The Bossticks - Does A Vegan Lifestyle Make Sense? With Jenné Claiborne AKA Sweet Potato Soul

Episode Date: February 7, 2020

#246: On this episode we sit down with Jenné Claiborne. Jenné is a vegan chef, health coach, cooking instructor, author and the creator of the wildly popular blog and brand Sweet Potato Soul. On today's episode we are learning all about the vegan lifestyle. Why would someone choose to go vegan? What are the benefits? What are the challenges? Today we deep dive into all of it and Jenné is the perfect person to break it all down.  To connect with Jenné Claiborne click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) This episode is brought to you by GLOSSIER What matters to you most when it comes to skincare? Quality of ingredients? Effectiveness? Glossier believes beauty starts with skin first, makeup second. Glossier's Milky Jelly Cleanser is the perfect way to start your skincare routine. Plus, all new customers will get 10% off their first order on Glossier.com/podcast/skinny This episode is brought to you by FOUR SIGMATIC We have been drinking this company's mushroom-infused elixirs and coffees for over a year now. When we need a break from coffee but still need that extra morning jolt and focus the Mushroom Coffee with Lion's Mane and Chaga is the way to go. Lauryn also drinks the Mushroom Matcha which is a green tea designed as a coffee alternative for those of you who want to cut back on caffeine without losing focus and cognitive boosts. This stuff doesn't actually taste like mushrooms, it's delicious. All of these blends have a ton of nutrients and amino acids to give you balanced energy without the jitters. To try FOUR SIGMATIC products go to foursigmatic.com/skinny and use promo code SKINNY for 15% off all products. Produced by Dear Media 

The following podcast is a dear media production. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her.

You want to rebel. Like my mom will never let me eat candy. I'm at my friend's house. I'm going to have it right now. But like for me, growing up, never eating red meat. meat in pork, I never, I never, never, never, ever was tempted. I, because my parents, the way they talked about it, they made it like a point of pride that we didn't eat those foods. And they explained it to me why we didn't eat those foods. And I understood. And so anytime I was

in that circumstance where there's, you know, only pepperoni pizza and nothing, no just regular plain cheese pizza, I would just wouldn't eat any pizza. I was totally fine with that because I knew that that wasn't for me. Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back to the skinny confidential him and her show. That clip was from our guest of the show today, Junae Claiborne. We are getting into vegan diets today. We love a plot twist. I mean, recently we talked to Anya, the owner of Bel Campo, and we talked all about the truth about red meat. So today we're going the opposite direction. Like I said, we're going vegan. We love, love, love to talk about all different kinds of perspectives. For those of you who are new to the show, I am Lauren Everett's Bostic, the creator of

the Skinny Confidential, and across to me is my husband who's looking hot. hot in that red hat. Yes, I'm always, well, you know, I would like to think that I'm always looking hot. And the red hat probably helps. Okay. You know, maybe I'm just having a better day than us. Guys, my name is Michael Bostic. I'm a serial entrepreneur and brand builder. Most recently, the CEO of the Dear Media Podcast Network. And like Lauren said, today we have a show. We have not touched on this subject. I don't think too often, both probably because Lauren and I are not vegans. But we always think that it's interesting to bring on different walks of life to offer different perspectives on one side.

Like Lauren said, we had Anya on the show, which was one of our favorite episodes, talking all about sustainable eating, red meat and, you know, a carnivorous diet. And now we're obviously talking to Jenae all about a vegan lifestyle and vegan diet. We really try to maintain a non-judgmental space here and let people come on, tell their stories, talk about what their perspectives are on the world and how they live and really leave it up to the audience, you to decide what works for you. Really like Lawrence Ola says, you know, take what you like, leave what you don't. that's really our take. You know, we're not pushing one lifestyle or another. We just like to learn on

this show. It's fun to present all these different stories and all these different journeys and all these different opinions on the platform because what's fun is we don't tell you what to think. You get to decide. So you get to go out and you get to sort of curate what content you're going to continue to consume. So like I said, presenting different perspectives and life's important. You know, I always think I'm right. But I, and the reason that is is I always think I am right for me. That doesn't mean that my perspective or my thoughts or my opinions are right for anyone that's listening, for any other people in my life. I just believe the way that I'm living is right for me. And if there's anything this show can do for anyone, it's empower them to live right for themselves.

And I think that's the best way to be right. You know, we're wrong in plenty of other walks of life, plenty of things. But when it comes to the way we like to live, what works for us, what makes us feel good, it makes us feel empowered. It's living right for yourself. And so listen to these episodes. Take what you leave. Leave what you don't. With that, let's welcome Janay Claiborne to the show.

Jenae is a New York City-based vegan personal chef, cooking instructor and blogger behind the brand, sweet potato soul. She's got an amazing brand, amazing channels, YouTube, social, blog. She's got it all. Guys, with that, Janay, welcome to the show. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. For everyone who doesn't know you, give us your spiel, a little intro. So I'm Jenae Claibor.

I'm a vegan chef, blogger, author, YouTuber. I like to say that I'm an all-around vegan expert. I've been vegan now since 2011. Not looking back. Not looking back. No. Okay, so why did you decide to go vegan in the first place? Because I was working at a vegan restaurant.

I was vegetarian floating between that and pescatarian at the time. And I was working at this restaurant for a year. So within that year, I was meeting all these other people who were vegan. Of course, I was eating amazing vegan food. I was learning about the lifestyle. I had met vegans before, but it was very special circumstances. So I had never considered ever even becoming vegan before I worked at this restaurant. So it was just like a real, you know, great introduction for someone.

Was it like a one-night stand with veganism where you just pulled the band-aid off or did you go in with just the tip and kind of go slow? The tip. The tip. Okay. Just the tip. Yeah, because I wasn't, I didn't want to become vegan. I was like, I can't give up. I was living in New York at the time.

And I can't give up pizza. and I can't give up yogurt. I can't give up these certain foods. So I didn't even want to become vegan. I just thought I'm going to eat mostly vegan. I'll be like 99% vegan, but then I still have my other foods that aren't vegan. And that's fine, right? So after a while, I started feeling guilty, though, every time I ate pizza or yogurt. Those are like basically the last two things that I gave up. And I started feeling really guilty. And I didn't fully know why because I didn't really. Anytime anyone wanted to talk to me about like animal welfare, I would just, just put my fingers in my ear and walk away and like, I can't hear this. I don't want to talk about it.

But when I started feeling guilty, then I decided, okay, you know what, I'm going to educate myself. And whatever I find, then I'll, you know, base my decision off of that. Will I become vegan or am I just going to stay the way I am? Started reading more about how animals are treated in the, you know, farming and just like in factory farms especially. And then I decided to become vegan. I got so, like, swept up into that. And so ultimately, I became vegan for the animals. And when did you start to become so passionate about it that you wanted to share it with other people through your blog and your Instagram? Yeah, crazy, like almost right away within a couple weeks. So I wasn't interested in becoming vegan for health. Is it like that cliche where it's like, how do you know someone's vegan?

They'll tell you. Yeah. Oh man. Back then, I was like proselytizing it everybody. My poor family, I'm so, so glad that I'm beyond that stage, though. What did they, like, how does your And they were they like, were they big meat eaters? No, not at all. No. Me, I grew up eating, we called it semi-vegetarian. I was, we ate chicken and fish and like turkey, so like poultry and fish. And so I was already kind of weird, you know, growing up because I would go to parties

and friends' homes and such things like that. And I would not eat any red meat or pork. And that was like, what is that all about? You're so weird. You're a vegetarian. So I was already used to it. And my family already ate that way anyway. And funny, my dad was actually really.

raised vegan in the 70s. What? Yeah. Where's your dad from? He's from D.C. That's even weirder, right? Weird. On the East Coast that he's, wow.

It was really weird. It's because they were in, they, his mom was involved in some sort of like religious group and veganism as part of it. Yes. Actually, so my dad has a brother and his brother, he's a little older. He's still in this religious group and part of, like, if you were really involved in this group and really committed, then you'll move to Israel. And he moved to Israel when he was super young and he has like 14 children.

I can't remember exactly. Your uncle. Living in Israel, you know, I've only met him three, four times in my life and I haven't met all his children yet, but he has a lot of kids. They were always vegan. A lot of them are still vegan today, except for the ones who moved here to the United States. So I had a background. I knew what vegan was because my dad, you know, would tell me about it.

And he still, when I was growing up, he'd make a lot of vegan food. He'd make tofu and like tofu cheese and all sorts of things. and all sorts of stuff, and nutritionally yeast, and I didn't like any of it. I thought that the only reason someone would become vegan would be because they're in this religious group.

I never ever considered, I had no idea that people were vegan for any other reason until I moved to New York City because I didn't even know any vegans outside of my family until then. Before we get into that hot topic, let me tell you about Glossier.

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slash podcast slash skinny. Again, that's Glossier, spelled g-l-o-s-s-s-s-s-S-S-S-S-Squeney. Certain exclusions apply. All right, let's get back to the show. Wait, so now I got, there's a lot to unpack here with you because we got to go back. So where, like, let's go way, way back. Childhood. Where did you grow up? Where are you from? I'm from Atlanta, Georgia. Okay. Born and raised. And so what was the childhood like? Like, you know, was it. It was great. It was great.

It was wonderful. Okay, so everything's fine. Everything's great. And your dad is, and your crazy uncle, is he still in the picture? Is he crazy or is he not? No, I didn't even know him at all. You know, the first time I can remember meeting him is... 16 children's a lot of children.

I said 14. You said 14. Okay, I added two because I just... You can't add too. Well, still. That's a lot of children. What if I came to you and I was like, I want to have 14 children? Oh, no.

We were talking off mic earlier and you came in and you're scared me. You're like, I have a slab. Oh, my gosh. We're going to get into that. Can you imagine 14? No, I can imagine two. Wow. Woof.

So when did you realize that you wanted to make this your career? Well, okay, so to backtrack just a little. When I became vegan, so I had moved to New York to become an actress. I went to school for acting. I got a BFA in that. I went to Boston University. I moved to New York to pursue this career. And in maybe within the first year, I realized it's not what I wanted to do.

because I didn't like auditioning. It wasn't nearly as fun as it was in school. But I didn't know what I would do because I literally went to school for this. I felt like so unqualified to do anything else in life but be an actor. So I was like searching. I was working this restaurant. I was so confused about what I was going to do with my life. And then at the same time, you know, started feeling guilty. I decided to become vegan. And within a couple weeks of becoming vegan, I realized, oh my God, I know what I want to do in my life. I want to do vegan food. And basically I thought I want to help other people become vegan because even though I had just become vegan, I still felt like I knew a lot about it because I'd worked at the restaurant.

And also I loved cooking. And I just felt like I can cook for people and I can help them. And I decided to start a private chef company rather than continue working in a restaurant or start a restaurant because I figured, well, first I want to work for myself. And I don't want it to be as stressful as working at a restaurant. restaurant, you know, and private chefs can make a lot of money, especially in New York City. And at the time, I was working on the Upper West Side. So how do you start finding clients? That was tricky. I thought it was going to be easy because I worked at this restaurant. I'm like,

all these rich people who eat here are going to hire me. Didn't work that way. So I started putting up pliers, I thought my ideal client would be. So fancy nail salons, hair salons, yoga studios. And in the end, I think it took me like five, six, six. months to finally get my first client and she found one of my flyers at a nail salon. And let me guess you cooked for her and it was amazing and then she recommended you. Yeah. That's how it works. It's such a momentum effect.

I know. After all those months. It's so smart to go put up flyers. I remember when I first started my blog, I would put business cards everywhere I went. Really? I still do it sometimes. Do you? It's like 10 years later and I'll still throw a business card.

I should do that. Yeah. It's like, why not? Yeah. Especially now. You used to do. We used to sneak into the Barnes & Noble and we'd find the book that and we put it in the front, right?

Yes. Her grandma used to do that. Me and her grandma used to sneak into the Barnes & Noble and put it right in the bestseller front of heart. I do that with my book, actually. Yeah, that's the move. No shame. It takes a little bit of groundwork.

Yeah, exactly. I didn't know you did that with my grandma. Listen, me your grandma would go on runs where we'd go, we'd find the book and we'd put it. Oh my God. James Patterson. Get out of the way. Get the fuck out of your bestseller. Yes.

No, yours is the bestseller now. That's what you got to do. I think James Patterson probably did that too. And that's how he got to where he is today. Okay, so what I see sometimes with people that become vegan is that they do do it because they think it's healthier. Yeah. But I also see a lot of people become vegan and they just start to eat a ton of carbs. Yeah.

And they end up gaining weight and it's actually not as healthy because they're just eating crap, basically. Yeah. Can you kind of speak like what your vibe is on that? Yeah. Okay. There's different types of vegans maybe, you know? I think of vegans as, especially like nowadays because there's so many animal, food meat alternatives out there, there's even more types of vegan. When I first became vegan, sure, we had like junk food, but we didn't have nearly as much as we do today. But generally,

I think most of us were like closer to like whole food plant based, you know, we need a lot of of vegetables and fruit and cooked at home a lot because there weren't so many vegan restaurants around and not as much junk food yet. Also, there were like a lot of people doing raw at that time. That's early 2011. But otherwise, that was basically it as far as I knew. Nowadays, You have, of course, the raw foodist. You have, like, the high-fat, low-carb vegans. You have the whole-food plant-based vegans. You have the really extreme whole-food plant-based where you don't even eat oil.

You don't even eat, like, nothing processed, just whole, like literally whole foods, right? I'm more in the, like, maybe like the 90-10, mostly whole-food plant-based. And then 10% of the time or so I'll just eat, you know, junkier foods. I'll eat out of restaurants. I eat processed foods, things like that. but in moderation. And then there are vegans, of course, who are just like fully. I don't like vegetables.

I only want to eat the processed foods. They're super easy and convenient. Why not indulge in these things? And I don't care about my health because that's the thing. People are becoming vegan for so many different reasons. Some for health, some for the animals. And some for the environment, right? So depending on why you become vegan, I think that also informs, you know, what type of eating you

choose to do. So let's unpack it a little bit for those. for the uneducated like myself, right? I would consider myself in that group. What is at the core, I mean, because a lot of people know what veganism is and what vegans are. But at the core, what are the, I don't want to say restrictions, but what's the general practice?

What can you do? What can you not do to be considered vegan? Wait, hold up. Who here likes coffee? Specifically, mushroom coffee. If you're sitting there wondering, what mushroom coffee, I don't know about that. I don't know how that's going to taste. Guys, it tastes exactly like regular coffee, except you don't have to worry about the

jitters, the coffee come downs, any of the bad stuff that comes on. It does sound too good to be true? That's because it kind of is. I'm all about not doing too much coffee right now. And just in general, I want to back off, especially after this pregnancy. So four-sigmatic is like the perfect way to do that. Four-sigmatic's been a part of ours for a long time now. Their founder, Terro, has been on this show multiple times, three times, I believe now. And that's just because we find him so interesting. And in addition to that, we find his company even more interesting. Sorry, Terro. So what are the benefits of Four-Sigmatic mushroom coffee? First, Adaptogenic. They contain two mushrooms, lions made in chaga, which helps you think and gives you a powerhouse of antioxidants, no sugar.

They don't cause the jitters. They give you mental boosts and it tastes delicious, not like mushrooms at all. So here's the deets. You can carry these in your handbag. They come in little tiny packets. They're ready to drink with hot water and they enhance with your choice of nut milk. So if you want to do like an unsweetened almond milk and a little cinnamon, it's delicious. If I want to wind down though, I have to say this, Michael, because this is my favorite.

I always reach for the mushroom cacao. There's a spicy one, and it's like a warm hug from grandma. So you can get the coffee for the morning to boost your productivity with the chaga and Lionsmane, and then at night you can wind down with the amazing, delicious, spicy cacao that tastes like hot chocolate. All of their products are extremely affordable, and they have something for everybody, whether you want to boost mental performance, you want a little bit of pick me up in the morning, you want to go work out, you want to focus, you want to sleep better.

So to check them out, go to foursigmatic.com slash skinny and enter promo code Skinny for 15% off your entire order. Again, that's foursigmatic.com slash skinny and promo code skinny for 15% off your entire order. Guys, they've kept this code for us for a long time. They never changed the offer. If you love the product like we do, you can continue to go back and take advantage that 15% off. Again, that's foursigmatic.com slash skinny. All right, let's get back into the show. Generally, that means you don't eat any animal products. That's like the dietary vegan definition. No eating any animal products. There's a little, it's, you know, honey is a gray area. vegans do and some vegans don't I don't but when I first became vegan I still did eat honey I was

especially into just like local raw honey. What's the reason for some not eating honey? Just because it's exploitative of bees yeah and so bees do get killed when you're taking the honey from them right and also the honey that they produce they don't produce it just like it's not just a byproduct they actually make it for food for themselves especially during for the winter so it's exploitative that's why some people wouldn't eat it. So yeah, that's why I don't eat it also. There's a guy here in L.A. that runs around and finds beehives. Our friend, Delio, was just on here, the guy that has Sun Life Organics. I don't have you ever tried. You got to try it if you haven't. But he said there's a guy here in L.A. that runs around and saves bees and saves their honey and takes them to a safe

place for bees. Wow, that's wonderful. We've got to find out who that is. Taylor, that is so cool. Yeah, please. That would be great. I actually think that if I, I always say if I had the space, but actually, to be honest, I do have the space right now. I would keep bees. I don't do it. Keep bees while you're waking up every two hours for Not now. Not now. Not now. Not now. I can hardly keep myself alive right now. Yeah. Yeah. Just I feel like it's, you already got too much going on. Way too much. Maybe one day. One day when she's like 10.

And she's like, I don't care about being with you anymore. Mom, I have my own friends. She can manage the farm. One of my favorite stories, like I'm a big heavy metal fan. This is a tangent. The lead singer of Metallica,

he is now, like, obviously he still has his band and he goes around and does these crazy heavy metal, like, concerts. But then in his spare time, he has this ranch, and he's a beekeeper. Really? That's a cool. I'd be a good beekeeper.

I like to be one with the bees. Okay, back to the, back to explaining bees. If I get the suit, I'll become the keeper. I mean, you're going, you're going to go down crazy. Oh, yeah. So back to just explain, like, just give us all the. Sorry, the rules restrictions.

Oh, right, right, right. I forgot. I forgot. I went on a tantrum. Oh, yeah, we were talking about bees. So, okay, so that's like the food, right? However, for me, I don't think of veganism is just a diet. I think of it as a whole lifestyle.

So I don't wear any animal products either, meaning, you know, no leather, no wool. Also, you know, when I first became vegan, I still did own a lot of wool and leather. and so I didn't just, you know, throw those things away or donate them all. I continued to wear them. And then when I would buy new things, I wouldn't buy wool and I wouldn't buy leather or silk. And so now, you know, it's been almost nine years being vegan. I don't think I have anything left at all. What's the hard part when you first transitioning?

Like what is this stuff they're like, oh, that's hard to give up? For food or for clothes? Just everything. I mean. Something you caught yourself like, oh, whoa, I didn't realize this would be difficult to go. For me, the hardest thing was not the food at all, but it was just like, fashion, shoes especially, like on-trent, nice shoes. That's still hard for me. Yeah. Listen, I can relate. It's so tough. And because also another thing is, so

as a vegan, over the years I also, I started, obviously, humans are animals as well. I started expanding what it means to be compassionate for animals and including humans into that too, right? I have compassion for not just non-human animals, but humans as well and exploited people all over the world. So I started, I stopped actually shopping for fast fashion. In fast fashion, you can get a lot of great looking on-trend, technically vegan shoes and accessories. If you shop at like 421, I don't know if they're, are they even still around anymore? They're having hard times. Yeah, hard times. They're having more than all times, but yeah. Yeah, right. Bankruptcy. H&M and such. And Zara. But I actually stopped shopping fast fashion, too, and that made it even more difficult. But now I buy things

used on Poshmunk, so it makes it a little easier. What is one thing that you miss that's not vegan? Is there any food that you miss or is there nothing that you miss? Do you not crave it? Hmm. It sounds like there's nothing. If you have to think about it, not a lot. No, there isn't, because there was. When I first became vegan, I didn't know how to prepare all my favorite foods vegan yet. Got it. That was so long ago. And now that is, like, that's been a big part of my career and what I've been doing is making my favorite foods vegan. Give us a, give us a, the cheese recipe that someone can whip up at home because cheese would be hard for me? It depends on what you want to do with the cheese.

Like if you wanted like a spreadable cheese, like a cultured type of cheese, I don't eat cashews, so, which means I can't have hardly any of the ones that you buy at the grocery store. So I make mine with sunflower seeds. Sunflower seeds, intritionally yeast, a little bit of lemon. You could age it or you don't have to age it. And it's very easy. You whip it up in the food processor. It's delicious.

That sounds good. Yeah, thank you. See, if I had someone like you around. Oh, God. Get on your violin. That could cook really, really great and healthy meals. I think the problem is a lot of people don't have your cooking skills, right? And they try to go vegan.

And then it's like they feel like they're eating cardboard, right? I think so. But I also think that they don't have the – now this is what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to help people understand that, sure, cooking skills are incredibly valuable. And I think we should all have them at least the basics. You know how to cut an onion and such. But more importantly, you should know what's available to you. So if you don't have any cooking skills, technically you shouldn't be able to cook anything, right?

But if you're able to cook chicken and fish and just turn on an oven, then you can still eat vegan and still cook vegan. There are so many things like, for example, mushrooms. Mushrooms are so overlooked as a nutritious, filling, easily accessible food. And that is something that you don't need to season it a lot. You don't have to do very much to it. You can saute it, you can broil it, you can roast it, you could bake it, you can do anything with mushrooms. But people don't realize that that's a food that they could whip up as easily as they might do

like a piece of chicken. You can make mushrooms taste like steak. Exactly. I've had mushrooms that taste just like steak. What do you do for butter, though, if you want to put butter on the mushrooms? Do you vegan butter. Vegan butter? Yeah.

And is it good? Yeah. There's a whole bunch of different ones on the market now. Like I said, I'm allergic to cashew, so I cannot speak from experience. but I hear that the very best one is Miyokos. Okay. Yeah. We need to talk about brands because I do look at, oh, is this vegan, is this vegetarian?

What is this when I'm buying stuff? Mm-hmm. And a lot of the vegan brands have soy. Mm-hmm. And I'm not a fan of soy. Okay. So what brands would you recommend that are soy-free or that are just really nutritional that you find that you keep gravitating towards?

You should try Miyokos, especially for the cheese and the butters and such, because they're all cashew-based. And then, like, most vegan cheeses, most of the higher-end ones, the aged cheeses and such and the really good ones are cashew based also or nut based in general so they don't usually have any soy in them even if you wanted to buy like earth balance that's like the OG vegan butter they also have a soy free one so you could buy that one too meat what about meat like fake meat fake meat yes I mean beyond meat even that one is soy free that one's pea protein so that's a good one okay I'm gonna look at beyond meat

Because whenever I go to look at the paddy section, I feel like there's so much soy in it. And I have a theory on soy that I've told Michael. Oh, yeah? Can I hear it? I just think too much soy is happening in our foods. Yeah. And it's causing too much estrogen and men. Oh, oh.

I don't know. What's too much estrogen and men leads to what? Little bitches sometimes. Oh, too much soy. This is my own theory that like when Michael whines or he bitches at me, I'm like, you're eating too much soy. Checking my package, my ingredients? I don't like a lot of soy in my diet regardless.

I just don't see the benefit for me. But in terms of like as a new protein source, when you think, and I know there was a great documentary that just came out that I want to see in like Arnold and all these bodybuilders. Yes. Game changers. This is the golden time of veganism. Yes. This is the, you are in the middle of like the golden age of vegans.

So when people are saying, okay, I don't get protein. Yeah. What's your response? Because I'm sure you have an answer for that. Yeah. You are, most of us are getting too much protein, especially Americans. So it's like with, so here's the thing. Just like with soy, most Americans, not vegans, but most Americans.

Too much of everything. Yeah, we're getting too much of everything. If you're worried about soy, don't eat a standard American diet, period. Don't worry about being vegan. Just don't eat a standard American diet because soy, especially processed soy, not whole food soy that's, you know, good for you, but the processed kind is in all the junk food, like every single thing. It's a filler.

It's, you know, any sort of protein that they've added. It's going to be a soy protein isolate. It's just, you know, just don't eat standard American, don't eat junk food. And then when it comes to protein, if you're eating a standard American diet, you are eating way too much protein. However, when you switch over to a vegan diet, the only thing that I would say about protein, well, first of all, you don't have to worry about getting enough as long as you eat enough food.

So everything has protein in it. But I think the issue with people when they first become vegan is they often don't eat enough food, period. Or maybe they're eating just too much process. but most of that processed food, especially now, like we're talking about the patties and such, has plenty of protein added because people are protein crazy. So you don't have to worry about protein with that. But just eat plenty of food. I tell people that if you go vegan and you feel sluggish and you feel tired and you feel hungry, that means you're just not eating enough food.

You might be starving yourself because I don't think people understand that vegan food, like the whole foods and such, the healthiest stuff, has far fewer calories. So sure, you might be used to going to chopped and getting, do they have chopped? in L.A.? Yeah. Okay. Chopped in getting a salad with, like a romaine salad with a bunch of chicken and I don't know what else animal products, people put on their salads.

But if you take that out, all you have left is the lettuce, that is not enough food. So you need to replace that with legumes, for example. I love lentils. I was eating lentils when you walked in. Oh my God. Lentils are the best. That was on brand for you. Yes, it is.

Okay, good. So on brand. Put lentils, whole grains, like faro and keats. kinawa and frica and all of those things i love tempe you know we're talking about soy my favorite form of soy is tempe because it's very hearty and incredibly high in fiber and protein and you can do so much with it so you can just bulk up your salads if you ever go in my blog and look at any of the salad recipes my salads are not side salads i don't eat side salads i have like these gigantic salads that i eat out of mixing bowls because you need to eat so much more volume of food when you're eating

vegan. And that's totally okay. If you like to eat, then you should become vegan because you eat so much good food. But another thing I just wanted to say about the protein thing, people should not be worrying about not having enough protein in the United States unless you're literally starving yourself. You're very, very, very unlikely to have a protein deficiency. But I think people need to focus way, way more on fiber. We don't get nearly enough fiber in this country. And the number one killers are all lifestyle related. So there's heart disease, cancer, and I can't remember the third It's like, I think maybe a stroke or something. Let's say just the first two, heart disease and cancer.

You know, studies show that if you eat more fiber, you have a lower risk of heart disease and certain types of cancer, especially colorectal cancer. And that's something that, you know, a lot of people have. And clearly we're not eating enough fiber. So what are the best sources of fiber? We've talked about this on the show for a few times. Yeah. But having you on, like, lentils a good one, right?

Lentel's a great one. Any whole food vegetables. The problem is people just don't know where to get a good source. And we were sold on the dreams like, hey, like the cereal has enough fiber. Yes, that's the thing. Yeah, don't worry about it. If it comes from a box, like, that's like a secondary source. The primary sources of fiber should just be fruits, vegetables, whole greens, and legumes, nuts and seeds. That's it. Just eat that. I am a big fan of fiber. Before I got pregnant, I tried to do it at every single meal. Good.

I also take a lot of inulin, which is an artichoke root fiber. That's fun in my coffee. It's a prebiotic. Yeah. Yeah, that's another way to get fiber. You know, it's interesting when you say that vegans sometimes they will switch to being vegetarian to vegan, and then they don't eat enough. One of my girlfriends who I absolutely adore, Jordan from the balanced blonde.

Yeah. I think she developed, and I hope I'm saying this right, orthorexia. Yeah. through a transition to veganism. Worrying so much about eating. Yes. Yes. And I think now she's vegan and she's had a completely different experience.

But I do see people switching to veganism and sort of, I don't want to say using it as a way, but it does sometimes develop into an eating disorder. Totally. Totally. So I don't think that's an issue with veganism. I think it's just, you know, some people are just more likely to get an eating disorder. And if they decide to become vegan, you know, and they're so worried. about what am I eating and how much of it am I eating, then it can be a trigger for, you know,

some other maybe underlying issue. Maybe they had something before in the past or maybe this is just a trigger for this to come out for the first time. So yeah, I don't think it's a problem with veganism though, because I think that is a rare situation. I have heard it before. Melissa Woodhalth is another amazing vegan to follow. She does a lot of good recipes like you. You guys, I feel like have the same energy. I think I heard her on your podcast. Yeah, she's amazing. Yeah. She gave me the tip to mix pasta with a bunch of arugula and kale instead of adding meat. Yes. And I love it because you get so much volume. Exactly. I know I love to bulk up pasta with, you know, things like that. I also have been eating. Now, I know this is technically processed, but I've been trying to switch at least occasionally. I'll have just the

chickpea pasta or the legume pasta, red lentil, whatever, instead of the regular wheat pasta so that I can get more fiber. and, you know, I'm not worried about protein. So for me, it's really about eating more fiber. And then I will bulk that up with more raw vegetables, you know, just like baby kale and such that I add at the end and let it wilt because you want the two types of fiber. You want soluble and insoluble fiber because it does different things right in your body. So that's a good tip for myself. I snuck the lentil pasta to Michael the other day and he said, this tastes a little bit different,

but he did eat it all. Yeah? I don't know what I'm just like, does she made it? I'm eating it. It was the, if I ate it all, it's because it's, The tolerant brand. Is that a good one? The tolerant brand.

Yes, that one's a good one. And it was the red lentil pasta and there's one ingredient in it. Like, how can you get better? Isn't that great? Yeah. I love all of that. Yeah, I think that's amazing. They're not my favorite, you know, legume pasta's, I do it just because I know it's better

for me. The texture's a little strange. It's a little, what are some tips and tricks for someone that maybe doesn't want to go full vegan, but wants to just add more vegetables into their diet. Yeah, that's a great place to start. Like even if you, I think that's a good. That's how I'll get you in. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Then you start to see it. Just a little tricks though that you can do. Yeah, for your kids or for your husband. So one thing you can do is for me, I'll say I was very picky when I was growing up and I didn't eat a lot of vegetables. The biggest thing that worked for me and I did this for myself was just to learn new ways

of preparing vegetables. So many of us just eat vegetables in one way. Like, for example, when I was growing up, the only way I'd ever had Brussels sprouts were boiled. And that's just, oh my God. cannot eat that at all. I never could eat that. So you learn how to shred them and turn them into a salad and massage it with a really good dressing or you learn how to roast them, of course, or make a groton out of them. There's so many different things. But if you want to sneak vegetables to people,

then a good way of doing it is I like to make little like burger poties. Sweet potato burgers are really good. Everybody pretty much love sweet potato though. But so that's, you don't really have to sneak that. But sweet potato burgers are my favorite. Black bean burgers. Black bean burgers. You could put spinach in there and kale and such. I love beet burgers as well. A lot of people don't like beets, but the beet burgers, I've made them for many, many, many people who don't

like beats and they love them. Yep, I bet your cooking is like amazing. Yeah, so I show the recipes, though, so anybody can do it. I'm actually eating hungry for a beet burger. Me too. I bet a sweet potato burger is so good. So good. My pregnancy craving is sweet potatoes with pomegranate seeds all over it

and ghee and cinnamon. Yeah. And if we could make that into a burger, That sounds so good. Totally good. Totally. Have you ever used pomegranate molasses? No, what's that? It's the best. The best. You have to message me that. Oh, I do. It's just, you know, boiled down pomegranate juice.

And they do add a little bit of sugar, but it's a thick, rich molasses. And I drizzle it over my salads, and I make salad dressings with it. And I make this really great. It's a red pepper sauce. It's called Muhammad. It's Middle Eastern thing. And you have to use pomegranate molasses in there. It's tangy.

And just, ugh, so good. So good. Does your partner just, like, love it? He loves it. Does he only eat vegan too? Yeah. Okay, so I have a question. As a mom, you just had a new baby.

Yeah. How do you make the decision of what the baby's going to eat? Oh, we're going to be some controversial turns. No, I want to know. I want to know if it was, like, automatic. Because to me, if you're pregnant and you're vegan and you're eating vegan the whole pregnancy, I can see why you would want your baby to eat vegan because that's what you're She was used to.

Yeah, she was built off of that. So for her, you know, first of all, well, she just started eating foods at eight months. She's 10 and a half months right now. She was a little slow to eating. I started introducing them at seven months and she was like, I'm not interested. She would like play with them on the little tray, but she wouldn't eat or swallow anything. But then around, I think exactly the day she turned eight months, she started eating things. So it is still pretty new that we're like actually feeding her solids.

She's been 100% breastfed up until. that point. So now I do, you know, going forward, I mean, I'm totally going to raise her vegan. I think a lot of people are concerned though, just like with adults, how are the babies going to get enough nutrition from a vegan diet, right? How are they getting enough protein? How are they getting enough minerals and vitamins and such? And the truth of the matter is that if you're eating a diverse array of foods and a whole and balanced diet, then the baby's going to get enough. They, my daughter, she eats peas and beans and lentils and things like that already and lots of vegetables. Vegetables are high in protein and obviously they're like the most nutrient-dense foods that anybody can

eat. Obviously sweet potatoes and such. I'm not concerned at all about her health at all. She's thriving and she's growing really well. She's pretty big for her age. She just seems amazing and great energy and all of that stuff hitting all her milestones. The only concern, it's not even a concern. And the only thing I wonder about is like when she goes to school and she has friends and she's, you know, outside of the home. She's at a sleepover or whatever. Well, it is a concern because you got, you know, like if kids are, and listen, I'm not, I don't ever put my parenting hat on or like I honestly could care a lot about how anyone's doing their parents. Because I'm never going to take advice from the way I'm going to parent. But it is something like just by human nature.

If people get restricted and they get around things. Yeah, you want to try it. Yeah. You're like, oh, like I remember, like if there's like, oh, my friend's house has a big candy door. Yeah. Oh, yeah. then you're just diving in. But especially if you've like really been restricted.

Like you want to rebel. Like my mom will never let me eat candy. I'm at my friend's house. I'm going to have it right now. But like for me growing up, never eating red meat in pork, I never, I never,

never, ever was tempted. I, because my parents, the way they talked about it, they made it like a point of pride that we didn't eat those foods. And they explained it to me

why we didn't eat those foods. And I understood. And so anytime I was in that circumstance where there's, you know, only pepperoni, pizza and nothing, no just regular plain cheese pizza, I would just wouldn't eat any pizza. I was totally fine with that because I knew that that wasn't for me. Now, that also might have something

to do with my personality. I don't know. No, I want to do that with my daughter with drugs. Oh, yeah. No, I want to, I want to explain to her really openly about what each drug does. That's what my parents said too. Why, why I didn't like it or why Michael didn't like it. I swear to God, this in my life, I've never done like a recreational drug. Outside of like I've, you know, I smoked a little weed once in a while, and it's not for me. But I've never done any drugs, right? My dad... You've done mushrooms.

No, but I don't consider that the same thing. Okay. I don't consider psilocybin. He hasn't done like cocaine. Yeah. I'm not one of those guys. But, you know, my dad grew up in a time, you know, he's 75 now. So he grew up in a time when that was prominent.

He just spent a lot of time with the kids saying like, hey, this is what the effect. Like this is like what marks and not works. So I was never curious. Right. When I got around and had a bunch of people doing it, it was not like I felt like I was missing out. Like, okay, cool. if you want to do it, like go ahead, but I just, I wasn't drawn to it.

Exactly. And I think if you're educated and you have those conversations with your parents in any field, any regard. Anything. Dating, sex, food, whatever. Exactly. You're not doing that. It's one of those things like you said.

You're telling the kid, like, no, you can't do this. And you're not explaining why. Right. It's like with my grandmother, she always says that with her parents, they never, ever talked about sex, pretended like it didn't exist. And she got pregnant. She got married, 16 and pregnant. And she said she didn't even understand what was happening.

to her body. She didn't even, because they, nobody ever talked to her about it. So if only, now everything, she's fine. Everything worked out. Fine. I wouldn't be here, right? Otherwise. But if only you talk to your children and explain and are really honest with them, I think it really makes a difference. Yeah, even like I remember being a little kid, like sitting at the dinner table, like maybe five, six years old, be like, okay, like if you want to take a small sip of this wine and I take it like, oh, this is gross. I don't want it at the time, right? Exactly. It's like just having it be normalized and have a conversation to see that it's a social thing and it's not, you're not going crazy.

And, you know, I think it's so important. Like, you know, I think one thing that's interesting about our generation is that a lot of these, like, the biggest thing for me is having conversation. I think that's how you either put a stop to something or start or a start to something. You get in a dangerous place in society when people are unwilling to talk about things. Exactly.

Right. So true. So true. So true. So true. So true. So true. So, so.

So, yeah, the veganism. Yeah. The veganism. Yeah. Okay. Well, first of all, acknowledge that the tip is already in because I'm sure everybody body eats some vegan food. If you just pick up an apple and eat it, technically you're eating vegan, right?

You're not eating animal products. That's true. So acknowledge that. And acknowledge that it's not that much of a jump. It's not that strange. You don't have to rework your whole life to even just like start. So beyond that, then I would say different people come from different places, though. So I would say, you know, just for example, you are pretty healthy, though you eat, you know,

animal products, but you are interested in eating more vegan. You're not like fully standard American diet. You already are like, you know, don't eat at McDonald's and such. Then I would say look at your diet right now and see where you could eat more vegetables. And if you already feel like you're eating plenty of vegetables, then maybe see where you can turn one of those meals into a fully vegan meal. So, for example, if you're eating, there's so many things you can just turn vegan. So do you guys have an example of like a favorite non-vegan food?

Michael's favorite non-vegan food is burger. which you already gave us a really good modification. Yeah. You also love steak. Steak would be hard for him to give up, I think. Yeah. How often do you eat it? Not that often.

No, not that often. Once a week. No. Maybe like a steak, maybe like once every two weeks. Okay. I mean, if you wanted to be a really like grass-fed good steak. Yeah. And it has to, you know, like a bell camper we just talked about.

I know that's not for you, but it's not, I'm not just like eating random steaks. Well, that's good. I mean, if you wanted to give up the steak, right? And you just go down to once a month, right? Instead of twice a month. What about eggs? Oh, eggs are a good one to, that's a good question. Because so many people rely on them for breakfast.

Yeah, and you love them. Why do you love them? I love them because they taste really good on toast, especially when you're pregnant. And I feel like I get a lot of vitamins and minerals from them, but they're also filling and satisfying. Yeah. And I like the way they taste. And I don't know.

I've just always loved an egg for protein. But I guess I need to stop focusing on protein and start focusing more on fiber. Yeah. Yeah. Or just like nutrient density. What is the substitution for egg? The thing is there's not, honestly, there's not a very, like a one-for-one substitution, unless you're going for nowadays a very processed substitution.

Because there are vegan eggs now that you can scramble and look just like the real thing. It smell like it and everything. That sounds strange to me. Right? Because. Yeah. Yeah. We want to like the real food.

Yeah. We want real foods. Yeah. Because that sounds weird to me. Like you cook. a fake egg. You might as well just do the real one. Exactly. Exactly. Those foods, I don't know. Are they for vegans? I don't know who they're for. They're not for me. But when it comes to like for me for breakfast and I'm going to eat something on toast, I hate to say lentils, but I really do love lentils.

I like stewed lentils. I make them in my instant pot with a bunch of different herbs and spices. And I put them on salads. I put them on toast with like tahini. I was telling you about Muhammad sauce. That's really good with that. Just like having lentils with something else that's very flavorful. Also though for breakfast and for toast I really love avocado and of course avocado toast who doesn't like that and mushrooms too. So I do the mushrooms just by like I cook them in the skillet and a cast iron skillet and put a lid on top of them like a very heavy lid and that weight of the lid will help them get really meaty and really juicy and like I literally only season them with salt. That is it. Put that on like avocado toast to bulk it up. Obviously

do lentils too. What kind of toast we need to? specific brands. I buy my bread at Arawan, the juice to sourdough. That's my favorite. Every single health professional has recommended this bread to me since I've been pregnant. Oh, really? And I think you need to go get it for me. Go get it.

Listen, I'm down. Let's go get it. Lorne is post-mating the Aeroons, which is or, we're about to go. We're about to, Arbori-I-Ca-Con is driving into the floor. In addition to the price of Airwan, which is insane. Insane. Postmates extra charge. I know.

What about Instacart? I got to try Instacart Yeah, because they have like a membership But the Gusta bread everyone keeps telling me about So good What's so good? It's vegan obviously Yeah, I mean it's just regular sourdough It's just really good

It's amazing It is This has been a recommendation You should do it When I had when I was pregnant And like where you are right now Like in ninth, what is the ninth month? I actually stocked up

I got I think three loaves And I cut them each and half And I wrapped them in aluminum And stuck them in the freezer so that I could, you know, I was planning to not leave the house for 40 days. I didn't want to do that, but all these voices in my head telling me I should do that. And I figured, how am I going to get my bread from juice? I didn't use Instacari back then.

So I stocked up. I'm going to get that. Oh, by the way, though, where do you guys live? West Hollywood. Okay, so no. I went to, I don't know where they're based, but I was at the Sunday, Santa Monica Market two Sundays ago, and I got an amazing sourdough bread. I think they're at them.

I got to stop you here because I know my wife and she's, I'm going to be traveling now. She's going to be like, no, I think that I say no more. The brand of sourdough you're talking about is at the Monday market. Oh, really? It's like a raw fermented sourdough.

It's not raw. Oh, maybe it's just fermented. What is a fermented sourdough. Okay. And I think it's like Codoro. I think the brand is called like Codoro or something. I love sourd.

I remember they on the package it said the bakery was in Inglewood. Oh, I love sour. She has me chasing down trucks and going all over. Yeah, they're real. Oh my God, you're such a good husband. Yeah. Let me ask you this. Sometimes.

I'm just kidding. Let me ask you this. So you're a public person. I can say that. We're public people. You're public people, yeah. Yeah, yeah. We're public.

So you have your beautiful baby girl and she's on public and you're raising her vegan. Are people giving you flack? I mean, I'm sure that you deal with a lot of crazy messages. I don't. You don't? You don't. You don't. I don't write any crazy messages.

I mean, honestly, I'm a little behind on the DMs. But no, really, no. So I don't share her photo. The most I've shared is like yesterday I shared a photo and she's looking down and you can see like kind of her profile. But that's the most I've shared for her face. And I don't like going forward, I don't know if I will at all. And they're smart. I think people overdo it.

I think so too. And the thing is, you know how people, people, I'll go to the grocery store and people will come up to me and hug me and like, be like, oh my God, I know you. like you're my friend and I'm you know I love that I'm very friendly person and I'll hug them back and that's I love it however I don't want I don't want them to have that same familiarity with my daughter who has no idea what the internet is or social media is I literally just had this conversation actually because I'm going to ask you and I said listen if it's what you've signed up for great right like fine it's expensive it's great yes but I would be I think I'd be really weirded out if people were trying to touch my kid this is this is like kind of going off on a tangent but there's

There's a couple brands that I'm working with, baby brands, when our daughter's coming. And they want to send me the stuff that I really want. Yep. And they want Instagram story or Instagram trade, which is totally, like, fine. It's a beautiful piece of furniture or something. Totally. Like, I'm down for that, especially when I picked it out and I can recommend it to my audience 100%. Yep.

But here's the problem I'm having. You're going to have to fit in the photos. They say, okay, well, we will give you this, but we need. need photos with the baby in it, editorial photos, that I would send to them so they can go use it in their ads. Listen, so my thing was like, no. And our thing, so Michael and I talked this morning and I just said, you know, I'm not going to promise my unborn baby that I haven't even seen myself to these companies.

And I honestly think it's like if I just snap like a car seat or something and the baby's not in it, I think it's good enough. Good enough. Because I do babies. I don't know how I'm going to feel. The other thing is like, listen, if there's something you really want, like, go, like, listen, we're in a position, luckily, fortunately. We can go and buy it. Like, not have to pick the kid out, right? I think that's a lot to ask, too. I think that these companies, if I happen to snap a picture of our daughter in it that I want to share great, but I don't think it should be like the baby has to be in it. Exactly. Especially if they want to take it and they want to have, I don't know if they're going to own, I guess you'll always own it, but if they're going to have usage rights to it. No way. Yeah. So we're. So we're. So we decided we're just going to buy our own stuff,

buying like no problem instead of just pimping the baby. Exactly. I don't feel good about that. The other thing about the baby, like even if you're not, it's not just a trade. Another concern that I had is, especially before she was born, is, you know, like worrying about numbers

and worrying about the content you put out how well something does. It always does better in my situation when my daughter's in it, even if it's just the back of her head. Oh, yeah, it's an easy light ground. It's an easy. So I don't want,

You know, like that's sort of the pimping the baby out. It's like, it's addicting. I think Instagram. I don't want to do that either. I believe that Instagram does that feature where they've been talking about removing likes. Have you noticed it? Well, I don't, I haven't, I know they're going to do it. Yeah.

I actually think it's going to boost creativity and up the content for everybody because people are going to stop worrying about the vanity. No, they are. And I'll tell you why. You're wrong. You'll still see it. No. No, you're wrong. I'll make your bet.

Okay. You'll start seeing better content creators come out because they're not going to be worried about doing the easy things, right? Like, listen, I'm not knocking anybody, but like, maybe like the butt pick or it's like the kid in the picture or like you were kissing your boyfriend, all the stuff that like we know all works and triggers people like. I think you're going to start to see more meaningful content because people are going to stop worrying about, hey, I have to post this type of content and get people to engage, right?

Because it's going to remove that. At least I hope that's what it does. I'm going to tell you why that's not going to happen. People are addicted to the comments. I'm telling you, you're looking at the wrong thing. And everyone keeps this likes conversation. I'm like, people are not looking at likes. They're looking at the comments.

And I'm telling you, when you, I can imagine you're a new mom, you're fucking tired, you just got back from the hospital and you need to post something on your Instagram to keep your feed going. You take a picture of your baby and then you get 2,000 comments and then you're like, oh my God. I can, I see it. Oh my gosh. So I'm telling you right now, it's not the likes. It's the comments. And people are not going to get more creative.

You're wrong about that. Well, I hope they do. I hope they do too. But aren't you going to be able to still see your own likes? I guess the point I'm trying to make is that and listen now it's like a roundabout way of seeing this whether I'm right or Lauren's right or whatever I'm always right I'm hoping that's true

I'm hoping that people start because I think what you said is insightful here it's like if you post a kid or you post your kissing your boyfriend or you post you know a sexy photo or whatever guy or girl like that does the best it gets the most vanity but I'm hoping that people start to think about more meaningful content especially content creator like yourself

and Lauren who've been in the space like because that's how you evolve that's how you evolve the conversation like we're still living in this window of where, you know, these types of mediums have existed for a very, very short period of time. Yeah. And when I talk to young people and contract groups, especially sitting in the seed of your media, I'm like, listen, I'm not so interested in what you do over the next year or two years. Like, what does your brand look like five, 10, 15, 20 years down the line?

Because it happened with the traditional celebrity. You can think all these people that have been popular 70s, 80s, 90s, 99% of them are gone off that. Like, they're not over a brand anymore. Exactly. You have to think about, like, you know, if this is your personal brand, which a lot of people are navigating. and you have to think about how do I stretch that for 10, 20, 30, or your life.

What else you're in trouble? Yeah, that's scary. I would be stupid not to ask you this question, and I didn't get to ask you in the beginning. What are the beauty changes that you've seen from going vegan, if any? Like, has your skin gotten more glowy? Has your hair gotten thicker? I want to hear about that. Okay.

It's been a long time since I became vegan. Two things. I had acne, but I also had terrible digestion. Like, so bad that I got to the point where I just thought, like I'm broken. I can't do anything because I'd gone to different doctors, been in different medications and yada, yada, yada. When I became vegan, all that went away. And my skin cleared up, obviously there was a connection, right? As far as my hair, I don't even remember what my hair was like when I first became vegan. The biggest thing, though, was the skin. The skin and energy, really.

I was just going to say, what about energy? Totally. Because the digestion is like your stomach is everything, right? Yeah. If you don't have good digestion, you don't have good anything. You'd have a bad mood. you have bad skin, you have bad energy, you just sluggish, just like dors? Taylor, how's your digestion? That guy back there. You know, really? What are you eating back there, Taylor? He eats like Hawaiian jalapeno chips for lunch with dipped in cream cheese or something.

If his stomach likes it then, you know, his stomach likes it. I don't know if it's his stomach, he clogged my toilet the other night. Oh, okay. Maybe not, maybe not. You know, that's been the test. We're going to have to get on a vegan diet. He might need to go vegan. I'll say.

He was raised vegetarian. Really? Where, what is one recipe on your blog that you would recommend to our audience that you think that they would really like if they're looking to dip their toe into veganism? Okay. Try the lentil meatballs. Ooh. Mm-hmm. That sounds good. I want those today.

Lentil meatballs. Yes. Okay. And then a book, a podcast, a resource that you would recommend to someone besides your blog, obviously, Sweet Potato Soul, that's looking to know more about veganism. And maybe it's a Netflix documentary. I don't know. Ooh, that's a good one. Yeah.

I would say, I'm trying to think. The two really powerful ones recently were Calspiracy and what the hell. And they're made by the same people. So either of those two on Netflix also. Okay, I'm going to watch Calparency. I've only watched What the Hell. Oh, yeah, watch Calpiration. That's the first one that they did.

I'll be whipping you up some fucking lentil meatballs with a side of sweet potato burger, which sounds so good. Is that on your site? Little pomegranate and molasses. All that's in my cookbook. You know crossroads down here? Oh, yeah. Amazing.

I went there the first time. Do you like it? I knew she was going to say that. She's a chef, Michael. But imagine if you never, I went in and didn't know. I'm coming over to your house. And I was eating my friend, I went to meet my friend. And he was giving me the chicken and waffles in there.

And I had no, I had no idea. You're blown away? No, I didn't even know that it wasn't chicken until after. I did. Yeah, that's great. I bet if we came to your kitchen that we would be blown away too. You would. I'm just going to bat.

The thing, the funny thing, though, is people have a much higher standard for vegan food than they do for non-vegan food. I could see that. And especially like a restaurant. What can I just ask you one more thing? What's a really good baked good recipe in your book? Like something like a cake or a cookie or something like that? Mm-hmm. That's what I'm craving right now. Okay. The tahini cookies? Mm-hmm. They're insane. Okay. So good. Okay. If I weren't sleep deprived, I probably could have gotten my life together to make some today. Oh my God. I'm going to blame your baby. Blame the baby. Let me tell you something. You're pretty sharp on the mic for us being so sleep deprived. Thanks. Thank you. I don't. I don't. Anyway, you were great. Where can people find your book and your insight? Instagram and your blog. They can find me. It's Sweet Potato Soul. Everything is called Sweet Potato Soul. So just

Google Sweet Potato Soul. The book is available everywhere, obviously. Anywhere books are sold. Amazon is easiest probably. And yeah, go to Sweet Potato Soul.com or Sweet Potato Soul on YouTube or Instagram. Maybe we can do a giveaway with one of your books. Yes. Okay. We'll talk. Done. All right. Thank you so much for coming on. One more time, your Instagram handle at Sweet Potato Soul. That's right. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you guys. Before you go, we just got the cutest heart TSC popsockets. Everyone in the office is rocking them, and we're going to give away a couple. All you have to do is tell us your favorite part of this episode on my latest Instagram at The Skinny Confidential. And as always, make sure you've rated and reviewed the show.

Thank you guys so much for listening, and we'll see you next week. This episode was brought to you by Four Sigma. Guys, did you know mushrooms can prevent and treat many diseases and boost overall health? They are known to be super healing. You know I'm obsessed with their mushroom hot cacao mix. I like to wind down with this at night. It's so good and it feels so satisfying and it's full of benefits, which we love. Perfect with pregnancy too. Anyways, 4Sigmatic is offering all TSC, him and her listeners, 15% off. All you have to do is go to 4Sigmatic.com slash skinny and use code skinny at checkout.