The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Gout and You: The Ultimate Gout Diet & Cookbook by Spiro Koulouris

Episode Date: February 13, 2025

Gout and You: The Ultimate Gout Diet & Cookbook by Spiro Koulouris Goutandyou.com Amazon.com Are you tired of gout attacks and do you want to lower your uric acid levels? Then the book Gout and You: The Ultimate Gout Diet and Cookbook will point you to the right direction when it comes to gout dieting. I've decided to write a Book outlining all of my research and knowledge about what should consist a healthy gout diet. Us gout sufferers have a unique disease that needs a tailor-made diet in order to avoid any worse progression of our gout which can eventually lead to other complications or even premature death. Our disease favors eating more certain type of foods over others but at the end the formula for a healthy diet is the same whether you suffer from gout, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, osteoporosis or any other disease. You’ll learn about that formula in this eBook, how humans are supposed to eat if we want to live a healthy long life and free from gout attacks. The truth of the matter is after I've interviewed doctors, health practitioners, dietitians and others, you’ll find in this eBook how there is no “special” diet and that the diet I outline in detail can also be used by anybody who suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure, arthritis, osteoporosis, heart disease and even cancer patients! The focus of the book is on gout but many gout patients also suffer from diabetes, hypertension, arthritis, osteoporosis, heart disease and even cancer. And if they are presently not, chances are they eventually will at some point in the future, suffer from one or more of these other diseases. Everything is inter-related and health deteriorates due to bad eating habits. In this book I will dispel some common myths about food and dieting, we will get the facts straight on fat, protein and carbohydrates. I’ll also discuss the truth about curing gout, the BS that is out there and how oil snake salesmen on the web will sell you lies that can lead you to an early grave. I believe that honesty is always the best policy. That’s the reason thousands of you keep coming back to my website goutandyou.com everyday to read up on gout. They may call it the rich man's disease but I will teach you how to eat like a peasant…The key is not to eat like a king but how to eat more like a peasant. Gout was historically known as “the disease of kings” or “rich man’s disease” and you’ll discover in this book how to eat right through a tried and tested diet! Once you dig in the book Gout and You: The Ultimate Gout Diet and Cookbook and begin implementing the gout diet right away and using the recipes in the eBook, you’ll be surprised how easy it it is to follow. Using the information in this book including the meal ideas, I've helped many gout patients manage their pain while also increasing energy, slowing the aging process, losing weight, and building immunity. I have to admit the gout diet described in the book is more of a lifestyle change rather than starving yourself, it’s a whole new approach to life too! The truth is that you need to make changes no matter what or else your health will only get much worse. Remember that you are not alone and that more than 8 million Americans suffer from gout and millions more around the globe. In England 2,5% of the general population suffers from this terrible disease. Despite the statistics, gout can strike anyone, anywhere no matter what the age, genetics, health, ethnicity or lifestyle. Although many people will scorn you and even make fun of your gout (like they did to me!) viewing it as your bad drinking or eating habits, the truth is gout can develop due to genetics, obviously diet, menopause in women, obesity, rapid weight loss and many other causes described on my website and book. By eating right and following the gout diet described in this book you’ll save thousands of dollars from expensive drugs, costly doctor consultation fees and unnecessary surgeries taking your life back!

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you're about to go on a monster education rollercoaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. I'm Moses Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the the show. and everything they can do to make their lives better, and then they come share with you to make everyone else's life better. Because last time we checked, we're not alone here in all of our problems.

It seems like there's a commonality in some of them, although some of you have more problems than even I do, which is something... That's what my therapist told me anyway. Opinions expressed by guests on the podcast are solely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the host or the Chris F faust show some guests of the show may be advertising on the podcast but it is not an endorsement or review of any kind uh today we have an amazing young man on the show we're gonna be talking to him about his insights and how he can help you with health diet gout and all sorts of

different things and how he's overcome them that's a little great thing about stories they they help us understand like an owner's manual to life. So today we're joined by Spiro Koularis, and he's going to be talking to us about his stuff, what he does, and how he does it. Welcome to the show, Spiro. How are you? Good. Thanks for having me, Chris. GiveUsYour.com says so people can find you on the interwebs. Oh, so anybody that has any gout-related questions can find me on goutandyou.com. That's basically a blog about gout, where I blog about what foods to eat, what foods to avoid, what treatments are out there, what is gout, who it affects, and so on.

And it's a big community of about 50,000 folks, I would say, on social. Yeah. About 50,000 folks that you have on your show there. Yeah, part of the community i would say the groups and social media and so on and yeah that's where people can find me if they want to email me i answer all emails this sounds like a forthcoming hollywood movie gout and you or something i don't know maybe document yeah maybe yeah you know maybe one day it's it's like that ted you know that ted movie where the it's

got the little it's got the little teddy bear you can personalize gout make it like you know i don't know like that geico lizard only bad or something i don't know and and then it's about it's a it's a buddy movie right anyway yeah see i got i'm big picture guys this is how i think so tell us about a 30 000 overview what you do there at goutandyou.com. So basically, goutandyou.com, what is gout? Gout is an arthritic condition. It affects about 2% to 4% of the general population, I would say. Three-quarters of men suffer from it, 25% of women.

It affects folks usually over 50. The older you get, the higher risk you are of getting gout. And basically gout is the condition where usually your body excretes uric acid via the urine. And if you produce too much and it doesn't excrete because the kidneys are not functioning properly, it basically stays in the body and crystallizes in the joints and you get a gout attack that's very painful. So I had that at the age of 26. I got diagnosed with gout. I was out drinking with a bunch of pals late at night, drinking a lot of Jack Daniels and Coke. And then I went home to sleep and around 3am I was stricken

with a very painful gout attack. You couldn't even put the bed sheet on my foot. I hopped to the doctor's office the next day. He checked me out and quickly diagnosed me with gout. I didn't know what gout was. I did some blood tests and sure enough, my uric acid levels were to the root. So back then I was obese. I was about 50 pounds overweight and I was drinking a lot, obviously being in my twenties. And that's the main culprits of gout basically. It's a bad diet, alcohol, too much alcohol, too much red meat, too many processed foods. I was eating a lot of McDonald's back then. And then I decided to do some research on my own and check out what the disease is about. And I decided to start blogging

about it and start looking at the studies and realize there are foods you can eat that improve uric acid levels in the body and foods that raise uric acid levels so i started blogging about it and building a community on gowdingu.com and that's where we are today and how many years you've been doing that now oh boy i would say since 2014-15 around so close to 10 years you know i'm i'm i'm drinking uric acid right now my coffee which is probably a spot for our sponsor here bob's uric acid you can find it local stores don't don't do that it's probably not probably not healthy to do that whatever that is don't put in your coffee either uh the attorneys made me say that oh yeah i mean

this is this is a big deal i've seen my mom suffer from gout attacks i may have had some gout attacks when i was drinking there were some times, back when I used to hard drink, I would, it was either that or it was low potassium attacks, right? You get the, oh, what do they call them? They're kind of like, I don't know, your legs lock up. Your leg muscles lock up from low potassium. And you get to, I forget what they're called, but they'll lock up and you got to jump out of bed and push your feet. So is it arthritic? I don't know if it's officially arthritic. called but you know they'll lock up and you got to jump out of bed and push your your feet so it

was arthritic i don't know if it's if it's officially arthritic i can't it's right on the edge of my mind what they're called but basically you know you get this leg pain and it zaps like really hard you're just like muscle locks up yeah and i forget i forget what it's called but yeah they used to have when i drink, you know, bad Chris. That was bad Chris days. That's when I had to be hit myself with the thing. So tell us more about your journey. You didn't discover this until, you know, is this a permanent condition?

Does your body naturally have a predisposition to low output? Yeah, so unfortunately it is, for most people, a lifetime condition. The thing is, a lot of people will get gout, and then a doctor will prescribe medication, usually allopurinol, which helps control uric acid levels to keep him safe. And then they'll be asymptomatic, right? And then they'll think it's cured. They'll stop their medication and then lo and behold a year later they might get a gout attack and you don't want to have too many gout

attacks because after that it could affect the joints uh permanently so yeah a lot of people write in that they've cured it themselves that were through diet and so on i say great but keep checking doing some blood work checking where your acid levels at make sure they don't rise and get another gout attack so So work with your doctor. Yeah. Is it hereditary? Yeah, for some folks. But I would say at the end of the day, it's more dietary. If your dad had it because he was obese, but you're in shape and you're eating well, you're not eating, drinking or eating too much meat, right? You'll be fine. You're not going to

get gout. At the end of the day, the studies show that gout is more dietary than hereditary. And like I mentioned before, the main culprits are alcohol, too much protein in your diet, because whatever strains the kidneys, that's where uric acid is produced. It takes about 90 hours to break down. Sugar takes out many hours to break down. Seafood, fish, anything high protein, which has high purines, the kidneys overwork. And when they overwork, they get strained. That's where uric acid is produced. That's the foods you need to limit. So I have a book that I've written 10 years ago, The Ultimate Gout Diet and Cookbook. And I advocate about what a healthy gout diet should consist of. I tell my audience they got to eat 80% of their daily

calories as complex carbohydrates. So that includes vegetables, legumes, some fruit, 100% whole grain breads, 100% whole grain rices, beans for protein, more beans for protein than rice. And then 10% of your daily calories can be protein as in meat. So preferably clean cut meat, not too much fats, turkey, chicken breast, some fish. You could have beef, but make sure it's a lean cut and always the size of your palm. Don't go in eating more than that in one day. That will control uric acid levels and not strain the kidneys. And then the final 10% of your daily calories that I recommend is fat, obviously. So you could have some dairy, some eggs, cheese, butter, and so on. So the 20% there, if you notice, is all animal-based foods. That's where you have to be careful because animal-based foods like meat and dairy strain

the kidneys the most, whereas complex carbs like vegetables, your kidneys break those down very easily, very quickly, and they burn in the body body clean so not too much uric acid is produced so that's basically the the gout diet that i recommend in my book and you've got the ultimate gout diet and cookbook i do see another book on the amazon there the holy grail of health good health from a biblical perspective. Oh, that's not me, no. That's not my story. Oh, okay. All right then. Gout and You, the ultimate gout diet and cookbook. And so people can order that up on Amazon. You offer there and on your website several recipes on how people can eat.

Yeah, there's a lot of resources for people that suffer from gout to check out on goutandyou.com. I mean, you could find some recipes to get started. My book also has 100 recipes to help you get started. And then there's other resources. There's a purines calculator. So you could put the food you're eating and then they could calculate how many purines are in there. There's a calculator for that. Yeah. And we have a section for supplements. So if you want to cleanse your kidneys, help clean up the body and control uric acid, we have NutriGout, NutriGout Plus. We have a pain relief cream in case you get a gout attack that you can apply. And we're a top seller on Amazon and Walmart with over 10,000 reviews. Wow.

And so the cream helps with all that stuff. The question, Charlie Horse was the name I was looking for. Charlie Horse. You ever heard of Charlie Horse? No, no. What's the reference? all that stuff you you the question a charlie horse was the name i was looking for charlie horse you ever had a charlie horse no no what's the reference it basically locks up your it locks up your leg charlie horse okay yeah yeah and that's due to the drinking really wow yeah yeah because i was it was lowering my potassium levels it's a colloquial term for a muscle cramp yeah suddenly involuntary contraction of muscle and usually it would be in the calf muscles and you'll get this sharp cramping that's made severe and usually it's dehydration electrolyte imbalances muscle fatigue

for me it was just you know when you drink it drains so much potassium and vitamins and i think it drains pretty much everything from your body. Yeah, you've got to replenish, yeah. Yeah. In fact, I had an ex-girlfriend who died of potassium deficiency from being an alcoholic. And I was just like, wait, how do you die from potassium deficiency? But such as it were. So the gout affects a lot of people people a lot of people get affected by it

and and so have you given up drinking have you have you done that yet or you found a way to balance it this is what i do now if i do drink it's only on social occasions if i go to a restaurant i'll have a glass of red wine or two max and the trick if you're suffering from gout is drink a lot of water before and after to flush it out and then uh if i have a beer or two again it's so only on social occasions and i stick to pretty much that i might have a little whiskey here and there but very rarely so i'm not i'm not uh i don't drink on a weekly or daily or weekly basis. I would say once every four or five, six weeks. Yeah. I gave up drinking in 2020 and I didn't have a problem.

I just, I just get tired if they're, you know, rebounds. And as you get, as you get in your 50s, you get older. Yeah. Your body just doesn't recover. It takes three days to kind of come back from, you know, and it just kind of the math. It just kind of, just math is kind of, just kind of, you're just like, I'm tired of feeling hungover. And then as you get older, you have three beers and you get a hangover. Like just your body's, fuck you. We're not doing this with you

anymore. This is your 20. And so then you're stuck and you're just like, I guess I need to grow up and quit being a, an idiot. But yeah, quitting booze, Ize i just quit it and geez it's been so nice you know i i started listening to my body and i would have three days of drag after and and so that's been one of the i think the best choices i've made in my life is to quit drinking and god it's i save a shitload of money too yeah yeah so there's a there's a plug for getting rid of that so people can go on your website, they can figure out what's good and what's not. Is processed foods a major problem, I would imagine? Yeah. Yeah. So processed foods, again, the kidneys get strained when you eat processed foods,

and there's a lot of ingredients that raise uric acid levels. I would say the most dangerous one being high fructose corn syrup and that's pretty much a lot of processed foods so try and avoid that ingredient because it's been linked to gout and high uric acid so yeah definitely avoid high fructose corn syrup i would say can i still go to mcdonald's yeah listen you could do it once in a blue moon i would say say McDonald's. I have a burger here and there. Nowadays, you have better choices, right, than microwave burgers. So go fresh as much as you can. But don't limit yourself.

I mean, if you like a certain food, have it, but don't have it every so often. You know, you save it for that special occasion once in a while. So no more burgers every day. Yeah, I used to have it every day almost yeah the big max yeah is is it part of it a limited kidney function from either yeah yeah as you're eating more and more protein you're damaging the kidneys really that's why yeah you're basically kidneys have worked so hard throughout your lifetime that they're not functioning properly and they're not excreting

uric acid that you get a gout attack and that's why it occurs mostly in folks 50 and over in my case i got it so young because my doctor said that i was born with a minor thalassemia which is a disorder in the mediterranean because i'm of a greek background and it's a little blood disorder it's nothing serious in my case uh for other folks it could be and he says probably that is the root cause of me getting out at such a young age but in the news i have been following the news and the trends and the gout is on the rise with the youth due to alcohol consumption so i know in the uk and the us uh gout on the rise for 20 year olds due to drinking too so i know in the uk and the u.s i get out on the rise for 20 year olds due to drinking too much over drinking too much over drinking and then you know i mean

there's so much i mean those those kids you and i were probably raised or at least i was i'm really really old i don't mean to throw you in the bus under how old we are but i'm pretty darn old and uh you know i, we grew up eating natural foods. And then somewhere in the 70s or 80s, we crossed over into, you know, this highly processed, highly sugarized food. Yeah. And these new kids on the block, they, you know, that's all they've probably known is McDonald's and crap foods and crap stuff. And so that's, you know know that's where they're at so I can imagine yeah it's it's gonna affect them more because they grew up in

this kind of world and I was really lucky I started losing weight in 2016 I started tuning in my body I I got sick of being overweight I went vegan ease where I mixed being vegan with a few other things, I guess. And I get yelled at if I don't explain what exact one of the 2,000 variations of veganism there is. So I never know which is the correct one. But I just started eating clean. I still do that to this day. I buy my salad and different materials from a local farm that does hydroponic stuff. And I've just learned that just eating right makes such a difference in the quality of my body, my relationship with my body.

You know, like it's still my friend. Yeah, for sure. And it just makes all the difference. Now, do you coach on this? Can people have like hourly calls with you and stuff like that? No, not at this time. No coaching services. But I mean, for gout diet, my recommendation is get a diary.

Start writing everything down that you eat. If you get a flare-up, you want to notice if there's a pattern with a certain food that may cause the flare-up before you get that gout attack. So you may want to adjust your diet there. You're gonna fail, I tell my audience from time to time. Tomorrow's a new day, so get up and try and get back on track, that's my advice. It doesn't happen overnight. It takes a few months, right,

for you to get used to eating cleaner and healthier. And your palate will change over time. So basically that's the advice I give to my audience. Now, I see something on your website that refers to a mortality date or death rate. This can, you know, eating poorly and not exercising. Our overall mortality death rate goes down by 50% if you exercise regularly and, of course, eat well as well. Yeah, definitely, definitely. Hit the gym like I do.

If you hit the gym and do weights at least three times a day, there's a study that came out a couple months back that says you're going to live an extra 10 years on average. That's what a long-term study stated in conclusion. But for gout sufferers, since you get gout attacks and it affects the joints, you want to restrengthen those joints.

So I do recommend some weight resistance exercises. Try and and hit the gym if you don't like the gym then get a fitbit start walking at least 10 000 steps a day maintain your ideal weight this is very important for gout lifestyle you don't want to be overweight because then you're at a higher risk of developing another gat attack and try and be physically involved. Find something that you like. If it's not walking, then if you like basketball, play basketball at least once, twice a week. Do something at least to keep those joints active and control uric acid levels because exercise does help also control uric acid. So people can buy your book on the website.

They've got pain relief and joint health support gummies tropical tropical pain relief cream and from when you've been in the tropics for too long I don't know topical pain relief just just get it it actually does say tropical so that's why I was basically alright okay I got a website's full of typos but I like the title, you know, Tropical Pain. I figured tropical meant that it's maybe you got some pineapple smells in it, but soothing back really for neck and all that good stuff. But sometimes you're just in the tropics for too long.

You need a break. You need to go back to the city. Uric acid control, dietary supplements, people can order those as well. Well, this is quite the journey. I mean, this is what we talk about on the show where people, you know, go through their cathartic moments. They go through these issues and lessons of life. Is the best thing to do if you think you have issues to see a doctor and stuff?

Yeah, for gout, I would strongly recommend you listen to your doctor and work with them. A gout is a serious condition, usually for life, and you don't want to be getting recurring gout attacks because that could cause bone erosion down the road. Go to your doctor. If you don't want to go on allopurinol, which is the main medication to control uric acid, then tell your doctor that you want to try a vegetarian diet

or the diet that I advocate in my book and check your uric acid levels through blood work every three, four months, I would say, for a year or two and see if you can get under control through dietary methods. If not, some people, it will not work. You have to take a dosage of allopurinol. For example, myself, since it's for life, I used to take 300 milligrams of allopurinol daily For example, myself, since it's for life, I used to take 300 milligrams of allopurinol daily, but with my diet, I lowered it to 100 milligrams daily. And uric acid has been in control for years now. No GAT attacks. I think I saw in your bio or story that it's not the funnest thing to take or something, that allopurinol...

Oh, no, that's the other drug, colchicine. That's if you get a GAT attack the other drug colchicine that's if you get a gap attack you take colchicine and colchicine is very powerful drug actually benjamin franklin used to bring the plant to the united states when he used to go to europe because he had gout he was one of the famous gout sufferers one of the founding fathers and colchicine is a medication you take when you on the onset of the gout attack you take it to get rid of the pain and inflammation it works very fast within a couple of days and you could be back to normal. But it causes stomach upset and diarrhea. So that's not fun. That's not fun.

Is that pretty much guaranteed? For most people, yeah, they're going to get that issue. I have that on Taco Bell night when we do the buffet at Taco Bell. That exploding diarrhea is never fun. No, it's never fun. So people can order the book, Gout and You, the ultimate gout diet and cookbook. What else haven't we touched on that you do for people to help them out?

Well, that's pretty much it. I mean, if you know somebody that suffers from gout, forward them this podcast interview. Visit goutandyou.com. Let them sign up to my email list so they could get the latest updates on the latest gout studies, gout information, blog posts, any other new products I put in the market. And they could get my ebook or a physical book, learn more about gout. And then if they have any questions, they could could email me i answer all emails within 24 hours

and if they're interested in learning more about my dietary supplements they could visit the website gout and you.com or on amazon and simply put in the search gout and you and you'll find all my products on amazon or walmart or whichever marketplace you shop at i think you need a gout and you mascot like a like some sort of embodiment maybe he's a little he's a little crumb of a maybe a little because usually it affects yeah yeah a big toe he's like he he slaps around some gout thing that tries to get up on him or something you know i just you know i'm thinking the marketing commercial you know that guy goes really big with that little lizard thing. Yeah, exactly.

So give people a final pitch out. Give them your dot coms, wherever people can find you on the interwebs. They can just visit goutandyou.com. I would say the top resource on gout on the internet. Thank you for coming on the show. We really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you to our audience for tuning in.

And go to goodreads.com, forgeschrisfisfoss, LinkedIn.com, 4chesschrisfoss, chrisfoss1 on the TikTok, and all those crazy places on the Internet. Be good to each other. Stay safe. We'll see you next time.