The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast - Vani Hari aka The Food Babe - Investigating Food Labeling, How To Decipher Ingredients, Activism, & The Food Industry

Episode Date: January 25, 2019

#165: Vani Hari aka The Food Babe is an American author and activist who criticizes the food industry. On this episode we sit down with The Food Babe to discuss food labeling, how to decipher ingredients, what to look for and watch out for in ingredients, & controversy in the food industry.  To connect with Vani Hari 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 Skillshare. Skillshare is an online learning space offering more than 20,000 courses. Join the millions of students already learning on Skillshare today with a special offer just for our listeners: Get two months of Skillshare for just 99 cents. That’s right, Skillshare is offering The Skinny Confidential listeners two months of unlimited access to over 20,000 classes for just 99 cents. To sign up, go to www.skillshare.com/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. 

The following podcast is a Dear Media production. superfoods delicious and easy to do with their mushroom coffees, mushroom superfood blends, and mushroom elixirs. If you're looking for a coffee alternative, switch up your caffeine intake. Four Sigmatic has the blends for you. Go to foursigmatic.com forward slash skinny and enter promo code skinny at checkout for 15% off your entire order. Check it out, Four Sigmatic. This episode of the Skinny Confidential Him and Her podcast is brought to you by Skillshare. Skillshare is an online learning community for creators with more than 25,000 online classes in design, business, marketing, and more. Take online classes taught by regular people just like you and me from the comfort of your own home. The best part, Skillshare is offering two months of learning for free. Yes, you heard that correct, for free. So join the millions of students already learning on Skillshare

today with a special offer just for our listeners. Get two months of Skillshare for free. Skillshare is offering the Skinny Confidential listeners two months of unlimited access to over 25,000 classes for free. To sign up, go to Skillshare.com slash TSC. Again, go to Skillshare.com slash TSC to start your two months now. That's Skillshare.com slash TSC. 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. Aha! The way we've been taught about food is that we're not really taught about what's really actually in it. You know, when we take a class at school about nutrition, we're not taught about ingredients in processed foods, but that's the majority of our diets as Americans. You know, we're not taught about what these chemicals are doing.

I mean, the fact that the majority of chemicals, 99% of them that have been invented over the last 50 years has been invented for one sole purpose and one sole purpose only, to improve the bottom line of the food industry. Howdy, howdy, everybody. Back on. Whoa, did I come in too strong there, Lauren? Welcome back to the Skinny Confidential, him and her show. If you are new to the show, thank you for joining. That clip was from our guest of the show today, Vani Hari, also known as the Food Babe. On this episode, we discuss labeling, how to decipher ingredients, what to look for in ingredients, the world of food labeling and food activism. For those of you

who are new to the show, my name is Michael Bostic. I am a serial entrepreneur and brand builder. Most recently, the CEO and co-founder of Dear Media Podcast Network, focusing on female content and voices. And across from me, staring me down because I'm coming in with too much energy, my beautiful wife, Lauren Everts, creator of the Skinny Confidential. Lauren, welcome to the show. How much coffee have you had today? I have actually not had so much coffee, but I'm wired up on life, Lauren. Babe, you look like that cartoon that hasn't slept in five years that's like on meth. I am not on any of those things and I will let that pass. Yikes. I think it has to do with my new morning routine. I've been on it all of 2019. Can I introduce myself? Oh yeah, I forgot. Go ahead and introduce

yourself. I was derailing the show. Oh my gosh, you guys. He has this new morning routine, which we'll get into because he actually wrote it down for you. No, no, I didn't write it down. You don't know. Okay, okay. You did. I'm Lauren Everett's Michael's wife. I'm a little shocked at how much energy he has today, but I'll embrace it. I am the creator of The Skinny Confidential, which if Michael will let me get a word in, is a blog, a podcast, and a brand. Taylor, I am bouncing off the walls. So yeah, my new morning routine, 2019 came in and I said, I got a lot going on. I got to step it up a notch. I need to

get my finger on the pulse of the day. And so I have a whole new routine and I swear to God, this routine I've been, I test, I've been testing it out and it is working wonderfully. Lauren, it's working wonderfully. Before you get into your morning routine, I found exactly who I was thinking that you look like, and this is who you've looked like for the last three days. Do you remember the show Ren and Stimpy? Yeah, of course. Okay. Well, Stimpy used to get these like really bloodshot eyes.

I thought it was Ren. They both did. No, no, no. No, that's not. See, that's Ren. Are you sure that's Ren? Ren's the chihuahua. Taylor, Ren's the chihuahua, right?

I don't know. I think that's Stimpy. Yeah, the cat. Stimpy's the cat. Are we sure, guys? Who's Ren? Who's Stimpy? You know the cat. Stimpy's the cat. Are we sure, guys? Who's Ren? Who's Stimpy? Hey, you know what?

For those of you that are old enough. Babe, this is you. You're Ren. Yeah. I do kind of feel like that. No, I don't feel like that. I feel good. Never mind.

I actually feel great. I'm going to have Mimi post it on the Instagram. For those of you that are old enough to remember Ren and Stimpy, that show kind of pushed the boundaries for a children's cartoon show. You remember that? You are all over the place today. That guy had a lot of eye crust going on. I got that. All right. Let's get back to your morning routine. You don't even know the morning routine. Yeah, I do know it. I can hear it every morning at 5am. Strict.

Well, first the day before is dependent. I need to be lights out asleep 10pm. If I get, if I get a little bit, if it goes to 1030, I can maybe make it 11, fucks me up, 12, then I'm done. But if I go to bed at 11, I will get six hours of sleep. If I get to bed at 10, I get a full seven. All I need is seven. That's it. I don't need eight. Seven's good for me. You are looking worse for wear. Six and a half, I can maybe do. Six gets me a little bit. But last night I got a full seven, which is why you can see I'm amped up. Then 5 a.m., wake up. Right away, 5 a.m. And what I do the night before, Lauren, I don't even know if you know, you don't even know my routine.

I set my gym clothes in my little office and I creep out of the room. I'm up so early. Yeah, I saw that with your whitey tighties. The dogs, you know, everybody that has dogs, these dogs love to fucking eat. They love it. And they love food. They even look at me at 5 a.m. They're like, we are not moving an inch.

They're not, they're not, they don't want to get up at all. They were wrapped up in the barefoot dreams blanket this morning. Nice and warm. It was raining outside. I was reading from bed. You're up, you're bouncing around. I'm trying to meditate. I ran to the gym. I might, I feel like the key to a happy marriage is two houses next door to each other. I'm not opposed to come over for a quick, you know, babe, are you kidding? Come over for a quick little boom, boom sesh, you know. I'm into it. Not at 5 a.m.

Yeah. But so yeah, 5 a.m. wake up strictly. Have to be out of bed. Force myself out. No matter how bad I feel, I just got to do it. But it's gotten a lot easier because now my body's naturally acclimated. And then my gym clothes were set out the day before. So the only thing I could put on is my gym clothes.

So now Lauren and I's new place has a dual level. So I can go upstairs, turn the lights on, don't bother you. Meditate. I've been working on it, guys. You know, everyone knows, listening to the show, I'm constantly kind of had a battle of meditation. 20 minutes. What do you think about 20 minutes, Lauren? I think 20 minutes is a long time. I sometimes bounce to 15. Yeah, I don't buy that, Michael. I'm stretching to 20 minutes. Robert Green, who that interview will be airing soon, said that he does, what did he do, like 30 or 40 minutes? He did something intense. I don't know, but I, for some reason, I'm stretching to 20 minutes. Robert Green, who that interview will be airing soon, said that he does, what did he do? Like 30 or 40 minutes? He did something intense. I don't know.

But I, for some reason, I'm going to say you do 10 minutes and you're lying. I promise I do minimum 15. Okay. A time it. And then sometimes 20. So I'm on 20. By the time I get out. I'll be watching that on the camera.

Because sometimes it takes me time to get dressed. It's 530. 530. Okay. Done meditation. And then I will journal for a little while or read for 30 minutes. In your journal, what does it say? I love my wife.

I love my wife. That's my decoy journal. Oh, you have a decoy journal. That's my decoy. I read it the other day. I just snuck a peek. That's the decoy. That's how I get some boom boom going.

I get the decoy out there. And then 6 a.m. Boom on the road to the gym. Got to be out. And what do you do? Rain or shine. Someone that is a skinny confidential reader snapped Mimi a picture of you running to the gym at 530 in the morning. Well, that's a little creepy. No, you're a little creepy for running to the gym.

You know what? Today I was fully committed. I didn't realize it was like kind of just drizzling a little bit, but when during the middle of it, it started pouring rain. So I was running up the hill. You hate when a one raindrop gets on your hair. So I'm sure that didn't work out well. No, because I have a windbreaker now and it's rainproof. I don't like when I go out and we're not in close. Okay. Anyways, get to Equinox, 30 minute minimum, 45, but I do circuit training the whole time. Then by the time that's done, I get, I walk back to the house, sometimes have a green juice or a smoothie. Now we're talking at 7am. By 730, I'm dressed and ready to go out the door. But I have, my office doesn't open here at Dear Media until 9 a.m. So I have an hour and a half ahead of everybody.

Emails. Thank you for your whole life story, Michael. We got it. At 7.30, I'm kicking you out of the house because your energy is way too high for me. I like to wake up like a cat. You know that. So you can leave at 7.30 and I can have the house to myself to wake up, do my workout, meditate, maybe walk to get a cappuccino with cinnamon and chill out.

But did you see, so you haven't even seen this, have you? No, I don't know what that is. See, I've talked about it on the show before. Oh, is that a bulletproof whatever? No, this is my, I've talked about it before. It's way of life. You know, I've done it on a few other episodes where it's my habit tracker. So every day I put in my habits and I have to hit these things. So it's like water, protein, greens, early up, read stoicism, meditating, writing, go to the gym. Oh, every day I do have to do a hundred abs, a hundred pushups. What does that say?

Compliment wife. I don't, what compliment did you give me yesterday? Every day. Yesterday I gave you a compliment. I wrote in my notes that you did one of the best interviews you ever did. Oh, what about the day before? I have one here that's got a double compliment. That's when I got it in that one. I said you got a double, you know, you got a little, you got a verbal and a physical compliment. So those are the best type of compliments.

You told me I was tight. Anyways, we're getting on the tangent here. Not tight, not in my vagina, tight body. No, we can make it vagina tight body you know what in there it says don't drink alcohol and tonight you're having wine because i am not yeah you are yeah you are because it's our anniversary kind of it is not our anniversary yes it is women will turn any 11 years ago you asked me out at u of a and you asked me on a date. So today is our anniversary. I asked you to come up to my fraternity. And I said no. So yeah, tonight's our anniversary. So I'm hoping that you're going to order a bottle of Brunello to celebrate and have a couple sips. Maybe so. Maybe so. Thank you.

Depends what I'm promised. All right, let's get into this episode. It's a good one. It's with Vani Hari of Food Babe. Okay, you guys love the Food Babe. You've all been messaging me about it. You're so excited for this interview. I actually met Vani probably like six years ago. Vani Hari is the creator of the Food Babe. And for most of her life, she ate anything she wanted. She was a candy addict. She drank soda, never ate green vegetables, and went to tons of fast food restaurants.

Now her life has completely changed. She's found a new inspiration for healthy living, and she has a drive and energy to investigate foods. She gets to the bottom of ingredients. And in this interview, we get real specific. She also has a product line called Truvaninie and she has two books, guys. So definitely check those out. And with that, let's welcome.

I want to say the names of her books. Vonnie has a product line called True Vonnie and she has two books, The Food Babe Way and Feeding You Lies, How to Unravel the Food Industry's Playbook and Reclaim Your Health. With that, let's welcome Vonnie to the show. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. People, I'm telling you, I've actually searched your name, like, or searched Food Babe in my podcast app to hear podcasts on you. So you'd be surprised. But like you said, Lauren's really fortunate because she has an amazing co-host.

With that being said, Food Babe is in the studio. Welcome into the studio. Happy to have you in here. We're kicking it right into gear. You wanted the compliment to be on air, didn't you? I wanted the compliment on air. You love a compliment. No, I get this very limited in my life.

I don't get that many, so I'll take them. All right, Bonnie, we're going to get right into it. How did you get into investigating the food industry? That is such a long answer to that question that I want to give, but I'm not going to give that answer. What I'm going to say is that, you know, for most of my life, I was sick. I grew up with two immigrant Indian parents that came here really trusting of the American food supply. And in order to fit in, they let us eat all the American food, right? Any kind of fast food we wanted to eat, any kind of processed food we wanted to eat. I shunned my mother's homemade Indian cooking

so that I would eat Salisbury steak and have Nutri-Grain bars like everybody else at school and Lunchables and all of that mess. And as a result, I was just really always sick. I had eczema all over my face, asthma, always had like some stomach issue going on, never felt really well about myself. And in my early 20s, I finally hit a breaking point. I was working for a big six consulting firm that put me on the road and I was traveling on this like lavish expense account. And I was basically eating whatever they brought in so that we would work through breakfast, lunch and dinner. So we would have these big spreads of like muffins and donuts in the morning and bagels. And then at lunch, we would have, you know,

huge spreads of like Italian food. And then of course, they'd have like a dessert table at the end, like tiramisu or whatever. And then at dinner, they'd have barbecue. And then in the middle of the night, because we were still working, they'd bring in like more donuts. I mean, it was just a smorgasbord of like gluttony, just so that we could work and be like, you know, full of sugar and caffeine. And we would just go and work and bill hours to the client. And we ended up being like the project of the year that year. And of course, doing this amazing project. But as a result of all that work year and, of course, doing this amazing project. But as a result of all that work, I got really sick, ended in the hospital with appendicitis.

You know, back then they said appendicitis is like random. It can happen to anybody. You don't need your appendix, like all of these things, right? And the new data, all the new data on it is pretty fascinating how your appendix actually populates your gut with good bacteria and you actually do need it. There is like a reason. I don't have an appendix either. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Anyway, so. Fuck my appendix. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You need some probiotics. So I was sitting in the hospital room recovering from this. I was in my early 20s.

I was like wanting to like just be out with my friends and meet guys and like hang out and like, you know, feel good about myself. But I felt awful about myself. And so I just made health a commitment. I said, you know what? Health is going to become my number one priority. I'm not going to make any job or boss or anybody get in my way of this. And so I started to channel all this energy that I learned in high school where I was

a top tier debater. I was like number one in state three years in a row and, you know, recruited a college to go and debate. And back then when we were debating there, you know, there wasn't Google and you couldn't just Google stuff to find out like evidence of to support your facts, right? So you had to go to the library and actually go through the microfiche and like print out stuff and carry big, large tubs of different papers and evidence and all this stuff to different debate tournaments across the country when I'd compete. And so I did the same thing with my health. I started with research. And I just started reading these huge books on nutrition. One of the first books I read was Conscious Eating

by Gabriel Cousins. And that book still to me is a Bible on how to eat. And he just, he broke it really down. He said, you know, the processed foods out there are dead. They're dead foods. There's nothing of life to them. And you need to really eat an abundance of raw fruits and vegetables and, you know, some cooked things and just kind of laid out this lifestyle. And so I started to quickly adapt my lifestyle to that, and things started to dramatically change for me.

I mean, not only did I get off of, at one point, nine prescription drugs, I completely turned around my health, my skin, my hair, my weight fell off. I mean, everything just changed dramatically to the point where people around me were like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you doing? You know, people who grow, you know, growing up with me in Charlotte, I've lived there all my life. I still live there. People going like, wait, you you weren't like that. You were kind of like a, you know, you were I mean, you were always kind of cute. But you know, you just didn't look that great because you didn't really take care of yourself. Boys and girls, boys and girls, we have a winner. This tastes like I'm drinking pineapple juice. I feel like I am completely in the zone, hyper-focused, ready to go. Ladies and gentlemen,

we have a winner. I am singing high praise. You've heard it here before, and now you're going to hear it again. Four Sigmatic. I'm telling you, these guys have it down pat. I'm currently drinking the Mushroom Focus Shot with Lion's Mane, bright orange bottle, pineapple flavor, can't taste any mushrooms, hyper-focused. For those of you that know about Four Sigmatic and use the product regularly, you can skip this unless you want that discount code, which is coming right after this. For those of you that don't know about Four Sigmatic, trust me, stick around. Long-time listeners of this show will realize they have heard about this brand before. We have had their founder, Taro, on this

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Go to foursigmatic.com slash skinny and enter promo code skinny for 15% off. Enjoy. Can you give specifics to what you did? Did you just add more vegetables? Was there a certain fruit that you started really eating? Like if someone's out there and they're listening and they feel like they're in a health crisis right now and they want to make a change, can you give like really detailed specifics to that person? Yeah, I mean, that's a really good question. And I can't tell you what the first thing I did was, but I guess the thing that made the biggest impact is I took back control of my food. Instead of allowing the office to cater in food for me, I said, you know what, I'm going to bring in lunch

every day. And I'm going to bring in breakfast. I'm going to decide what I'm going to have for breakfast. And shortly after this health awakening, I met my husband, who I was dating at the time, and he introduced me to oatmeal. I had never had oatmeal in my life, literally had never had oatmeal, just was eating sugary cereals or bagels or muffins for breakfast, Nutri-Grain bars. And that was one of the first things that I said, you know what, I'm just going to eat oatmeal every day for breakfast. And then I'm going to bring in my lunch and I'm going to cook like, you know, some grilled chicken and have some vegetables. And I'm just going to take back that control and start learning how to

cook. And I had to teach myself how to cook from scratch at that age because my parents just, you know, I just, I never was in the kitchen with them in terms of like helping cook or learning how to cook. It wasn't like a priority for them to teach me that. And because they were both working teachers and busy themselves. And so, you know, I just wasn't involved a lot. I remember like shelling beans and going to the farmer's market with my mom. And I hated that. I just, I don't know, I didn't, I didn't like anything about healthy lifestyle whatsoever growing up and started to really embrace that and started to just learn about fruits and vegetables and started to just incorporate more into my diet.

But I think where I really made the dramatic change was when I stopped eating processed foods. And I didn't completely stop eating all processed foods, but the majority of ones that I would be snacking on, the Oreos, the Doritos, the processed foods that are at fast food. We're talking about the extreme processed foods here, like categories that is like junk food. Yeah. And I mean, and I would even say like right now, like, and we can get into this, but you know, I have a new, from writing my new book, Feeding You Lies, I have a new found awareness of just how bad processed food in general is, even organic processed food.

And just the way it's produced with the machinery it touches, the plastics it touches, the things that get leach into it, the contamination from non-organic and conventional foods that get contaminated with organic food. I mean, just all of that in the awareness that I've learned from starting my own food line, Truvani, I see what's going on in the marketplace and it has just strengthened my resolve so much to just stay away from anything that has been mass produced. So let's talk about a little bit because you're basically single-handedly taking on the entire food industry. I was Googling you before and I was trying to figure out, okay, where to start here. You've even taken on the Obama administration. You've really kind of gone after, let's see, Chick-fil-A, Chipotle, Kraft, all of the mass

food producers. Where does this drive come from and how do you decide who you want to debate or kind of go after? Yeah. So early in my, early in my career as an activist, you know, I was just writing, sharing information about different products and menu items and things that I had come across because of personal experience. Like, you know, with Obama, it was that I was a Democratic national delegate for Obama to become president. I really believed in his presidency, and I still do. And but one of the promises that he made during his presidency, or during his campaign was that he would, you know, challenge the administration to label genetically engineered ingredients. And he couldn't get that done because of just the,

the the lobbying efforts of the food and chemical industry. And Michelle Obama, too, tried to make that her platform. And she also couldn't get as far as I know she wanted to go because of the persuasion and the influence that the big junk food companies have, the Cokes, the Krafts, the Kelloggs, the General Mills of the world. And so, you know, for me, it was about just, you know, pushing the envelope and using my stature as a delegate at the Democratic National Convention to protest in favor of, you know, labeling genetically modified ingredients, because I think the labeling and knowing what's in your food makes you become more aware. And, you know labeling genetically modified ingredients because i think the labeling and knowing what's in your food become makes you become more aware and you know the the reason why this was so important to me was not the genetically modified food itself wasn't the actual seed that

they were you think do you think labeling will really like solve everything because let's take like the the cigarette industry for example you go to europe and they like literally you want to smoke a pack of cigarettes over there and there's a literally a dead baby on the on the on the pack on the pack there's people with open throats you think like labeling is going to solve you think there needs something else no so labeling was like the first step to creating awareness right and what what happened with this whole labeling campaign which is so beautiful to watch is not only with the with prop 65 that was happening here in California that lost right? There was a proposition that was proposed to label GMOs here in California, but it lost. But it was such a widespread mass campaign

of awareness, teaching people about GMOs that people actually know what Roundup is and Monsanto is now. And Monsanto is being sued for the fact that their product is linked to cancer and they're losing in court and, you know, awarding individuals millions and millions of dollars because of this. And so, you know, this awareness has allowed people to become cognizant of the mass amount of chemicals being sprayed on our food. And so we can start to hopefully reduce that. So that's really the point of labeling, right? It's awareness. And it's the same point of why, like, for example, some of my campaigns, I've been able to target one specific ingredient, like, for example, Subway was using this chemical called azodicarbonamide. And it was a chemical that was banned all over the world. If you used it in Singapore, you got fined $450,000. It was a chemical that when it's, you know, it's a dough conditioner.

So when you have a piece of bread, right, there's those little itty bitty bitty air pockets that you see all throughout the bread. And if you bake bread at home, you know, sometimes the air pocket is big over here and small over there and you break it open and it's just it's not like uniform. Well, Subway wants uniform bread across all of their locations. So they use a dough conditioner like azodicarbonamide to create that look and feel of the bread and also to decrease the amount of time it takes for it to rise and leaven. So it's a cost-cutting measure as well. And so they were using this chemical when it's inhaled can cause asthma, but also when it breaks down

and is heated, it can turn into a carcinogen. And they were using this chemical here in the United States, but not elsewhere in the world because it was banned and regulated in other places in the world. And so I started a petition to get Subway to remove this chemical to increase the awareness of this unethical behavior that the food industry has when it comes to the regulation of chemicals. harmful, they should take it out of all their products, no matter where they're being sold. Instead, they use the government regulations to their advantage to continue to sell these chemicals to us. But don't you, I get all this, but don't you think some of the bigger issue maybe here is just us as human beings, as individuals? Like, for example, once in a while, and you're going to hate me for this, I'll go and eat

fast food. I didn't. She's not going to hate you for this. You're not going to like this. Once in a while. You're not going to like this. More than once in a while for this. I'll go and eat fast food. I didn't know. She's not going to hate you for this. Once in a while, you're not going to like this. I fundamentally know like I'll get this up every day, five, go in the gym. I'm working out. I'm drinking, we're drinking the mountain water. We're doing all this stuff. Fine. 90% of my time I'm healthy. Right. And that's fine. Don't you think that there's like some middle ground here? Do you think I can never have that? I want to

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Used to be 99 cents, and now it's completely free. It's hard to beat that. To sign up, go to Skillshare.com slash TSC. Again, go to Skillshare.com slash TSC to start two months of free learning now. That's Skillshare.com slash TSC. Again, go to Skillshare.com slash TSC. Enjoy. I don't think it's really about whether you can have it or not. I think the problem that I've had with the way we've been taught about food is that we're not really taught about what's really actually in it. You know, when we take a class at school about nutrition, we're not taught about ingredients in processed foods, but that's the majority of our diets as Americans. You know, we're not taught about what these chemicals are doing. I mean, the fact that the majority of chemicals, 99% of them that have been invented over the last

50 years has been invented for one sole purpose and one sole purpose only to improve the bottom line of the food industry, not improve our health, not to make us avoid disease not to help us but don't you think the fundamental problem here is that we're just being gluttonous as a society like maybe like i know that back to my point that yes and no here's where i'm gonna disagree with you actually don't like i know i should not be eating fast food every day so i don't it's all in moderation i think that like as a society people have gone over the edge where they're eating these things way too much here I think that's the problem. Here's the other problem is that I go to the market and I turn over everything and I look at the ingredients because I want to be informed when I'm buying something and I'm using it day after day.

Where I get pissed off is when they sneak shit in or when they call something maybe olive oil but it's not cold prep. You know, I want to know exactly what I'm eating as a consumer. And I feel like they're, they're lying to you on the back of the label. Yeah. So that's where I get annoyed. There's some really good examples of that actually in my new book. You know, I talk about, you know, one really popular bar that just got bought by Kellogg's and RX bar and they, you know, they list the ingredients on the front and they say no BS. And I was like so excited because Whole Foods CEO reached out to me a couple years ago and he says, hey, what are the new trends that I need to be aware of in packaging and ingredients? What do you see? What's, you know, it just was picking my brain. I said, you're going to start seeing the ingredient label on the front

of the packages. People are going to actually going to list their ingredients in big letters on the front of packages. And that's what RxBar ended up doing. And so I was so excited to see this. And then I turn over the package to read the ingredient label just to see if it's true. And then they're sneaking in natural flavors. And natural flavors aren't anything but natural. It creates this pop in your brain for you to get this boost of flavor, for you to remember that flavor, crave it, and just keep continuing to consume that flavor. And it makes food that wouldn't otherwise taste good, taste good. Or special seasoning or natural flavors or preservatives or what's that? Sunflower seed? There's like an oil that starts with an S.

I forgot what it's called. Soy oil? Yes. Or they sneak soy and stuff. I mean, I was taking a vitamin shot the other day and it says vitamin C. It's the best of Yes. Or they sneak soy and stuff. I mean, I was taking a vitamin shot the other day and it was it says vitamin C. It's the best of the best. They're comparing it to an IV, blah, blah, blah. I turn it around and it says it says leptins in it. So I think I'm saying that right. Is that what it's called? Leptins, leptins, leptins.

And I'm just like, you can't even take a vitamin shot without getting sneaking something in. So that's where I get frustrated. And I agree with, with how you're really, you're being a crusader for so many different people. Cause it's, it's, I want to know what's in my food and I want to know exactly what I'm eating. And then if I choose to make the choice to go to McDonald's drive-thru, that's on me, you know? Yep. Yep. I, I'm not, I'm not disagreeing with all of that. I'm just fundamentally thinking that as a society, we've just gone over the edge where we've become gluttonous, right? People are eating so much fast food. They're just, well, let's take all this junk food, eating and eating. Like fundamentally, people just need to understand, okay, everything in moderation.

And what's happening is we're going way over the edge and we're blaming the food industry, which does play a part. But us as humans play an even larger part. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, like, I feel like so much of our food that is coming from like our main crops, like corn, soy, canola, cottonseed, is being, you know, used to create these processed foods and used to create fast food. And, you know, that's what the majority of Americans are eating, because these farms are being, you know, farm crops are being subsidized. And so, you know, I think the larger problem is like getting to the root of it, right? We need our government officials to start subsidizing like real fruits and vegetables and like everything and like, you know, an abundance of a variety of vitamins and minerals that we need in our diet.

But also, I think the fundamental thing that hasn't happened up until now is that this awareness is starting to take place. We're in this food revolution where people are finally paying attention to what's in their food. They care about it. They care about buying organic. I mean, that's the largest growing segment of any food sector right now. It continues to grow every single year. We have the opportunity to use social single year. You know, we have the opportunity to use social media to our advantage. And, you know, we are the voices, you know, no longer do traditional media get this message out. We can get it out ourselves. And that's what's so powerful about the food babe community is that they not only care about themselves, they care about getting

this message out and educating other people about what's actually happening. You know, you talk about McDonald's, you know, McDonald's French fries is another great example of just the disparity across nations. So like, you know, here in the United States, there's a slew of chemicals that they use to make McDonald's French fries. One of those chemicals is dimethylpolysiloxane. It's used in silly pudding. Yeah, you want some dimethylpolysiloxane fries, Michael? That's my favorite one. How do you say that? I'm going to say that every time. How do you say it one more time? Dimethylpolysiloxane.

You want some of those fries? Whatever they're putting in, it's good. It's preserved in formaldehyde. It's definitely not an ingredient you want to be consuming. But in Europe, in the UK, they're making these McDonald's French fries with three ingredients. Potatoes, oil, and dextrose, a little sugar. That's just sugar. And then you add the salt after the facts,

you can actually regulate how much salt you get. And here in the United States, we have a totally different recipe because they can get away with it here. And I just think it's a completely unethical thing that these companies are doing. And so these campaigns that I've started have just been to point this out. So people are aware and they can't be so trusting of all the foods that are out there. I mean, there's this underlying assumption that all the food that we eat is safe, that it's been tested by the FDA, that someone's looking after us. But the FDA is relying on the food companies themselves to test these ingredients. And, of course, the food companies are going to say they're safe because they're making money off of it. I mean, Michael, don't you think that it's fucked up that I will go to a grocery

store and I go and I buy strawberries and I think I'm being safe. And then I go and I buy blueberries and cantaloupe. And then I find out that it's, and I don't know if this is the proper verbiage, that it's fake. It's GMOs. It's not even like, it's not even a real organic strawberry. You almost have to go to like the farmer's market. Well, luckily there's no, as far as I know of any GMO strawberries out in the marketplace. Oh, that's good to know. Okay. Maybe I'm talking cantaloupe, corn. What else am I talking? So you're, so the, the main GMO crops are corn, soy, canola, zucchini, squash, papaya, and cottonseed. So if you go to the grocery store thinking you're being healthy, getting a papaya, and you take it home to eat it, and it's not even like, is that the proper

verbiage? It's not a real papaya? Well, no, it is. It's just, it's, you know, the seed that was used to create that papaya has been engineered to do something different than nature intended. Got it. Yeah. And it's patented. It's patented technology. Okay, let's talk about the brands that you like. If someone's out there, they're listening, what are some legit brands that you could just recommend to the audience that they should go check out that you love? Oh, that is a really good question. So again, you know, I have the strong resolve to like really reduce the consumption of my processed foods. But you know, one of the companies that I've loved, and it's a pasta brand that I feed my daughter, is Tolerant. It's a red lentil pasta. They make little elbow versions. They look like little macaronis. They make penne. They make ritone, like little spiral shapes. And she loves it. And it's 100% one ingredient organic lentil flour. You're going to get some tolerant tonight. Yeah, it is amazing. And it has like, I don't know, 20 grams of protein or something ridiculous.

And it fills her up, fills me up. I love it. I put some kale in there, you know, and I use, I love this sauce. It is so hard to find, but it is amazing. It's this biodynamic Italian sauce from Italy. It's called Yellow Barn. And it is phenomenal. I can eat it right out of the jar. I'm writing this down. I'm writing this down. It's the best on the market. And any other brands? So that's just something that I have a staple in my house. I'm trying to think what else that I typically eat. It doesn't need to be a brand either. When you go grocery shopping, what are you looking for? Yeah, I'm staying away from all the package process stuff. I'm eating a lot of fruits and vegetables.

I buy organic meat whenever I can. I like wild salmon. Every single day, I'm having pretty much the same thing for breakfast. I make my steel-cut oats in a crock pot so it's ready to go first thing in the morning. And I make sure those are organic, of course, because non-organic oats are sprayed with glyphosate, you know, sprayed with Roundup. And so, you know, they're harvested with that. So it's really important to buy organic. And there's been a new study that came out recently that shows, you know, that this is actually really occurring in major brands, like Quaker Oats, you know, one this is actually, actually really occurring on in major brands, like Quaker Oats,

you know, that one of the biggest brands owned by Pepsi. So, so yeah, I have that every morning, I had my ground flaxseed that I grind myself. And I store in my refrigerator. That's amazing for breastfeeding. I'm still breastfeeding my daughter. So it's amazing for that. It's amazing for women's health. It's, It's really great for cleaning you out. So keeping your gut in check. And then I always have either a green smoothie or green juice every single day. And I keep the fruit content down to a very minimum. Like my green juices, I almost never get fruit in them.

Maybe just a little lemon, but that's it. And then for lunch, I always have a big salad. And so I'm not eating a lot of processed things, even the steel cut oats are the least processed oats you can buy. And then in the afternoon, I do eat something sweet. I like something good. And so I love organic dried mango. So Peeled is a brand that I buy. I love that brand. Yeah. I can eat the whole bag in one sitting. So how much of this like, say, is it is your policies like every chemical is bad?

Or is it there's some that can make like how much of this is based? You look and say, okay, there's a list of these chemicals. Like do any make the cut? I don't think they're all bad. I think that there isn't a necessary reason to consume a lot of them. Now, there are some that, you know, I think you can really, there's enough processed foods out there right now that are being created without any of these like industrial chemicals that you can still eat processed food and still get by without eating them. So I don't think they're necessary for your human diet. Like I personally don't want to be an experiment of the food industry. Like I don't want my body to be hijacked by the food industry.

That's why – one of the reasons why I avoid natural flavors. Now there is a product that is like crack to me. It's the Annie's Chocolate Bunnies. Those things are like crack to me. I cannot stop eating them until the box is gone. And they use natural flavor in them. And I know that's the reason why, because there's just no other reason why all the things on this planet that I will eat that is organic, you know, I just can't stop eating.

I have that problem with Cheez-Its and chips. There's probably something in Cheez-Its that I don't even know. There's an organic version of Cheez-Its. The reason I ask all these questions, and I do this with everybody, like, you know, we just had Dr. Gundry on and we'll probably get into some of his takes soon. But there are so many extreme examples on both sides that I've seen gone wrong. Like, you know, somebody eats really, really unhealthy. We all know what that looks like. But then I've seen the other side of it where someone thinks they're eating extremely healthy. They cut out all processed

foods. They only eat organic. And a lot of those people end up having a ton of problems. You know what's difficult, Lauren? Women. Really difficult. You know what's even more difficult? Women shopping for men on Valentine's Day. We don't need flowers. We don't need chocolates. We need a couple things. I think you know what I'm talking about. But if you want to get a gift, you know, for me and and if you for the women out there that are thinking about a gift for the man in their life, we have the answer for you. And that is woo more play. That is the answer, ladies, that woo more play because that's going to lead to the boom boom in the bedroom. Here's what you do. You take candy hearts from Rite Aid. You put a little woo

on your bedside. You sprinkle the candy hearts around the woo. And then you write on a little post-it note, see you tonight and do like a lipstick kiss. Okay. That's all you have to do for the guy. It's so easy. It's so efficient. And it's a win-win for everyone because who doesn't like all natural coconut oil lube? And for those of you that think, like, I don't know if that's for me, trust me. If it's not for you, it's for your men. We are excited about it. The men that I have given it to, my friends, the ladies that I've given it to, their friends, they are experiencing woo on a whole new level,

which means they're experiencing the other thing on a whole new level. Okay, Michael, let's not get like so technical about it, guys. Just go check out woomoreplay.com and you can see for yourself, there's all these natural ingredients in it, like stevia for a little taste. We got a little beeswax for a little grip and then some vanilla essence for a little smell. And then of course, coconut oil. Speaking of vanilla, let's keep some vanilla and woo, but not vanilla in the bedroom. Let's spice

it up, ladies. Spice it up. Get the men in your life. WooMorePlay. Go to WooMorePlay.com and enter promo code HIMANDHER for 20% off right before Valentine's Day. That's WooMorePlay.com and then code HIMANDHER for 20% off. Enjoy and happy Valentine's Day from Lauren and me. No, I don't think those people have a ton of problems because they stop processed food. I think it's because they stop food groups. So they eliminate, like they become vegan, or they are on a keto diet, or they go to some extreme where they're eliminating food groups. I think some of those people end up getting sick because they end up doing that kind of stuff. I have never known anyone to get sick because they eliminated processed food.

Okay, so let's talk about it a little. So maybe they cut out all red meat all of a sudden. No, done. Or they cut out all gluten. That's where you see the problems coming in. Well, no. I mean, I'm saying when anything is taken to the extreme, like reducing or removing processed foods from your diet I don't think is extreme because still you have the abundance of everything, everything nature intended, everything on this earth that we're meant to eat. You still can eat all of it, right?

Every nut and seed and fruit and vegetable and meat that's out there that's being produced, like you can eat it all. So I don't feel like that's a – I'm still eating butter. I'm still eating bread, right? But I'm just eating homemade bread, right? Or Ezekiel bread. That's another product that I buy that I love. Okay. I liked Ezekiel bread too and then someone told me there's soy in it.

Is that true? Yeah. There is a soybean. It's a fermented – not a fermented but a sprouted soybean, right? Okay. And some of the products, right? They do use that as one of the, you know, ingredients in one of the, you know, one of the breads or whatever, but there's certain breads that don't have it too. Okay. And I was also going to ask you about dairy. You know, with dairy, it's like, you know, we don't need to have a cup of milk at breakfast

and yogurt as a snack and then a cheese stick later on and then have pizza for dinner and then have ice cream for dessert. Like that's way too much dairy, right? No one should be eating that much dairy, period. It's just it's not intended for that purpose. And so I actually tell a story in the Food Babe way about how my ancestors who grew up with dairy used dairy. You know, they had one cow that they shared the entire, whatever that cow produced in terms of milk, shared with the entire street or village at the time. And, you know, and they would use as much as they could, and they'd make a couple of desserts with it. And they would use yogurt and make yogurt for it to like dip their, you know, prompt these and

rotis and everything with back in India. right? And that's how and they would make butter with it. And that's it. You know, that's what they would do or ghee. And that's all you need it for. You don't need to eat it at every single meal. And so I think there's just, you know, we have government subsidies going to the dairy industry. And the dairy industry wants us to consume milk, they have actually an abundance of cheese to the point where they want schoolchildren to eat so much Domino's. It's just going out of style. Right.

So it's like, you know, we have a problem with like our government telling us and subsidizing advertising and media and programming to our to our schools and to, you know, getting it ingrained into our lifestyle that we need to be eating this much dairy all the time. And that's, and that's part of the issue. And so like, for me, I use dairy like a condiment, right? I don't think it needs to be eaten at every meal. So how are you going to balance your, your strong views on processed foods with being a mom? Because I, that's, that's going to be hard. Cause I feel like if you say, no, you can't have anything, then that almost is going to make, yeah. yeah like they're gonna be wanting to sneak things like what's your strategy there? I've seen it happen we have a lot of friends that have young kids and the kids you know they're under strict diets and they get away and they go with their friends or they go to the fair they do something and the kid immediately going for the candy immediately going for the junk because they're so restricted. Yeah

so it's funny I for the first year of Harley's life like I did first year and a half or so, I did really well with like kind of like shielding her from processed foods, right? And then she saw like my husband munching down on some, he's like a chipaholic, munching down on some chips. Yeah, they're organic chips, but whatever, you know, munching down on these chips. And she's like, want one? Want one? And she just thinks it looks so cool. It's this bag, it's bright colored, you know, he's crunching on something and she just got her looks so cool. It's this bag, it's bright colored, you know, he's crunching on something and she just got her molars in. So she's like, I can crunch now. And so she's just, you know, wants these chips and she loves them, you know. And so what I do is I do a really good job of making sure that I give her a lot of choices in terms of fruits,

vegetables, and what she's eating. And I teach her about every single fruit and every single vegetable. And I let her pick foods from our garden and make them with us and see how we're cooking them and preparing them. And she's only two, but she sits down with us at fancy restaurants and will sit there for the entire meal of an hour and a half to two hours and sit like an adult and not get up and run around or do anything because like we have really ingrained having a very conscious time eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner with her. That's something that I do almost every single day. And yeah,

it prevents me from being more productive at work or more productive at other things in my life, but it's so important for me to instill those like great eating habits in her that so when she thinks about eating, she sits down, she mindfully eats, it's not like eating on the go or like shoving something in her mouth just to keep her full or quiet or, you know, entertained. And so, you know, really good example of the way that I kind of want to parent is the other day at the at the airport, I was trying to entertain her at the airport, right? And we're waiting for our flight. And I said, hey, let's just go into this little store. And sometimes I let her play with like the stuffed animals or whatever they're selling

in the stores. And there was this huge display of candy. And she was like, you know, yeah, this looks cool to play with. So she's picking up Butterfingers and Kit Kats and York Peppermint Patties and Snickers bars and all that. And I just said to her, and I said, hey, Harley, these things are yucky. They are so yucky. And she looked at me and she said, yucky? And I said, yes, they are yucky. This is what mom has made her mission in life to be, is to teach people not to eat these foods because they're so yucky. And she goes, yucky. Okay.

Not yummy. Yucky. And I was like, yeah, that's right. And so, you know, I didn't get into all the chemicals with her. You know, her level of understanding is not quite there yet in terms of understanding that, but I will. And if I can just educate her so she knows the truth about the food in terms of what's actually in there and, you know, how it serves the body and doesn't serve the body, then I'm going to let her make her own choices. And she's going to make bad choices. And I'm going to have to cringe and look the other way. And, and I'm just going to have to grin and bear it. But that, but then I know I've kind of done my part. And it's the same thing I deal with, like my family that doesn't want to change, right? You know, everybody has people in their family,

they want to change and when they can't, they're the hardest people to change, but you can only lead by example. And, you know, I, you know, I'm in charge of the groceries, right? I'm in charge of the groceries at the house. I see what comes in and out, you know, occasionally my husband will sneak shit in, but I, I, I, you know, I, I man the household. So, you know, as long as she's eating in my house, I know I have, I have some really great choices. I'm like that kid. Remember that movie Heavyweights? When you like hid the stuff in the bedpost and then had the secret stash?

That's how I'm in the house. Yeah, but he's not attached to food, really. He has no attachment to food. So that's an interesting thing. Like I feel like I associate like chips and salsa with just heaven. He doesn't have any kind of attachment to food. So that's what I always say about him. That's why I feel like you can have a Snickers and move on. It's doesn't have any kind of attachment to food. So that's what I always say about him. That's why I feel like you can have a Snickers and move on.

It's not that I don't have attachment to food. I appreciate good food. I just, it's not what, I don't base my life around food. I look at it as kind of like fuel. But again, if we go to Italy and we're in a really nice restaurant or we go down the street, like last time we had Italian at Dantana's, Dantana's is great. And like, I'll get all into it,

but I'm not sitting around thinking about my next meal for sure. So you've built a massive brand, just on the business side, what is a day to day for you? Is there I'm sure every day is different, but kind of if someone's out there and they're listening, and they want to, they have something that they're inspired by, like you, where would they start? So every day, let's just take a typical day. So I wake up in the morning, I usually allow my daughter to be my alarm clock. And again, I'm still breastfeeding. So the first thing I do is breastfeed my daughter. And then I have lemon water, lemon with warm water and cayenne pepper every single morning without fail. And even my daughter knows to wait until I have it right. And she's so funny,

she started to take a couple sips here and there of it, which is really cute. And she goes spicy. And, and so then I have an espresso, I have my steel cut oats. And, and then about 30 minutes or so later, I am off to go work out. So either my husband's watching or I have someone come in to watch Harley for that hour or so. And I have to work out every single day for my mind. Otherwise, I'm a big ball of anxiety. So I have to work out every single day. And I do various things like Orange Theory. I go to a place called Hilliard Studio Method. That's really awesome in Charlotte. I go to yoga, hot yoga. I love that. And then I have a little gym in my house too. And then I come back, shower, and go straight to my office. And I typically try to, you know, before Truvani started, I typically only tried to have meetings like one or two days a week and have the rest of the time to do creative work, to actually write and like think of the next investigation, like investigate, do the research, make the phone calls to experts, do think of the next investigation, investigate, do the research,

make the phone calls to experts, do all of that stuff. Now things are way different with Truvani. Since I started Truvani, it's a product company that we started that believes in real food without added chemicals, products without toxins, and labels without lies. Right now, I think the goal with Truvani is to create as many products as we can with the highest integrity possible. I mean, we did the impossible this year, which was to create a protein powder with like five ingredients. Five ingredients with the cleanest pea protein that is available. Let me ask you this. I imagine you're crusading against a lot of big companies, a lot of money behind them, powerful companies.

When I think about you, I think there's like that guy that's watching you in the car, like on the radio, radio back to headquarters. That's definitely happened. I wonder, has anyone ever, what is the, has there any been any moments where you felt like, you know, this is, this is maybe dangerous to talk about, or this is, you know, making me feel uncomfortable. There's people that are like some powerful people looking at what I'm doing. Yeah. I mean, I think the biggest, you know, there's been challenges where I've definitely felt threatened and scared. But I think the biggest point where I was probably upset the most in my life in terms of an activist was actually after I was featured on the cover of Experience Life magazine. So after I was featured on the cover of Experience Life magazine, it was, it was like so cool, first of all, to see yourself on the cover of a magazine, but it was the food issue. And that was really happy. I was really happy about that because

we were talking about really important issues in that magazine and just getting the mission out there about the ingredients in food and getting people to pay attention to these chemicals and getting them to pay attention to what they're eating. And it just was a really exciting moment for me. And what happened was their entire website presence on Facebook got taken over by an AstroTurf campaign paid for by the PR industry. We don't know exactly who paid for it or who orchestrated it. But it was partly a hate group that, you know, I have on Facebook that just sits and hates on me all day. And then partly, you know, actual experts and other people that are paid by the food industry to like say that I can't believe you

had this person on your cover. I'll never buy your magazine again. You know, your magazine is shit. You know, all of these really, really bad things about Experience Life magazine, people in an uproar about me being on the cover, right? They've never had anything like this ever happen with anybody that they ever put on a cover of a magazine. And it got so bad that these trolls went to their Amazon rating and took their magazine that was at like four and a half stars down to two stars. And I felt so helpless because I was like, first of all, the whole Experience Life magazine opportunity was amazing. They flew me out to LA. They treated me with such respect and so nice. They like,

the lady who does like Gwyneth Paltrow's hair did my hair and I just felt like so like proud to be part of that magazine, right? It was just such an amazing opportunity. And they just stole, you know, the spotlight. And they also stole like the moment from me, it ended up being the most sold magazine for them that year, which was incredible. But it also brought down, you know, their brand value on Amazon. And it was a moment where I couldn't, you know, there was nothing, you know, other than, you know, trying to fight this kind of astroturf troll battle online, there was nothing much I could do. And if I were to spend my energy doing that, I would be taking my focus off the willing and focus off, you know, get – I mean, the whole reason they're doing that is to keep, you know, to take your eye off the ball, right? They don't want you to figure out the next investigation or the next company to expose.

They want you to, like like fight them, right? Get into this like petty, petty bullshit, right? And so that's what was really hard for me to handle. And that was like the start of just probably six months of a ruthless PR campaign to take me down in the media. And, you know, they tried to paint me any which way they could. And the New York Times, the Atlantic, these giant publications, they try to paint me down in the media. And, you know, they tried to paint me any which way they could. In the New York Times, the Atlantic, these giant publications, they try to paint me as a pseudoscientist, as someone who didn't have, you know, a science degree, so I didn't know what I

was talking about. And it just made me so mad because like, you do not need to have a science or nutrition degree to know how to eat, or even to research how to eat. I agree with not needing to have a degree, but how much of this is based in science, I guess, is from my own knowledge. Yeah, I mean, some of the harmful effects of these chemicals, there are studies that have been conducted and reviewed by several nonprofit organizations, and anyone can read those and talk about them and expose them. So it's like, you know, just like a journalist, you know, research is something and writes about it's the same way that I was doing

it. But, you know, they were trying to paint me as a person that didn't know much, and paint me just as a pretty face. And that really angered me because I, you know, that was never my intention to use the name food, babe, to do that. It was really just a cute name to name a blog. I never knew I was going to be turning into this activist. It was really just to share how I'd turn my life around and my health. How do you deal with trolls on the internet? Because it sounds like you've had your fair share of them. Oh my gosh, yes. So the first thing I did after this was I turned off Google Alerts. So I didn't want- I did after this was I turned off Google Alerts. So I didn't want anything that was positive or negative about me to affect my daily work,

right? I wanted, because my mission comes from within. My mission comes from my own integrity of teaching the world they can eat healthier, right? There are things that they need to know about the food industry. They need to know about their playbook, how they use these tactics, these astroturf campaigns. They don't only use these astroturf campaigns, by the way, on activists. They use it to promote ideas as well and to advance their agenda and comment sections of every major media outlet there is. I mean, in the political realm,

you see it all the time. I mean, you see all the fake news that Facebook has tried to combat. And it's the same thing. And it's being, you know, it's, you know, they use these front groups and trade groups. And I talk about this in Feeding You Lies, my next book about, you know, what specifically they're doing and how to safeguard yourself and become your own health investigator. And when you see a headline, for example, I mean, there was a headline recently, and I'll get back to your question. But there was a headline recently that was like, coconut oil is unhealthy, right? It was everywhere. Did you see it? I didn't see that. Oh, okay. Because it I mean, it was on the front of the USA Today. I mean, it was everywhere. And even my mom's texting me like, I told you so like, you know, and I'm like, Mom, no, no, no, no, no. The American Heart Association is the person

that put out the statement. And their experts that were reviewing the research cherry picked it to favor themselves because they're being paid by the corn and canola industry. That's what's really happening behind this. And she's like, oh my gosh. And so I like, of course, I had to write about it. And then of course, write this book and like expose like, when you see these headlines, you have to dig deeper, you have to go and see who these experts are that are telling you to eat this way because they might have an agenda behind the scenes. Like me, I don't have an agenda.

I want people to eat the cleanest possible like to the earth. So there's no like, you know, I'm not trying to sell you some chemicals. So the first thing I did was, you know, stuff to go back to your question about how I deal with online trolls, stop Google Alerts. The second thing I did was I got a Facebook moderator so that, you know, they could handle, you know, get rid of the riff raff because, you know, this is your community. This is your page. It's your... So what would be classified as a hate? Like say that somebody came in and because I always like to have a healthy debate. You come in and I'm just questioning something. Is that a troll or is that somebody

that's just debating? So like what is the line of troll like if so i understand if someone's making comments about your looks or if someone's just saying mean derogatory things but if they're trying to enter into debate would that be moderated would you oh no debate's fine debate is fine and i and i put an asterisk there now certain debates were started by some of these experts that were being hired by the food industry. And they would say to their followers, go to Food Babe's page and debate them and try to, you know, tell them they're wrong or whatever. And you'd see these same people come over from that page, and then they would take over your page. Well, if we saw

an AstroTurf campaign like that happening, we would just block them all. That makes sense. Now, the reason I ask, so you've been labeled by some as a fear monger. How do you respond to that? I think it's really interesting that people label me as a fear monger when we're in a situation where people are dying every single day of cancer. And the only solution out there in the mainstream medical world is to like either cut, poison yourself or burn. And it's a really sad situation. And to say that I am scaring people about processed foods or these chemicals, I ask them to just go read the studies themselves. Do they want to eat small doses of chemicals that are linked to cancer every

single day? You have to ask yourself that question. I'm not here to tell you what to eat or what not to eat. I'm here to show you the information. And I want you to make that decision for yourself. And that's why at the back of Feeding You Lies, I take people through a very simple challenge. And this challenge will just change your perspective on the way you're eating and will open your eyes so dramatically, but it is so, so simple. You just literally ask yourself three questions at every single meal. Try to do it for a week. And the three questions are, what are the ingredients, right? You have to know what you're eating in order to really change your health. And if you know what the ingredients are, and what they're there for, and what they are, and if you don't know what they are, you need to stop eating it until you do. That will fundamentally change what

you actually just even put on your plate. Then the second question is, are these ingredients nutritious, right? You know, if health is your goal, and you want to be the healthiest you can be, you want to live life to your wildest dreams, because I can tell you right now, if I felt like I did, you know, 15 years ago, I wouldn't be able to do what I'm doing today in terms of the impact I'm making this world and following my dreams and making everything become a reality. And so when you really achieve health, you start to see other areas of your life of like, oh, here's my purpose. Here's what I need to be doing. And this is what's going to really truly make me feel alive every single day. But the next question you ask is, are these

ingredients nutritious? And if there are ingredients that are there that are not nutritious, you'll know that you're eating them and it will change your awareness, it will change your brain, and it will, you'll start to say to yourself, well, maybe I don't need to eat that. And then the third question you ask yourself, or where do these ingredients come from? Where do they come from? You know, is this, you know, is this white sugar that I'm eating over here that I sprinkled on my oatmeal or whatever that way? Yeah, I know it's, you know, what is it? It's sugar. Is it nutritious? It's really not nutritious. There's not any nutrition really in sugar. And then the third question is, where does it come from? Oh, it comes from a factory where they bleach it white. It doesn't look like pure cane

sugar anymore. That's like green and brown, right from nature. So like, you start to, to investigate all the different things that you're eating on a daily basis and you start to become aware of where things come from. And like, you know, even if you started with a piece of meat, you know, you know, it's a piece of meat and then, you know, it's probably nutritious, right? There's a lot of macro and micronutrition in a piece of meat. And then, you know, there's protein, there's other things. And then where does it come from? Is it coming from a factory farm where they're feeding old candy to those cows? Because that's actually happening. People don't know that.

But all the old candy has some place to go and it's being fed to our farm animals. That's one of the things that I expose in the book as well. And so it's- All those Butterfingers that you didn't get your daughter and now they're going to the cows. Yeah, all the old and Halloween candy you donate. I don't know. What is a book, a resource, a podcast that you can recommend to our audience? So, you know, I kind of already said it.

Gabriel Kusin's Conscious Eating. That book is just it's so ancient, but it's so powerful. And where can everyone find you? Where can they find your new book? Pimp yourself out. Yeah. So you can find my book at feedingulies.com. You can find it at every major bookstore.

And it's going to open your eyes about the food industry. It's going to reveal the entire playbook. It's going to make you a better eater. And if you eat, you need to read it. If you eat, you need to read it. So that's everyone. Label liars beware. You may be investigated.

And what's your Instagram handle? At thefoodbabe. Love it. Thank you so much for coming on. Yeah, I loved it. Thanks. I'm sure you guys are running to purchase Vani's book, and we're going to do a little giveaway here.

Okay? At the end of each episode, we usually do this, and today we are going to give away Vani's latest book. All you have to do to win is tell us your favorite part on this episode on my latest Instagram at the Skinny Confidential. And of course, you have to be subscribed and rate and review the podcast. It takes five seconds. And with that, we will see you next week. This episode is brought to you by Four Sigmatic, one of our favorite companies, one of our favorite sponsors, one of our favorite founders,

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