Dhru Purohit Show - A Doctor Ranks the Best and Worst Foods For Your Gut Health and Shares How Much Fiber You Need to Be Eating Daily with Dr. Karan Rajan

Episode Date: November 5, 2025

This episode is brought to you by BiOptimizers, Cozy Earth, Ollie, and  BUBS Naturals. Most of us know fiber is essential for gut health, but actually getting enough of it can be confusing. Today���s guest breaks it all down, showing us exactly what to eat and the simple daily habits that make it easier to optimize your health, keep your gut happy, and help prevent chronic disease. Today on The Dhru Purohit Show, Dhru sits down for round two with Dr. Karan Rajan to tier-rank the best and worst things you can do for your gut health. Dr. Karan shares his favorite fiber-rich foods and breaks down which trendy products are worth skipping and which can be enjoyed as an occasional treat. He also offers simple, practical tips for adding more fiber to your diet through tasty snacks and everyday foods that help you stay consistent with your fiber goals. He also explores the everyday habits that can quietly harm your gut and shares new research showing why fiber should be a daily priority for optimal health and longevity. Dr. Karan Rajan is a doctor and one of the biggest health & science creators on social media. Since 2020, he has amassed over 11 million followers across TikTok, YouTube, Instagram & Facebook with his refreshingly frank medical myth-busting and health advice videos which combine education, entertainment, and generous servings of dark humour. In this episode, Dhru and Dr. Rajan dive into:  Are green bananas good or bad? (00:43) Why getting 50 grams of fiber a day is essential for long-term health (3:05) What to look for in a fiber supplement (6:42) Dark chocolate as a fiber-rich food and snack (10:46) Simple foods and snacks to help you reach 30 grams of fiber a day (13:51) Dr. Karan’s new fiber supplement (29:29) How to make tacos fiber-rich and gut-friendly (38:13) Dr. Karan’s go-to morning routine and Dhru’s protein shake (43:06) Are prebiotic sodas actually good for gut health? (47:56) Three reasons late-night snacking can harm your gut health (1:03:06) The connection between oral health and the gut microbiome (1:09:25) Should you take a super greens powder? (1:13:04) Dr. Karan’s advice for improving health habits and staying consistent (1:17:43) Final thoughts and takeaways (1:19:14) Also mentioned in this episode: LOAM Dhru’s shake recipe Kraut Krackers For more on Dr. Rajan, follow him on Facebook, X/Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, LinkedIn, or visit his Website. This episode is brought to you by BiOptimizers, Cozy Earth, Ollie, and Bubs Collagen. Go to bioptimizers.com/dhru now and enter promo code DHRU to get 15% off any order of Magnesium Breakthrough and find out this month’s gift with purchase. Black Friday has come early! You can stack my code DHRU on top of Cozy Earth’s sitewide sale for up to 40% off. Just head over to cozyearth.com/dhru today. Want to give your dog the best in clean eating? Take the online quiz and introduce Ollie to your pet. Right now, Ollie is offering 60% off your first box of meals when you subscribe today! Just head to Ollie.com, use the code DHRU, and you’ll get 60% off your first box of meals in your subscription. Support your skin and your health with BUBS Naturals Collagen Peptides. Head to BUBSNaturals.com and use code DHRU for 20% off your order. Sign up for Dhru’s Try This Newsletter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today we are talking about some of the best and worst things you can do for your gut health, including some of the best and worst fibers that are out there with me today. Medical doctor, science educator, Dr. Curran, welcome to back to the podcast. Drew, thanks for having me. Round two. Here we go. I'm super excited for today's episode. We're going to be ranking here on today's episode.

And for those that don't know, we have a whole tier ranking system. If you're listening on audio, we have S is the best. A, B, C, D, F being the worst. I don't know if anything's going to make it on that list, maybe a couple. And we're going to start off with something that a lot of people actually have even heard of, don't know if it's good or bad, and that's green bananas. Why am I asking you about green bananas? What are they about and where would you rank them on our tiered list?

Ooh, green bananas, I do love green bananas. A lot of people don't love them because they have less sugar and less of it. sweet taste, but green bananas are, because of less sugar, they are higher in resistant starch. And as the banana ripens and as it becomes more yellow, that sugar content increases and the resistant starch content goes down. So resistant starch is something that has a prebiotic-like effect on the human body where it's not digested in the small intestine, make its way to the colon, where it's fermented by gut bacteria, and especially it makes it weigh all the way to the end, to the distal colon, where there's a high abundance of butrate-producing bacteria, which then produce

butrate, which is a short-chain fatty acid, which nourishes the colonocytes, the cells lining the colon. So for that reason, green bananas, similar to day-old rice or cooked and cooled rice or potatoes or any carbohydrate, is very good for your gut health. Hmm. With someone with a sensitive gut, having lots of resistant starch can sometimes be abrasive to their gut. So for that reason, I will put green bananas in A. In an A.

So they're great, but you don't want to go, you don't want to listen to this podcast and say, Dr. Curran, who knows everything about the gut, is saying green bananas are great, I'm going to go eat 12 of them right now. Yeah. But, you know, I think it's a great food. if I eat a banana during a day, it will generally be like kind of on the greenish side of things, a little bit of yellow, but greenish. And then, you know, like other sort of sister foods would be things like cassava and plantin,

love them. But yeah, I would put it as an A tier. It doesn't make it for the S tier for me right now. Yeah, yeah. And zooming out even a little bit more, you know, we're talking about some of the best and worst habits for gut health, but we're also talking about some of the best and worst fibers because you were just on the podcast recently talking about why you personally, again, this is your personal goal, and I've kind of adopted

as my goal now too, why you strive to have about 50 grams of fiber in a day at least. Give our audience a little bit of a recap for the top few reasons, maybe one, two or three, that you found for you personally that getting that much fiber is essential for you feeling well and for your long-term health goals. You know, I've slowly increased my fiber intake over many years to this 50, 60 gram per day intake. And if we look at some of the data on studies that are done on carbohydrates and fiber intake, there is no specific cutoff beyond which you start seeing no additional gains, right? The dose response curves in these studies suggest that there is increasing yield and benefits beyond 30 grams.

It's not a linear curve or a linear graph where if you double your fiber intake to 60 grams, you're getting double the benefits. It doesn't work like that. there are, you know, there is like a diminishing gains. But if we look at some of these subsistence populations, non-industrial populations, that are eating over 100 grams of fiber a day, they have some of the lowest rates of chronic disease. And for that reason, I try to increase my fiber intake as much as I can, not only for the gut benefits, but for mood benefits, skin benefits, immune benefits,

metabolic benefits for glucose regulation, insulin sensitivity, cholesterol. You know, there's not much in the human body in terms of wellness that fiber isn't associated with either directly or indirectly. You know, a lot of South Asians and even separate from the South Asian population, there's a lot of people that care about their heart health. And there's all these incredible experiments. You know, people got the memo over the last few years about protein and making sure that we don't under-eat on protein, especially as we age.

But then a lot of people, as they started prioritizing their protein, and I saw this with my community, their fibers started going down. And they've gotten back the memo again, largely to people. people like you. And there's other individuals that are there that are talking about their N of one experiments where they're adding back in significant amounts of fiber in the form that works best for them because fiber is so hyper personal. And they're lowering their LDL. They're lowering their APOB. Talk to us about what's happening there. I found a similar N equals one as well. And beyond N equals one, we know that fiber, especially soluble fibers, have a very

good evidence base at lowering LDL cholesterol. And what happens is your liver and, you know, produces all of this cholesterol, some of that cholesterol ends up in bile acids and it makes its way to the intestines. Fiber that you consume, especially soluble fiber, can bind and trap some of those bile acids and excrete it via feces and your stool. and that has a direct role at lowering cholesterol. You know, that's one of the roles that fiber does, one of the many things that fiber does.

And obviously, we know that LDL cholesterol, lowering that is beneficial for long-term heart disease risk. Yeah, that's great. You know, one of the ways that you've told people that is a great way to up your fiber, and there's a lot of ways to do it. We're going to be chatting about those today, is that you can take things that you're already doing,

and then you can find a fiber that could potentially work well for you there and add it into that. One of the ways that I've been doing this in my own life is that I've been adding in this product here. For those that are listening, we have a bottle of a jar of cillium husk

and I want to get your thoughts. Cillium husk, especially whole husk fiber, where would you rank that on our tiered list? You know what? I'm going to put that in a tier as well. And the reason

it's not lower than eight here is because it's got good evidence base behind some of those metabolic benefits like lowering cholesterol is good research, you know, empirical data to suggest that. Beyond metabolic benefits like the cholesterol, it's also a viscous fiber as well, which means, you know, it traps the water and it forms this sort of jelly-like consistency. And that also helps in binding some of these things that we want to get rid of in our bodies, but also it expands. You know, when you see salium husk granules or husk powder, it's not a huge volume, but when you add it to water, it expands significantly, and that has a satiating effect. It makes you feel full as well, which can be helpful for weight loss and stop you over-consuming calories.

Now, so it's pretty effective from, you know, that fiber point of view, and it also helps with bulk formation helps you poop more regularly, a ton of good benefits. The reason it doesn't make it to S-tier is because when I'm consuming fiber, especially in supplement form, I want something that has high prebiotic potential and prebiotic activity. What do I mean by that is that does it have a significant role in manipulating and influencing the microbiome? Cillium Husk has a very limited prebiotic effect, right? It's more of that physical effect that it has, bulk forming and, you know, viscous and satiating. And also it's a monofiber. It has just cilium husk. It doesn't have other fibers. When I'm taking fiber supplements, I want variety. I want diversity of fibers

that can mimic as close as it can to dietary diversity in real foods. So it lacks that. It's just one fiber. And thirdly, it doesn't have the most pleasant mouth fill. It has this sort of mucus snot-like consistency. And you have to add it to other things to almost get rid of that user experience that's not great. So those are the downsides, but there are a lot of upsides. Hence, it makes its way to a tier. It's a great food. You know, it's a great substance to add in, but not quite elite level. I try to bury it in my smoothies, so I don't even notice it, right? And if somebody is constipated, which a lot of the population is around the world, primarily in the Western Hemisphere, if somebody's constipated, it seems like one of the go-to places that a clinician or somebody working with them would start off with would be something gentle like a Cillium husk.

Is that right? Cillium huff. In addition to like food-based fibers that are out there. Yeah, absolutely. As a, as something to help with constipation, it's very effective. In fact, because it's got both soluble and insoluble components to it, it's effective for both constipation and diarrhea, because of its binding properties and the way it can absorb water

and have that effect, but also from the constipation. It's actually dual acting. So, you know, for that reason, it's very highly recommended by a lot of physicians. You know, one of the things that I love about the work that you do is that on your education about the gut microbiome and the importance of taking care of it and how so many different diseases that we all know are connected to a poorly functioning gut and bad gut health.

And fiber is a huge part of that. What I love is that you're very inclusive on your fibers. You're showing people that there's a lot of foods that are out there that can work as part of your goal of hitting 50 grams. Somebody who's not as well educated on fibers, they think, oh my gosh, am I just eating a ton of oatmeal all day or brand or other stuff. There's actually a lot that you can have.

And one of the surprising ones that people don't know about. And again, this is part of it. It's not like we're telling you to only this food all day is dark chocolate. Talk to us about dark chocolate. And where would you rank it honestly on this list? Yeah. So dark chocolate. And we're talking about dark chocolate that's above 70% cocoa concentration, right?

It needs to be at least that or above to then come into the conversation. of it being a fiber-rich food snack or a gut health adjunct. And so I would put dark chocolate as B-tier. Right? I still think a B-grade is good. Yeah. You know, if your kid gets a B on his test, I'm like, okay, that's not bad. You know, you could get higher, but at least it's not a C or a D or an E or an F.

So, yeah, B, I would say B for. these reasons. So why is it not lower? It's because as you increase the concentration of cocoa from 70 to beyond like even 100, it increases its potency from antioxidants, polyphenols, but also fiber content as well. It goes up, you know, gram for gram. It goes up as you go up as well. Why is it not any higher? Is because at the end of the day, at the lower reaches of, you know, 70%, 75%, 80%, it still has like some sugar content and it also depends on the quality of dark chocolate that you're getting it from. Most of these store bought dark chocolates from your average supermarket or grocery store are going to be somewhat ultra processed.

They're going to have high amounts of sugar, various additives. You don't know where it's sourced from. Is it ethically sourced? There's also been some concerns about contamination. However, I don't think that's like a major worry for some of these like really highly sourced, high-quality dark chocolates. Same conversation for, you know, this kind of like good roasts of coffee as well.

So for those things, it's not something that I would say you can eat mounds of, right? And then be like, yeah, it's a health food. Or this is the way that I'm going to get my fiber. Yeah, exactly. Like, you know, if you compare green bananas and dark chocolates,

I would say it's like night and day. You know, green bananas are generally very low in sugar. It gives you a boost of carbohydrates and energy. It has other, you know, minerals and nutrients and the fiber and the prebiotics. It's got fructo-oligosaccharides. Dark chocolate, as a snack, if you just wanted to break the mold and, you know, like, cheat a little bit, it's still super healthy. You can mix it with berries. You can put it into your smoothies, mix it in, melt it with your oatmeal. It's very functional, very like, you know, as like an

additives, as like a sweet treat. But it's not something that you need to include in your routine. It just turns out, hey, this is not bad for gut health, and you can justify consuming it. That's why I want to leave it as a B-T. I pulled up an image from a social media post on a new company you're working on. I'll have you share in a second. And this is a way that you're highlighting for people who can't fathom, how do I even get to 30 grams? You know, just for background, so many people here, especially in America, they're not even hitting 15 to 20 grams. So the idea of getting to 30, which is a great initial goal for them, they're like, how would I do that?

So first, do you want to just give a little background about the company that you're building? And that's part of the reason that you're here in America and we're chatting here in L.A. And then we'll break down the social media post. It's officially Black Friday saving season and this one is massive. You've heard about me talk about bioptimizers for years. Shout out to my brother-in-law, Dr. Neil Patel, because he was the first person to tell me about them. And we love them because they're science-backed, lab tested supplements, and effective. few of our favorites that you'll always see in our supplement cabinet are magnesium and sleep

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And if you get a post-purchase survey, make sure you mention you heard about Cozy Earth right here on the Drew Perode show. Wrap the loved ones you love in luxury this holiday season with Cozy Earth. Yeah. So Loam Science is a microbiome startup that we are launching next Wednesday. And the aim behind that is that I see a lot of problems with gut health as an Indian. and especially gut health supplements and products that are available out there, where there's a lack of scientific rigor and research on there. So I want to innovate not only products and solutions

for people's microbiomes and basically the grand aim being to save people's microbiome from extinction, but also to innovate and pioneer new research in that area as well. And one of the first products we're launching with is a first of its kind multi-prebiotic fiber blend that hits the sweet spot between user experience where it can add to water and it will dissolve and go clear just like water, but it also has clinical validation of the ingredients behind it. It has a great user experience with no mouth feel, no chalkiness, no grittiness, has a high dose, 10 grams of fiber in a serving, and diversity. You know, it's not a monofiber, it's a poly fiber, has multiple prebiotics, multiple fibers, which have very potent prebiotic effects at different parts of your microbiome,

and really targets the entire colon and has benefits beyond pooping. Immunity, gut health, metabolic health, gut brain effects. So really excited to bring that out to the world. That's exciting. Congratulations. Definitely following along. You've given me a sample over here, so I'm going to try it out. I'll let you know what I think.

I'm sure I'm going to love it. And again, I've been very vocal with my audience about how I'm always looking for different tools that I could use, snacks, products, other things, in addition to Whole Food. That's the foundation, of course, to help me make eating healthy fun. And I celebrate any entrepreneur that's going to be creating better things that are out there that can help our population. We have so many examples of ultra-processed foods that are out there that will help your gut spiral downward.

We need a lot of examples of products, companies, solutions that are out there to help us spiral upward. Okay, let's break down this social media post. This is one slide of how you could get. to 30 grams of fiber in a day. We're sharing it on YouTube, but explain it for our audience and walk us through how you would hit a target of 30 grams of fiber in a day

with some of the things that you've mentioned. Yeah, I mean, if you look at that, right? So we've got, you know, an apple sliced up, we've got just a couple of tablespoons of chia seeds and we've got like a serving of oats, cup of raspberries and almonds. Across those five things. Like, you could realistically,

if you were a bit of a daredevil, have all of that in one meal, like potentially. Like you could have oatmeal, like overnight oats that has all those components and hit 30 grams in one meal, essentially. So I don't think someone looking at that, those five items, they're not hard to source from your supermarket or buy online. They're very common foods that people are already eating. Maybe the chia seeds could be new. but looking at something like that visually

tells you actually how simple it can be if you structure your shopping and your meal plans, how easy it is to hit that baseline 30 grams. I mean, you know, that is pretty simple and I think most people should use this as like a cheat guide to try and do that. Yeah, you look at it and you see one ounce of chia seeds

is 10 grams of fiber. Right? You visually look at it, it's so small. But yet it packs a powerful punch. Another one on here, too, one cup of raspberries, eight grams of fiber, right? We could easily crush that. Easy.

Easily crush that. Let's go to the next slide in this social media image over here. Here's some other examples. And if you want to highlight any of the benefits of these specific foods in particular, you know, definitely go for that. So this is another slide. If you could share what's on the screen over here.

Yeah. So again, you know, you could almost argue we're moving from breakfast options to like a lunch or dinner option. So you've got three large carrots. You know, again, not only is it high in fiber, but also, you know, it's rich in beta carotene, the antioxidant effect.

Sweet potatoes, they would be rich in resistant starches, but also the fibers and the prebiotics as well. So, you know, these would be the types of fibers that make it all the way to the end of the colon and start fermenting. Broccoli as well, just adding in more color, other antioxidants like sulforophanine that it's got. as well. Brown rice, yeah, as an Indian, I love rice. And you can throw this in with the chickpeas as well. Like the rice and chickpeas combined so well. Everything here combines it really well. And

I think a lot of people complain that in a plant-based diet, you're not getting all the essential amino acids, but you are. If you combine different plant sources and protein sources, you are getting that, right? Chickpeas, beans, legumes are a powerhouse. If you look at most of the, like, South Asian cultures, Mediterranean cultures, beans are a core part of like the dietary plan, right? And so chickpeas not only pack fiber, but protein as well. And just half an avocado, five grams of fiber, you can easily throw that on to like some brown toast, sourdough toast, and you're doubling up your fiber intake, but also a source of healthy fats from the avocado as well.

So all of that is pretty, again, simple to source from your local grocery store. And also, you're hitting over 30 grams of fiber in that meal if you made it in one thing. And I think, you know, you were recently with a mutual friend of ours, Sean Stevenson on his podcast. I'm excited to listen to you guys' interview. Sean and I both way back in a day, we were raw food vegans, right? and that was where a huge percentage of our diet came from not just vegetables but like raw vegetables. It was a whole movement. I used to have one of the largest websites in that community for recipes and people blogging

and stuff. And, you know, back then I was getting so much plant food in my diet. And I was appreciative of a lot of the stuff that I learned about juicing and the importance of fiber and other things. And as I personally decided to start including some more animal foods in my diet, I noticed that I went through periods of time where I dropped the fiber load and it took a while to realize, like, I don't feel as good as I did previously. And I think most people that are listening today, you know, they're probably omniphyr, right? They eat a little bit of, they eat some plants, they eat some animal foods as well. And I'm seeing this marrying of a community that's coming together

where it's like, hey, yes, we want to prioritize protein. And you can figure out whatever version of protein works for you, but we also don't want to deprioritize the stuff that we know is food for our microbiome. Because if you tune into social media, you'll still see out there that in the same way as a raw food vegan, we used to tell people like protein is a scam, right? We'd say protein is a scam. We don't need protein. Just eat your greens. Look at a gorilla. Look at an elephant. You know, they don't eat, you know, steak or fish or chicken. What we didn't obviously take. tell people is they literally eat all day. And if you track the amount of protein they're getting, it's a lot of protein through the quantity of plant food that they're eating, right? It was a very

simplified argument that was there. But in that same sense, you have some people on another extreme today that are saying fiber is a scam. Fiber is not an essential nutrient. We don't need it. And there's not enough studies that are out there showing. It's all correlative data. What do you want to say to those folks that say that? Well, we have an abundance. of not only randomized controlled trials, systematic reviews, and meta-analysis on fibers and prebiotics showing how effective they are for not just gut health, but human health in general, you know, across different domains, you know, from liver health to brain health, cognition, heart health and beyond. And, you know, we can go beyond just association and

correlative data here because we also have in vitro colonic simulation, colonic plate studies which show the mechanistic link where in those in vitro studies we can actually see and assess how prebiotics and fiber can stimulate the production of short chain fatty acids. And we know short chain fatty acids are powerful determinants of human health. So linking those in vitro lab studies and dish studies to human health studies, we get that link. And so I think it's beyond question that this is not just an association that we're seeing. Because also, we just look at population data where you then compare people with the highest fiber intake to lowest fiber intake. They are healthier. They have

better metabolic profiles and blood profiles. And so we don't need to get into the realms of, oh, we don't need fiber. And actually, you know, if we're adding nuance to this conversation, can someone live and survive with no fiber? Yeah, they absolutely can. But then you look at the quality of life over a long period of time, it will deteriorate. You put yourself at higher risk of various chronic diseases,

not only physical, but mental as well. And so it's purely the, you know, it's an uno reverse card to the person. You don't need fiber to live. But do you want to live healthier for longer, then you probably do need. fiber and do you want that? Well said. I think we got one more slide here and it's another breakdown of fruits. You know, people sometimes sleep on fruits and how important they can be as part of getting the right amount of fiber in a day. Give us a breakdown of some of these fruits that are here and how much

fiber would be in a serving of them. Yeah, again, I mean, you know, you've got a lot of fruits here, which are pretty readily available. Blackberries, depending on your country, maybe a little bit bit harder to source, but, you know, it's similar to raspberries and its fiber content. And also, just to add on the blackberries, probably the total antioxidant content, the TAC or the polyphenol content, would probably be one of the highest of any fruits just because it's so darkly colored and that's a sign that, you know, something good to eat. Kiwis, you know, there was a recent systematic review and meta-analysis performed suggesting that Kiwis were up there with one of the things that kids.

and really go toe to toe with a lot of commonly available laxatives, right, in terms of how it can help relieve constipation because of its effect on gut mortality due to its enzyme actinidein, but also high in fiber. And you obviously amplify the fiber content if you consume the kiwi with the skin. Now, a lot of people are worried about the hair on the skin. If you eat golden kiwis instead,

they often have far fewer hairs on there, easier to tolerate as well. Bananas, as we mentioned, any banana, whether it's kind of yellow or green, you know, it has fiber. The more unripe you go, the higher the resistance starch and fiber content, and the more ripe you go, you actually get more of these antioxidants in the super ripe stuff as you get those black spots in the banana. You compromise on the sugar, but you increase on the antioxidant content. So it depends on what you want to do. And obviously, pairs as well, pairs are great. Like in terms of a single fruit that gives you a high amount of fiber, pretty good. It's also got sugar alcohols like sorbitol, which actually has like a osmotic laxative type

effect on your gut and can, you know, pretty powerful in terms of relieving constipation as well. So all of that there, you know, it's kind of high fiber content, which you could easily fit in as snacks throughout the day. Yeah. And as a bonus, we got in the upper right hand corner, 10 grams of a supplement that you could add in to your routine as well. too to get a little bit extra fiber. Can you just talk about a couple of the ingredients that you're really excited about when it comes to your new supplement? Yeah, so some of the ones I'm really excited about. We've got this carrot-based fiber prebiotic, which is super beneficial in terms of actually that gut immune axis. There's a lot of new data coming out about that as well. So I'm super

excited about that. We've also got, you know, a combination of some of these fibers from like the wheat fibers and the corn fibers and even like the guab bean fibers that we've got in there which are some of these medium and slow fermenting fibers which makes it all the way to the end distal colon some of these modern supplements and food and beverages that are fortified with fiber have super cheap commodity fibers which you know all fiber is good but some of them don't make it all the way to the end of the colon, which is where most of the bacteria actually live. So I really formulated this with that in mind. How can I get a mix of slow, medium, and fast fermenting fibers, which can really ferment across the entire journey of someone's colon? I love it. And, you know,

just for the record, everybody listening, I have no affiliation with your company. There's no affiliate link that's here. I just wanted you on to talk about one practical things that people can do. but again, I'm an entrepreneur. I love celebrating people who are working on new things. So just getting out those disclosures along the way. Talking about cool companies, I love scouring the grocery store and online and kind of seeing what people are up to because I love to try new things. Because if I can try something new that I like,

and especially that my wife can like, because she's a big critic of a lot of stuff. She doesn't naturally shoot towards having a lot of vegetables in her diet. That's kind of the home that she grew up in, no shade to my mother-in-law and father-in-law. So anytime I come across something new that I can make into something fun, I get excited and I like to write about it in my newsletter. So I'm going to show you a product that I came across recently. I have no affiliation at all with this company, but I've been in addition to having like my morning shake, I've been taking these little crackers.

I wrote about them last week in my newsletter and I'll put a little bit of primal kitchen mayo on there and I'll add in some fermented garlic or pickles or other things and I'll have a little snack. So if you wouldn't mind doing a little breakdown of this product that I'm having, what is it good for? And are there any ways to make it better? And there's some more details on the back as well, too. So take your time. As we gather with friends and family this month, it's a good reminder that our dogs are family too.

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Please support our show and tell them we sent you. These guys actually hit me up on Instagram. Oh, amazing. I think they were going to send me some stuff, but I didn't have like a PO box I could send them to. But I actually wanted to try these. So you get them in Whole Foods, do you? I just ordered online. Okay.

Yeah, I ordered online. So, yeah, I'm definitely going to check these out. Four crackers is 256 calories. And for 256 calories, you get 12 grams of dietary fiber. 12 grams of fiber for four crackers. I would say that, yeah, the can. Calorie fiber ratio seems, you know, maybe... A little high.

A little high, potentially, yeah. I'm just trying to see... Okay, so I would say off the bat, this is just like a functional food, right? It's like the same snack, like a better for you snack. So as something like that, I would be keen to try these without trying this. I wouldn't be able to say anything.

But I think overall it's got like, you know, like a decent whack of protein and fiber, it seems. right? So this is a snack that I would definitely, my eyes would light up and be like, wow, okay, if I did feel like having a snack during watching like a football game or like watching some sport, I think I would be interested in something like this. Yeah, like you might typically reach for a chip, but you're like, okay, let me have some of these crackers and stuff. Yeah, for sure. And also like, you know, they mention about live probiotics here. This is the thing that I would put some caveat on because, you know,

They obviously mentioned that they've got some purple cabbage maybe. Is that like the probiotic component? I don't know. But probiotic supplements are different from probiotic rich foods. Yeah. Right. So you can't eat sauerkraut or kimchi and say that's equivalent to a probiotic supplement. Because in a probiotic supplement, you have the genus, species, and strain ID, three parts.

And the third part, the strain ID is usually a combination of, like, like letters or numbers, right, when you pick up a supplement, if a probiotic-rich food doesn't, usually they don't have the specific strain ID because you don't know. Like when you eat yogurt, right, it doesn't say it is streptococcus, whatever, with the third part. It just says live and active cultures. Sure.

Which can mean a lot of different things. Yeah. Probotic rich foods are good generally for dietary diversity, but they're not equivalent to a probiotic supplement, which has a specific use case. This is a snack that I would buy and assuming it tasted good, I would probably continue eating it. So I would definitely probably put this in like a B tier, right?

Where, again, it's not going to replace my food and it's not like potent in the form of like a supplement. But as like a replacement for like, you know, just some chips or something that don't have any nutritional value or are just high in carbohydrates, low in fiber, low in protein, Yeah, I would give this a go, so I'm probably going to put this functional fiber protein-rich snack as a B-tier. Okay, great. We'll put it as a B-tier.

Amazing. All right, on the theme of making everyday foods a little healthier, a little bit more gut-friendly, a little bit more fiber. You had a video recently that actually I was very surprised about. And I think our audience would be very surprised about. And that's the idea of making a taco healthier. and more gut friendly. Talk to us about that. You know, people assume that a lot of the foods that are available out there like a taco is unhealthy because you see it at takeaways and fast food restaurants selling tacos.

And there's nuance there because if you go back to the, and if you trace the origins and ancient past of a taco or that type of food and how it's made, this was being made in, you know, the Aztec era, the Mesoamerica, region and era thousands of years ago, right? Those guys unlocked the power of the microbiome knowingly or unknowingly, I don't know. And so, again, a taco that you would buy from like, you know, a fast food restaurant is different from one that you'd make at home

or that you'd buy originally from a store that makes it well. Because if we start from just like the actual, you know, corn tortilla, the authentic stuff is often made via process known as Nistimalization, where that corn is prepared in a certain way where it's kind of rich and resistant starches and it's actually a microbiome-friendly meal. Then you layer in some of the vegetables that are in there and like some of the herbs and seasoning, maybe some cilantro

and things like that. And even if it has on the side some beans and even some of the meats, meat doesn't have to be unhealthy, if it's packed with fiber as an adjunct. And so, you know, the salsa sauces that you might have on it. So really, it becomes quite a powerful dish when you've got fiber, prebiotics, maybe some fermented food.

I had a taco in Arizona where it was a Mexican food truck. It was run by a family. And I was speaking to the guy, and I was asking why they would put some fermented pickles and fermented cabbage on their tacos. This is something I'd never had before. And he was like, the region they're from in, you know, like where they were from, this is some of like the native, like, authentic things they add to it.

So looking at that dish, I was like, hey, this is actually not bad for gut health. And I would like want to share this message that one single food, just because it's been distorted by the modern world and by advertising, doesn't mean the original food and it's original food. form is unhealthy. Yeah. And so I would put taco as like somewhere between an A and B tier. If it's done well, A tier, let's put it at A tier.

If it's done well, it's an A tier food. Yeah, it's the reminder that so many of the things that we all regularly eat, there are ways to modify them, to make them, you know, a better version and still enjoy them. Yeah. Right. That's a huge reminder because when we see our diet like that way, we stop thinking of things as, you know, 100% good and 100% bad.

And it's just like, hey, this is all part of a diet. And as long as I'm watching out for my total level of calories, avoiding some of the bad habits that are out there that cause overeating and are damaging to the gut microbiome, then a lot of things that I do can be beneficial and healthy for my long-term goals. Yeah. I think it depends on how you prepare it, the ingredients. I mean, you can have a salad, right, of just like lettuce and cucumbers and, you know, things like that and tomatoes. And that can be incredibly low fiber.

And then you add on loads of salad dressing, which is kind of high in ultra-process components and high in calories and high in fat. And then you question, is that salad as healthy as you think it is? Because you've actually like dosed it and all of these different sources and things like that. And the components you have are like low fiber components. as well. So you should think mindfully about what you're eating just because something is high calorie or just because something doesn't typically comport with your understanding of what a gut health friendly meal is doesn't mean it's not good for your gut health. And even one single food, like if you eat a croissant, that doesn't make or break your gut health. Right. And equally,

eating some raspberries doesn't make or break your gut health. It's about long-term dietary patterns. Is there anything that you do in your sort of morning routine that is your go-to way of being like, I'm already a little bit ahead on my fiber goals for the day, right? Is there anything that you eat, that you shoot for, that you try to include? And the reason I'm asking this is that everybody's different, but I've found personally, that how I start the morning sort of sets the tone for the day. And on days where I get behind on my fiber in the morning,

or my protein, which will happen occasionally. It's just I got to work a little bit harder to make it up later on in the day. So anything that you've seen that really works for you for starting on your morning off? Yeah, so I flit between kind of like two different types of meals. So I don't feel like eating breakfast every single day. And sometimes where I like to just have like a bit of a light breakfast and maybe extend that fast a little bit more. I would just stick to like a black coffee. And to that black coffee, I actually just add my product that I've been making. So I just got like, so you can add it to a hot beverage too.

You can add it to any food and beverage, whatever temperature, it works. It's kind of heat stable as well. So I have my black coffee and I just add that 10 grams of fiber to it. And so I've got my coffee, which is black coffee and rich in polyphenols and fiber and then add more fiber to it. That's like my start on some days of the week. Other days of the week, especially, weekends and maybe like a Monday where I just need a bit more of a G up, I want a bit more of like a calorie-rich breakfast, which is tasty and just sets me up. And that I would prep like some overnight oats. So I'd have some overnight oats, which is rich in fiber and protein, especially prebiotic fibers, beta glucan. And I would add in like chia seeds, bezzles seeds,

some like raspberries, maybe sprinkle in some like nuts as well. Maybe it was like some crushed pistachos or something else. And for me, that's like a sweet treat in the morning, but also packed with like all of those fruits are bringing that sweetness onwards. I might even add some of those like, you know, cacao nibs or something like that just to have a bit of a crunch. But that for me is like a protein rich, fiber rich breakfast on some days of the week where, dude, in that overnight oats, you could easily be crushing around 20 grams of fiber. which is like, okay, that takes a pressure off. Even if I skip some meal or I'm eating out with friends or it's like a takeaway, which is low in fiber, I know I don't have much to go to get to 30 at least.

I love that. My version for me is that I love making a morning shake. And I have my go-to protein powder. I'll put in two scoops, usually with water. And actually, this shake tastes amazing. I'll link the recipe in the show notes. In fact, earlier this year, or was it end of last year, Dr. Rungan Chatterjee came and stayed with me here in the U.S. And he was like, dude, I got to try the shake that you keep on talking about.

And I made it. And he was like, so you just use water for like the base. And I made it for him. And he was like, this is really, really good. Like, surprising good. So I put two scoops of protein powder, which basically gets me, it's about 40 grams of protein for there. And I add in some cilium husk, kind of like the product that I showed you. a little bit earlier. I think that was Organic India. No affiliation with them, but there's plenty of

different ones that are out there. I am an investor in this company called Farmers Juice, and if I don't use them, I'll use something else that's just food-based, and it has 10 grams of fiber and like a gut shot that's there that's coming from whole sources of fiber and chia seeds and other things like that. And then I'll also do, for the creaminess, I'll put in about 30 grams of frozen Avocado. Frozen avocado, I've found, like, not only does it have the fat, the healthy fats that you want, the frozen version helps me skip adding ice, which doesn't have any, you know, because it's like you want the smoothie to be like creamy, the shake to be creamy. And then also it has obviously a good source of fiber inside of there. We talked about avocados.

And then I'll put in about 50 grams of frozen strawberries inside of there. So I have some chia. I have some avocado. I have a bunch of different you know, sources of whole food polyphenols and fibers from this gut shot that I use and then I have the protein.

I have to tabulate the exact amount of fiber but I wouldn't be surprised that I'm getting probably like 20 grams of fiber and 40 grams of protein. And it's a big drink, right? So it takes me a little bit of time to sort of go through that. But when I start off the day

like that, I feel like I'm ready to go. And for a little boost, I'll put in like maybe five, six coffee beans, whole coffee beans. And that adds in a little bit of a crunch and also a little caffeine pop as well. I drink coffee too, but it's a nice little texture that adds into the mix. So that's my morning go-to shake. Yeah, I might have to try that. So yeah, please. You're here for a couple days. Maybe I'll have to send one over to you on Uber Eats. Yeah, damn. I definitely incorporate that into my routine as well. Okay, we have a few other things that we want to tier rank and talk about here. And before we started this interview, I was showing you a product. We're not going to name any names.

We're not here to throw shade. But it's this growing category of prebiotic sodas that are out there. And the reason I bring it up is that so many people there are now through the beauty of social media and marketing, people are like, oh, I don't worry too much about fiber or other stuff. I have this supplement or this thing that I take, and that's what I do for my gut health. And there's a place for everything that's out there. But I want to get your thoughts on some of these common ingredients and the breakdown of some of these fibers that are typically included in these prebiotic ingredients. So again, we're not going to name any names, but I brought up a typical ingredient panel for a lot of these sort of probiotic fiber sodas that are out there. And they're a replacement for

a Coca-Cola or a Pepsi or a Sprite. I'd love to hear what you have to say about it. It looks like here they've got like a blend of different fibers which make up their sort of proprietary fiber blend. The issue I have is the cassava root is okay. I don't know how much of that they're using. I think that's a good fiber. The chicory root and the Jerusalem.

artichoke inulin, they're both inulin-based. Chiquary root and Jerusalem marshock, they're both inulin-based fibers. So you've got two fibers that are, you know, like giving you inulin. Inulin, for me, is one of the lowest quality fibers that you could include as a supplement. If you're eating chicory root or eating Jerusalem artichoke, you get a ton of other stuff which kind of like, you know, makes it work in a food. But as a neat supplement, that's often high dose because, what, this has nine grams of fiber. And at doses above five grams, inulin starts to become pretty potent as a gas and bloat producing engine, right? Because it's one of those fast fermenting fibers, which ferments in the proximal colon, or the first

part of the colon. And it really produces quite a lot of gas. And if you've got a sensitive gut, which a lot of people do, or irritable bowel type syndrome type symptoms, I don't think that's ideal. And that's one thing from just the components point of view, but also if I'm looking at someone who's drinking these prebiotic sodas, soda in itself contributes to bloat. And bloat is one of the most common GI symptoms that people complain about. So it's a bit of an oxymoron.

It's a paradox. Having a soda, which is going to cause bloating, and then inulin, which is a huge component of it, also high risk of bloating. And then someone who's trying to improve their gut health, soda's not the ideal way to go. So I don't know if they have these types of sodas in the UK. I'm sure it's made it over there.

Not this brand, but there are... There are the different ones in a day. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So typically people are sure. for these because they're like, hey, this is a better for you product. And you've given your thoughts on the type of fiber that's included in it. But if somebody's like, hey, look, I eat pretty healthy and I'm getting my fiber from different sources. I understand that this product, you know, these prebiotic sodas are not like the best source of fiber. But I'm debating

about should I be shooting for something that's like this that has at least some type of fiber in it, or should I just have a classic sort of diet Coke? I think, yeah, you could argue both ways. You could argue that, hey, yeah, it's an extra nine grams of fiber, which is something, you know, it's a pretty decent whack compared to like a Coke zero or a Diet Coke or any other non-healthy for you kind of sodas. So, yeah, I mean, if that was not replacing the fiber that you were consuming, but just as a, you know, now and then you took it, I could see that.

But equally I could see that it's not going to move the needle hugely versus like a Diet Coke, which, you know, is what, like zero calories? And I think there's hardly any difference, I would say. Yeah, it's almost like it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Focus on everything else. You want to have a soda here or there, whatever. So the next big question that a lot of people have,

And I have so many of my friends that actually are like, hey, I proudly enjoy Diet Coke because it doesn't have, you know, any calories that are inside of their low calories. Actually, it's been such a long time since I've had one. A lot of people were saying, well, these non-nutritive sweeteners, the jury's out about whether not they're good for gut health or whether not they're bad or whether they're neutral for it. And I've seen very moving arguments on both sides of the course. Do you have any thoughts about some of these sweeteners? And for our audience who may not be familiar, can you name some of the top sort of types

of sweeteners that would fall into this category? Yeah, I mean, typical things that roll off the top of my head would be things like aspartame, sucralose, erythritol, allelos, things like that. I mean, you know, these non-nutriative sweeteners have got a bit of bad rep. But again, you know, the poisons in the dose, right? And if you look at most of these studies, the amount of sodas people are consuming that contain artificial sweeteners,

I don't think the average person is maybe consuming more than three a day. And that would be probably like someone who really loves those kind of sodas, right? I can't imagine any of my friends who love drinking those diet sodas are consuming any more than three a day. You'd need to probably, I'd need to double check the math on this, but I think it's around like you need to consume upwards of 12 so does a day which have artificial sweeteners to begin to have any risk of, you know, negative health consequences.

Yeah, that's taking the sort of laboratory data that they have. Yes. In vitro or in mice and saying the human equivalent for our body size would be around 12 and upwards, right? And if you're consuming 12 sodas a day, you got other problems. You've got problems. Yeah, there's other stuff that we need to talk about, right? And so from that point of view, I think they're safe.

They can support someone's weight loss efforts because they're not having the real kind of sodas that have hundreds of calories or 300 calories or whatever. But then there's actually newer data which has come out now which suggests that artificial sweetener-based sodas can actually be beneficial for gut health. And so I think there's one indirect benefit you can make here where it's like there's nothing in the sweetener itself

which is improving the individual microbiome, but a lot of people consuming these non-nutrient sweeteners in diet sodas are maybe doing it to aid weight loss efforts. So if someone is using a diet soda to then lose weight and then they end up losing weight, that improved metabolic profile from the weight loss then confers a improved gut microbiome. So you're changing from a dysbiotic state to a well-balanced state

because obesity can confer a pro-inflammatory state systemically, including the microbiome. So when someone loses weight and improves their cardiovascular health, improves their metabolic health, they're also changing the state of their gut microbiome. They may be exercising more. So there's all these benefits as well from that. I would say, however, someone who has chronic gut issues and has a very sensitive gut, could you make a link between artificial sweeteners and worsening gut health? maybe in certain niche populations,

is it better to minimize the amount of artificial sweetness you consume? Yeah, potentially. And we need more data looking at those specific patient cohorts as well. That's great. So going back to our prebiotic soda, if you had to rank it, and again, for people that don't have severe gut issues, we're going to put it on our tier ranked list.

I'm putting it as a C. And, you know, I think that's fair, because C is not a fail, right? Would it be considered a pass? It's a pass. It's a pass. It's basically you just barely passed. Yeah.

So I think C is fair because, you know, there's so many other ways to get your fiber, get your prebiotics. Yeah, I would give it a seed that you pass, you're not dangerous,

you're not bad, maybe it's better than other things, but it's definitely, you know, not punching, you know, to the kind of upper echelons of the gut world. Don't overdo it, and especially if you're crushing a couple of day, if you're noticing any sort of gut issues, bloating, that sort of stuff, realize that it's inulin most likely

is a very difficult fiber for a lot of people. And inulin is fructo-oligosaccharides? That's a difference. So fructo-oligocorides are actually chains of inulin. So they're kind of very similar. They are two distinct prebiotics, but they're often found in similar foods as well. Got it, got it. Okay, here's another one in America.

Have you been to Air One yet? I went yesterday and I actually was, I bought some sweets which had like 20 grams of fiber in them. Okay. Some like gummies. And I was impressed but also worried by Air One. Okay, well, I actually am asking you. So I love Air One. There's all sorts of stuff that's there.

And obviously this is much bigger than Air One. if you go anywhere, Target, Costco, Walmart, even your local gas station, especially here in California, you're going to find that one of the biggest crazes that's hit us in the last few years is gummies. There's a gummy for everything, everything. There's creatine gummies.

There's obviously weed gummies that are out there that are at different stores. But recently, we've been seeing this explosion in fiber gummies. So again, we're not here to throw shade at any particular brand, but I have the nutritional facts of one of these fiber gummies that I've put up on the screen, and I want to get your thoughts.

Fiber gummies, yes, no, maybe, where would you rank them on our list? And if you want to give us a breakdown of their ingredients. Yeah, so if we're looking at, what is it, two gummies gives you five grams of dietary fiber, all of that coming from fructo-ologosaccharides. we know that fructo-ologosaccharides, very similar to inulin, is a fast-fermenting fiber.

It foments in the early part of the colon, higher risk of gas and bloating, because it's a high-phodmap prebiotic, a high-fodmap ingredient. So again, caution on anyone who's got a sensitive gut or who can't really tolerate high-fodmap ingredients. There's a lot of people out there who are similar in that boat. Pectin.

is where they get some of their prebiotics from, and black carrot juices the coloring. Yeah, I think I would need to know where that fiber is coming from. I'm not sure I'm quite clear. Is it all coming from pectin or somewhere else? So it's a bit unclear from me from that side of things. But I think, you know, at the day when I'm looking at a gummy, I don't see a gummy as like a health food.

It's similar to the prebiotic sodas where, if you want a sweet treat and instead of having like, I don't know, what's like a gummy that most people know, like a haribou, right? You have a harrowbo in the USA? We don't have that. We don't have like...

Yeah, gummy bears. Okay, yeah, yeah. I think that's the maker of gummy bears, right? Yeah, exactly. So, you know, something like gummy bears or any other equivalent, you know, high sugar and it's got a ton of stuff. And if you wanted a fiber gummy,

it's going to be the same sort of, like, sweetness, maybe a far less sweet, but it's now going to have fiber. So again, you know, I'm putting this in like C tier because it's not a health food, but, you know, I'm going into the world of this is a better for you than the average or original. Having said that, I went to Erwan.

I bought one of these kind of fiber gummies, like the gummy bears. It had no taste. I wanted something sweet. It had no sweetness at all. And it was like really high in fiber. You know, like that's a good thing, a bad thing? It's a bad thing because like it didn't satiate my sweet cravings.

So I was like, damn, I should have just literally had like a banana or something like that because I was out and about. I didn't have anything at home that was sweet. I wanted like something like this. I was like, hey, this has got 20 grams of fiber in it. Boom, crazy. And I had it. There's no sweetness at all.

And actually I felt a bit crampy as well because it was 20 grams of that fast fermenting fiber. And I was like, okay, that's not ideal. And so, yeah, I would say fiber gummies, somewhere between a C and D tier, actually. Might even bump it down. Might even bump it down. So treat it, treat it like candy. Yeah. In a way that it's not something that you're going to have on a regular basis. And if you're banking on this as a regular source of fiber for you, you're getting typically lower quality fiber, not from a lot of different sources. So buyer beware. Buy a beware and ultimately life's about enjoyment. I wanted something sweet and I was thinking to myself,

should I have just got something that was sweet and didn't have any fiber or anything in it? And it's just like a one-off, hey, I feel good. This is like, tastes great. It's a little bit of sweetness. And I just needed a couple of gummies just to give me that kind of like sweetness. And this didn't do the job and it was very expensive. So the fiber gummies are probably going to be quite expensive as well, right?

Zooming out for a second. Obviously I made my list over here and there's still a couple of, more to go through, but we don't have anything yet at an S and an F. So if you were to put something, and maybe we already talked about it, and we didn't rank it, but if you were to put something at an F and you were to put something at an S, that would fit in the conversation, does anything come to mind? And if it doesn't, we can continue on. Well, I would say something like alcohol is obviously F tier for gut. Okay, great. You know, like, The standard stuff.

Alcohol, smoking. Yeah. Well, here's one that might be in this category, and I think that you've talked about it before, and that's the idea of late-night snacking, high-fat, high-calorie, traditional sort of chips that's there. Why is late-night snacking so damaging to the gut in particular?

So there's so many reasons why late-night snacking as a concept and philosophy, it's bad. it's well, we have this circadian clock, right? The sort of body clock which guides when we feel tired, when we want to make up, when we want to sleep. And our energy dips as the day progresses. Our digestive system follows a similar pattern to our energy levels. We experience peak digestive prowess somewhere between 11am and 2 p.m. It will vary slightly.

But that's when your digestion is most active and most powerful. And your digestive juices are flowing. colonic motility and gut motility is, you know, humming along, and it's good to front load your calories as early in the day as you can. As the sun sets and as the day gets on, your digestive function declines where the secretion of bile, digestive juices, all declines as well. And if you're consuming a lot of caloric foods and meals closer to bed, then it's going to be harder to digest, you increase risk of acid reflux, bloating, and general digestive discomfort, right? And that's in alignment with chrono gastroenterology, which is this idea of meal

timing and nutrient timing as well. You may not even absorb the nutrients as well later in the day based on all of these things. And even your microbiome will probably feel a bit sleepier later on during the day as well. They also are slave to this master clock. That's one of the reasons. Another reason would just be simply that you need to let your gut just have moments of no food. Because when you don't eat, that's when the MMC or the migratory motor complex, which is this wave of contractions of the muscle in the intestines, are sweeping through, clearing debris, clearing dead cells, and essentially like a biological rumba for your gut and just cleaning stuff. You need that gut reset.

And if you're constantly snacking and late night slacking, you're not allowing that migratory motor complex to activate. It stops as soon as you start eating. It's like you switch the light on. Oh, it stops. It's like Toys R Us. I mean, not Toy Story. It's like when you watch, the toys are like planning to be dead.

And when the door closes, that's when they start talking and doing all their stuff. So that's also a reason. And the third reason is because it takes around 90 minutes for 50% of the content from your stomach to empty into the small intestine. And so if you're eating close to bed, you're not giving enough time for your stomach to empty its content, and you're increased in risk of discomfort and reflux,

which could actually impact your sleep. You know, occasionally one thing here or there is not going to throw you off, but if you're regularly relying on something as part of your routine, you should at least know the risk reward. Short-term reward of, you know, pleasure, and long-term, you understand the damage that it could have.

And also, too, you know, no shade on anybody who is regularly late-night snacking, especially with ultra-processed foods. But to me, it's usually an indication that you didn't properly fuel throughout the day. The body all of a sudden doesn't just get crazy hungry at random times if you've appropriately fueled. So where could you early in the day have more fiber, have more protein, have more polyphenol-rich foods? whatever needed to feel like, and the appropriate levels of calories. You know, I always worry when I have friends who go on these periods of time where, you know,

way back in the day, like juice cleanses were popular or people would lower their calories to like a really, really low level, trying to get ready for a wedding or whatever it might be. I would always worry because of the rebound effect. You know, you kind of starve yourself during the day and at night, your just body is so famished. that'll just reach for whatever and your willpower is low to and you'll just crush things so that your body can at least feel

that it got something in. Yeah, absolutely. And for all the reasons you mentioned as well and that I've just discussed, yeah, late-night stacking is definitely F tier as a concept. All right, we'll throw it on our F. It's our first F that's here.

S, anything came to mind on an S? Yeah, I mean, just absolutely God tier is beans, any legumes. any bean pretty much I would say from like both fiber and protein and just general how it's such a functional optimal food

yeah that is that is S tier I don't have a photo of a bean but we'll put it on there now if I had my own personal one and we talked about this a little bit before unfortunately beans for me are going to be a D and that's only because

I eat a bean and you're definitely going to know that I ate beans I for whatever reason, I think I shared with you, I grew up Indian vegetarian diet. I'm no longer vegetarian anymore. But I used to have so many beans and lentils and other stuff. And I would look forward to having them on a regular basis. I didn't like spicy food. That always kind of messed with my system. And then there was this period of time where I stopped having beans as much, probably when I

went on my journey of, you know, being a raw foodist, maybe some sprouted beans occasionally. And then I don't know what it was. Maybe I just didn't have them. But does even sometimes a smallest amount of chickpeas make me feel so bloated and off? But again, I'll learn from somebody like you that there are so many incredible sources of fiber that are out there. So if one category of foods doesn't work for you, don't worry. There's so many of the things that you can eat that can do a body good. Yeah.

And I think also maybe is there a way to get you to retrain your gut? but for beans, like, you know, pressure cook them, steam them and start with like a low intake of beans and you slowly up it. But yeah, I mean, listen, there are so many hundreds of fiber rich compounds out there, thousands, you know, just unlocked, waiting to be unlocked in nature. You can miss so many different sources and still find something that works for you. There's been an increasing understanding that our oral health also supports our gut health. You have poor oral health, gum disease, bad oral microbiome. There's some companies that are in that space that are starting to kind of look at that,

that you're also swallowing saliva throughout the day too, and that can have detrimental impact on your gut health as well, too. So you made a list on a video a little while ago talking about some essentials that if you care about your gut health, you want to make sure you prioritize. And I think we have an image of it over here, and some of them are going to be familiar to people, and some of them may not be as familiar to people,

but basically we have mouthwash with an X through it. You're going to explain that in a second. We have a tongue scraper. We have floss, and we have an electric toothbrush. Talk to us about the connection between oral health and gut health. Your gut health starts in your mouth. You know, it's the kind of first part. part of the GI tract, your oral cavity, and you've got this whole ecosystem of bacteria and

microbes that live in there as well. Now, they have overlapping roles with some of the gut bugs, but also they have some unique roles that they perform as well, not only keeping, you know, your sort of mouth and oral cavity tidy and kind of well maintained, but some of these guys are producing, you know, nitric oxide, which is a potent vasodilator and widens the blood vessels and it's good for vascular health and heart health. So when you don't take care of your oral microbiome, you could put yourself at higher risk of heart disease, hypertension, high blood pressure, a bunch of other things as well.

So we know from a lot of these epidemiological studies that poor oral health, periodontitis, gum disease, can increase the risk of other things like Alzheimer's, dementia, and there's even been some studies linking certain types of pathogenic bacteria found in the sort of gum lining like fusobacterium nucleotum, and then they've found that same pathogenic bacteria in colonic polyps, which are growths in the colon, which are precursors to colon cancer. So we are just beginning to sort of unlock that bit of the oral microbiome.

We are still way behind in our understanding of the oral microbiome compared to the gut microbiome. But, you know, they are intrinsically linked as well. Fantastic. So I'm guessing if you're going to take these, and you didn't mention mouthwash, but maybe you could. If we're going to rank them, we'll probably throw them up here as an A, these daily habits that are there for you. So is that all of them? Essentially, it's avoiding mouthwash, tongue scraping, flossing regularly, and using an electric toothbrush. Yeah, I think we should probably go ahead and put that as S tier. Okay, great. You got our first S tier.

Yeah, those things should be core habits as like, I wouldn't even say like luxury. oh, it's nice if you do. Everyone should be flossing. Everyone should be brushing twice a day. Ideally, with an electric toothbrush if you can. You should be avoiding alcohol mouthwashed on a regular basis. There are some cases in which you might need that, like certain dental procedures or if someone has some specific chronic gum or mouth issues,

they may be prescribed alcohol-based mouthwashers in certain places. But for the average person, like you or I, those core habits are key. Amazing. All right, there's one other daily supplement that's become super duper popular that I wanted to get you to chime in on. And there's all sorts of different versions of this product that are around the same. And that's your daily greens superfood product. I'm sure you've seen many of them that are out there. We're not going to name any names. Even like super famous soccer players have their own version of these daily.

supplements that are there. You know, we're going to be talking about them as a whole, but I think you're pretty familiar with the category. And I want you to talk about them specifically in the context of, I think a lot of people take these superfood greens and they think this is an all in one. I have everything that I need for the day. What do you want to say about them?

Yeah, I mean, I know that there's a whole wave of these supergroups. and I don't fully understand why they're so popular. I mean, I do understand why they're popular because it's like a shortcut, a cheat code potentially to optimising your health. But my concern is, you know, just scanning the amount of certain nutrients and vitamins you get as a percentage of daily values. It's insane that someone would want from one serving

to get 467% of their vitamin C. or 154% of their riboflavine or 553% of their vitamin E. And we can keep going on. I mean, there's over 100% of so many different vitamins and nutrients and micronutrients here, which at some point if, you know, it can become dangerous. If you mega dose certain things like this, you don't need that much. There's a reason why there's 100% daily value recommendations. And so I think some of these all green solutions sell the illusion of health

and actually is it papering over the cracks in their actual health where they're not prioritizing how to get that from foods, you know, worrying about other big buckets of their life. And just out of the corner of the thing there, they've also got some fiber and it's fructalogosaccharide-based prebiotics, which for me, again, it's like a poor quality fiber. And if you think about this, there's what, over 50 different types of things they're adding to this. You've got to worry about the dosing.

Is it just fairy dust dosing of each of these things sometimes? That, you know, they're promising. And so I think this is very expensive for what it's worth. I've seen the price point of some of these things for a month's supply. It's very, very premium, but I don't think it comports with premium health. Yeah. And at least if people are going to take something like this and everybody has different stuff that they take, I think in the context of this conversation is like, don't forget about your fiber and also don't forget about eating your greens, right? Because even if it has a lot of ingredients of different stuff, you're still going to need actual whole foods and greens and fiber as part of your diet as well. I would rather, and in fact I'm going to do something like you're making, right,

where the two supplements or two things that you're adding to that is a protein supplement and a fiber supplement and the rest of it is just real foods that you're blending in to make this super smoothie in the morning, right? And for me, that tastes better, looks better, sounds better, and is more aligned with like health outcomes than something like this. Yeah. Okay. So if you had to rank it, organic, generalized super greens powder, where are you going to put it on the list? Super greens powder on pudding is like probably a D.

Yeah, because it's- fiber gummies. Yeah, it's expensive. It's maybe a fairy dust dosing of some important things. Not high in protein, not high in fiber, which are like two of the biggest things. Has a bunch of other stuff that you don't need. mega dosing of so many vitamins, which can be dangerous in some cases. So for me, it's a no. Dr. Kern, what else do you want to talk about right now in the context of this conversation?

Anything that we didn't get a chance to rank, anything that you didn't get a chance to give some special love to or talk about? Because I know you're always scouring social media. You're seeing different trends. You're seeing different ingredients that are popping up. I'm sure your brain is totally firing after being both in good and bad ways. being in the US now for the last month. We have the best of things.

We have the worst of things that are there. Just giving you an opportunity as we were winding down for today's episode. Anything that we didn't rank or talk about that you wanted to. Yeah, I think, you know, like the tier list is such a nice way to just look at health. But, you know, as we've said as well, the nuance in is that none of these things are going to make or break your health in one day or one week or even one month. right? You could eat a green banana every single day for a month and that will probably make you feel better, make you poop better and improve your health for that one month. But once you stop doing that habits, you also lose the gains. So everything is about consistency. So whether you're taking a

multivitamin, whether you're taking a fiber supplement, adding protein to your life or going to the gym, you need to do that consistently over a long period of time to actualize and experience benefits all the time because as soon as you stop doing it, you lose the benefits. So one of the S-tier things that should be added to this is consistency and behaviors. That's great. I love that reminder. Your product's coming out soon. Where can people go to join the wait list or check it out once it comes? Yeah, so I don't know when this is going out, but it's out on Wednesday, the 29th of October next Wednesday. And so, yeah, you can get it at loam science.com

and it's going to be ready on Wednesday and ready for the world. That's amazing. I can't wait to try it. Well, we'll link to that in the show notes and all your fantastic social media accounts. I'm so glad that we got a chance to connect in person, have this conversation in person, bring a little fun. You know, I think health as a whole has gotten very serious. and that's why so many people

you know, seek out other forms of entertainment because they don't want to come on a podcast and hear the 15 different things that they're doing wrong. So if we can make it fun, which you do in your content on a regular basis, that just lightens the mood a little bit and it doesn't have to always feel like such a serious thing.

So I want to applaud you on that and I hope that I did my best to try to bring in some of your essence in today's episode. Thank you, man. It's always a pleasure speaking to you. And yeah, like we only met. like what? A couple of months ago or maybe two, three months ago, but I already feel like, you know, we're good friends. And yeah, it's been great to connect with you in person as well, which was super important to me. Appreciate your brother.

Hi, everyone, Drew here. Two quick things. Number one, thank you so much for listening to this podcast. If you haven't already, subscribe, just hit the subscribe button on your favorite podcast app. And by the way, if you love this episode, it would mean the world to me. And it's the number one thing that you can do to support this podcast is share with a friend, share with a friend who would benefit from listening. Number two, before I go, I just had to tell you about something that I've been working on that I'm super excited about. It's my weekly newsletter and it's called Try This. Every Friday, yes, every Friday, 52 weeks a year, I send out an easy-to-digest protocol of simple steps that you or anyone you love can follow to optimize your own health. We cover

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