The Wellness Scoop - Sugar, Bread, The Immune System Breakthrough & When to Exercise

Episode Date: March 24, 2025

Is spinach really bad for you? We break down the latest controversy around oxalates, calcium and whether leafy greens are as harmful as some claim. A media doctor says two tablespoons of sugar are healthier than two slices of wholewheat bread—but is this just another viral nutrition myth? We unpack the science behind the claim. Scientists have uncovered a new part of the immune system that could lead to a breakthrough in natural antibiotics. Could this discovery change the future of medicine? Plus, new research suggests morning and evening workouts could lower cancer risk—does when you exercise really matter? We also discuss why nutrition misinformation spreads so fast, why slushies are no longer recommended for kids under 8, and answer a listener's question on overcoming fear of calories in nutritious meals. Recommendations This Week: I Can’t Smile or Play with My Kids: Life After My Brain Injury by Clemency Burton-Hill I May Be Wrong by Björn Natthiko Lindeblad  Let Them by Mel Robbins My NutriWeb - for health professionals CPD Saturated Facts by Dr. Idz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The wait is over. The NBA season is here and FanDuel is the place to bet on all the action. I'm talking everything from point spreads to money lines to player props. You can even pick who's going to win it all. Whether you're betting on a breakout performance or an underdog victory, tip off the season right with North America's number one sportsbook. Just download the app and bet on the NBA all season long. Please play responsibly. 19 plus and physically located in Ontario. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or the gambling of someone close to you, please go to connectsontario.ca. You know that feeling when you find the perfect song? Imagine that, but for your next meal at Tim's. Whether you're craving something meaty, cheesy, or just straight up satisfying,

make a meal of it with Tim's new three meat hat trick flatbread pizza loaded with pepperoni, bacon, and sausage crumble. Pair it with our new garlic bread and a refreshing peach lemonade quencher for a meal that just hits. Order on the Tim's app today. At participating restaurants in Canada for a limited time. It's time for Tim's.

Welcome to the Wellness Scoop, your weekly dose of health and wellness inspiration. And we are your hosts, I'm Ella Mills. And I'm Rhiannon Lambert. And after a decade in the wellness industry, we know how overwhelming and confusing health advice can be. So that's why we created this podcast to cut through the noise and make healthier living simple, fun and personal.

So welcome guys. Thanks for coming back, listening, we love having you. I guess big news this morning is that next Monday, so that's the 31st of March, the tickets for our live show The Wellness Scoop Live are going up, so get that date in your diary. In next Monday's episode we will give you all the details of how to book the tickets, but it's going to be on the 14th of June. We cannot wait. Yeah, it's going to be a big event. We've already started thinking about how we're going to make the show more exciting, what we can offer you in person and honestly the feedback Ella that we've got at the moment and the fact that you're all wanting to do these small changes because you've

got one to read out haven't you Ella? Yeah, I just it was exactly as you said, it's these small changes? Because you've got one to read out, haven't you, Ella? Yeah, I just, it was exactly as you said, Rie, it's these small changes that seem to be getting through to everyone that is just making my heart sing. Because it is, it's all about these little habits and the number of pictures I've seen of people adding those crispy lentils we talked about last week, or Rie's chocolate walnuts.

Oh yeah, chocolate walnuts. Sprinkling of seas. Even my mum sent me a picture of a bag of walnuts that she'd bought as inspired by the show. And I just love seeing these little changes that you're making because they're so sustainable in terms of long-term health. And I thought this message really summed it all up. She said, good morning. I just wanted to send you and Rhee a quick message to say how much I am loving the wellness scoop. So thank you. I tend to be a very all or nothing kind of person

and have recently moved into our first home. Things have been a little stressful so my wellness habits have gone out the window. I've spent the last two weeks catching up on all the episodes whilst painting our new bathroom and have since taken the reminder from you both to reintroduce some of the habits that simply make me feel good.

Today I swapped the local meal deal for fresh blueberries, raspberries, and a little yogurt, granola, and honey, and it felt feel good. Today I swapped the local meal deal for fresh blueberries, raspberries and little yoghurt, granola and honey and it felt soooo good. Please do keep the wonderful episodes coming as it's truly inspiring. And I just love that there was another one on this line. I added a bag of mixed nuts to the grocery shop this week and have been having a handful in my porridge every morning. Thanks so much for the reminder that little healthy habits add up and that the simplest, most natural changes are often all that's needed.

Instead of buying the highly processed and marketed protein powders, I just need more nuts, seeds, lentils, and chickpeas in my life. Oh, yes to that. Yes to that. Yes to that. It's just amazing.

So keep sharing it with us. We love it. These little habits, it's so inspiring. And if you're new to the show, I guess that gives you a good sense of what's to come. It's all about how we can inspire each other to make those day-to-day habits a little bit simpler. A thousand percent. And also your feedback on the body image discussion that we had with regards to

a zempik celebrity culture at the moment, the comeback potentially of the dreaded size zero. And we were apprehensive about how to communicate it in the right way. Thank you. Basically, I mean, we've been inundated with messages that you feel seen, that you feel heard, and it doesn't matter what your size and shape is. This podcast is for everybody. And we just want to help cut through all of this madness. So, Ella, your turn today. What is coming up on today's show?

OK, so on the show today, we are looking at a new discovery within the immune system. We are looking at slushies and whether or not they are harmful. We have a whole section on misinformation and the spread of things like bread versus sugar and whether spinach is killing you. Even water potentially is bad news now. What is going on there? We're also looking at the gut microbiome and the effect of processed meat on that as well as the best time to exercise. Plus, we've got a listener Q&A and that is looking at overcoming a fear of calories and nutritious meals and changing your mindset. So a very diverse mix of topics for us today.

And just a heads up, we're recording in a new room today and it's a little noisier outside than we would have liked. Should be fine. But if you hear any little bit of things in the background, that's why. But if you hear any little bit of things in the background, that's why. Okay, so let's talk about what we've been up to this week because it's been busy again, hasn't it? It's always busy.

And I wanna start with you because Rhi last night was at an event talking about continuous glucose monitors, which we did cover a few weeks ago in this trend of monitoring your blood sugar, which has all become quite, I'm going to call it, obsessive. And she texted me last night saying, I cannot wait to talk to you about this. I haven't heard anything about it yet.

So tell us everything. What was the event? Who was there? What were we talking about? Yeah, I've been dying to speak about this. I've saved it. I said, Ella, we're not speaking about it until we actually record. And so I think it was really needed. Now, as a regulated health professional, you are invited a lot of the time to different continuing professional development events, or things that are just going to help enhance the public health workforce. So, you know, it could be an event on how doctors are integrated

into nutrition, or how to manage the conversation around calories. And it was a room full of registered nutritionists, dietitians, doctors and media actually that work within the nutrition space. And the panel was led by Professor Charles Yeo, who we've had on the podcast before. Shout out to Charles, some amazing researchers, Oxford professors from Oxford Uni and people specialising in the world of continuing glucose monitors. I'm going to call them CGMs just to save the mouthful. So they work with CGMs and people working on apps or within that specific field. So we just wanted to understand, do they work?

And can I just caveat there? We're now talking about the CGMs outside of the context of diabetes, right? We're talking about it as CTMs outside of the context of diabetes, right? We're talking about it as a nutrition trend of monitoring blood sugar and seeing the blood sugar spikes and etc. as a kind of marker of health. It's become such a trend. It's blown up far beyond anything I think any health professional thought it would to the point where multiple apps now use them as a health tracker for data and essentially the concern is

there for us health professionals that is this misleading the public? Are CGMs accurate? Is the information coming out of them correct? And are they just causing more anxiety around food? Are they linked to any benefits? And the debate was strong Ella to say the least it was very passionately debated because you had a lot of people in the room that were very anti CGM use and you had some people that dip in and out of it and people, this is for the non-diabetic population, so anyone that's type 1 out there, these are lifesavers by the way, if you're type 2 or even in gestational diabetes during pregnancy they can be really useful. But

for the mainstream for the public who they're sold about a hundred pound a month it costs I think to order these privately are they worth it now research that Javier on the panel produced Javier Gonzales he works at Bath University and he conducted a study and he said you have to test a glucose monitor 20 to 70 times to see if the glucose reading you get is actually accurate to get a regular average. And it's even harder to read these glucose readings

from CGMs when someone has more adipose tissue. So obviously the target audience for these is often people that are overweight. And just for anyone who's not aware adipose tissue is... Fat. Yeah, extra fat cells around the body. And the more fat you carry, the more tricky it is to get these accurate readings. Now, I think most people don't realize that CGMs, when you put them in your arm, the fluctuations in blood sugar, you could test someone on a banana

at the same time of day on a Tuesday one week, measure it the week after and the reading will be totally different. And it goes to show that these glucose readings are not accurate. And I think the overwhelming conclusion that we had from this evening, and I'm talking the debate with professors from Cambridge, we had doctors specializing in this area in the NHS, working with private apps, working with NHS apps. There was a huge discussion on the night. And the biggest problem we had were accounts online, very mainstream glucose accounts. You know, they have Channel 4 TV shows now. And they're saying that everyone should be worried about glucose spikes. Now what a lot of people don't realize is the glucose spike is actually the symptom of the underlying problem, it's not the cause of the problem. So just by looking at

glucose spikes it's not giving you any idea what is going on with your body. Is it stress that's caused that glucose spike? Is it an inaccurate reading? Is it a mis-fluxuation that day? Is it a lack of sleep that's caused the glucose spike? Is it a lack of exercise? You know, there's so many factors. And when asked the question on the panel, Lucy Jones is a registered dietitian that I'm a huge fan of. She used to do those shows on TV like Shop Well Eat Less or things like that, I think. And she said that there's been some research in Europe that CGMs could actually be useful for migraines. And then Javier said it's been useful for sports athletes, so people that are cycling, you know, to measure their glucose in the liver

potentially roughly to see how much glycogen, which is stored energy, guys. I'm going a bit science-y. So when you store energy in the body, it's often as glycogen in your liver, and you release that when you do really vigorous exercise. And it might be a good way for athletes. But for most of us that don't have diabetes, that are looking at weight loss, it's just behavior change. I think the only benefit that people find by putting something in their arm like that

is that maybe it holds them accountable to eating better. You caveat that with the fact that, you know, we've got this amazing panel of experts that are basically saying that it's just not accurate and it cannot tell you how food impacts the body because what we have been seeing which is really worrying and Professor Dr Nicola Guess at Oxford University, she said she'd seen patients that had been measuring their glucose levels with a CGM and then basically cutting out all carbohydrates because they didn't want spikes and they'd replace the carbohydrates with meat and with dairy and their saturated

fat intake and their LDL, so the bad cholesterol everyone, had just gone up and up and then they're predisposing themselves to risks of cardiovascular disease and other things all over again. So the worry we've got as health professionals is, is it actually pointing you towards a better diet? Or is it causing more harm than good? And that's the conclusion that we got from it. So yeah, it was a big evening, Ella. It was at the Royal Society last night.

And this is when I get a bit fed up to see things in the headlines that we're going to discuss today, like sugar is better than bread and all these crazy trends you see that go mainstream. And we'll speak about misinformation later. I think I'll just leave it as that because my week was just a blur. It is absolutely fascinating and thank you for the debrief. I think it really just points the essentially the point of the show and why we're here, which is trying to get that middle ground, which is so difficult to get in the world today. And I'm excited to talk about misinformation later.

Definitely don't have a thing that interesting in my week to match it. No, tell me. No, we've given out 50,000 oak bars across London this week, which is being cool. Was that what you were doing yesterday? I saw the shot on Instagram with all the buckets.

Yeah, the social team being out and about with buckets, branded buckets, basically all the kind of major stations, which is so cool. I feel like I've disserviced at saying buckets. They were like fridges. They looked like mini upside down fridges. Yeah, they are. They're very cool buckets. They are.

They are buckets at the end of the day. But yeah, we've as part of the Choose Ultra Process Free campaign that the delicious yellow team been running, they've given out 50,000 note bars. Where was I? I missed it. We've never done anything like that. So that's been very, very cool to see. I have a great recommendation this week,

moving on to our recommendations. And I read it over the weekend and it just really got me thinking. It was a piece in the Times and it's by a woman called Clemency Burton Hill. It's called, I can't Smile or Play with My Kids, Life After My Brain Injury. And you guys might have read some bits about her

over the last few years. She was a British broadcaster living in New York and at just 38, she suffered a catastrophic brain hemorrhage completely out of the blue due to something she didn't know she had, which was an, I'm not sure if I'm going to pronounce it properly, but an art of venous malformation, which is a rare tangle of abnormal blood vessels in the brain. And they suddenly ruptured, as they said, completely out of

nowhere. She was in a meeting. She was placed in a coma, underwent emergency surgery, which did save her life. But five years on, she's still navigating the aftermath, living with paralysis on one side of her body and facing loads of challenges with her speech movement and facial expression. And I said, you might have come across her because she's written quite a lot. She's spoken quite a lot about it. And she wrote this piece that was, yes, in The Times on the weekend. And it was just the most amazing reminder. It was so powerful of how life can just change in an instant. And ultimately, the only certainty in life is uncertainty.

We have no control over anything to some degree. And I think as humans, we're so predisposed to want control and to believe that we can plan everything. And it was just a really heartbreaking but deeply insightful, inspiring reminder and kind of underscored that importance of gratitude for every good moment that you get. And she was talking about that juxtaposition essentially of being so grateful to be alive. But when people say to how are you, she doesn't really know how to answer it because her life is so different

from what it was. And she misses so much of her old life and not taking for granted a second of the good days that you're given because as I said, the only certainty is uncertainty and never knowing really what's coming. I kind of had tears dripping on the paper if I were reading that. Oh, it was so powerful. And she just wrote so brilliantly. She's got a BBC documentary coming out at the end of the month, I think next week called My Brain After the Rupture. So I think that's definitely one for us all to watch. And it got me thinking actually just as a reminder as well, if anyone is looking, I know I certainly would love to be better living in the moment than I am. And anything like that serves as such a powerful reminder to me of being able to do that. But

there was a book, read it twice now, it's one of my favorite books I've ever read. It's called I May Be Wrong. It's by a Swedish man called Bjorn Nethico Lindblad. Again, I'm so sorry, my Swedish is not good. And so my pronunciation probably isn't right. But he was a successful Swedish businessman. He left everything behind because he felt he hadn't kind of found purpose and meaning in life to become a Buddhist forest monk.

And he spent 17 years living that life as a monk. And very shortly after he left his life in the monastery, he was diagnosed with a terminal condition. And the book is just a reflection of his life. And it's filled with musings and thoughts and anecdotes and beautiful stories. And again, it's the best reminder I've ever read of how important it is to embrace life's uncertainties and live in the moment because it's all you've got. Because we, what's the phrase in the UK that we are terrible at is that you live to work rather than work to live or you know what I'm trying to say is that it is a really big

reminder that when we go home we have a chance to do what we want to do. Yeah and just enjoy every minute, try and make the best of every minute. Can I borrow that book, please? Oh my gosh, I'll bring it in next week. It's absolutely phenomenal. And I think you should read, there's another one. It's the one that's charting at the moment, massively let them by Mal Robbins. And it was my nutrition manager, Abby, who brought it up to me. I was speaking about some negative backlash, you know, as you do, you know, this job that we face sometimes in life, especially me as a nutritionist,

not everyone's going to agree with public policy or what you say. And she just said, just let them. It just, it creates more control and emotional peace for you. If you just don't worry about it, and just keep saying to yourself, well, let them, what can I do about it and I thought yeah it kind of lines and leads on nicely from the book that you've recommended there's a lot to be said for Buddhism as a religion I remember at school doing the eightfold path and thinking oh my goodness this is beautiful so I'm definitely going to explore that a bit more. Yes Mel Robbins is everywhere at the moment. Yeah absolutely I think a really good person to quite empowering to have a listen to I'm definitely going to explore that a bit more. Yes, Mel Robbins is everywhere at the moment. Yeah, absolutely.

I think a really good person to quite empowering to have a listen to. And then I've got one more superficial recommendation, but I haven't tried it yet. Caroline Hirons. I see her everywhere. She's got skin rocks and I'm going to order some and try some. That was it. Nice. Well, keep us posted on that. I do like the superficial recommendation. I have a feeling our audience probably do as well. It's self care, well keep us posted on that. I will. I'll keep you posted. I do like the superficial recommendation.

I have a feeling our audience probably do as well. It's self care Ella, it's self care. I'm curious if the audience are really into the Mel Robbins bandwagon and hype as well. So let us know. As I said, I haven't done a deep dive into her podcast yet, but I keep seeing it everywhere and was reading quite a lot about the Latham theory. The kind of pros and cons, people's different opinions of it over the last week. Yeah. There are some sides that are saying, well, it's not that appropriate for everybody.

Oh, no, it can't apply to everything in life. But equally, as you said, I think this point of like, as you said, it very much thinks this idea of living in the moment, like you can't control whether your boss is in a bad mood, you can't control whether or not it's pouring with rain. You had your period and it's just a bad week. Exactly. All these things that are so out of your control and being able to let go of that is the non-attachment side of things.

There is a lot to be said in that. Do you know what's funny? This is something totally funny that I'm gonna share because I think it'll amuse everyone. Speaking of being a woman, and you know we had the extra scoop on cycles. While speaking to my son and I go, oh, you know, if we ever had another baby,

by the way guys, this is just a discussion. If you ever had one, would it be a boy or a girl? And he goes, well, I don't like girls, mommy, because they have key rings in their ears and they bleed out their bottom. And I was like, oh my goodness. It was the funniest thing I'd ever heard. I cackled, like, you know when a cackle like comes out.

They've got key rings in their ears. Key rings in their ears, because obviously that's what he thinks earrings are. And it just goes to show, girls, we're doing a great job because we deal with a lot in life, key rings and the other things. Oh, my gosh, that is gold. Thank you for that. But we move on to the headlines that matter. We're starting quite serious.

We've gone from key rings in ears to quite serious, which is a major new study. I guess it's a pickup from earlier episodes talking about red and processed meat. Again, the conversation continues and there is a major major new study and it's revealed how different types of meat impact the gut microbiome differently and same impact on key health markers. So we will you talk us through this because it's very, very interesting in terms of gut health. And it does lead on nicely from the study study I think we discussed in episode one or two actually around the gut microbiome. So all the bacteria that lives in your gut, you know, the beneficial grow that lovely garden that we discussed quite a lot. The study has actually

shown some key health markers. So the more processed red meat you have in your diet means you have lower gut diversity. So it's basically linked to the amount of good bacteria you have in your gut and you've got less of it if you eat a lot of things like bacon, sausages, deli meats because that doesn't help our gut health and of course what we have to remember is that not all red meats are the same or they'll have the same effect but the processed meat is a class 1 carcinogen which we've discussed multiple times on this podcast as well and it has the strongest impact. So it affects 322 species of gut bacteria and that's out of the ones we know about.

Can you imagine how many things we're exploring and discovering in nutritional science at the moment? So remember that number 322 compared to white meat like chicken turkey which only influenced 36 and then unprocessed red meat like steaks affected only 14. So this highlights the fact that different meats have different effects and of course we know processed red meat is also linked to inflammation and metabolic risks. You know all these sorts of marcozella that go alongside eating eating these meats it's associated with increased blood pressure. You've probably seen if you've ever been in hospital and they're looking for how you're recovering from an illness they often take your CRP or C reactive proteins because they're inflammation markers and I remember being in hospital after I'd had my first

son waiting for that to go down after an infection. But that's also an association, fasting insulin and glucose, so diabetes risk goes up. Your fats and your blood change, this is linked to heart disease. And then another thing with the red meat that they found, the processed variety, is that the bacteria produce these harmful byproducts when they break down the amino acids which are the building blocks of protein so by breaking down that processed meat you're giving off all these extra unbeneficial properties. So I think that kind of summarises it a lot to be honest rather than going on rather than going on more but can I just emphasise again that higher creatine and

carnitine which play metabolic roles can be risky in excess. So again we go back to the supplements industry and if you're taking too much of these extra supplements there's also this harm to your gut health now which has been shown potentially from this research. And you can also be getting too much of that from eating lots and lots of this processed red meat. That's the study ultimately is the processed red meat but I wonder if they ever look into supplements and they look at that. And really clarify for us what we mean by a processed red meat. Yeah. So it is things like your pepper army, your salami, your sausages.

It's meat that's undergone a processing and a burning. And when I say burning, it's like caramelization of meat or smoking, like an additional property to make it taste a certain way. And often then dyes are also added to keep the color of the meat pink on the shop shelves. So it's a highly processed form of meat that is very commonly consumed like ham

in kids' sandwiches every day at school. I know, it's just crazy. But I think it is really interesting because we've been, you know, it's been in the news for a long time, President Trump means it's not very good for you, et cetera, et cetera. But this really specific study showing

that how detrimental it is to gut health is just very timely in terms of everyone's interest in increasing their gut health. It's a very clear way to decrease it. It is, but we do have a very interesting positive headline now. So remember that though, guys, your diet does matter. And that's what we try to discuss here. But you can make changes. It is possible. Yes, it is possible to make changes.

And it is I think if you are trying to do it, really do just think about what do you already eat and how could you just change that a little bit? So instead of feeling like you've got to change everything overnight, how can you make those small tweaks? A meal or a recipe you're already so comfortable with, can you add an extra plant or could you swap out something that for example, a processed red meat for something else? Or if you love- Even the white meat, like if you're not ready to reduce meat completely, if you swap from

ham to a chicken slice, that's still better for your gut than the ham. Totally. Or if you love making shepherd's pie or bolognese, try having half lentils, half meat, for example. So that's where I would start. Start with where you're at and then try and make changes that don't feel too overwhelming because we so appreciate everyone's got a big mental load as well. And so I think trying to emotionally make changes is just as hard as practically. But that moves us on to a really nice positive headline, which is all about the best time to exercise goes without saying before we get into a bit more of the details here.

Exercising at any time of the day is much better than not exercising. Oh, gosh, a hundred percent. Yeah. anything you can do, guys. Don't panic. Exactly. And obviously, it's not all in our hands. But equally, I think this is absolutely fascinating. So there was a new study out of Germany, which found that being more active in the mornings and evenings could reduce your risk of bowel cancer by up to 11%,

so a really meaningful amount. And again, it's a big study. The study analyzed data from over 86,000 adults. Wow. Yeah, big. And they identified four types of exercises, morning movers, evening exercises, midday movers, and those who were just active throughout the day. And it found that those who exercise levels peaked at around 8 a.m. or 6 p.m. had that

reduced risk of colorectal cancer. And so the exact reason is currently unclear but previous research did suggest it could probably be due to improved insulin resistance and lower obesity rates, both known factors in reducing cancer risk. That's really interesting to me. Obviously we're just looking at the reduced cancer risk because what we've found in the clinic is actually, obviously everyone's unique, but we don't see beneficial results from people exercising in the evening. We've often tried to recommend getting it in obviously this varies I mean if you're a surgeon or you're on call or you do night shifts you know let's just put that out there it's not possible

for everyone but we find in the evening it triggers people to get really hungry afterwards and they have a huge meal then they've got health off and then they don't sleep as well. So it just goes to show we're all unique, but get it in wherever you can. Totally. And I thought this was interesting. I just added in a few other stats after it, but I think particularly for those morning workouts, there was a 2019 study from the British Journal of Sports Medicine and that showed the morning exercises displayed better concentration and decision making skills, which again, suggest that early morning movement Journal of Sports Medicine and that showed the morning exercises displayed better concentration and decision making skills, which again suggests that early morning movement really helping

cognitive function, but it very much speaks to that kind of appetite control as well. And again, that was then backed up as another study 2018 from the International Journal of Obesity. They tracked a just shy of 3000 adults on a weekly exercise plan and found that those who worked out in the morning made healthier food choices throughout the day. I mean, I'm going to say as someone that can only work out once a week and even that was hard to find for me, it's a luxury, but I always feel God, if only my life allowed me to do that more, but it makes me feel amazing. I feel 10 times better.

It doesn't matter what mood I'm in when I get that morning workout and I go at 8.45 after school drop, nursery drop. And then because I run my own business, I'm able to start work at 9.30. But that's not an option for so many people, is it Ella? So I can see why we know it's so good for us, but society just makes it hard. It makes it so hard. It really, really does. I totally agree. I wish I had time for like a full workout every day. I think I would be a much better person. Oh my gosh, I would be like skipping into the podcast studio today. You were already skipping. You put lots of good vibes.

That's because it's podcast day. But it's true. I mean, certainly I anecdotally backed that up. I think when I exercise in the morning, my decision making is much stronger. I feel much better. I'm much more inspired to make healthier choices for my body. Yeah, me too, me too. Oh gosh, the next headline, Ella, I was jumping for joy, but also half relieved and half frustrated with this one, Slushies. Slushies, you guys probably saw this everywhere. I think it was front page news of every outlet and then all kind of, yeah, various different broadcast channels. And honestly, before we go into it, I'm just going to kind of preface this with, it summarises everything that's wrong with the health landscape at the moment.

And I don't mean this with an iota of criticism for parents for giving this to their children, because it's part of the kind of culture that we live in. But obviously, slushies aren't good for small children. I know. But they're everywhere. And so as I say that, I don't say that with criticism to parents. But the idea that we have to have headline news saying,

please don't give best part of a liter of blue or pink dyed sugar to children around four years old, it kind of summarizes everything that's wrong with our landscape at the moment. Like that shouldn't be news because that shouldn't be an option for children that age. Oh, it shouldn't be. But before I go on a soapbox about the problem, Rui, I know you have been all over the news talking about this.

And also for years though, I feel like I've talked about slushies for years, Ella. Tell us everything. It's heartbreaking because I have been to parties and I've discussed this before where there was no water and there were tokens for slushy drinks and parents genuinely don't know. To anyone out there listening, please don't feel bad you didn't know it's not out there. This is on the companies that sell these drinks, that put them out there, that make them bright red and bright blue and rainbow unicorn style. So every child is going to want it. But the

study suggests, and this has been for many years now, that these drinks can cause something called glycerol intoxication syndrome. It can hospitalise children. Ella is so deadly serious and it used to be not recommended for under fours and now they've pushed that age up. That's what was making front page news. Things like under eight or under 10. It was under eight. Under eight, that was it recently. And essentially glycerol, which is a sugar substitute, it's used to keep the drink cold and frosty. So instead of the ice just, you know, melting and making it watery, you've got that texture, which let's be honest, kids will just gulp. And they're often available at places where there's high amounts of activity like trampoline parks, parties or the fair comes to town and then these

machines pop up. So kids are going to be running around very thirsty and they gulp it all down very quickly as well which is also part of the problem. And here it said that a review of medical records revealed that 21 children aged between 2 and nearly 7 experience acute symptoms such as decreased consciousness, low blood sugars, that's hyperglycemia, lactic acidosis and low potassium levels. So that's shortly after consuming these drinks. And the guidance that we've got now from the FSA, which is the Food Standards Agency, yeah, says not under 10 guys. It's just not worth having your child in hospital on a drip, hooked up,

going in and out of consciousness. And these conditions, like, so you've got hyperglycemia, you've got hyperkalemia, which is the low potassium levels, they then lead to further complications for a child. So just to reiterate everybody, like Ella said, it's just not a good idea to give them a tool. And I think everywhere should come with a warning. But some machines don't. I actually wrote to my local trampoline park. I am that parent and they never replied and I'm going to write again. Yeah. I think the problem is,

is the advice is not to sell them to under eights as far as I'm aware. I don't think it's possible for under eights to get hold of them. Oh no. A parent can choose still to give it to their child because they don't know, they won't know and they won't read that tiny label. The machines that have the labels, they're so, so small. No one reads the small print on the corner of a big colourful machine. Who has time to do that when you've got kids pulling on your legs saying they want something? Exactly. And it's so difficult and their friends are having it etc etc but I also wanted to talk to you about the glycerol element of it because sure underage shouldn't have these things but let's be clear I don't think any of

us should is that correct? None of us need glycerol guys none of us need it. Do you remember the conversation it's very similar to the use of high fructose corn syrup in the states being such a refined sugar and sauce that everyone suddenly was like, oh, we're never going to include this again here in the UK. We don't anyway in our diets. I wonder if glycerol will go down the same way as one of those ultra processed food ingredients that obviously I've written about in my new book, The Unprocessed Plate. I've got a list of all of them. I wonder if it'll be banned in a few years. Do you think glycerol should be banned?

I do. Yeah. Yeah. I get it. What an amazing creation, right? It's like the ingredients that make ice cream, to keep it a certain consistency so it can be transported across the world. But let's be honest, there's zero benefit to your health. It's dangerous. Anyway, sorry.

Heavy, heavy stuff, guys. No, but as I said at the top, to me, this was so symptomatic of the, I think this whole episode is actually symptomatic of the insanity of the world that we live in, where on the one hand, you've got drinks that can hospitalise children for sale in places where children desperately want them. They go all the time. This is where the children in the UK, look, we get rain and cold in like most of the years, so they want to do indoor activities and all these indoor activities, soft plays, all of them have these drinks.

Exactly. So on the one hand, you've got that. And as I said, it's, they shouldn't be allowed to be given to children at two, three, four years old anyway. So the fact that they then are being advised against it kind of summarizes how mad ultra processed food has gone on the one hand. And then as we're going to get to a little bit later in the episode, on the other hand, we're being told that spinach is killing us. We're actually going to even hear a viral clip about how water is very bad for us. So we're kind of vilifying almonds, spinach, wholemeal bread, like just a whole cohort kind of quite standard ingredients. And yet at the same time, we're slushies and it just summarises this complete juxtaposition, this almost impossible to navigate landscape that we all live in. And as we were saying, like, this is no parents fault for giving it to their children, it's

no one's fault for buying it. It's just this bizarre, as I said, almost impossible to navigate landscape that we kind of desperately need to decode for people. I think I had one in my school canteen. Oh wow. I just got this flashback to, I don't know, I mean we definitely had the fridge with the Yorkie bars and stuff in, you know, that you could access on your school break. I'm just wondering if we had those or not. It wouldn't surprise me back then.

Anyway, not good. Yeah, let us know if that's been attained for you guys. And very interesting to get your thoughts on all of this as well. But there's been so much information and we're going to talk about it a bit more again next week about kind of children and early years. And there was a report out at the end of last year talking about that first thousand days and how early sugar intake shapes lifelong health, which I think was just worth referencing in conversation to this stushies debate. This research came out at the University of Southern California and it showed that cutting sugar intake during the first thousand days of life,

so that's from conception till you turn two, significantly reduces the risk of chronic disease and adulthood. So the scientists were analyzing data from around 6,000 people, again from the UK Biobank, and they were comparing those who were born during the World War II era, where you obviously had sugar rationing, so that's born before 1953, to those who were born after, where sugar intake nearly doubled. And despite experiencing the same societal changes over 70 years, the early sugar exposure made such a significant difference

in long-term health outcomes. So 35% lower risk of type 2 diabetes, 20% lower risk of high blood pressure, 30% lower risk of obesity. That's for the adults who didn't have that high sugar intake in their first two years. So it's absolutely extraordinary. Again, my children had sugar at that point because with my second, I found it impossible to get around it at birthday parties and all the rest of it. I didn't want to stigmatize it. It's all a complicated debate. I think every now and again, like a birthday party, you can't of it. I didn't want to stigmatize it. It's all a complicated debate. I think every now and again, like a birthday party, you can't avoid it. But I think this

study is referring to it being a daily household thing and it's creeping into snacks. So, you know, ultra processed food snacks, which we should probably go into next week or something with a different, there were multiple headlines on this, but also between nought and two, that's when a child's brain grows the most. It's the biggest neurodevelopment phase, this 1,000 days research. And it's actually a really big global campaign to help lower socioeconomic groups and countries,

third world countries. It's a big challenge to try and help children between 0 to 2, because that does impact the population in the future. So we know the importance of diet in this phase. Also going into pregnancy when a child's in the womb, all of that counts and the mother's diet and goh, my diet was awful while I'm in pregnancy.

Yeah, mine was terrible first time, much better second time, interestingly. But that was just because the first time I felt so ill and the second time I didn't feel ill at all. So it was really easy to make those decisions. I remember when we were on the tube when you were pregnant. I don't know why we were on the tube. We were on the central line and you were saying

you could only eat bread. Yeah, bread and chips. Yeah, and I was like cheese and bread. Yeah, beige and beige alike. Beige and beige. Whereas with May I didn't feel anything. No. And so it was so easy to eat well and I really wanted to.

But anyway, it shows how complicated it is. But I think it was just the slushies thing. Totally regardless whether you have children or don't have. But I think it was just the slushies thing. Totally regardless whether you have children or don't have children, I think it's just a very interesting conversation that we've got to a point that we're selling things on a day-to-day basis that are so bad for us that they're having to be banned and hospitalizing people.

But it's confusing because you've got professionals out there saying, you know, the problem with ultra processed foods is they don't contain enough protein. So, you know, you've got very controversial topics out there at the moment, guys had to throw that one in. So we move on to headline number three. Headline number three, which is positive news. But I think it's also really indicative of

the fact that, as we always say, the science is always changing. It's always moving forward. People are learning new things about the body and the way it works every day, which is so exciting. And this is that scientists have discovered a new part of the immune system. Wow. Which is amazing, isn't it? So researchers have uncovered a previously unknown component of the immune system that could serve as a rich source of natural antibiotics, potentially transforming the treatment of infectious diseases. Obviously, this is in very, very, very early stage.

But the discovery just centers on something called a proteasome, a structure which is found in every cell, and it's traditionally known for recycling proteins. But the scientists have now found that upon detecting bacterial invasion, it shifts its role to produce antimicrobial peptides that can effectively kill bacteria. And obviously, one of the big fears in the world is antibiotic resistance. And so this was a massive breakthrough. And again, but it just fears in the world is antibiotic resistance. And so this was a massive breakthrough. And again, but it just shows quite how clever our bodies are.

I mean, a whole new area. Watch the space guys, because when we say that science is evolving as we speak, something that came up in last night's chat was that the tech is always going to be ahead of the science. And the problem is the science is always catching up or not ready yet, but the tech's already there. So the reason that CGMs are everywhere is because despite there not being enough data, tech's already out there. People are selling, they're making the money. And with the immune system and the research with antibiotics, this is going to take so many years to unpick. But what do we do in the meantime? I find it fascinating. It is absolutely fascinating. This is mad. The laboratory tests demonstrated that these natural antibiotics were as effective as

some existing drugs in the market, which is just extraordinary. Yeah. And remember, our gut health is important because our gut microbes train our immune system effectively in those interactions. So if we eat better, perhaps that's also linked to this new part of the immune system. I want to learn more. I know me too. linked to this new part of the immune system. I want to learn more. I know, me too. Hey, are you in the mood for something new? Why not fly with Air Transat to an eclectic music scene? A vibrant nightlife and your next big discovery. Starting this summer, you can fly direct from Toronto to Berlin,

exclusively with Air Transat. Now all things Berlin feel closer than ever. Air Transat. Travel moves us. FanDuel Casino's exclusive live dealer studio has your chance at the number one feeling, winning, which beats even the 27th best feeling, saying I do. Who wants his last parachute? I do.

Enjoy the number one feeling, winning, in an exciting live dealer studio, exclusively on FanDuel Casino, where winning is undefeated. 19 plus and physically located in Ontario. Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600 or visit connectsontario.ca. Please play responsibly. Okay, on the topic of learning more, we're getting into what's trending in wellness.

And I'm gonna say this is gonna be our shunkiest take on trends yet. But before we get into the heart of this section, just a positive pickup, I know you guys are very latched onto, I am as well, our weekly hot girl walks, pop the wellness scoop in, feel good about life, get outside. There is obviously so much info out there about how positive nature is, exposure to nature. But there was again a new piece of research that came out last week and that found that exposure to

nature may actually change the way the brain processes pain, reducing the intensity of pain. Love that. Right? So good. Another reason to hot girl walk. And I said it was fractals. It's not. It's fractals when you look at nature. That makes you feel good. Yeah. I got the word wrong. And so this was researchers from the universities of Exeter and Vienna and they found that people watching videos of natural landscapes led to a measurable reduction in pain perception. So they were scanning

their brains and that revealed that the brains responded much less intensely to pain when they were viewing nature. So it's not just a placebo effect, it is a real biological response to how much nature helps. What they should have in hospital rooms when anyone's in pain or you're giving birth or whatever it is you're there for, they should just have like screens around the room with the beach or a mountain. Exactly, some trees resting. We should just play David Attenborough everywhere. But yeah, they had 49 participants.

It was quite a small study, but still very interesting. And they were giving them small electric shocks while they were watching. And they had videos of nature, city scenes and office spaces. And as I said, it was those watching natural landscapes that felt less pain than versus the urban environment videos. That is my worst nightmare, a study where I have to sit and be shocked in an office space, can you imagine?

Oh my gosh, I know. I wouldn't be the first to sign up to it. But yeah, it showed that it wasn't, the brain wasn't distracted. It was actually processing pain differently when exposed to nature. I know. And talking of nature, let's go into kale and spinach then.

Let's do it. So when we're talking about spinach and kale, I just want to preface the fact that we're not just talking about this one trend. What we want to talk about today is the spread of misinformation and what makes it therefore so confusing for us all to know how to make healthy habits and what we should change, what we should incorporate, what we shouldn't. And these are just a couple of videos that we've pulled out as I think the crux or real summaries of where the issues lie. And a lot of the spinach one again relates to oxalates, which you guys have probably seen again things people talking about.

So we're just going to play a clip of it so you get a sense of what we're talking about. And this is from an account where it's had about 33,000 likes, so loads of them that have like millions of views. The image is like of a bodybuilding guy at the start, just to paint the picture, but there's a scientist being interviewed on this podcast. Okay, here we go. Which by the way, kale and spinach are not healthy for you

at all, they're loaded with anti-nutrients, especially spinach. Spinach is probably the worst vegetable that most people eat when they're eating a healthy diet. Spinach has loaded with oxalates, creates inflammation in your gut. People juice spinach like you want to stay away from spinach. It's one of the worst things you can consume and

almonds as well by the way. Almonds are loaded with oxalates. It's something that I never eat. Almonds, almond milk, almond flour like it'll create almond butter. Yeah, I would stay away from too much of that. What do you even say? Sometimes it's the claims about inflammation that they make in the gut and these really drastic things. They say it so confidently and they say, I would never consume it. So let's delve into what oxalates actually are everyone. So it comes from something called oxalic acid and this is used interchangeably in the scientific community. They'll either say an oxalate or this acid word. So it's basically an organic compound and it's found in loads of plants. I've discussed before the

protective properties that plants have, the powerful amazing things and you know you get this in leafy greens, this compound, vegetables, fruits, even cocoa, you know nuts, seeds, it's not just spinach. So for him to just point out almonds and spinach is kind of crazy. But this is often discussed because spinach is, people label spinach as the leafy green that's a source of calcium and the problem you've got is it's not actually one of the best sources of calcium out there because it's got oxalates and it prevents a lot of the calcium from being absorbed by the body. But that doesn't mean spinach causes inflammation in your gut and it

doesn't mean spinach is bad for you. It can still contain lots of other beneficial vitamins and minerals. So for most of us, it's just not even a concern, Ella. And we'd only say if you've got an underlying problem, like you're working with one of our gastro dieticians in the clinic or you've got a chronic illness, something that where you are struggling to absorb foods or you are looking actively at increasing your calcium intake and I'm doing a diet that's high in calcium, I probably wouldn't include spinach

as one of those items of foods, but it is most definitely not going to kill you. I just can't get over that bit. And oxalates aren't inherently bad. No, no, and your body can produce oxalate on its own, or obtain it from food anyway, so vitamin C is converted to oxalate when it's metabolized. So you can't say don't eat these foods.

You know remember calcium you also get in other areas guys. Oranges contain calcium for instance. Things you wouldn't think about. But once consumed to explain, oxalate binds to different minerals and then it forms compounds like calcium oxalate or iron oxalate if it binds to iron. And this most commonly occurs in our colon. So I think that's why he said it causes inflammation in the gut. It doesn't. It's just where this process occurs. And then it can also take place in the kidneys and other parts of the, you know, urinary tract tract and for some people if

they have a really really high diet in oxalates then it can be linked towards kidney stones but I'm being honest here this is really really really really rare. They're taking things out to proportion they take these really rare conditions and foods and blow it out to proportion just to create clickbait clips. I wonder if these people sell something on the side. You know often they sell a supplement themselves and they demonize something to say they've got the solution but the misinformation is wild. So there is just to clarify for people listening there is nothing dangerous about eating oxalates?

Nothing at all. Nothing unless you have a Crohn's or an underlying gut health condition where you need to be aware of oxalates but it's not dangerous to eat it, it's just it's not going to help with your calcium. That's it. All your own. Honestly, I may sound a bit blunt. I'm really sorry everybody. I really appreciate that this is really scary when you see headlines like this, like Will said the one about carrots and people think they make you infertile. You know, it's just not true. This sort of thing, in my opinion, should be banned from social media and it has to be regulated. It's insane. It just becomes impossible for people and I was reading all the comments on these videos, it becomes impossible for people to understand what to do. Yeah, because everywhere you look,

you're being told this is terrible for you, this is terrible for you, this is terrible for you. It's like, slushy is bad for you, but so is spinach. And so where are you meant to find this middle ground? And it's so overwhelming. And then we go on to the fact that this very well-known doctor was on a big US show and said, word for word, two tablespoons of table sugar is better for you than two slices of whole wheat bread. My reaction is, Ella's saying this like my head's in my hands, because how can you go out there and tell people on a whole that two tablespoons of sugar, cane sugar, is better for you than bread? It provides you no nutrients, no nutrition, just going to give you a load of tooth decay and probably a really dodgy tummy

if you just eat raw two tablespoons of sugar. It's going to cause your blood sugar to go absolutely haywire. And there is nothing wrong. Cane sugar is not bad either, guys. It's great in cakes, you know, put it in different ingredients. But to say it's better than a whole wheat bread that contains fiber, that contains nutrition. And yes, there's a difference. Like I discuss in my next book, The Unprocessed, play a lot with bread as an example of a good UPF

for so many people. It has additives in it to extend its shelf life so for some people out there on a real budget that are really struggling that don't have a fridge at home if they've got a slice of whole wheat bread that can sit in their kitchen and not go off and that's providing them with food so they're not starving that is a wonderful thing and it still contains fibre. For those of you that are interested in taking those extra additives out and you just want a nice fibre rich bread and you can afford that, it's a wonderful source of fibre. And bread also contains protein and people don't realise

that two slices of bread can contain just as much as a protein biomarketed of protein. So to me, these types of phrases are just deeply, deeply saddening to hear. I think the other thing about bread, about pasta, rice, etc. is they're great carriers. And so, yes, the bread on its own may not be as nutritious as some other things, although as you said, it's still got fiber, etc. But again, it's such a great topper, you can put avocado, you can put hummus, you can put anything, you can make it into a sandwich, pack it with all sorts of things, which then give you lots of nutrition. Same with pasta, etc, etc. And I just think it's just not a very constructive way

to think about the world. It's a really privileged, almost uneducated thing to say from a doctor, which is really concerning. Because, you know, when you've got no time, I'm going to go home tonight, I haven't prepped any food, the fridge is empty, the shop's coming late tonight, I'm going to get some slices of bread out, probably do scrambled eggs or avocado or baked beans, whatever it is, on toast. It's quick and easy and it's a one-off. it's not my everyday item for the kids. But that's still a nutritious meal. And it's fine if it is because it contains protein, carbs,

vitamins, minerals and this is just the real epitome of misinformation online. And I think the epitome of all of that is this clip about water being bad for you. I believe water is a scam. Water is a solvent, so it's dissolving your body. The fact that people say it's hydrating your cells is crap. It's not a carbohydrate, it's not a fat, it's not a protein, literally a solvent. You put any type of material in water, it dissolves it.

That's what it's doing to your body. And same thing with water weight. You're drinking all this water and bloating, there's actually no benefit to it. If you want to hydrate, you have fats, you have juices, you have something that your cells can actually utilize. We're not picking like random niche things that one person has said and it's this like fully left field, you know, need to know kind of conversation. This isn't kind of conspiracy, well it sort of is conspiracy theory, but in the sense of this isn't a kind of conversation. This isn't kind of conspiracy. Well, it sort of is conspiracy

theory. But in the sense of this isn't a kind of niche, these because of social media and now reaching tens of millions of people. And I think that's why we wanted to talk about it today. Because that's the problem is that you've got tens of millions of people seeing the bread is going to kill you. Water is going to kill you, spinach will kill you, almonds will kill you, carrots might kill you, lectins will kill you, this is all going to kill you. Then on the other hand, as I said, you've got this kind of world of UPFs, of slushies, etc. And you're just left and I would love to hear... And people are just saying protein's the cure to everything.

Exactly. And I want to hear what our audience think, because to me, this is the crux of the issue where it's the world of health and wellness has become this kind of click bait, Wild West, which is almost impossible to navigate, to have standout, to have cut through, to have an audience and make that your job. Now it feels like you've got to be pretty out there. Yeah, because in the olden days you didn't have social media or you didn't have a chance to voice your conspiracy theories and now you do so anyone can get access to them. But early on in our careers as well and as kind of health and wellness started to pick up, it was the early days of social media and you didn't need to be really, really,

really, really left field for people to listen to it. Talking about lentils and carrots and chickpeas and kind of nutritious food or exercise, et cetera. You didn't have to get your body out. You didn't have to do any of those things. You didn't need that for cut through. You needed to be useful and you needed to help people to some extent not to be kind of too sacramental. But it is. It was just that it was quite simple. And now to get cut through because it's such a saturated space with so many people in it, where the way the algorithms work is this kind of clickbait effect, essentially. It feels like you've got to make claims like this for tens of millions of people to see it. And therefore, and I

want to ask you about this, a lot of nutritionists, dieticians, doctors choose now not to be registered because that allows you to be able to make some other claims to get a bit more cut through. Will you just give our audience before we get into misinformation the 101 on that because I think it is really important in understanding who you're listening to as well. It's a real sore spot for me as Ella knows and I've discussed it quite a bit if anyone follows the Retrition channels because morally if you go into healthcare, if you become a doctor, there's that phrase trust a doctor, you know, if you become a doctor, there's that phrase, trust a doctor. If you become a nutritionist, a dietitian in the UK anyway, you have a responsibility

to abide by a code of conduct and that's ethics. And we've got a whole list of things that you can and can't say. For instance, when I launched Retrition Plus, my supplement brand, I wasn't allowed to have a picture of me holding my own product because that shows bias and I have to always list in press pieces like other examples two or three so I'm not showing that I prefer one over another in certain scenarios is so much to consider. For doctors this is even more important because they are the first point of call when anyone needs something you should go to your GP. And they have a responsibility in society to uphold these guidelines. And the problem now with social media is that I think money

talks. Well, I think everyone knows money talks. And I'm not scared to say I'm owning this opinion. I see people who are immensely successful, who still can call themselves a doctor, still can call themselves a nutritionist and not be regulated by the GMC or by the Association for Nutrition. Dieticians eventually can get pulled down because their title is protected but they can still call themselves a nutritionist because that's not protected yet which is what we're still waiting to hear back from the Privy Council on that kind of side case that we've got in the UK at the moment to get the title nutritionist protected. But it means these people can sell things to you and have nobody hold

them responsible. They can say whatever they want. They can say these outlandish things about two tablespoons of sugar is better than bread. Because if you're not choosing to be registered, you're not paying to be part of a community, I pay voluntary every year to be registered. I get nothing back but a slap on the wrist if I do something wrong. But that's how I feel morally it's the right thing to do. It's there to protect the public. And so many now are not choosing to do that because the money they get online is bigger than them actually doctoring or actually being a nutritionist. It's absolutely fascinating. It's the kind of thing that I think you wouldn't know unless you exist in this industry. But I don't know if it helps. And I'm not saying everyone's doing that,

but I don't think the kind of collective muddiness of the water helps this misinformation. But you have got a voice note for us about why this spread of misinformation has become so rife. I do. Now, my friend Idris, Dr. Ids, you may know him online. He does a lot of those debunking videos online that I think are really difficult to approach or do because you actively have to call someone out. It's quite an aggressive form but effective of debunking videos. And he's very good at it. It's called Dr. Ids. And he discusses why seed oils, let's use that as an example,

there's so much misinformation about seed oils, for instance. So I think there are several reasons why the hate on seed oils is at an all-time high. Firstly, the rise in popularity of diet fads like animal-based or carnivore diets, you know, likely plays a role. Proponents of these dietary patterns often fall victim to many logical fallacies, like the appeal to nature fallacy, which is the idea that just because something is natural, therefore it's better for you, and if something is artificial, therefore it's harmful, right? And of course, seed oils aren't found in nature, you have to process the

seed, so they automatically think it's harmful. Secondly, the rise in chemophobia, especially in the post-COVID era, has likely played a part too. The fact that certain chemicals are used in the manufacturing process of seed oils can sound scary to some people, especially when they don't understand these processes and their function. So big sounding chemicals also plays a role into the anti-seed oil movement probably. Another factor is probably the general distrust in science overall. So despite the dozens of controlled human studies independently conducted, which show that seed oils are in fact healthy for a variety of blood markers, you know, blood lipids, liver fat, insulin resistance, inflammatory biomarkers and so on. It's that often these people won't even care, right? Which means

that no matter what evidence you bring to them, they'll still fall back on these very superficial arguments like the logical fallacies like the appeal to nature fallacy or just chemophobia in general, or the composition fallacy or the, you know, false equivalence. So those are probably the main reasons why the antecedent movement has garnered so much attention. I think he really summed that up so, so, so well. And I think it's, it's probably the biggest example of the spread of misinformation. And as we're saying how difficult it is to navigate the landscape. And again, we're just be so curious to hear from you guys on that.

On that I was speaking to someone that owns a huge company in the US last night, and they're having to reformulate all their products from seed oils in the States. Yeah, because of the misinformation on seed oils. They're having to reformulate everything. Yeah, it's absolutely fascinating. It really, really is. And I think the important thing is it's almost for everyone just like find the middle ground. Like we just need to have this more kind of calm, less stressed, less click-baity, sensationalist viewpoint. It's so reductive and kind of silly in a way to say,

like, go back to the way your grandparents say. But there is so much in that. In when it all gets confusing, just go back to basics. I know, absolutely, 100%. Just try and eat a nice balanced meal, guys. I'm a bit lost for words on this episode. I feel like this episode, these trends, I... Yeah, I'm a bit lost for words as well. But as I said, for me, the key thing here is it highlights this

huge dichotomy, which was my whole reason why I called you about this show. And it's my kind of big passion in life because I feel that it's very difficult to help people change the way that they eat in the world today because of this extraordinary split where on the one hand there's this huge proliferation of foods that are very very bad for us slash eating in today's episode where it's become normal where you're odd for being at a trampoline park or a birthday party and not wanting your young child to drink something like that. And it's so hard because they're left out and so many times. So hard. Or you don't want them to have the ham in the ham and cheese sandwich, even though we know it's a carcinogen. Not saying you can't have every now and again, but every single day.

And then on the other hand, you have this demonization, this clickbait, this algorithm driving kind of insanity where the health and wellness world has become so extreme and it's no longer okay to just talk about crispy lentils or chocolate covered walnuts or these easy things. I couldn't even talk about protein because then people think you're saying it's not important, but it is important. We know this. It's just not the most important or singularly important thing. It's very emotive guys, food and wellness because it affects us all is emotive.

It is, but I hope this is like a weekly reminder to find that middle ground and not to get too bogged down in everything you're seeing, reading. Be inspired to exercise of all those examples, be inspired to make those changes but don't be overwhelmed. And I think talking of overwhelmed it segues us on beautifully to our listener question today which I thought was a really really important question and one that I hope is really helpful. This listener said, I wanted to say yours and Rhiannon's. Podcast is my favorite part of the week. We love to hear that. I get out on a hot girl walk and press play.

Woo! Yeah, woo, hot girl walk. I have learned so much and it really helps me evaluate the advice you see online. The advice there is in inverted commas. My eating is a lot better since listening to you both. I have some nerves about trying out your recipes. I love the look of them and have all the books but I'm nervous to try them as typically

nutritious meals tend to incorporate things like nuts and seeds, which I do eat as a snack more recently walnuts, but they're quite high in calories. How do you eat these delicious meals without gaining weight? I know there's something to be said for mindful eating here, but I was wondering if this is something that could be addressed in a podcast at some point please. How do you change this mindset? I know eating these meals will do me the world of good, but it's a block I have and I want to get over. It is understandable. Weight loss obviously is difficult. Just to let everyone know, you know, it's never a linear line and something I always say in clinic is that if you are looking at weight loss, first of all, that is okay. That

also seems to be taboo for people saying they want to lose weight because it is okay to embrace all body sizes and shapes but it's also okay to want to do something for you so let's just put that out there as well it's never a straight line weight loss it never just goes down once you start looking at it it will plateau and you'll go through periods where it's why you need support or it's very difficult now nuts and seeds let's take this as an example, they are high in calories and they're high in fat, but the good type of fat.

But I would say if you had a snack of walnuts that afternoon, it's probably not a good idea to make a meal with walnuts in as well that day. You've had the walnuts. This is when diversity comes in. This is when you need to pick a different meal off that array of meals. And not all meals contain nuts and seeds. You you know there are so many delicious plant meals I

think the big fear comes from seeing these people do these what I eat in a day videos as well if they're plant-based or you know sometimes they don't do that and they're making it up which is why I've got a big thing about what I eat in a day videos there's no way and I can tell there's no way someone is eating exactly what they're sharing a lot of the time. You just know that the calorie content is too high and they're gourmet meals. They're cooking up fresh three times a day. As Ella and I have both said, it just doesn't happen. Look at those star meals. I call them star meals.

Your hero meal of the day. The one that you have time, the one that you can embrace to get the diversity in. I love star meals. I haven't heard about that. It's a really nice way of thinking about it. Yeah, I just used to do it in clinic all the time. I'd be like, look, what day of the week can you do a hero or star meal? Like when, when can that happen for you? What are we going to make? And then do like three portions and put it in a lunchbox, you know,

freeze it for the rest of the week. But plants are actually low in calories. And I think the fear comes from carbohydrates, I think, and people don't realize they're actually really low in calories. Like a big plate of rice or obviously portions are different for everyone. Take a large portion, like a big cup of your hand of rice or pasta, and that's your portion of carbohydrates, two outstretched hands of vegetables, chuck that on the plate with it. The proteins you can get from plants like pulses and beans,

they are very low in calorie and very high in fiber. So where you see a lot of people living in this way, consuming plant-based diets like Hela and I do, the calories actually are lower than you think. It's your eyes are seeing the portion. The calories come from the fats you add to these plant-based meals. A lot of the time they come from the avocados, the nuts, the seeds. So I would just say be sensible about looking at your day rather than the individual meal. If you know a meal is going to have, this comes with education, it comes with practice. Like if I knew I'd had a whole avocado, I probably wouldn't eat it another meal that day. I'd actively not consume that and I would choose something different. But genetics count, activity levels count, your age counts, are you

menopausal, are you not, what is going on with stress levels, stress is huge and then mixing it up. So try not to compare yourself would be the biggest bit of advice and I hope that's been helpful in terms of education when it comes to looking at your unique requirements and seeing these people creating these recipes online. It's great to use for inspiration, but you have to apply it in a way that works for you. Totally. And I think the other thing that's worth saying is that these foods tend to be higher in fibre as well, which does kind of simply put just going to keep you more full.

And you need to drink more water, Ella. They need to drink more water if they cook these meals as well. Explain that a little bit for us. Sorry, I just came out with that. I looked at it and I was like, don't forget the water. When you consume more carbohydrates and fibre, you need more water to help your body process those to digest that. So to each molecule of carb, you attract three or four molecules of water, for instance, if you're looking at it on a molecular level.

So you just need to increase your water when you increase your fiber intake and build that up slowly or you're really going to notice your gut going, ah, help me. I'm suddenly eating what these what I eat in a day girls are doing and it's not working for me. Do it slow. Do it slow. Yeah. But the fiber will probably reduce your appetite at other moments in the day because you will be really, really full, which is great. And it's going to give you that long lasting energy. So you're not going to suddenly be like, I'm starving and feel hangry.

So this isn't sexy, guys. But before we close the show, there was a study, I think it was 2008 or nine, long, long time ago, but it showed that stall weight really matters. So the heavier your poo, essentially, from all the fibre, the healthier you are. And in countries around the world where they don't live in Westernised societies, but they eat a lot of things like tubeless. And I think it's the tribe that was studied, the Hadza tribe or Hadza tribe were the one at the time. And they have studied all the time. All the time, because they're one of those tribes

that live in an environment that's not corrupted by everything we have around us now. And yeah, they're basically the larger and heavier your poo, just to put it out there, the healthier you are because of the amount of fiber. And they weigh more than 30 grams of fiber a day that we are aiming for and not hitting here. Yeah, it's such good advice. I think the other thing to go back is the closing thought on our episode. It's our first ever episode where we had Giles Yeoh to reference him again, talking about the myth of calories and why calories aren't all created equal. I think there is also something a lot to be said instead of thinking how many calories are in that meal to think how much nutrition is in that meal.

A thousand percent. I wish I hadn't said calories. Explaining that guys, I just know it's what you know. I like to call it energy. Just think of food as energy, but it's not, we can't possibly calculate it 100%. And again, not to be too kind of wishy washy or reductive to close it, but I think there's something so inherently positive about thinking about a recipe or thinking about that star meal, you know, maybe the one meal a day that you can put a little bit more time and effort into and thinking like what's going to make me feel great.

Enjoy it. Oh, the joy from food. Like when you actually have time to enjoy a meal, it's such a rare opportunity in today's society. Yeah, so enjoy it and think about what it's doing versus breaking it down into calories. Love, love, love, love. So we will see you next week. Next week, we are going to be releasing

the live show tickets. So big, big, big week. We can't wait to see you then. That's all I got for today. Amazing. I hope you guys enjoyed it. Keep putting your comments, your feedback on the Spotify app, on your Apple app. Please send us DMs as well because we're trying to get this community idea and we've got a

few ideas now. We have and in order to reach more people and strike the middle ground that we really want to do, please, please, please, please rate the show, five stars if you feel generous, and leave a comment that's on Apple or Spotify. And if you're feeling really, really generous and you genuinely are really enjoying it, please click follow because this just makes the world of difference for the charts and helps us reach new people. So we would appreciate it so much.

Have a great week. Bye.