The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Michael Fenster, MD of ChefDrMike.com

Episode Date: June 8, 2022

Michael Fenster, MD of ChefDrMike.com Chefdrmike.com

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. 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 roller coaster with your brain now here's your host chris voss hi folks this is voss here from thechrisvossshow.com i'm ready for a bleed my brain bleed my brain bleed i don't think it's ever stopped bleeding it's been bleeding for a long time these days welcome to the show my friends we certainly appreciate you guys tuning in.

Be sure to further share your friends, neighbors, relatives. Say, have you subscribed to the Chris Voss Show? You can go to YouTube.com, Fortress Chris Voss, Goodreads.com, Fortress Chris Voss. See everything you're reading and viewing over there. All of our groups on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and all those crazy places those kids are playing these days. You can check that out as well. Also, we're going to be giving away some uh really cool stuff today or this month actually the month of june 2022 if

you're watching this 10 years from now you'll be like well that doesn't help me now we're going to be giving some extra.com wallets away these things are pretty cool they're uh specialized wallets that are really nice and they even have a thing where you can just anytime you want to pop out your cards you can just go like that whoa see now you got to go watch that on youtube what's also cool is it comes with a tracker what do we do with the tracker the track is around here somewhere because the tracker and it works just like one of those apple tracker things only you can use this with your android and so there's that we're doing anyway two of these babies this later this month so go to thechrisfoshow.com for a giveaway.

And you can see the giveaway that we're doing on that. And if we're not doing it this month, then you can go see whatever we're giving away on any given month. So that'll be given away in the month of June. Enter to win that as well, and we'll give those two away. Today we have an amazing gentleman on the show. He's an author, a doctor, and a chef. What I like to call the trifecta of glory and food and, you know, whatever. I mean, he can fix stuff that's broken on me. He can feed me

and, and did I get all three? Where am I missing? I'm missing a third one. Anyway, jokes aside, Michael Fenster, MD is one of less than 20 physicians worldwide who holds both a culinary and medical degrees. He is the only interventional cardiologist and professional chef to do so. He is also the only cardiologist with joint academic appointments in both the medical and culinary arts. He serves as faculty at the University of Montana College of Health and in the Missoula College Culinary Arts Program of the Department of Business Technology. He serves as an adjunct professor of medicine at the Kansas Health Science Center. Welcome to the show, Chef Dr. Mike. How are you? Doing great, Chris. Thanks, mate. Appreciate you having me here.

And the one other thing was that I'm also a professor of culinary medicine, so we can feed your brain as well. Oh, there we go. What's left of it that isn't bleeding? My brain bleed? There you go. I can feed the brain. Maybe it'll stop the brain bleed.

So give us your.com so people can find you on the interwebs. Sure. www.chefdrmike.com. That's chefdrmike.com. There you go. So give us a little rundown. How did you become or why did you become Chef Dr. Mike? Did you become a chef first?

Did you become a doctor first? How the hell did you get doing all this? Well, my training was actually that I cooked professionally first. So the pathway was sort of, you know, I'm old. It's like Methuselah could be my middle name. So I grew up way before the Internet and before celebrity chefs and we moved around a lot. So I was like always the new kid on the block. But like way before boy bands were cool.

Boy bands are cool? They were. They were at one time. Yeah, for sure. New kids on the block, right? I've lost all two of my new kids on the block listeners. And so, you know, as the new kid in school, really coming home, the kitchen became a bit of a sanctuary for me. That was a place I come.

My mom was really a great home cook. She was a jewel of child, the galoping gourmet, all that. So every time I came home from school, she'd be in the kitchen fixing something and I'd hop in and start fixing stuff with her. And it became a bit of a sanctuary. And so when I went off to college and had to work to help pay for college, it was real natural to go into the food industry. Given what I thought then was really extensive and, you know, formidable

culinary credentials, you know, I walked in and I was like, okay, I'm here to be your chef. And they said, we have a dishwasher job. And they, and to their credit, they said, if you're willing to be a dishwasher, as soon as a job opens up on the line, which was only like a short order cook. They said, you know, we'll move you up there. And so I worked six months as a dishwasher, got a break on the line. And from there, went to another restaurant where somebody took me under their wing and kind of worked my way up to what today would be an executive chef. And so I cooked professionally. I was running the back of house before I left college. And when I finished college, I went off to medical school, did the whole medical thing,

became an interventional cardiologist, still a cook, owned a restaurant, things like that. So I always kept this love of food, you know, my entire life. And one day, you know, life kind of caught up to me as it does for a lot of people, right? I knew better having grown up and been in the kitchen and what real food was about. But I got busy, you know, man, I'm right. You know, I'm an intern. I'm a resident. I'm working these incredible, insane hours.

And I went to see another physician because I was getting married and we were going overseas and I didn't grow a toenail. And I said, well, I don't want to be overseas because, you know, I'll be out of the U.S. medical system and who knows what will happen to me over there. And so I go in to see him and he comes out with a new patient. So they take x-rays and all this stuff. And he comes in and he pulls up my chart and he looks at it. He goes, I'll be right back.

Okay, whatever. And this goes on like three or four times and finally comes in the door and he's like can i just ask you something i was like please i've been here like 20 minutes you know sitting in this room and he's like it says here you're in for you're here for an ingrown toenail i was like yeah he's like how are you even walking and he's like don't your feet hurt and i was like dude my feet hurt all the time but you just get up and do it right and long story short he said i needed not one but two joint replacements and the first one should have been done about five years ago wow and so the first thing i did

as a medical professional was get the hell out of there and get a second opinion yeah and unfortunately the second verse was same as the first. Wow. And so I was like, well, you know, what can I do? I knew, you know, my diet had gone down. You know, I did my training at the home of Krispy Kreme in Wichita, North Carolina. So it was like, you know, on your way in, the red light was flashing. It's a jug of coffee. It's those melt-in-your-mouth Krispy Kreme, you know, on your way in, the red light was flashing. It's a jug of coffee.

It's those melt in your mouth, Krispy Kreme. You know, we grabbed what you can that the drug reps were bringing, which was just fast food, you know, there. I said, well, I know I can, you know, change my diet. And that's related to inflammation. I know that from all the stuff that I read. And I actually did get a debridement surgery. So they said, well, we'll clean out the joint. But like, dude, you're going to be back here in three years and need another surgery.

I was like, let's just do that for now. Thank you so much. And Chris, that was over 20 years ago. And I still haven't had the surgery. Now, I can't go jog three miles on the side of the road like I used to. But I live in Montana and I can hike, you know, the hills of Montana for eight hours and walk around. So I'm pretty happy with, with where I am. And that, and that was all about, you know, changing lifestyle for me,

predominantly changing my diet. And that really led me to develop and get involved in what today we call culinary medicine. Wow. Now I'm looking over your site and I mean, you do a lot of things. It looks like you've written what, about four books. Is that correct? Yeah. Okay. And give us a rundown on the books, if you would. Well, sure. The first one was kind of a little collection of vignettes that's eating well, living better. There's a couple of recipes in there, which quite honestly, based on the data, since that was probably written maybe, I guess, about 10 years ago or so, maybe actually longer, I think, would be updated. Then there's Ancient Eats, which is kind of one of my favorite. It was my foray into

a novel. So for foodies out there, we have somebody take you on a historical food adventure through classical Greece, which is the original Mediterranean diet. And that character is based on a historical character called Archistratus, who I modeled after Tony Bourdain to take you on a culinary tour. And then as a little contrast, we look at the Viking diet. And the idea behind it really, and this is actually part of culinary medicine, is when we look at what we call traditional or historical diets today, we often think that we eat so much better and we're so much smarter, but really because they were eating pretty well-balanced diets based on natural foods that in many ways is much more healthful than the diets we have today. Because you don't come up with philosophy.

You don't conquer the known world if you're malnourished, if you're on a decent diet, if you're a fat, overweight American. So there's something to the way that these folks ate. And that's what Ancient Eats explores. And Fallacy of the Calorie is exactly that. We look at why focusing on the calorie and nutrients is sort of an outdated idea in the world we live in. And Food Shaman takes that a little bit further and builds on that and starts to incorporate these other important aspects of our relationship to

food, which is how we eat, with whom we eat, when we eat, where we eat, things like that. Yeah. Excuse me. Those are all really important. So you've got the books, and then you have online courses. Tell us about some of those. Yeah, those are actually through the University of Montana. So what I teach is a graduate level. It's a 400-level, three-graduate course at the College of Hell.

And a lot of folks really want to do it, but they don't want to enroll, obviously, in college. They just want to take that one course. So we work with the university and their online program, and we developed an online version of it. So it's the same material, a slightly different format. So you can just do it at your own pace. And, you know, you can do it in three, four or five weeks if you want. You can do it at three, four or five years if you want. But when you finish, you actually get a micro accreditation or a level one certificate certification from the

University of Montana in culinary medicine. So it's rigorous, but it's constantly being updated with new information. And we're really very, very happy that we can offer that to the general public. That just came out about, I think it would be two years ago next month. Oh, wow. And then you also have, what is culinary medicine? What is the definition of that? Well, you know, at the university, and folks are going to say, we have a very specific definition that, you know,

in the vein of food is a bit of a word salad. And we have to do that for academics. Yeah. But the long and the short of it is it's pretty simple. It's about your food experience. It's about your relationship to food. way beyond just nutrition, which is really the study of how an organism uses food in terms of biological and physiological processes to stay alive. And, you know, what I'd equate is nutrition is kind of like looking at sex from a biological reproductive imperative. Yes, that's part of it. But in the human experience, right, it's much more complicated than that. And it plays such a much larger role in our lives, you know, than that particular aspect. And so culinary medicine is like that. We look at everything, you know, from how the food is grown. Is it monocrop, industrial agriculture? Because that is one aspect of the food that ends up affecting our

health. How is it produced? Is it ultra processed? Turns out that's huge. And many people don't even know that ultra processed foods have a specific definition and are specifically correlated to disease way beyond just categories like red meat and things like that. And then, like I said, we looked at all the other aspects of how we eat, with whom we eat, where we eat, when we eat, et cetera. Well, that makes sense. I mean, I've learned when I lost weight and started really looking at my food and reading ingredients, man, I learned so much. And I was just like, wow, I can't believe the crap that's being fed to me

and all that stuff. And, you know, I mean, for a long time, I was eating just the worst stuff. And, of course, I was going to Taco Bell and everything. And that stuff, I'm not even sure there's any. You know, we have so many foods that really have almost zero to no nutrients in them as well. Yeah. And what's interesting is what we really look at first, like you said, where culinary medicine starts, we look at all these things, but it starts with what you put on your plate.

Yeah. And there's really, you know, 50, 75 years ago, we didn't really look at something called the food matrix because food was pretty much the way nature packaged it. And then we process it when we cook it, when we ferment it, all those sorts of things. When we chew it, those are forms of food processing. But then something happened after World War II and we began to ultra-process our food. And the reasons that that is different is that we destroy what's called the food matrix.

And the way you can think about it, like nutrients, like if you were thinking of nutrients as something that you ordered from Amazon and they're delivered to your house, what you get is important, right? But the matrix is the package they come in. And if it's not packaged properly, you know, it's a mess when it's delivered or it's not even, you know, in one piece. And so it turns out that this packaging is really, really important. And I think for me, one of the great turning points for culinary medicine and a whole understanding was about two years ago. I've been doing this a long time. And the mainstream conventional folks, you know, I had a lot of colleagues of mine who are cardiologists and academics like myself.

They said, Mike, you know, I love what you've written. Your data is great. But, dude, I can't say this or I'll get fired. I mean, I can't say, you know, you can eat saturated fat. I can't say, you know, the amount of salt isn't important. You're crazy. I can't say cholesterol in the food doesn't matter, which in 2018, the government agreed and took cholesterol out of the recommendations. Well, the data was never there. I wrote about that in Fallacy to

Calorie years before it happened and got feedback like that. And then finally, the government said, look, there's no data that cholesterol levels in the food have any impact in health. And then, you know, finally the government said, look, there's no data that cholesterol levels in the food have any impact in health. In fact, sometimes it's the opposite. So like shrimp is one of the highest cholesterol containing foods, you sort of per gram, but people who eat shrimp all the time, fresh shrimp, seafood, especially indigenous people who eat that as part of their diet, where it's not Long John Silver's deep fried shrimp, it doesn't correlate with the Z-Pan. Eggs, for example, people who regularly eat eggs have a better lipid profile than people who abstain from eating any eggs at all. And some of the latest data shows actually the more eggs you eat,

the better your lipid profile. That's the exact opposite of what the conventional wisdom was, which was never really looked at, but just extrapolated. So, yeah, it's really kind of crazy that we haven't looked at that. We continue to focus. But about two years ago, there was a Harvard researcher who actually set out to prove that our approach, which is looking at the ultra processing, the way foods package didn't matter, that it was all about the nutrients. That's what this guy was saying, Professor All. And so he designed the study that was pretty airtight and pretty unique because what he did

was he got people to volunteer at his NIH lab and he fed them a diet. One was ultra processed food. One was not ultra processed food. They were matched exactly the same amount of calories, but more important, he then matched it for what we call macronutrients. So same amount of saturated fat, same amount of overall fat, same amount of carbohydrates, blah, blah, blah. And what he found was that when people ate ultra-processed food, they spontaneously gained weight and markers of inflammation went up. And when they eliminated that from their diet, they spontaneously lost weight and their markers of inflammation went down. Wow. And he said, you know, when I went into this, and this is a quote from him what food scientists are doing in these corporations, but whatever they're doing is making people fat and sick. Yeah. Well, you can really tell the

difference after you really start tuning in your body on how your body responds to, you know, I had some broccoli this morning with a little bit of ranch and I, I eat it raw. I, I just, you know, I've just learned to fuck it. I'm not going to eat by cooking. I just eat it raw. And you know, it's, and you, you can tell the difference. I mean, I can go to McDonald's and eat a burger and be like, I don't, I don't know what I ate, but it's not, you can tell the difference. I mean, I can go to McDonald's and eat a burger and be like, I don't, I don't know what I ate, but it's not,

I don't feel full. I don't feel, I feel ucky and icky and I mean, it's just gross. And so a lot of people really need to get tuned into what those nutrients are. And, and like you say, the processing stuff,

like, have you ever seen what I saw one time with how they make the meat at Taco Bell? It's a meat, quote unquote. Yeah. Yeah. And what's interesting too is, you know, people, when we look at it, another study just came out a couple of months ago called the Aventis Health Study 2. And what they looked at was really interesting. They said it was over 75,000 people and they said, you know, we're going to look at a plant-based approach and we're going to look at an animal-based approach

and we're going to measure mortality, which is, you know, a very hard endpoint, right? Because you're sort of counting bodies at the end of the day. There's no yes, no, maybe, not sure about this sort of thing. You know, that's a very hard endpoint. But then they did something really interesting, which they said, yes, no, maybe not sure about this sort of thing. You know, that's a very hard end point. But then they did something really interesting, which they said, well,

then we're going to take all those and we're going to account for the ultra processed food. Because if you were to go to the grocery store and kind of look at the six top areas or categories of food that contain the most ultra-processed food, those foods labeled vegetarian are among the top six. Almost 90% of what's labeled vegetarian food in the supermarket is ultra-processed food. And what they found, interestingly, was it didn't matter if you were plant-based. It didn't matter if you were animal-based. Early mortality, your risk of dying, in other words, specifically correlated how much ultra-processed food you ate. And that was it. And that's shown in many other studies around the world. But this idea of what we call ultra-processed, it's only been out about a decade. It was

actually developed in Brazilzil interesting story because because of like the taco bells and the coca-colas so brazil some number of decades ago uh started becoming an emerging economy which means people had money which meant you know our big soda big food big snack went down there because people had money. They could buy snacks. They could buy fast food. And as the story goes, the representative to the UN from Brazil actually went to the U.S. representative. I was like, dude, can you do something about these companies? Because we never had a problem with diabetes and heart attacks and people becoming fat. So all your corporations came down here and started selling sodas and drive-thrus and this and that.

They're like, dude, it's a free economy. Sorry, we don't control the corporations. So what the government did, and at the University of Sao Paulo, is they specifically started looking at this item, this variable of food matrix, and that's how they came up with what's called the NOVA classification. And in the NOVA grouping, there's a specific level called group four and there's a specific definition for these ultra-processed foods. It's been adopted by a number of countries around the world. And what we find continually wherever you look is diabetes, obesity, heart disease, early death, and a number of other things all correlate to how much ultra-processed food you eat. So that really seems to be a key. And like I said,

Harvard professor Kevin Hall really opened the door with that study that he did a couple of years ago. And actually, he just got funding a couple of months ago in the tens of million dollars for the NIH. And we're going to complete a a couple of months ago in the tens of million dollars for the NIH. And we're going to complete a study here in the United States looking at that in 2024. Yeah. People got to really understand what's going on with their food and how important it is. And like you say, it can cause cancer and everything else. Do you coach people? Do you work one-on-one with them or help anyone? Or do they just need to buy your books and programs? No, no. You know, certainly we actually are working on developing a software platform, you know, so we can work and then train other professionals, teams of, you know, other healthcare

professionals, culinary professionals, et cetera, you know, to help people and guide them through this. It's called the patient's table. Folks can read about that. It's something called IMBAS, I-M-B-A-S, integrated mind, body, and spirit. So it's not.com, it's.health. But they can learn a little bit more about that. So we specifically work with their healthcare providers.

We work with their employers. We work, you know, through all those types of organizations to help to lift service to folks. That's pretty awesome. That's pretty awesome. So they can, you know, people can empower themselves. They can take the courses to eat better. I mean, your body, one of my problems, and it's not a problem actually, but one of my problems of going vegan and eating better, paying attention to what I was putting in my body, I can't go back to stuff. I used to drink like 10, 15 Mountain Dews a day. I can't even stand to drink the stuff. I have a Coke every now and then, but it has to be like

a Mexican Coke where it's the pure original formula. It's cane sugar and it doesn't have the high fructose. I hate high fructose corn syrup stuff. You know, I can kind of tell on a lot of different things what goes in my body. And, you know, I cheat every now and then. Like I had some onion rings last night. That probably wasn't the best thing for me. Fried, you know, breaded. But that was it. I didn't have the burger.

I didn't have the drink. I just got the onion. I've got a place that makes really good onion rings. But, you know, the rest of the day I did my vegetables and some of my garden of life powder meals, my protein shakes and stuff. Yeah. You can, you can really tell what a difference is if you listen to your body. And I think so many people, they don't, they're just like, why do I feel like crap? Or why does my stomach hurt? Why, why don't I feel well? And they just think, well, maybe I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed. A lot of times it's the crap

you're putting in your body. Oh, it absolutely is, Chris. And it's funny, well, maybe I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed. A lot of times it's the crap you're putting in your body. Oh, it absolutely is, Chris. And it's funny, you know, I've got to share what you just said is what so many people have told me, you know, anecdotally. And what it's akin to, you know, coming from a cardiology background, is that when I finally get patients to quit smoking, and literally, you know, they were smoking two packs a day, and then, you know, I would see them in the office, and they hadn't been smoking for six or eight months. They're like, how did I even do that?

It's like, I can't even walk into a room where somebody's smoking. How did I smoke, you know, two packs a day? I can't stand it. You know, my body reacts violently, You want to start inhaling just the ambient cigarette smoke. And it's the same sort of thing. You know, if you're sick all the time, you don't know what feeling good actually is. And so, yeah, you just kind of go through life comfortably numb and you're never really aware. But then when you realize how good you can feel, it's like, I'm not going back to that. What you say also is interesting. I was talking to a friend of mine.

He's a professor at Johns Hopkins and one of the foremost leaders in doing gastric surgery for people who suffer with Crohn's disease and other inflammatory bowel diseases. And we were at a conference together. We were talking about culinary medicine. I said, you know, Mike, what's really interesting is if you look back in the literature before the 50s, what we're dealing with today in terms of these inflammatory bowel diseases, what you were saying, Chris,

like people just say my stomach hurts and maybe it's the gluten, maybe it's this. I don't know, but I just don't feel good. He said, there's like none of that. It just really didn't exist. And yet now you see pharmaceuticals where instead of addressing simply what you're eating, it's this old take a pill for every ill. I mean, diabetes, type 2 diabetes is an epidemic in this country and many others. But according to Harvard, 90%, 9-0% of type 2 diabetes can be prevented with all the things you're talking about. Diet, culinary medicine. And yet, you don't really see that promoted.

It's here's another pill. Try this one. Take two pills for your diabetes. But keep going through the drive-thru. Keep going through the drive-thru. And, and half the time, those give you side effects too, that make everything worse. And some of the pills they need, and you need another pill to take care of the side effects for the other pill you're taking. And that's not a joke. You were, you were on really, cause that really happened. So you give somebody something, it causes a side effect. Then you give them another pill for that.

Then you're giving them another pill for that. And understand when we do these studies to look at pills, right, their safety profile is done in isolation. So we have no idea how one pill really interacts with another. So let alone when you have polypharmacy and people are taking five or six medications a day. In one study they did in the UK, 10% of the daily sodium that people, particularly elder people, were taking came from their pills. They only use sodium binders in the pills. They were taking so much medication that 10% of the sodium, you know, came in the form of the binders that are used in medication. Wow.

That is crazy, man. It is totally crazy. That is crazy, man. It's just amazing. So to give you a rundown on all your stuff, people can take, there's three different courses they can take, the culinary medicine course, and, well, there's the culinary medicine course in the course packages and then the overview so is there just one course or two yeah there's just there's just one course and we're working to bring some of our other courses that we're developing and have at the university

you know online but bless you but right now they can take that level one course and get that level one certification in culinary medicine there you go and that way no one can argue with you ever again because you're like i'm not just a chef i'm a culinary medicine do i get a doctor's thing if i if i pass that course we're actually working with the university of Montana, which is the only university that offers this graduate level course. They teach aspects of culinary medicine and some culinary schools for medical students right now. But we're the only one that offers it. And we're working with the deans, both in the culinary program and in our College of Health, to actually get to where people can get a doctorate in culinary medicine. And, you know, I got to tell you, too, we address things like sustainability in culinary

medicine, but it all starts with your sustainability. And by that, I mean, as a chef, as a food person, like it can't taste like shit. Yeah, that's true. Because who the hell wants to go through life, you know, eating a miserable diet? Because it turns out that when you look at things like just how happy a person you are, and this is crazy because this sort of goes back to my love of food, maybe a rationalization, but when you look at and adjust for things like cholesterol, health, diabetes, all the standard stuff,

that top group of people who are healthy live almost eight years longer than people who are miserable. Oh, wow. And so if you make somebody miserable by taking away the joy of food, are you really helping them live a healthier, longer and a life filled with joy and wellness? We did a study recently came out showing that putting people on low salt diet did not help with heart failure. This was a very big study. No surprise to me because I think when you look at salt,

77% of the daily sodium for the average American comes from eating ultra processed food. Oh, wow. So it doesn't appear to be, when we look at indigenous peoples like the Kuna Indians, who eat three times the level of salt we do, when you look at the Japanese, who are amongst the so-called healthiest folks on earth,

they eat way more salt than we do, but they don't have the issues because they don't eat as much ultra-processed food. You know, high sodium intake in the U.S. is a mark of a diet that's high in ultra-processed foods. So in a lot of ways, that was not a surprise to me. I've been writing about this for about a decade. There's never been a study done where you address taking dietary sodium out of the diet as the only variable and you see better health. Not one. It's never been.

And, you know, that's just simply a fact. You can look at some studies where you change what people eat, you have more potassium, they eat more fruits and vegetables, and you change their diet, more like a Mediterranean diet, and they do do better. But there's never been a diet where you just look at reducing the sodium, and that's what they've done and people get better outcomes. So we end up having to change the foods that they eat. But, you know, it really seems to come back to, you know, the ultra processed foods, which doesn't mean that you can't have delicious food because you talked about a burger, right? We're here on a Friday. Every time when I'm home, it's pizza Friday at my house. Now, my pizza is my homemade dough from sourdough.

Oh, wow. Sourdough starter, flour, salt, water, crushed tomatoes and salt, buffalo, grass-finished mozzarella, fresh basil. I'm coming over. Oh, anytime, man, anytime. And that's what we call a group three or a processed food. It has all the things that are great for you, great for all the bacteria in your gut. So you don't have to spend a hundred bucks a month on probiotics because you're getting them naturally. But if you were to order what you were talking, right, that delivery or go to, you know, pizza slot or whatever.

And, you know, that is one of the 10 worst foods you could possibly eat. Oh, yeah. We live in a world where burgers aren't burgers and pizzas and pizza. And so we got to get a new way of looking at this. And that's part of what really what the message of culinary medicine is. It's stop looking at the way we've been looking at things for half a century because it's got us, you know, bloody nowhere. Yeah, that's true. You know, the one thing I've been paying more

attention to is my gut health. And it's amazing how much your gut is everything and how it processes, how it digests, how it uses the food. You know, I've gotten really good. In fact, I've started using more foods, arugula, pineapple, kiwis. There's all messes, different stuff that I'm using to naturally try and have better gut health. And people don't realize how important that is. And, you know, at 54, my body's sick of everything with me. And so I'm trying to – well, the two of us are just trying to get along at this point. We're just trying to get along. But, yeah, it's pretty amazing how important this stuff is.

Let me ask you this. Does sodium, is there a different, when people are taking, you know, say sodium from freaking McDonald's, is that very different than, you know, like one of the things they say I should have in my diet is a good sea salt and a good natural sea salt. Is there a difference between that sort of processed sodium? Is it a different chemical? Fortunately, my college degree is in chemistry, so you got the right person here. There we go. So, no, a sodium molecule is a sodium molecule, whether you get it in a burger from McDonald's or you get it from sea salt. Now, again, this kind of goes back to the high levels of sodium that they use in these ultra-processed foods. So, again, to go back to kind of goes back to the high levels of sodium that they use in these ultra processed foods. So, again, to go back to kind of that, you know, ordering something from Amazon analogy, what what they're doing at McDonald's is they're coming to your door.

They're stealing your package. Then they're taking it out and they're putting their own stuff in and repackaging it from the way it came from the original shipper. And in doing that, they tend to add levels of sodium, sugar, and fat because that is our Achilles heel from an evolutionary perspective. A lot of psychiatrists and people who study addiction behavior point to our need as primates, as social primates, for salt as the origin for all addictive human behavior. Because primates, we are omnivores. We didn't live in a fantasy world where we were herbivores all the time and lived in trees and, you know, that's all we ate and, you know, jumped down and rode flying unicorns. We were omnivores, which means we ate bugs and whatever meat and things we could find. As an omnivore, unlike carnivores, which get the sodium they need from flesh,

we seek out salt. You can see this behavior in certain chimpanzees. They'll go to certain trees and they'll eat the inner bark of that tree because it's very rich in sodium and they know and saw anybody who's a hunter who's who's been out there hunting knows that if you put a salt lick out in a field you'll get those herbivores to start showing up and it's a thing and so that that food this ultra processed food isn't just like me making that pizza and taking natural things and kind of putting together and cooking them.

It's literally tearing it apart and then putting it back. A great book by David Kessler, former head of the FDA, called The End of Overeating in America. I love this stuff, as you could tell. But I could tell it was written by a doctor because it was a little dense to get through. It was like study after study. But what David showed, because he went out and he actually interviewed these people who make the foods. And have you ever heard of something called a bliss point? No. Okay. This is how your food is crafted. So when these food manufacturers go to put something together, there is a certain level

of sugar, salt, and fat that hits your brain and actually lights up our dopaminergic reward. It's actually the same area of the brains that we respond to opiates with. And we've done pretty good managing that, I think, as a country. I don't think you could argue about that. And sarcasm. Sarcasm. And what they do is, you know, if you want a potato chip, right, so you expect a certain level of saltiness. And so,

you know, the sugar salt ratio in there is very different than a donut. I expect that to be sweet. And so for different foods, there are different list points. And what we really respond to is the sugar and the salt. And the fat is added because by adding layers of fat, you can amp up the levels of sugar and salt that you can combined with the packaging of ultra processing that really seems to be detrimental at multiple levels. We have data that it negatively affects the bacteria in our gut that you were talking about. It affects our brain in negative ways and addictive ways. And obviously it affects our health.

Yeah. Ultra processed foods correlate with depression. So all these markers of various aspects of health, whether it's mental health, gut health, cardiovascular health, obesity, it really seems to go back to this creation of these artificial foods, which is what all foods are. They really have, you know, at McDonald's and these other places, these scientists have really sat down and figured out how to basically turn into,

like you mentioned, the Salt Lake in the wilderness, where we're just like, oh, that's good. I mean, you know, we're like these ultra-processed zombies, like, burger. Burger. But that's what they want. I mean, you know, we're like these ultra-processed zombies, like burger, burger. But that's what they want. You know, Morgan Sperluck, and that moved me once again, supersized me. Yeah, supersized me. I had to go through the drive-thru, and then he started going every day, and he said, you know, after two weeks, it's 11 o'clock, and all of a sudden I'm thinking, man, what do I want to order at 1 o'clock?

And so there's all these things that go into reinforcing that behavior. And unfortunately, right, a lot of it is targeted marketing, which is a whole aspect of this that's like another show. But suffice to say that they want to train you from a young age to have brand loyalty. Oh, yeah. These foods and things like that. That's why they have the playgrounds there. So you go there as a kid.

You know, my mom, you know, she took us to McDonald's as a kid. We didn't have playgrounds back then. But, you know, you always wanted Big Mac. You're like, oh, I want a Big Mac. And, you know, you had the clown. I mean, when I was growing up, there was the clown, of course. And the, you know, the Hamburglar. And there's a whole host of whatevers. Mayor McCheese.

Mayor McCheese, yeah. I think there was a, wasn't there a mayor of diabetes? So they all look like they were diabetic. Even the clown. I mean, it's kind of an interesting color. So, you know, they all look like they need to be, I don't know, put into rehab. But I think I'm going to get sued by McDonald's. So you're just sparing our trademarks anyway.

You're just sparing our diabetes. But no, you can tell. I mean, I can eat a burger and sometimes I can get a really good burger, but I can tell the bun, the quality of the buns there and maybe how they process. But yeah, learning to make stuff at home, like I got really good at stuff where like I would take jackfruit and, and make, turn it into like a, so where it would taste like pulled pork, put barbecue sauce in it, you know, blend it up a little bit and, and, and fool your brain. And, and then it would taste so good and and so i got really good at at at the taste aspect of making vegan foods and the taste is really what your brain's after so your brain's

like hey this really tastes really great i don't really care that this is broccoli no yeah i mean yeah absolutely you know it's about the taste. It's about the pleasure. And, you know, at the beginning, you asked me, what is culinary medicine about? I said, it's about your relationship with food and right relationships are built on experiences. And so each of those experiences of what you eat, with whom you eat, when you eat, where you eat, when they're positive and, you know, and the taste brings you pleasure and the experience brings you pleasure, naturally we're programmed as social primates to want to repeat that behavior. And so just as we could get into negative sorts of loops where we're going through the drive-thru every day and never even realizing it,

we could build those positive ones that you're talking about. Yeah. It makes all the difference. It's about empowering people, giving them the tools and the resources they need. Because ultimately, Chris's diet is about Chris. It's about what you want to eat and how it makes you feel, whether you're happy. And so that's why there really can never be this one size fits all and this idea of sort of eat this don't eat that it just doesn't work yeah the the the interesting thing is i used to live i used to eat crap food all the time of course drink a lot about do and a little bit of vodka here and there half a bottle or two and you know i would live on with

rolates i would live with eating rolates i keep i keep like a bottle by the bed know i would live on with roll aids i would live with eating roll aids i keep i keep like a bottle by the bed because i would wake up in the middle of the night going i need more roll aids and you know i mean sometimes you go through two or three stops the roll aids thing you know and and that was an indication that this crap i was eating wasn't healthy for me and my body was just basically saying hey big f you F you, man, knock it off, eh? Yeah. You know, and, and, you know, when we're, when I was 20, you know, something and, you know, doing all that with my residency, you know, we're young and our bodies are strong and we kind of power through stuff. But, you know, ultimately the bill comes due as I found out,

but I think the good news is, and I think you'd agree, right? It's never too late to change. And, you know, in some ways, I feel so much better now than I did 20 years ago. Even though, you know, obviously, you know, much older and, you know, aging happens, whether you like it or not. But, you know, I think that you can also, you know, start to just maybe slow down a little bit and really start to experience food because part of what we do in this culture is we not only eat crap, but we don't even think about the crap we're eating. So there's a mindlessness, you know, that surrounds that, that really feeds into the ultra-processed foods. You know, you kind of crave it. You're not even thinking, and you're grabbing that mountain. Then later, you're just popping some, like I said,

popping some Rola, just swigging some Pepto-Bismol, and then on you go to the next, you know, task in front of the computer or whatever we've got to do on our cell phone. So there's something to be said for kind of slowing down and actually eating our meal. And a lot of research on quite a bit of it done at Harvard, actually, that shows that even just having a family meal, it doesn't have to be every night of the week, but even just once or so, which tends to be more home-cooked foods, with kids, serves them later in life so that when they're adults, they're making better food decisions. They have better health, better metabolic profiles. So that sort of social aspect of maybe cooking with your kids or having a family meal, that also has huge benefits.

So it's this whole kind of food experience. And that just takes us beyond counting calories and looking at the nutrients on a food label. Yeah. In fact, one of my recent gut health aspects that I've been focusing on is chewing, making sure I chew up my food. I'm really bad at sitting down in front of my computer and like eating stuff. And sometimes I'll get caught in my esophagus because I haven't chewed enough. And, you know, I was, I was reading and learning that, you know, you've got, I've been taking more apple cider vinegar because I really focused in on like, okay, so there's my stomach, there's the pancreas,

there's something else that processes food, you know, insulin, and the whole works, you know. And if you don't, if you're not making sure you've got that good stomach acid going that can chew everything up, then it's got to go to the intestines and then they're pissed off. And then, you know, just everybody hates you, which is pretty much the sum total of my body these days. But, you know, we're working on it. We're getting better and stuff and focusing on it. As we go out, is there anything more we need to talk about, about what you do and how you do it so people can be aware of it? No, I just encourage folks to head on over to the website, www.chefdrmike.com.

I'm not rich and famous, so I have to answer on my own social media. It may take me a day or three to get to you, but I'd love to hear from folks. Drop a line with your questions, concerns, and I love the dialogue. So if a lot of people say, hey, Chef Dr. Mike, I think that's a load of BS, what you said. Do you have the data to back it? You know, I'm very transparent. You read the blogs, all the data is there. So you can read it yourself and draw your own conclusions.

You know, I'm just here to kind of share the information. And as we talk, Chris, that, you know, help people empower themselves, you know, for health and wellness. And, you know, I think you'd agree, right? When your body feels good, you tend to feel good, which means you're a little bit more of a joyful person. And, you know, the world is pretty angry right now.

And so each of us could be a little happier and spread a little bit more of that karma around. You know, who knows? The world us could be a little happier and and and spread a little bit that more of that karma around you know who knows the world might actually be a decent place i mean all i know is around here there was less murdering after i started eating better so that was good especially the judge says i can't do it anymore you've got uh four books people should definitely check out an amazon bestseller food sh Shaman. Shaman? Food shaming? That too. Food Shaman.

The art of... Shaman. You could squeeze the shaman. Squeeze the shaman. There you go. Food Shaman. Don't eat the shaman. But Food Shaman. The shaman.

The shaman. You're killing me, man. I'm trying to read this and it's going all food shaman amazon best seller by the way ancient eats the greeks and vikings you can read about that the fallacy of the calorie i'm really interested in this book why the modern western diet is killing us how to stop it eating well and living better the grassroots gourmet guide to good health and great food and we've had dr funung on a few times. Do you know him?

Yeah, the renal doctor, correct? Yeah. Yeah. He's the guy that really got me into intermittent fasting and Cray Ray and was the guy from Who's the Vegas Show? I can't place it. It's Friday. The rain's completely gone for this week.

Penn and Teller. It was Penn Jillette. His book, what was it? I can't remember. But I lost 100 pounds and I basically started falling asleep. But yeah, just learning how important food is and, you know, eating a good apple. I mean, look, you cover your fallacy of calorie book. And I think, what is that?

Is that a baked potato or a cupcake on the front? No, so you got, I think that one's got the apple. And then on the scale is a natural, is sort of Chef Dr. Mike's Egg McMuffin, which is something that's related for you, right? It's my homemade sourdough English muffin. It is a piece of prosciutto, which is nothing but pork and salt. None of these additives, not ultra processing. Some real cheese, which has again been showed, which is a naturally fermented product. So it's basically a probiotic.

And you put those together and you've got, you know, a McMuffin with a free range organic egg that's as good for you as an apple. I can see I can see the blow up of that. So it looks really good there. So it's been wonderful to have you on the show, Dr. Mike. We really appreciate it. Thanks, Chris. It's been wonderful. I appreciate you having me. Thanks, and I had a happy piece of Friday to you. There you go. And we've got your dot com, right?

Yes. Okay. Sounds good. Guys, go check it out. Live healthier, eat healthier. Maybe it should go the other way. Eat healthier, live healthier. There you go. Do both. There you go. And all that good stuff. Be sure to subscribe to the show. Tell your friends and relatives. Subscribe to the show at iTunes.com. You can go to YouTube.com forward slash Chris Voss. Goodreads.com forward slash Chris Voss. All the groups on Facebook, LinkedIn.

See the big LinkedIn newsletter and the big LinkedIn group that we have over there as well. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe. And we'll see you guys next time.