so uh our health defenses uh which
I'm going to tell you f the five of them
in a moment actually started to be
developed in our bodies when we were
still in our mom's womb so when our
mom's egg met our dad's sperm and
fertilized in the womb within about four
or five days these cells primitive cells
uh and stem cells wound up forming our
organs you know our our our circulation
our hearts our brains our noses our
hands our our feet our bones
and along the way at the same time our
body form these remarkable defenses now
these defenses are designed to protect
our bodies the same way that in a
European Fortress a medieval Fortress
there are these defenses right yeah you
have the moat you actually have the
drawbridge you have those Arrow slits
that you can shoot out of you've got the
curved wall all these defenses that you
find in a castle there is a counterpart
in our body in in our body our defenses
to keep us healthy and and resist
disease and help us maintain resilience
are the following number one we have a
defense called
angiogenesis angiogenesis two words uh
it's actually one word but it's two
component parts of it angio meaning
blood or blood vessels Genesis meaning
growth so it's how our body grows blood
vessels our circulation and the reason
blood vessels are a defense system is
because we've got 60,000 miles worth of
blood vessels packed into the average
adult body and these are the highways
and byways that deliver blood oxygen
that we breathe and the nutrients from
the food we eat to every single cell in
organ and if we don't have enough of
these blood vessels our our tissues our
organs starve and many times they'll die
so we need to our body needs to be able
to maintain enough uh blood vessels
enough circulation and on the other hand
if we've got too many blood vessels and
overage overgrowth that would be like a
um a garden that overgrows with weeds
those weeds actually obscure the
function of a garden and they can
actually destroy our health by feeding
diseases extra blood vessels can feed
diseases like cancer as an example or
arthritis or psoriasis or many other
types of harmful uh extra blood unwanted
blood vessels and so the body maintains
its resilience in circulation by
literally maintaining a balance this set
point this gyroscope center of gravity
and the way that I tell people it's kind
of like the old um fairy tale Goldilocks
so not too many blood vessels not too
few blood vessels just but just right
like the Three Bears yeah the not too
hard not too soft not too hot not too
cold just right this is a paradigm that
follows all the health defenses so blood
vessels are one of them secondly are our
stem cells remember I said that we
formed in a womb with stem cells yeah
well when we're born we have extra stem
cells left over that we're not used so
it's kind of like painting a room uh if
you're painting a room and you're going
to buy paint right you always buy extra
paint because the last thing you want to
do is to run out of paint before you
finish the job what do you do when the
when the room has been completed from
painting you've got extra cans of paint
so what do you do you put the cap on you
put it in your garage okay for for
another time if you need to spot check
well this is actually what happens with
our stem cells when we're born and our
organs have formed all these stem cells
the ovary
and we've got extra stem cells in fact
we've got 750 million extra stem cells
when we're born that gets packed up into
our bone marrow where it basically sits
for most of our Lives until we need to
repair our organs from the inside out so
regeneration our ability to be able to
renew ourselves is another Health
defense system the third one is our gut
our gut microbiome so much has been made
of how important our gut bacteria is um
I will tell you we're just stretching
the of the iceberg of understanding our
gut bacteria but I will tell you it is
so important that we've got about
roughly the same number of bacteria
growing inside our body as we actually
have human cells and Beyond bacteria
there's even viruses that are healthy
viruses um I just learned this the other
day you know we've got about 39 trillion
bacteria growing inside our body most of
them are healthy and as you know when we
were in medical school we were all
taught you know we drank the Kool-Aid
that bacteria are bad and so one must
destroy bacteria and hence there are
antibiotics to match with bacteria but
in fact most bacteria in our bodies are
good and occasionally there is a bad
actor that kind of Springs out and and
so uh the the but what I learned was
that there are good viruses as well in
fact there are 10 times more viruses in
and on the body than than bacteria so
it's 380 trillion viruses the human
viral our DNA is hardwired is a fourth
Health defense system hardwired to
protect itself against damage from the
environment like ultraviolet radiation
radon from the ground any chemicals
solvents we might
inhale oxidative stress even emotional
stress which can actually Fray Our our
DNA our genetic code our DNA can protect
that and of course finally our immune
system which like a uh like the volume
switch on a car radio is perfectly tuned
to be able to deliver a little
inflammation where it's needed a lot of
immune protection to be able to ward off
Invaders from the outside like bacteria
and viruses and Invaders from the inside
like cancer and that whole system like a
volume switch on a radio needs to be
able to turn up and when you've had
enough to turn it back down and and back
down to that homeostatic balancing point
that set point and for all these Health
defense systems our body kind of chugs
along through life getting keeping us
right sort of Steady As She Goes every
now then it's got to rear up um and and
swash buckle to get rid of some disease
but it comes right back to Center uh and
that's what foods can actually help the
support hi there if you enjoyed watching
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