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Day 7 of my top 30 for 30:

One of the biggest challenges to creating new health-promoting habits is actually having healthful food that you enjoy on hand. How many times have I heard from people that early on in their raw food or plant-based vegan transition that they ran out of food and had to resort to preparing something else that happened to be on hand but wasn’t really what they wanted to make. They were hungry, maybe they just got home from work, or their family was wanting to have a meal soon. They didn’t want to go out shopping for fruits and vegetables, etc. so they just made something in their pantry left over from before they started eating healthier.

Can you relate?

Honestly, I hear similar stories even from people who have been on the path for a while, so if this is similar to your story, no worries. Please know that you’re certainly not alone.

How can this situation be handled? One answer is keeping your fridge and pantry stocked at all times if possible. Implementing this can take practice. Depending on what types of foods you like, whether or not they need refrigeration (like lettuce or other types of leafy greens), or need to be left out to ripen for a period of time (like rock-hard avocados) or can store well in a pantry (like sunflower seeds for sprouting), it may take a while to “get used to” eating this way. And that’s okay.

It took me some time to figure out how much of each type of food to buy and how long these foods would stay fresh versus how much of these foods I would eat and what recipes I would make.

It’s a lot to digest all at once. But in time I figured it out and it became just as second nature as meal planning in the before times. My most helpful strategy was to always have something delicious and easy to prepare on hand at all times. My new ‘staple’ foods which you’ll see in a lot of my recipes.

What kitchen planning success strategies have you developed? What are your favorite staple foods?

Day 6 of my top 30 for 30: Know that your social situations may change, especially when it comes to meals away from home. How do you handle social situations that involve food, such as going to a friend or family member’s house or a restaurant?

Here are some of the strategies that Rick and I have employed in such situations:

• For a friend or family member, we have offered to bring a dish to share with everyone, which usually brings a happy sigh of relief from the host. And you may find that your dish is one of the first to disappear with lots of smiles and requests for the recipe!
• If you are going to a restaurant with a group of people (such as co-workers or family members), you can suggest a restaurant where you know you can get a healthy dish.
• If the group chooses another restaurant that you’re not familiar with, you can call the restaurant ahead of time to see if the menu contains some healthy items, and if not, you can see if the restaurant is open to special requests. During the past 30 years, we have found it to be progressively easier to find dishes we like at most restaurants.
• Another useful strategy is filling up on healthy food before going out, so you can be assured that you will not be left with undesirable menu choices and a hungry stomach.
• What matters most is what you eat consistently, day in and day out, not what you might consume once a month or a few times a year at various types of social gatherings. So, if you end up eating something that you wouldn’t normally, notice how you feel, without judgment, and get back on track the next day.

By the way, you can find the recipe for this raw pumpkin pie in our holiday recipes eBook that you can receive when you register for our email list.

Our Holiday Raw Food Recipe Guide is Ready!

What has been your experience with social situations? What healthy eating strategies have worked for you?

Day 5 of my top 30 for 30: Know yourself. When I say this, I mean that is helpful to know what approach to dietary transition works for you, or worked for you. Are you the type of person who likes to jump in with both feet and go all out? Did raw food and/or veganism resonate so deeply with you that you transitioned overnight and never looked back? Or are you someone who likes to take your time to transition and give yourself the opportunity to let each step fully sink in and integrate into your daily life? Do you like to know all the facts first, come up with a solid plan, and then start? Or are you somewhere in between? Is your goal to be 100% raw or is it to be high raw or some other percentage?

I ask these questions because over the years, I’ve had many people share their transition experiences with me and a number have expressed that they wish they had done things differently or felt pressure to transition differently than they had.

It’s my thought that there is no one ‘right’ way to transition. One of the common threads I’ve seen in successful and long-maintained dietary transitions is that the person was happy with their experience. They considered the strategy that resonated the most with where they were at the time and started on the path. They minimized the influences painting a picture of what it ‘should’ look like in order to ‘work’.

They were true to themselves. Whether it took a day or a year or more time to transition.

For me, I was really motivated to improve my health with raw food and resonated strongly with the vegan message, so I went full in and figured the out details over time. This was quite a stretch for me given my normal tendency to approach situations more methodically. This being said, I was enthusiastic, ready to learn, open to making changes as needed, and happy with my overall transition experience and health outcome.

What was your transition like?

Welcome to my top 30 for 30! During the month of October, I am counting down the top 30 mindset and practical strategies that have made all the difference in my success for 30 years as a raw food plant-based enthusiast to help you on your path!

Day 4 of my top 30 for 30: When I first got started on my raw path over 30 years ago, there were not the food resources available we have today. I purchased my food at a regular grocery store because that was all that was available to me where I lived in the northeastern US and even though I did not have access to organic food at the time and didn’t have a wide variety of produce options then, my health improved dramatically.

It certainly can be challenging to eat healthy food consistently if it’s hard to find or if it is too costly. Rick and I have listed below several options for purchasing produce other than traditional grocery or health food stores:

1) Farmers Markets

One of the main benefits of farmers markets is that the food is grown locally, and tends to be fresher than food found in a store. At farmers markets in the area where we now live in northern California, organically grown or pesticide-free food is fortunately easy to find. Because the food is local and fresh, one may often find a much greater variety of produce compared to what is available in a store, where shelf life and transportability are major concerns that dictate availability. We look forward to each season to buy the freshest local food. For example, we love peaches and other stone fruit in the summer, and look forward to pomegranates in the fall and persimmons in late fall and early winter.

As you get to know some of the farmers at your local market, you can inquire to see if they would be willing to sell you larger quantities than the average consumer purchases, for a discounted price. Some will and some won’t. We have been fortunate enough to find some good sellers who know that we are raw food enthusiasts and will buy in quantity from them consistently if they offer us a good deal. As there are many other raw food enthusiasts in our area of northern California, many farmers are familiar with the benefits of selling in quantity.

You will tend to get especially good deals on items in season. This seasonal model works out as a double bonus as you get lots of high-quality fresh produce and at a great price. In the summer for example, we often eat a lot of raw zucchini with tomato-based dressing. Dr. Rick has been known to shred up 6-8 zucchini into a large mixing bowl which he tops with his favorite tomato dressing for dinner.

2) Wholesale produce markets

We have visited wholesale markets in both the San Francisco bay area and the New York metro area. We live in the SF bay area, so when we buy from our local wholesale produce market we buy enough food to last the two of us about 2 weeks. Why so much? The food available at wholesale markets is sold in boxes or cases. This works well for us because the produce is so fresh, that it lasts for often weeks at a time in our large-capacity dedicated refrigerator.

On average, we spend about 50% less on produce from the wholesale markets than we would spend on the same amount of food at a natural foods retail market or average farmers market prices. A good example is organically grown Romaine lettuce, which at our local farmers market and in a retail store in our area cost about $2 or more per head. In the summer of 2015, we paid $21 for a 24 head case of very fresh organically grown Romaine lettuce. This price does vary depending on the season. Sometimes cases of romaine may cost $40 or more, but the retail prices at that time are more like $3 per head. In 2020, these prices are similar. It is interesting to note that the romaine lettuce in retail markets are often much smaller than those sold at wholesale, because they are not as fresh and have had several of the outer leaves picked off. We have found that when we buy lettuce at wholesale, the heads are very large, since very few, if any of the outer leaves have been removed.

The wholesale markets we have visited often have a wide variety of produce, since there are many produce vendors who obtain their food from local, domestic, and international farmers. We really enjoy going to the wholesale markets because of the wide variety of food available, especially organic and locally produced. A very large percentage of the food that we eat is organically grown and local.  This is one of the benefits for us of living in a major metropolitan area of California where we can access the year-round wholesale produce markets and farmers markets.

Wholesale produce markets are usually further away from home than local retailers, and often are open during overnight hours instead of during the day. While this can present some challenges, we have found it well worth the effort, as for the next two weeks or so we barely have to buy anything in a retail store, have fresher food, and save thousands of dollars per year. On the whole it is also much more convenient to purchase a car-load of food in cases, as opposed to having to run all of that food through a retail cash register. We would often find it a challenge to load up all the produce on the conveyer belt that was not nearly large enough for all of the food, and try to supervise the bagger not to damage any of the produce. At the wholesale produce markets, those issues don’t exist. You either carry the cases yourself, which is great exercise, or if you purchase larger quantities the sellers may bring your order on a pallet right to your car, as we have experienced. Everything is well-packed, protected, and easy to transport.

It is important to mention that wholesale produce sellers are often located in industrial areas with loading docks. It is sometimes very noisy with trucks and pallet loaders zipping around, so while shopping, we have to be constantly aware of our surroundings. We are fine with that, as it is well worth it on the whole to get large quantities of very fresh produce very conveniently at about half the price of retail. We are very fortunate to have Earl’s Organic Produce in San Francisco, where we know most of the people there at this point and have been “regulars” for many years.

We have spoken to some of our students who have considered purchasing food at wholesale markets, but think that cases of produce would provide too much food for them, so they have thought of starting:

3) Produce buying clubs

This strategy allows one to buy fresh produce in quantity with a group of people, who then share the produce. This can help keep produce costs down, while not having to buy individually in such large quantities. Dr. Rick started a produce buying club with a friend while in graduate school. They ordered produce for the group weekly and people would come over to their apartment and pick up their order on specified days. This model worked reasonably well, most of the time. Rick found that the biggest challenge was people in the group not picking up their produce at the specified times, and people would be coming over at times he needed to study. He did have a busy schedule between work and school, so the hours that he was available for pick up were somewhat limited. Also, although there was a minimum order, he had many people in the club who would buy small quantities such as a bag of raisins and a few apples, which meant more small transactions taking up a lot of time.  Also, back in the mid 90’s, before the use of personal computers and the internet were widespread, there were a lot of logistics that made things a lot more complicated than they are today.

We think this model would work well for a small group of committed people with pick-up hours amenable to all group members. One could maybe even share the produce pick-up or delivery responsibilities. In the past few years, we have seen many examples of produce buying clubs that work well.  We occasionally do some of this informally, such as when we buy a whole case of avocados, which is a lot for us. We’ll typically call some produce-based raw food friends and see if they would like to buy half the case from us. Another example is at times we have split a 20-pound case of dulse with one or more raw food enthusiast friends who live in our area.

4) Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) Programs

In this type of program, one “buys in” to the harvest of a local grower or group of growers. Each week when the produce is harvested it is split up among the CSA members who pick up the produce at a specified time and place. This often results in being able to obtain the freshest and most local produce available. We have admittedly not taken advantage of any such programs in our area, as our other methods work well for us.

5) Costco and other wholesale clubs

We are delighted that Costco has been increasing its offerings of organic produce over the past few years. We often use Costco for produce purchases to “fill in” between trips to our organic wholesale supplier. We can buy for example some green and some yellow bananas for staggered ripening so we almost always have ripe bananas available to eat and use in smoothies. Costco also has an excellent selection of organically grown frozen fruit such as mangoes and berries for making smoothies. The prices at Costco are comparable to what we find at wholesale produce markets, often approaching half the price of retail natural food markets. When you don’t need an entire case of something, Costco can come in handy as well.

Other wholesale clubs are following suit so it may be worth checking out those in your area.

6) Mail order

There are times and circumstances that purchasing food through the mail may make sense. For example, buy organically grown sundried tomatoes through the mail from a company that has been around since before our early days of raw food eating. We use the sundried tomatoes in tomato-based salad dressings to add thickness and concentrated flavor. We like the tomatoes more and can get better prices than those that we were previously purchasing from our wholesale organic supplier.

Here is another tip that will interest some of you. Many of you have heard that raw almonds can no longer be sold at retail stores. However, you can buy raw almonds directly from farmers, including mail order. Although almonds are not a staple in our diets, we do occasionally enjoy them, and we have at times purchased a bag through the mail directly from a farmer who sells organically grown raw almonds.

Since we live in northern California, we take advantage of our year-round growing season and have our own:

7) Outdoor garden

We are so thrilled to be able to grow all kinds of food year-round in our own yard! Of course, since we live in northern California somewhat close to the coast, we do have some limitations. We can grow lettuce, tree collard greens, kale, and other leafy greens year-round. In the spring, summer, and fall, we can grow tomatoes, cucumbers, summer squash, and zucchini, sunflowers, Jerusalem artichokes, basil and other culinary herbs, grapes, and bell peppers, just to name a few. We also have fig, lemon, and lime trees. At some point we plan to plant a persimmon tree and other fruit trees that grow well grow here in this Mediterranean climate. Even though we can grow food year-round, some years we have experienced an occasional frost, so we are prepared with coverings for our most vulnerable plants. From mid-summer to early fall we often skip buying any lettuce, tomatoes, or zucchini as our garden supplies more than enough for us. We rarely ever buy collards as we have a consistent year-round supply in the back yard.

At various times, we have had an:

8) Indoor garden

In the past we have grown wheatgrass and sunflower greens indoors and we regularly sprout lentils and green peas. Admittedly, we go through phases with indoor gardening and our endeavors have been much more off than on, but whenever we grow food indoors we find it to be very rewarding. There are so many foods that can be grown indoors in small spaces. We have visited people who live in large cities and have very little space to grow food, but they have very successful indoor gardens. Indoor gardens can also be aesthetically beautiful while giving a space an ‘aliveness’ that plants can provide.

I (Karin) personally get great satisfaction from gardening, which started in childhood, when my dad involved me in planting and caring for the family backyard garden. From a young age, I had the experience of knowing how plant foods are grown and had a great appreciation for this process. We can only hope that many of you will give yourself and your family the opportunity to grow food, even if it is as simple as growing a culinary herb on a window sill.

9) Other food sources

Of course, there are also the obvious other places to buy whole natural plant foods such as local food co-ops, natural food restaurants, natural food markets, and the organic sections of regular supermarkets. Nowadays, there are so many options available in different areas. Check out the options in your area, or perhaps there will even be opportunities to create some of your own.

Even if you don’t take advantage of the methods above, eating a raw food diet in the modern world is still very feasible and extremely well worth it! For years we each, both before and after we became a couple, purchased most of our food from retail stores and that worked just fine for us. Freshness, greater abundance, and lower cost is great, but even at retail one can still make eating a raw food diet work in the real world. In other words, don’t let anything said here become the limiting factor in your pursuit of health.

Welcome to my top 30 for 30! During the month of October, I am counting down the top 30 mindset and practical strategies that have made all the difference in my success for 30 years as a raw food plant-based enthusiast to help you on your path!

Day 3 of my top 30 for 30: So far, we’ve talked about establishing a strong ‘why’ and getting clear on goals for creating lasting change. Another key I found to be super helpful when I got started on my raw path 30 years ago is organization. For me, this involved taking stock of the contents of my kitchen. I knew that I would need large bowls for vegetable dishes like salads, utensils, mason jars for drinks like smoothies and juices, a cutting board, a blender, a grater, a juicer/homogenizer for juices and banana ice cream (aka nice cream), and other items. Most of these I had already, or should I say that my parents did, since I was in college when I got started and was living with them for part of the year. I did buy some mason jars initially, and used some saved money to buy a popular-at-the-time juicer/homogenizer and some large mixing-sized bowls. I used my parents’ kitchen blender to make smoothies, that a super-enthused raw friend of mine referred to as ‘chunkies’ since the blender didn’t make the mixture completely smooth. This being said, the simple kitchen tools that I had worked just fine for me and didn’t own a dehydrator or a high-power blender until over 10 years later.

In the beginning, I also found that I needed some time to become familiar with the raw plant foods that were available in my area and how to prepare them. At the time, I was living in New England and it was winter. The fruits available were bananas, oranges, apples, pears, grapes, dried papaya spears, raisins, dates, and a few other choices. Available leafy greens included three different types of lettuce, spinach, and other greens that I had never tried, like kale.  These and other day-to-day considerations that one needs to address when getting started with raw food became part of my own self-stylized transition that progressed as I became more educated. I made a shopping list of all the foods I wanted to try and thought of the whole experience as an exciting process of discovery. The produce department of my local grocery store was not a place that I had ever spent very much time so this was a completely different world for my 22-year old newly-empowered self.

The bottom line here is that my organization strategy consisted of determining what kitchen items I needed and then learning about and preparing very different foods than I was used to. I know these seem so simple and self-evident now, but back then, for me this was almost like stepping into an alternate universe with brightly colored food, exquisite flavors, and progressively improving health!

What organization strategies did you use when you got started on your raw food journey and how does this compare to what you are doing now?

Welcome to my top 30 for 30! During the month of October, I am counting down the top 30 mindset and practical strategies that have made all the difference in my success for 30 years as a raw food plant-based enthusiast to help you on your path!

Day 2: Yesterday we considered the importance of establishing a strong “why” for making a change, whether that is dietary or some other type of shift. From my experience, really getting clear on the reason or reasons for making a change has been both the strongest initially motivating factor AND the inspiration to continue when challenges arise. If you’ve made changes in your life that you’ve maintained, you know what those challenges can look like. The greatest challenges that I faced when I started adding more fruits and vegetables to my diet included: eating enough, keeping my kitchen stocked with healthy food, and the fulfilling the deep desire to expand my knowledge of nutrition and health. So, in order to address these challenges, I set some goals.

My biggest goal was to overcome the fatigue I was experiencing, which was also the source of my “why”. The rest of my goals supported this larger goal and addressed my challenges directly. The first being, eating enough to feel satiated. I noticed pretty quickly that I had to shift my thinking about portion sizes, which increased appropriately after this realization. Because of this, I found that I had to go shopping more often to keep my kitchen stocked with healthy food. Along with these, and other shifts in ways of thinking and being, I had this insatiable desire to learn more about everything health related, so I found myself reading and researching voraciously which led to more formal education.

I’ll be addressing everything I’ve talked about here and much more over the next few weeks as part of my top 30 countdown, so what I’ve covered here today is just an introduction. The unifying point here is that addressing and finding solutions to these challenges became goals for me. And they all supported the achievement of my initial “why”.

So, while you were reading this did you think of any goals, either official or unofficial, that you have considered for creating positive change that supports your health or otherwise?

During the month of October, I am counting down the top 30 mindset and practical strategies that have made all the difference in my success for 30 years as a raw food plant-based enthusiast to help you on your path!

Day 1: When I got started on my raw food and plant-based journey 30 years ago, I was looking for an answer to the progressively increasing fatigue that I had been experiencing for the previous couple of years. At that time, it wasn’t unusual for me to sleep more than 10 or more hours per night and still wake up feeling like I needed more sleep to feel good. The healthcare providers that I saw didn’t have an answer, so I was going to have to find a solution myself if I wanted to get better.

I started reading and researching different healing systems, which led me to a whole food plant-based dietary approach, which helped improve my fatigue. But when I learned about and implemented a raw food diet my energy soared far beyond the impressive improvements that I experienced by eating a largely cooked whole food plant-based. Long story short, my fatigue vanished along with a variety of other symptoms I had for years and I had more energy than I knew what to do with. I could not remember a time when I felt better! I started to look healthier and slept better. I enjoyed exercising and my digestion improved.

The natural skepticism that I had about raw food and changing my diet to an approach that seemed “extreme” to me at the time started to melt away as my health improved. Making the switch to a plant-based diet was easy, but moving to raw food was much more of a paradigm shift for me.

But I made the change because I really wanted to see if my health would improve. I was motivated. I was committed. I had a strong enough “why”.

I’ve found from this experience and many more that commitment and having a strong “why” is one of the biggest factors for success with anything in life, including dietary change.

What is your “why”? 

While living in my college dorm during the winter of my junior year, I alarmed my friends, family, co-workers, and dorm mates by fasting on exclusively water for 14 days. I absolutely, positively, do not recommend fasting in this context, but at that time I was young, adventurous, motivated, and admittedly a bit reckless. As it turns out, it was one of the most extraordinary experiences of my life. In addition to so many other incredible and some unexpected benefits, my seasonal allergies that burdened a great deal of my childhood and adolescence up until that point in my life diminished by about 90%, which was absolutely amazing to me in addition to being a great relief.

Ten years later, after completing my doctorate degree, I became a staff doctor at the True North Health Center, a medically supervised, multi-disciplinary, water-only fasting facility in Northern California. During my four years there I had the opportunity to be involved in the care of nearly 1,000 fasting patients. I saw so many extraordinary healing experiences, including many that made my personal fasting experience look rather unremarkable by comparison!

I love speaking and teaching about ketosis, gluconeogenesis, autophagy, and the many other scientific and academic facets of the fasting experience. The bottom line about how fasting really works though is actually quite simple. Our bodies do have the capacity to heal themselves. When we overburden our body systems with extra calories, especially when those calories are from processed foods and foods that otherwise do not support our health, we undermine our body’s ability to heal itself to its fullest extent. This is extremely common in modern societies, so it’s no surprise that obesity, brain fog, low energy, type II diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, strokes, cancer, autoimmune diseases, etc. are so very common. But when we stop eating and rest, that healing capacity is given the greatest opportunity to express itself most fully, hence all the remarkable experiences that fasting patients have recovering from so many of the aforementioned health challenges and others. Not just occasionally, but from my experience, consistently, routinely, and predictably.

As incredible as fasting is, I’ll state the obvious in that it can only be utilized for relatively short periods of time, and is safest and most effective when under the care of a qualified healthcare provider.

How then do we allow the greatest amount of healing ability when we are eating?

In the 1930’s, Dr. Clive McCay and his research team at Cornell University discovered that when rats were placed on diets with lower calorie intakes than typical diets but still supplied needed nutrients, the rats lived about 33% longer than their normally fed counterparts. Amazing! Fewer calories, extended lifespan! Not only did they live longer, but they were healthier throughout their lifespan as well. Since that time, this has been repeated on many different species, ranging from simple protozoans to monkeys. Every time, every species, the same result. Fewer but adequate calories with nutrient needs met, leads to longer healthier lives.

There is some pretty good evidence that this strategy works well with humans, when we look at the healthiest, long-lived populations on the planet. They all consume fewer calories than is common, from nutrient dense foods. Within the scientific community this strategy is known as “caloric restriction.” I am not a big fan of that term, as “restriction” when it comes to food does not sound the least bit enjoyable. I prefer instead to use the term caloric optimization.

One amazing attribute of fruits and vegetables is that they are super high in nutrient density, while simultaneously being low in calorie density. This means we can eat a generous amount of them to feel full and satisfied, while providing ourselves with an abundance of needed nutrients, and optimizing our calorie intake all at the same time. How cool is that! No feelings of restriction! In fact, in order to obtain the majority of one’s calories from fruits and vegetables, one actually has to increase their food intake. Sometimes eating enough to obtain even an optimal quantity of calories from fruits and vegetables can become a significant challenge. Adding just the right amount of still healthful but more dense foods can often help fill in the gaps.

Another strategy that has become popular in the last decade for decreasing excessive calorie intake, thereby reducing the burden on the body and increasing health, is known as intermittent fasting. This usually takes the form of one of two strategies. The first is eating “normally” for 5 days per week while eating a calorie-restricted diet for two days per week. The other strategy is extending one’s daily “fast” to 16 hours per day each day; in other words, eating all of one’s food within an 8-hour time frame each day.

In the context of people eating conventionally, I love these intermittent fasting strategies. They allow the body to get a break from the calorie-dense foods commonly consumed, to allow it to “clean up” from the excess and be able to do a bit of extra maintenance and healing at the same time. It gives the body a much-needed regular break from the usual burden of overeating, which is of great benefit in so many synergistic areas.

But what about when someone is already optimizing their calorie intake by eating very large quantities of fresh fruits and vegetables, like many fruit and vegetable based raw food enthusiasts do, and then they add one of the intermittent fasting strategies on top of that? This can create a further challenge / hurdle to obtaining an adequate / optimal quantity of calories. I have had several patients and students who have found themselves with this extra challenge in their commendable attempts to be as healthy as possible.

I would rather see someone eat within a 12-hour window and fast for 12 hours per day when their diet is based on fresh fruits and vegetables, as opposed to having them try to get all of their food in within an 8-hour window so they can fast for 16 hours per day. With the latter approach, people can get pretty stressed about eating enough fruits and vegetables to obtain all of their calories within this limited time frame, especially when real life schedules factor in. They may overeat during this eating window, which means they are overburdening their digestive system, thereby putting more stress on their body. Then they will need that 16 hours of fasting per day to recover from the stress of overeating. Without the extra stress, one doesn’t need as long of a recovery period.

Another strategy I’ve seen is adding too much dense food back into one’s diet in order to obtain enough calories within the 8-hour time frame. Again, I would rather see people extend their eating time / shorten their fasting time, to be able to eat lighter, healthier foods more consistently.

Another result I’ve seen is that people can become too lean and sometimes depleted from a lack of calories (and the nutrients that come along with those calories from healthy foods), when both strategies are employed together for extended periods of time. In this case they are not optimizing their calorie intake as they are restricting too much for too long.

Having said that, I have met some who do center their diet around fresh fruits and vegetables AND engage in one of the intermittent fasting strategies, and if that is working well for them on all levels, I do not want to be the one to discourage them. But if this strategy is causing more stress and harm than good, please know it can be quite a challenge for many of us to eat enough fruits and vegetables to get to an optimal calorie intake, and if one needs some extra time to do this, then it’s not a problem in this context. One will have less stress and be less likely to feel the need to overeat or eat foods that are too dense for them to experience their optimal level of health and vitality.

In my opinion, the majority of people who over consume conventional foods could benefit from either of the intermittent fasting strategies discussed earlier that get them closer to an optimum calorie intake and allow their bodies the much-needed periodic breaks. However, when one eats healthy foods that do not cause such undue stress on the body, the periodic breaks do not need to be as long as there is less to recover from in the first place. With these shorter breaks, one usually still comes out ahead with the strategy of giving oneself longer to eat larger amounts of fruits and vegetables, all things considered.

As with all complex, multifactorial processes for which we need to make good decisions, we must consider all factors and how they interact with and affect each other. Taking one consideration out of context can sometimes lead to an out-of-balance health equation which makes it harder to achieve the results one is seeking. When this occurs, one can feel defeated because they have put a lot of effort into something that hasn’t worked as well as anticipated. This discouragement often leads to giving up and going back to conventional eating, which now means one doesn’t experience the benefits they have worked so diligently toward. We don’t want this to happen to any of you! Sometimes a key modification, such as giving oneself a few extra hours per day to consume an optimum calorie intake from a diet based on fruits and vegetables, can help one stay on the healthiest path for one's particular set of life circumstances.

We hope you have enjoyed this perspective on the intermittent fasting and fruit and vegetable centered diet combination of considerations! For more details and information on this topic, feel free to watch the 33-minute video presentation from our June 2019 webinar on this topic as seen below this article. The section on intermittent fasting begins at the 17 minute, 30 second mark, and continues until about the 51-minute mark. For those of you who like what you see and hear and would like to find out how to learn a great deal more about plant-based and raw food nutrition and how all the considerations fit together into a cohesive whole, you can keep watching to hear about our Mastering Raw Food Nutrition online curriculum. Enjoy!

It’s certainly not news that there’s been a lot of conversation in the health community for some time about the importance of probiotics, prebiotics, and microbiome health. In fact, we have been teaching about these topics for more than a decade in our Science of Raw Food Nutrition series of classes and our Mastering Raw Food Nutrition online and interactive program. We also created a webinar (see below for the video replay of it) to share with you our latest findings on this topic.

So, what exactly are probiotics? Simply stated, they are microorganisms with studied health benefits that can live in our digestive tract and compose our intestinal microbiome.

The most well-known probiotics include the bacteria lactobacillus acidophilus, bifidobacterium bifidum, and many more that have been studied and have become popular recently. Probiotics start to populate our digestive tract upon birth and establish a mutually beneficial relationship with us.

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It’s important to understand the health benefits of probiotics, but there is one piece of the microbiome puzzle that is often omitted from these health conversations, which has to do with how to keep these important organisms viable in our GI tract.

How do these probiotics stay alive?

One important consideration is food. But what type of food is consumed by probiotics?

Do probiotics prefer the same types of foods that humans do?

The answer to this question, is partially yes. Because the preferred food of probiotics is certain types of fiber, which we as humans don’t digest or use as a food source. But many of the plant foods we consume contain these certain types of fiber preferred by probiotics.

Fiber that can provide nourishment for probiotics is referred to as prebiotic fiber or prebiotics.

Probiotics prefer certain types of fiber, but not all types. The one of the most plentiful types of fiber we find in whole plant food is called cellulose. Cellulose is composed of glucose molecules hooked together by bonds that cannot be broken down by our digestive system. In other words, the glucose in this fiber is not digestible or usable by us as humans because it is bound in the fiber complex, so it passes through our digestive tract largely undigested.

Here’s what cellulose looks like:

As you can see, cellulose is composed of a series of glucose molecules hooked together by bonds that are not digestible by humans.

By contrast, the fiber preferred by probiotic bacteria is composed of fructose molecules instead of glucose. We can’t digest this type of fiber either, but probiotic bacteria can digest it and it is their preferred food.

Here is an example of a fructose-based type of fiber:

Instead of glucose molecules hooked together by bonds, prebiotic fiber is composed of fructose molecules hooked together by bonds.

This type of fructose-based fiber would include both fructooligosaccharide (FOS) and inulin. There are others too, but we’ll focus on FOS and inulin in this article. These are two of the main types of prebiotic fiber found in plant foods.

Now, what exactly are FOS and inulin? They are each composed of fructose molecules and the difference between them is in the number of fructose molecules they each contain. FOS are composed of 2 to 10 fructose molecules. Some sources say 2 to 9. If we look at the term ‘fructooligosaccharide’ we see the fructo- which means ‘fructose’, oligo- which means ‘few’, and saccharide- which means ‘sugar’. So essentially, FOS are a type of fiber or undigestible sugar composed of few fructose molecules hooked together by bonds.

By contrast, inulin is composed of over 9 or 10 fructose molecules linked together by bonds.

Probiotics break down FOS and inulin into fructose and free fatty acids. The probiotics can then use the fructose as a food source. Because these prebiotics are probiotics’ favorite food, this creates a microbiome profile in favor of the probiotics. Additionally, the abundance of probiotics helps to keep the less desirable organisms in check.

What happens to the free fatty acids the probiotics produce?

They form into short chain fatty acids (SCFAs).

There are 3 short chain fatty acids, butyrate, propionate, and acetate, each of which has beneficial properties.

Butyrate, also referred to as butyric acid, is used by the cells of our large intestine (colon cells). Propionate or propionic acid can be used by the cells in our liver. Acetate or acetic acid can go to fuel peripheral tissues, such as our muscles.

Now that we’ve laid the foundation, here is the big question: where do we get the prebiotics FOS and inulin?

The good news is that FOS and inulin are found in more than 36,000 plant species.

Some examples of rich sources of FOS and inulin include: artichokes, leeks, shallots, jicama, dandelion greens, bananas, and many more. Even popular raw plant foods such as carrots, lettuce, raspberries, watermelon, and oranges as well as many others also contain prebiotics in smaller amounts as we’ll see shortly.

Is there an official recommended amount of prebiotics to consume daily? Because this is such a newly emerging field of study, there are no set US DRIs (Dietary Reference Intakes) for prebiotics. Researchers have been studying varying amounts for general health and therapeutic benefits. The research on prebiotics is an exciting work in progress and I’m looking forward to more in the coming years contributing to and clarifying what is currently known.

Even though we do not have a daily value for prebiotic fiber, we do have established DRIs (specifically Adequate Intakes – AIs) for total fiber:

• 25 g for women (21 g over 50 years of age)
• 38 g for men (30 g over 50 years of age)

To put these numbers in perspective, most Americans get around 15 g of total fiber per day. Standard western diets tend to be lower in fruits, vegetables, and whole plant foods in general so this number is not surprising. People on ketogenic and other types of low carbohydrate diets, which usually end up being low fiber diets, are likely not consuming this level of prebiotics either. Self-evaluation of one’s dietary approach would help determine where one stands on prebiotic intake.

Getting back to our conversation about prebiotics specifically, here are some foods that are especially rich in prebiotics: bananas, dandelion greens, and Jerusalem artichokes (also known as sunchokes).

Here is the FOS content of certain foods. There are a number of foods that have been measured for prebiotic content, but many more that have yet to be measured. Hopefully more will be known in years to come.

It’s interesting to see the FOS and inulin content of individual foods, but what does the prebiotic content look like on a raw or plant-based meal plan. Here is an example of a couple of meals (not everything) that I ate on one particular day a couple of summers ago. On this particular day, I went for a long run, so that’s why I had a large fruit smoothie:

3 oranges                           
¼ cup blackberries          
¼ cup raspberries                            
1 cup mango slices
3 cups kale
2 bananas

And here is the salad I had on that day. On many days it can be even larger than this:

2 cups dandelion greens              
10 cups lettuce                 
1 cup carrots                     
1 cup cucumber
1 green onion                   
3 tomatoes
1 date
1 tablespoon chia seeds
1 tablespoon tahini
Juice of one lemon

The prebiotic content of these foods is at least 4.6 grams. The reason I say at least is because many of these foods have yet to be measured for prebiotic content, so given what has been measured, we can expect to find at least 4.6 grams of FOS and inulin in these foods and most likely more. However, the 2 cups of dandelion greens and 2 bananas were not included in the original calculation of the 4.6 grams, so when we add in the bananas and dandelion greens we actually see a total of at least 21.1 g of FOS and inulin! That’s amazing! This shows us that plant foods can provide a notable amount of prebiotic fiber and that certain plant foods like dandelion greens and bananas are extra-rich sources of these prebiotics.

As we can see, whole natural plant foods provide these and other beneficial types of fiber, which is just one of the many health benefits derived from eating whole natural plant foods.

What about the total fiber content of these foods?

Total fiber content is 61.1 g from these foods alone!! This is much higher than the average American intake of 15 grams of total fiber per day and the DRIs for total fiber.

For some added perspective, I usually eat more than this in a day so my total fiber intake is even higher than this.

And the information in this article is just the tip of the iceberg on probiotics, prebiotics, and raw food and plant-based nutrition!

The video of our webinar on this topic has additional information and explanations (see below). The information on prebiotics starts at around 16 minutes and 35 seconds and ends around the 30 minute mark. You can also learn more about us and our class Mastering Raw Food Nutrition by watching before and after these points.:

References and Research:

Brownawell AM, Caers W, Gibson GR, et al. Prebiotics and the health benefits of fiber: current regulatory status, future research, and goals. J Nutr. 2012;142(5):962-974.

Campbell J, Bauer L, Fahey G, Hogarth A, Wolf B, Hunter D. Selected Fructooligosaccharide (1-Kestose, Nystose, and 1^F-β-Fructofuranosylnystose) Composition of Foods and Feeds. J. Agric. Food Chem. 1997;45(8):3076–3082.

Davani-Davari D, Negahdaripour M, Karimzadeh I, et al. Prebiotics: Definition, Types, Sources, Mechanisms, and Clinical Applications. Foods. 2019;8(3):92.

Kelly G. Inulin-type prebiotics--a review: part 1. Altern Med Rev. 2008 Dec;13(4):315-29.

Lloyd-Price J, Abu-Ali G, Huttenhower C. The healthy human microbiome. Genome Med. 2016;8(1):51.

Markowiak-Kopeć P, Śliżewska K. The Effect of Probiotics on the Production of Short-Chain Fatty Acids by Human Intestinal Microbiome. Nutrients. 2020;12(4):1107.

Moshfegh AJ, Friday JE, Goldman JP, Ahuja JK. Presence of inulin and oligofructose in the diets of Americans. J Nutr. 1999;129(7 Suppl):1407S-11S.

Niness K. Inulin and oligofructose: what are they? J Nutr 1999; 129 (7 Suppl): 1402S – 1406S.

Slavin J. Fiber and prebiotics: mechanisms and health benefits. Nutrients. 2013;5(4):1417-1435.

Van Loo J, Coussement P, de Leenheer L, Hoebregs H, Smits G. On the presence of inulin and oligofructose as natural ingredients in the western diet. Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr. 1995;35(6):525-52.

Vyas U, Ranganathan N. Probiotics, prebiotics, and synbiotics: gut and beyond. Gastroenterol Res Pract. 2012; 2012: 872716.

We get a lot of questions about what we eat, given that we have been on this raw food focused plant-based path for decades each, which is one of the many reasons why we share some of our raw creations here on our blog, on Instagram, in our free recipe eBooks, and elsewhere.

In fact, this week is my 30 year raw-anniversary, so in celebration I made one of my favorite recipes: raw tacos with salsa. Interestingly enough, we rarely create complicated recipes since after 30 years on this path each, we tend to enjoy simpler combinations of whole natural plant foods.

But finding some heirloom tomatoes in late January, which for us is a rare find at this time of year, inspired us to create heirloom tomato salsa.

Here are the ingredients in our Heirloom Tomato Salsa recipe:

Equal amounts of Cherokee purple and a non-specified variety of red heirloom tomatoes (about 2 of each)

Several chopped sprigs of cilantro (amount added to taste)

1 – 2 chopped green onions (optional)

Fresh squeezed lime juice added to taste

Avocado chunks added to taste

Our raw tacos are made with lettuce for the wraps, zucchini, sun dried tomatoes, walnuts, medjool dates, and paprika to taste. Sometimes we add some chickpea miso to taste as well.

Given how busy we are, it’s easy to make salads, dressings, smoothies, soups, etc. But once in a while, it’s fun to make more celebratory recipes like these tacos. If you sign up for our email list, you can receive our free Holiday (and everyday) Raw Recipe eBook for more recipe inspiration from us.

Enjoy!

We love this time of year for so many reasons! The air is cool and crisp, the leaves on trees are starting to change to beautiful golden yellow and orange hues, the autumn light casts longer shadows as the days grow shorter, and our garden is in full harvest mode.

• 

In celebration of autumn, here is a fall harvest salad for you!

This one has:

3 cups of dandelion greens grown in our backyard

¼ cup of basil grown in our garden (so aromatic!)

3 cups of heirloom tomatoes also grown in our garden

3 figs grown in our yard

2 cups of carrots

3 cups of cucumber

8 cups of Romaine lettuce.

Enjoy with the whole food raw plant-based dressing of your choice!

• 

And for those of you who love to know the nutrient breakdown (like I do!):

	Salad	Adult DRIs
B1	0.72	1.1 – 1.2 mg
B2	0.73	1.1 – 1.3 mg
B3	5.26	14 – 16 mg
B5	2.40	5 mg
B6	1.10	1.3 – 1.7 mg
Folate	492	400 mcg
B12	0	2.4 mcg
C	137	75 – 90 mg
D	0	5 – 15 mcg
E	5.50	15 mg
K1	1041	90 – 120 mcg
Beta-carotene (mcg)	36,603
Vitamin A - RAE	3363	700 mcg
Lutein and zeaxanthin (mcg)	18,564	Not established
Calcium	439	1,000 – 1,200 mg
Iron	7.9	8 – 18 mg
Magnesium	180	310 – 420 mg
Potassium	2816	4,700 mg
Zinc	2.6	8 – 11 mg

One might say that this salad is nutrient dense, given its nutrient content per calorie. Vitamins B1, B2, B5, B6, folate, C, E, and K1 are very plentiful, as is beta carotene, and lutein + zeaxanthin. This salad provides 43% of the DRI for calcium, almost 100% of the iron DRI for men and postmenopausal women, 44% of the iron DRI for premenopausal women, 58% of the magnesium DRI for women and 42% for men, 60% of the potassium DRI, and 32% of the zinc DRI for women and 24% for men.

Impressive numbers considering that this salad contains only 351 calories! For those of you who are curious, without the figs, this salad contains 240 calories.

Spring is around the corner and citrus season is in full swing here in northern California! Our lemons are out in full force along with the many other varieties of citrus grown by neighbors throughout our neighborhood. Last night Rick brought home some blood oranges, which if you have not had the opportunity to experience yet, have a red to orange outer rind and pink to red flesh on the inside.

Their flavor is much different than your standard Valencia or navel orange. Blood oranges to me taste like a cross between pink grapefruit and raspberries – both of which I love! Even though I enjoy eating sweet-tasting fruits, I have a special place in my heart for savory/astringent/tart/bitter flavors, so as of last night, these blood oranges have become one of my favorite fruits next to pomegranates. Speaking of which, the juice I made with these blood oranges had a very similar deep red color to my homemade pomegranate juice.

That deep red coloring of blood oranges gives us a clue as to what important nutrient we can find in them. Generally, when fruit has a blue, purple, or deep red coloring, the antioxidant anthocyanin is present. This is the case with blood oranges along with blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, and other fruits of similar color.

Not surprisingly, blood oranges have important nutrients that one finds in other citrus fruits like vitamin C and calcium. What is surprising is the similarity in carbohydrate content between blood oranges and their more popular counterpart, navel oranges.

Here’s a comparison of carbohydrates and other nutrients per 100 g of blood and navel oranges:

	Blood oranges	Navel oranges
Calories	50	49
Total carbohydrate	11.4 g	12.5 g
Sugars (non-specified)	8.6 g	8.5 g
Vitamin C	51 mg	59 mg
Calcium	43 mg	43 mg

So, even though blood oranges have a flavor that is more on the tart than sweet side, the carbohydrate content is similar to the sweeter navel orange. I would be interested to see how the simple carbohydrate content of each compares, such as the amount of fructose, glucose, and sucrose in each variety and look forward to a time when this information is available.

On another note, I found a recent interesting study done on the effect of orange juice consumption on gut microbiota. This study was not done using blood oranges, but with more common sweeter varieties. It was a small study with 10 women, who consumed orange juice for 2 months. The researchers found after those two months that consumption of the orange juice was associated with an increase in the population of Bifidobacterium species and Lactobacillus species, both probiotics, in their respective microbiomes, along with a reduction in ammonia production by gut flora and an increase in gut flora production of short chain fatty acids. All of these changes are positive indicators of microbiome health improvement. The study also found positive changes in blood biochemical parameters including increased insulin sensitivity!

You can read more about this study by searching for the study information shown below. It’s important to note that this study was done using pasteurized orange juice, so naturally I would love to see what the results would look like using fresh squeezed unpasteurized orange juice! Nonetheless, I thought you might find this information to be interesting as I did. I’ve seen many studies that show improvement in microbiome health with the addition of fruits and vegetables, so the outcome of this study is not surprising. It’s just another testament to the many health benefits of whole natural plant foods!

Lima ACD, Cecatti C, Fidélix MP, Adorno MAT, Sakamoto IK, Cesar TB, Sivieri K. Effect of Daily Consumption of Orange Juice on the Levels of Blood Glucose, Lipids, and Gut Microbiota Metabolites: Controlled Clinical Trials. J Med Food. 2019 Feb;22(2):202-210.

Nutrition information on navel and blood oranges: nutritiondata.self.com

The first two articles in this series on blood sugar regulation were regarding a lab measurement in the human body known as A1c and a food measurement known as the glycemic index, respectively. In this third article we discuss insulin sensitivity vs. insulin resistance. In order to get the most from this article please read the first two articles in previous blog posts below, which we will refer back to here.

Influences over Blood Sugar

There are many components of human physiology that affect our blood sugar level. This includes several interrelated hormones, the state of our autonomic nervous system, our emotions, our physical activity level, the amount of body fat and lean (muscle) tissue, amount of dietary fat consumed, type of dietary fat consumed, dietary fiber consumption, the physical structure of our cell membranes, certain nutrients, etc.

One of the key hormones involved in regulating blood sugar is known as insulin. One of the main jobs of insulin is to escort glucose, aka blood sugar, out of the blood and into the cells, where glucose can then be used to fuel cellular processes. When our cells are responsive, or sensitive to insulin, this process works properly, and glucose remains at appropriate levels in the bloodstream because it is being efficiently escorted into the cells to use for energy.

When our cells are not responsive, or resistant to insulin, the process of escorting glucose from the blood into the cells does not work as well. As a result, the glucose level in the blood remains higher than is desirable as it cannot get out of the blood and into the cells as readily. In our first article in this series on A1c we discussed some of the significant consequences of elevated blood sugar levels.

Insulin Sensitivity vs. Insulin Resistance

In our second article in this series on the glycemic index, we saw different blood sugar response curves for 4 sample people consuming straight glucose, then the same quantity of carbohydrate from bananas. We noted that the response curves varied quite a bit between individuals. How could there be such a variation in the glucose response curves when each subject was given the same quantity of food with the same glycemic index?

The answer is that some people’s cells are sensitive to insulin, while other people’s cells are resistant to insulin. Those experiencing insulin resistance have higher glucose response curves than those experiencing insulin sensitivity, no matter what they eat, even low glycemic foods! In our glucose vs. banana comparison to determine the glycemic index of bananas as described in the previous article, you may have noted that subject A had the lowest glucose curve for both glucose and banana consumption, while subject D had the highest glucose curve for both glucose and banana consumption. Subject A’s cells are sensitive to insulin, while subject D’s cells are resistant to insulin. Subjects B and C are in between on the insulin resistance vs. insulin sensitivity spectrum.

The glycemic index is a rating of the blood sugar response curve in a sample of humans RELATIVE TO THEIR GLUCOSE RESPONSE CURVE. It is not a rating of what will happen when that food is consumed by a particular individual. The state of insulin sensitivity vs. insulin resistance exerts a much greater influence. In insulin resistant individuals, every food consumed will cause a greater increase in blood sugar levels compared to someone else eating the same food who is insulin sensitive.

IF YOU HAVEN’T ALREADY, THIS WOULD BE A GREAT TIME TO REVIEW THOSE GLUCOSE RESPONSE CURVE CHARTS IN THE GLYCEMIC INDEX ARTICLE BELOW.

Insulin resistance is the hallmark of type II diabetes, pre-diabetes, and slightly elevated blood sugar. People with type II diabetes make plenty of insulin, in fact often times extra insulin, but their cells are resistant to it. That is why people with diabetes have higher glucose levels than people without diabetes, even when they eat the exact same food. This is because when insulin attempts to escort glucose out of the blood and into the cells, the cells are resistant to that process occurring as efficiently as it does under optimal conditions of insulin sensitivity.

Conventional Advice

It’s very important to note that carbohydrates are not the cause of insulin resistance. The body not being able to regulate carbohydrates well is the effect of insulin resistance.  However, the usual advice when this occurs is to limit the quantity of carbohydrates in the diet. Unfortunately, this process does very little, if anything, to correct insulin resistance, the underlying cause of the problem in the first place.

In fact, many low carbohydrate, low glycemic foods actually promote insulin resistance! Most doctors however advocate the consumption of these foods to their diabetic patients. No wonder these same doctors tell these patients that there is no cure, and that they will be on medication for the rest of their lives!

A Better Solution

In order to recover from type II diabetes, pre-diabetes, or slightly elevated blood sugar, the root causes of insulin resistance need to be addressed. When you stop causing insulin resistance, your cells become more sensitive to insulin, and blood sugar levels start to come down as a result.

In the next article in this series we will look at the major causes of insulin resistance and how to reverse the process and therefore allow elevated blood sugar levels to come back down to a more healthful range.

When one thinks of good raw plant sources of minerals such as calcium and iron, certain leafy greens, nuts, and seeds generally come to mind. It’s rare that one would think of fruit as being a good source of minerals. In fact, often in conversations, people ask questions like “but isn’t fruit deficient in minerals?” or “isn’t fruit high in carbs but not much else besides antioxidants?” After repeatedly hearing questions like this, I put together some tables with the calcium and iron content of a variety of fruits along with a video and a talk I presented at the Woodstock Fruit Festival a few years ago.

Seeing the actual numbers can help us make more informed food choices and increase confidence in our dietary approach:

Food	Amount	Calcium content
Figs	5 fresh	100 mg
Valencia Oranges	2 medium	97 mg
Deglet noor dates	1 cup	57 mg
Mulberries	1 cup fresh	55 mg
Kiwifruit	2 peeled	52 mg
Blackberries	1 cup fresh	42 mg
Mamey sapote	1 cup	32 mg
Raspberries	1 cup	31 mg
Medjool dates	2 pitted	31 mg
Papaya	1 cup pieces	29 mg
Strawberries	1 cup sliced	27 mg
Apricots	1 cup fresh	21 mg

As we can see, some fruits can actually be considered good sources of calcium, especially figs.

For comparison, the adult daily values for calcium are 1000 mg up to 50 years and 1200 mg for 51+ years.

Regarding iron, certain types of berries are quite rich in this important mineral, especially when compared to the adult RDAs for iron of 8 mg for men and post-menopausal women and 18 mg for premenopausal women:

Food	Amount	Iron content
Mulberries	1 cup	2.59 mg
Dates, deglet noor	1 cup	1.50 mg
Durian	1 cup, diced	1.04 mg
Blackberries	1 cup	0.89 mg
Raspberries	1 cup	0.85 mg
Persimmons	1 fruit	0.62 mg
Strawberries	1 cup halves	0.62 mg
Apricots	1 cup halves	0.60 mg
Bananas	1 cup, sliced	0.58 mg
Grapes	1 cup	0.54 mg

Now, I know that not everyone is going to eat these amounts of fruit, however some raw food enthusiasts will eat even more fruit than this, so one would need to adjust the iron content based on the serving size they choose to estimate how much of each mineral is in their food. These numbers are helpful to know, however, it’s important to consider that certain leafy greens are much better sources of these minerals. So, for comparison, let’s take a look at the calcium and iron content of certain leafy greens:

Leafy Green	Calcium content	Iron content
Romaine lettuce, one head (626 g)	207 mg	6.0 mg
Dandelion greens, 4 cups (220 g)	411 mg	7.0 mg
Kale, 4 cups (268 g)	362 mg	4.6 mg
Arugula, 4 cups (80 g)	128 mg	1.2 mg
Frisée greens, 4 cups (200 g)	104 mg	1.7 mg
Escarole, 4 cups (200 g)	104 mg	1.7 mg
‘Spring mix’ (200 g)	190 mg	1.2 mg

There are lots of other leafy greens that are also good sources of these important minerals. But it’s also important to know that certain leafy greens are not good sources of these minerals because they contain significant amounts of oxalic acid (oxalate content). Those would include: spinach, Swiss chard, beet greens, parsley, purslane, and others. Oxalate binds to iron and calcium in these foods making these minerals less usable by the human body. These foods are not ‘bad’ foods, they are just not great sources of these minerals, especially when they are raw. If you would like to learn more about oxalate, we encourage you to watch our recent webinar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUGt9_Xx4rU

Wishing you the best of health!

Introduction

In our last newsletter we posted an article about a very useful blood sugar measurement called A1c. In this issue we look at another measurement that is often referred to when considering how to keep our blood sugar in an optimum range, known as the glycemic index. We have all heard about the glycemic index, but how is it determined, and how much relevance does it really have to the big picture of blood sugar regulation?

What is Blood Sugar?

“Blood sugar” is the concentration of a simple carbohydrate known as glucose in our blood. Glucose is the primary source of fuel for most cells in our body, so it is found in the bloodstream as it is being transported and distributed to those cells. The same characteristics that make glucose a good source of fuel also cause it to react with other molecules it comes in contact with. These “glycation” reactions lead to stiffness, inflammation, wrinkles, and a host of other problems. When this continues over time, circulation and nerve function becomes impaired, leading to numbness, tingling, amputations, vision problems, kidney problems, hypertension, heart disease, strokes, etc. It is therefore highly desirable to keep our blood sugar aka glucose levels in a healthfully low range.

The Glycemic Index

The glycemic index of a food is the degree to which that food raises blood sugar after being consumed. How though, is the glycemic index of a particular food determined? It starts by taking at least 8-10 people, feeding them a specified quantity of glucose, usually 50, 75, or 100 grams, and then measuring the blood sugar level of each participant at periodic intervals over the next two hours. In the figures below, only 4 sample subjects are shown for simplicity purposes.

Figure 1: Glucose response curves in 4 sample study subjects

As you can see, the resulting glucose response curve can vary widely depending upon the individual. Because of this, an average is taken of all of the study subjects. The “area under the curve” of the average curve is assigned a value of 100, to be used a reference point for the comparison food.

Figure 2: Average glucose response curve of study subjects

Then, under the same conditions as when given the glucose, the same study subjects consume the test food in a quantity that equals the same amount of carbohydrate as the glucose that was consumed initially. If the subjects consumed 100 grams of glucose for example, they will subsequently consume 100 grams of carbohydrate from the test food, in whole food form. Then just like with glucose, periodic blood sugar measurements are taken over the next two hours to determine the glucose response curves of the subjects for the test food, in this case bananas.

Figure 3: Bananas response curves in (the same) 4 sample study subjects

As we saw with glucose, the response curves vary among individuals. The curves are once again averaged out and an average banana response curve is obtained.

Figure 4: Average banana response curve of study subjects

Then the area under the average banana curve is compared to the area under the average glucose curve.

Figure 5: Average glucose curve vs. average banana curve

The area under the average banana curve is 52% of the area under the average glucose curve for the same individuals under the same set of circumstances. This means bananas raise blood sugar 52% as much as the same quantity of glucose consumed directly. As the average glucose response curve was assigned a glycemic index reference value of 100, bananas are assigned a glycemic index value of 52.

Figure 6: Average glucose curve vs. average banana curve determines the glycemic index of bananas.

Foods that have a glycemic index below 55 are considered low glycemic foods. From 56-69 is considered medium glycemic, while foods that rate at 70 or above are considered high glycemic foods.

Conclusion

Now is where the plot thickens. Brace yourself. As it turns out, the glycemic index is one of the least important factors in blood sugar regulation!!!  In fact, it leads to a great deal of confusion and often leads people into a false sense of confidence while they continue to sow the seeds of unhealthy blood sugar regulation.

Stay tuned for upcoming newsletter articles to continue this discussion and find out what is most important in blood sugar regulation.

Copyright 2018 Drs. Rick and Karin Dina, D.C. All Rights Reserved

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