Full Transcript Introduction and Expert Background 0:00 All right, everybody, this is real time. 0:03 We've got one of the world's experts in food. 0:05 Is medicine one. 0:07 Think I'm going to give her an opportunity to explain what that means? 0:10 Thank you for joining us again to reverse your heart disease summit. 0:13 And thank you all for meeting Doctor Deanna Minich. 0:17 And, she is a superstar. 0:19 How are you tonight, doctor? Am. 0:21 I am doing great, doctor. Joel. 0:24 Thank you. 0:25 And thanks for taking your time and dressing up. 0:28 Everybody gets a little bio introduction. 0:31 Yours would take the full time, but you have a master's. 0:35 You have a Ph.D. 0:36 or certified nutritional sciences certified and functional medicine 0:39 practitioner, nutrition researcher, really amazing nutrition researcher, educator. 0:45 You've written some awesome, medical papers, research papers, 0:49 functional medicine trained clinician. 0:52 And you've served on many boards like the Institute of Functional Medicine 0:56 Nutrition Advisory Board. 0:57 Basically, if you think nutrition, do you think Doctor Diana minnick 1:01 and I mean that seriously, just and you think energy and you think 1:05 just a grace about you and just, different approach to so much wonderful stuff. 1:10 Six books and nutrition, wellness and psychology. 1:14 And I think everybody's going to learn a lot from me tonight 1:17 because this is a reverse your heart disease. 1:20 Naturally. 1:21 Summit and you are the queen of food. 1:23 And that's what we're going to talk about. 1:25 So I use the term food as medicine. 1:27 Talk a little bit about in your practice in your couple decades of being a leader. 1:33 What that means you. 1:35 Yeah, that phrase is bandied about a lot. 1:37 Food is medicine. 1:38 I think it's more than medicine, though. 1:40 I think, food is healing. 1:42 Food is connection. 1:44 Food is emotions. Food is the mind. 1:46 Food is the spirit. 1:48 I really see food through this lens that is full spectrum in nature. 1:52 So yeah, I think food is medicine is just one dimension of where food 1:56 can actually take us. 1:57 Food is so interconnected into our daily lives. 2:00 So, I what I have done is look at the rainbow of food 2:05 through colors, but also the rainbow of food through 2:09 the many different aspects of who we are. 2:11 And again, the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual aspects. 2:16 That's, a very profound answer. 2:18 And you anticipated where I had to go, which is, 2:22 when anybody knows your incredible work, you immediately are going to say 2:26 rainbow diet or rainbow colors and everything about your website 2:31 and your books and your beautiful artwork is about the rainbow colors. 2:35 So how do you relate, you know, artwork, rainbow colors to 2:41 educating people about eating for health, eating for a healthy heart. 2:45 But there's so much noise out there in nutrition, 2:48 it kind of feels like, you know, I could go into all of the science 2:52 and I can start to pick and choose. 2:54 One of the things that I think 2:55 you can't pick and choose and you can arm wrestle is eating more plants.
Food as Medicine and the Rainbow Diet 3:00 There is a lot of research about the benefits of eating more plants, 3:04 like fruits and vegetables for reducing the risk of chronic disease, 3:08 but not just reducing the risk of chronic disease. 3:11 Even for helping with mental health. 3:14 So becoming a happier person, having a better quality of life, 3:18 reducing psychological distress. 3:21 So when I look at the literature 3:24 on fruits and vegetables and whole foods of color, 3:28 what I see is that they're imparting so much to us, 3:30 they're changing us at the cellular level, they're changing us at the system level. 3:35 And since your focus is on the heart, you know, 3:38 I do have a color coded way of how I see these individual colors. 3:42 And the one for the heart specifically, I do believe, is green foods. 3:48 Well, let's let's go with that a little bit 3:50 because obviously many people would jump to red and pomegranates and apples. 3:54 Oh well that too. 3:55 Yeah yeah I know, I know we're not. 3:58 We can be inclusive and have a little red with our green. 4:01 But what is it in your beautiful writings 4:05 about the rainbow diet that you connect green foods and the heart? 4:08 What? 4:09 What's the, you know, the specific nutrients, the bigger picture. 4:14 Where do you see all that? 4:15 We go back to the Garden of Eden. What's up? 4:19 Well, first let's just look at a leaf. 4:22 When I look at a leaf very close, I symbolically see the vascular system. 4:28 I see all of those tendrils, I see all of those interconnections. 4:32 And then when I look at a leaf, 4:35 whether it's kale or lettuces or spinach, whatever it is, when I start to 4:40 look at the nutritional components, I see things that are good for the heart. 4:44 So things like magnesium or even folate or, 4:49 you know, one of the things that, the nutritional components 4:51 that I do think is getting more traction is that of nitrates. 4:55 Sometimes we think about nitrates with with things that are red like beets, 4:59 but greens, especially some of the bitter greens like a regular or 5:04 even things like celery can be important for nitrate activity as well. 5:09 And then of course vitamin K, vitamin K1, 5:12 vitamin K in my mind is like the next vitamin D. 5:16 Vitamin K is used throughout the body to use for the bone. 5:19 It's used for the vasculature. 5:20 It helps to place minerals appropriately. 5:23 So there's this complex 5:25 web of different nutrients that we get from all the different colors of food. 5:29 I don't want to say that for heart health, all you need is green and nothing else 5:33 but the beauty of green foods, especially these leaves, is that 5:37 many thyme underneath the chlorophyl which gives it that green color. 5:41 You get the reds, you get the oranges, you get the yellows, 5:45 which are all embedded into that leaf of the plant. 5:48 And all of those colors are really important. 5:50 We see them in the fall time. 5:52 We see that in autumn when the leaves start changing 5:55 colors, we start to see what's really underneath the green. 5:58 So I often say to people, start with green because green can give you 6:02 a lot of nutrient density just right off the bat. 6:06 And I believe I have learned that that is, a leaf turns 6:09 from green to those beautiful shades of bright yellow bright orange. 6:13 It's depletion of chlorophyl, as the tree is preparing for winter. 6:18 That allows those underlying colors, like you say, you don't really see. 6:21 But it's a magic in nature, and I do when I do. 6:25 Look in Michigan, 6:26 we have all the leaves come down and we get to see that naked aspect of a tree. 6:30 And then springtime we see everything but again. 6:33 But I have to say, as a cardiologist, when I see those trees 6:36 devoid of leaves, it looks exactly like the arterial system to me. 6:40 No, I don't always bring that down to the leaf itself, but I agree with you. 6:45 The branching and branching and branching 6:47 of the structure of a leaf is very much like the cardiovascular system. 6:51 So it's, a beautiful analogy. 6:53 I will say it's a little hard to see on these small screens, but 6:56 I put on my most colorful, oh, I see it the end of time. 7:01 Perhaps there should be a, DNA minute design. 7:04 I, I love it, I love it, and you could do is your next adventure. 7:08 But I think it's one of the few times we are going to see you 7:11 dressed up in black. 7:12 Yeah. Oh, I thought about that for this interview. 7:15 I was like, you know, I'm just going to do something different today. 7:17 And, you know, it was cold where I'm at. 7:20 And so I just wanted 7:21 to get cozy with the turtleneck and this is the one that presented itself. 7:24 But my wardrobe is actually in rainbow. 7:27 Hey, it is the morning I go in the into my closet 7:30 and I feel out, you know, what is the color I most need today? 7:35 So you said food is medicine. 7:37 I think color is medicine. 7:39 We get colorful foods. 7:41 We can have colorful moods. 7:42 We can have colorful spaces. 7:44 All of that is changing our psychology. 7:46 And our psychology is changing our physiology and the heart. 7:50 The entire cardiovascular system, 7:52 I would say, is very much connected into our psychological distress. 7:57 So if we're calming the mind with something like a cooling color 8:02 or a color that we really need, you know, black to me is very grounding. 8:06 It's kind of neutral. It's kind of like, 8:09 what I was needing today was 8:11 just kind of getting down into some basics of getting some things done. 8:16 So there wasn't a lot of like orange and flowing or red. 8:20 I actually could have wore red because red is, very much an active vigor color. 8:25 It's it is connected to the vasculature. 8:27 And I like that you brought up things like red foods. 8:30 I was just in Cyprus, and there's the celebration there. 8:33 Pomegranate. 8:35 So, I went into a pomegranate juice juice 8:38 stand where they were juicing fresh pomegranates, which grow right there. 8:42 And, pomegranate, at least in the Mediterranean, is a symbol of fertility. 8:46 But we know it also has application to things like metabolic detoxification, 8:51 cardiovascular health, so many things. 8:54 And I think of lycopene. 8:55 Lycopene is important for the heart. 8:57 There's an association there between that particular plant
Green Foods, Heart Health, and Vitamin K 9:00 based carotenoid and heart health. 9:04 You know, and that's what we see in that leaf when it turns color, 9:08 when we see the red, we need to be thinking of all of those red carotenoids. 9:12 Or if it turns orange, the orange carotenoids or the yellow ones. 9:17 So all of those beautiful. 9:18 That is nature's art and that art becomes 9:21 the art that drives our cellular beauty in so many ways. 9:27 Wonderful. 9:28 I just want to follow up on your comment. 9:30 There's actually a little aspect in nutrition. 9:32 I'm not salad on leafy greens rich in vitamin K1. 9:37 If you open my refrigerator to see a jar of natto beans, 9:41 because I will sometimes throw them out of the salad to get vitamin K, I need 9:44 to, had to learn the taste and the texture and the goodness of natto beans, 9:50 but they are available on big box sellers nowadays. 9:53 They've become a little popularized. 9:55 How able is the human body to take a big arugula salad 10:00 rich in vitamin K1 and convert to vitamin K2, or it doesn't happen efficiently and 10:05 you need to derive it from a supplement or from a few foods like natto. 10:11 Yes. That's a very good point. 10:12 There are different forms of vitamin K, and so I only spoke to one. 10:16 But as you mentioned, there's vitamin K2, vitamin K2 is found 10:20 in different kinds of food, typically fermented foods like you mentioned. 10:23 Although not everybody is a big fan of NATO. 10:26 In some cases, the gut microorganisms, depending on which ones you have, 10:30 can also manufacture some degree of K2, but usually not a lot. 10:34 So fermented cheeses, as you mentioned, fermented 10:38 beans and products of various types. 10:41 And vitamin K2 does have a little bit of a different function than vitamin K1. 10:46 So it's a complex fat soluble vitamins. 10:48 So it is good to get diversity. 10:50 This is where diversity of our eating comes in. 10:54 How some days it's good to have a little bit of natto. 10:56 But then maybe you you rotate and then you know, 10:59 you get different things from different foods 11:03 so that your nutritional status is more sound. 11:05 In fact, many times what I say is, if people can just focus on 11:09 dietary diversity, it's protective for so many things. 11:13 In fact, 11:14 even if I can recall correctly, there was a study looking at blood pressure 11:18 and how when people had, I think it was eight or more servings 11:22 of fruits and vegetables like that was the threshold of dietary diversity 11:26 that you needed to have some level of, diversity in that intake 11:30 that that was protective to help with vasculature 11:34 and even high blood pressure. 11:37 All right. 11:38 So, I mean, before we go away from the colors 11:41 and the rainbow diet, tell us a couple more, blue green. 11:45 There are blue green foods out there. 11:47 Any significance to a particular part of the body? 11:51 Well, let me go through the the rainbow order quickly, 11:54 just so everybody gets grounded. 11:55 I call this the color code. 11:57 So red foods I see is corresponding to inflammation 12:01 as well as the immune system, which definitely ties into the heart. 12:05 Orange foods, which I see connected to the carotenoids, 12:08 largely, can be connected into reproductive health, fertility, 12:13 oxidative stress, such as in sperm or even the ovaries, 12:17 which are connected into certain carotenoids. 12:20 Yellow, I see as digestive colors. 12:24 I think of the acids of lemons. 12:27 I think of ginger, I think of pineapple. 12:30 Then I think of some of the prebiotic fibers of starchy yellow foods. 12:34 Green. 12:35 As I already mentioned, I see that as the heart color. 12:38 And then we have blue purple, which is connected to the brain. 12:42 So looking at things like blueberries, blackberries, figs, 12:45 purple varieties of foods that aren't always purple in color 12:49 like purple cauliflower, purple carrots, purple broccoli, purple Brussels sprouts. 12:54 There's something about each of these colors 12:57 which aligns to certain phytochemicals that have certain functions in the body. 13:02 So they're not in all really tight boxes like, 13:05 well, it's only blue purple for foods that help the brain. 13:08 But in general, there's some kind of pattern recognition 13:11 that we see in the research around those things. 13:13 And I did published an article in the Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism 13:17 on that. 13:18 So I as a scientist, I like to look at those patterns. 13:22 And this is what I emphasize about eating the rainbow. 13:25 Important to get all those colors so that we get the functional signature 13:29 of those different colors for the whole body. 13:32 And if we're fortifying the brain, we're helping the heart. 13:35 We're helping the heart, we're helping other systems. 13:38 This is functional medicine, integrative medicine. 13:42 Fantastic. 13:43 And for people that are interested in following up on this, Doctor 13:47 Minnick has a book called The Rainbow Diet. 13:49 I've read it. It's a wonderful book. It's got a beautiful color. 13:52 She has other books, too, but 13:53 picks up specifically on this color guide is Rainbow Guide. 13:57 And, I'd encourage everybody to, learn more about this. 14:01 So, I mean, we trying to avoid food fights here, but people are confused. 14:06 They're hearing about a one color diet called the carnivore diet, 14:10 the real antithesis of what we're teaching here 14:13 as the science behind heart disease reversal using food, 14:17 which is a very colorful, very rainbow plant diet. 14:20 Any comments from your nutrition research on the long term 14:24 success of a diet that's largely or completely meat based? 14:28 That's called a gray diet or a gray red diet? 14:32 Wow. I hadn't heard it referred to as a gray red diet. 14:36 Well, as you know, I am a big advocate of personalized nutrition. 14:41 This is the wave of the future. 14:43 Looking at gene variants, looking at a person's 14:46 functional laboratory markers, looking at their environment, 14:48 their taste preferences, all of those things. 14:52 So, yeah, it's the carnivore diet, 14:54 which is I, you know, I've seen different renditions of the carnivore diet. 14:58 Actually, it doesn't seem like it's only meat in some cases.
Rainbow Colors, Diversity, and Plant-Based Nutrition 15:02 It seems like some carnivores bring in some degree of fruit and even honey. 15:06 So it seems like there are variations on the theme. 15:09 But in general, what we see with the carnivore diet would be 15:13 that we don't have the inclusion of plants, 15:16 and the inclusion of plants, I think is really important 15:19 from a number of different aspects the fiber, 15:22 the vitamins, the minerals, the the thousands of phytonutrients. 15:26 It's not to say that you don't get that in a carnivore diet, but you're getting it 15:30 indirectly through the animal. 15:33 And, you know, I think for some people. 15:36 So I was recently on PubMed and that's like a library of all of 15:39 the different scientific publications that are peer reviewed and such. 15:44 And there were 13 when I just typed in Carnivore Diet, 15:47 there were 13 published articles. 15:51 You know, now the Mediterranean diet is probably upwards of like 8000. 15:55 So what I would say to you is that we just don't know enough. 15:59 Sometimes we hear 16:00 anecdotal reports like, oh, I feel so much better on a carnivore diet. 16:04 You know, some people have concerns about the toxins 16:07 that get interwoven or, incorporated 16:11 into fruits and vegetables, and they're concerned about toxin load. 16:15 So for that reason, we know to again, be diverse 16:19 in our offerings and also whenever we can choose organically grown. 16:23 But yeah, I mean, I think 16:25 sometimes we find ourselves through different dietary patterns. 16:29 I think when we eat a different way, it changes who we are in body 16:33 and mind and emotions and, you know, just our personality can can shift. 16:38 We learn a lot about where we need to go. 16:41 And so maybe temporarily for some people, that could be 16:45 an acceptable approach for themselves. 16:47 I just don't think we have a lot of research on the carnivore diet. 16:52 And certainly when you restricted even to specifically cardiovascular disease 16:56 and I have a clogged arteries, I'm trying to work on stabilizing or reversing it. 17:01 We have zero data on it. Right. 17:04 That's a good point. That's a very good point. 17:06 And are you willing to experiment with your health and something 17:09 that might load you up with saturated fat? 17:13 And, pesticides and herbicides 17:15 and other concerning, components that have to be in meat? 17:19 So you've written a brilliant article there 17:22 in the last 5 or 6 years, a lot of discussion. 17:25 I'll pick out lectins, good or bad. 17:27 And for the audience sake, in a minute, I'll ask you it. Tell us. 17:30 What I'd like to know is, you know, oxalates, again, we'll talk about that. 17:34 Good or bad. 17:35 You wrote a paper called Is There Such a Thing as anti Nutrients? 17:39 And the wonderful paper is a very long scientific paper. 17:42 And I give you credit, it's very comprehensive. 17:45 So tell us what lectins are briefly where we find them and from, you know, 17:51 from your best view largely good foods, properly 17:55 prepared, largely dangerous foods, properly prepared. 18:00 Great. 18:00 I'm so glad that we're going to talk about what's called anti nutrients. 18:04 Because I promote plants and I talk about plants wherever I can go 18:08 and talk about the rainbow. 18:09 One of the biggest pushbacks was that people would say, 18:11 but I can't eat plants because they contain anti nutrients. 18:16 So then Weston Petroski and I took the time 18:19 to just roll up our sleeves and say, let's explore the science. 18:22 What does the science say about lectins, oxalates, tannins, fights, phytoestrogens. 18:28 You know, we went big and broad on this, even goy Trojans, 18:31 which we have heard about as it relates to antineutrinos. 18:35 So what are lectins? 18:37 While lectins are, glycoproteins. 18:40 So they are complex structures found in plants, typically legumes. 18:45 And where they become problematic is when people eat raw legumes. 18:49 So we have these these structures 18:51 which can be perceived in the body as inflammatory. 18:56 So now if we are 18:57 cooking and processing and autoclave ING, 19:00 boiling our our legumes and going through all of the right procedures 19:05 and eating them as, as they have been eaten traditionally, 19:09 so throughout time and not in some other fashion. 19:14 So we're sprouting. 19:15 We might be, you know, going 19:16 through a rinsing and soaking process and then cooking them adequately. 19:20 We should have negligible lectins. 19:23 Now, Doctor Donny, who is an immunologist, has also done 19:28 some work on immuno reactivity of certain individuals or certain 19:33 patient population types, like people with autoimmune disease. 19:37 And it does seem that in certain 19:41 people, there might be a certain increased 19:44 reactivity to some of these lectins. 19:49 The problem that I have is that I find it very difficult 19:52 to just isolate and say it's lectins, unless you have a bolus of lectins 19:57 and you say, eat these lectins, let's see your response. 20:01 But many times the I mean, all of the time the foods are complex. 20:07 They've got fibers, they've got other things in them. 20:10 So I think it's difficult to just isolate and say, well, it's just the lectins 20:14 there just isn't the degree of clinical data 20:17 that we need in order to say, avoid all of these foods versus 20:21 the amount of clinical data we would see in order to support eating. 20:25 Some of these foods, which which have these, these lectins. 20:29 Now there is some initial morsel and, 20:34 other types of preclinical 20:35 work that might suggest that lectins may even have some benefit. 20:39 I think that some of their immune modulating activity is being explored. 20:44 And, you know, Joel, would I think at the end of the day, 20:47 is that so much of how we respond to certain foods can also say something 20:51 about the state of our gut, the state of our gut microbiome, 20:56 and in certain cases, certain foods might be triggering a response
Carnivore Diet, Anti-Nutrients, and Lectins 21:00 because we might have some imbalance or dysbiosis in the gut. 21:05 So I think we have to 21:05 look at the whole many times, it's not just pointing the finger to the food. 21:09 The food is actually being the messenger to say there's something awry in the gut. 21:15 So as it relates to lectins, I would say if we're eating foods 21:19 in their traditional format, we're cooking them, we're soaking. 21:22 We're not eating raw, kidney beans. 21:25 Then I, I think that, you know, we're 21:28 we're pretty much on an, a favorable side, you know, 21:32 and I have talked to a lot of patients over the last 33 years, 21:37 and I don't remember any of them ever telling me, man, 21:39 when I've got the Jones, I've got to get some raw kidney beans and Joe and 21:44 I just. 21:45 And, it just, it just doesn't happen. 21:47 And of course, there could be an accident where you just didn't cook food properly. 21:52 And there have been reports. 21:53 Yes, there are there, but overall, it's you're counseling a patient, 21:58 you're talking about blue zones, you're talking about fiber, 22:01 you're talking about minerals, you're talking about amino acids. 22:04 You're okay with peas, beans and lentils properly cooked. 22:08 Absolutely, absolutely. 22:09 I mean they're such a great protein and fiber source and rich in minerals. 22:14 All right. 22:14 Well let's switch gears. But same topic. 22:17 Couple of years ago, famous Australian hunky actor Liam Hemsworth 22:22 announced I'm no longer vegan because I got kidney stones. 22:26 And, he reported that he was making a green smoothie 22:29 every morning with like, a pound of spinach, always spinach. 22:32 Every day, every day, every day. 22:34 And people have heard about oxalate. 22:37 So why don't you give us again a minute or two I what? 22:40 Water oxalates? 22:41 And how big an issue is it really. 22:43 And you know, do we none of us eat spinach because of that risk or, 22:49 you know, Swiss chard or we just rotate our foods. 22:52 What's what's your take on that? As you wrote in your article? 22:55 Yeah. 22:55 So oxalic acid you typically do find 22:58 bound up in, in minerals in some of these green leafy foods. 23:03 And if we take the case that you just described where he was 23:06 having large amounts of juiced spinach 23:09 repeatedly, you know, again, we're taking something out of its 23:13 natural context and traditional way of preparation. 23:17 And sometimes I think about that with the celery juice craze, 23:20 you know, these 16oz of just raw celery every day. 23:25 I think, again, any time we're doing something 23:27 and large amounts out of its natural context, 23:31 over and over again, we're subject to some kind of change or some kind of response. 23:36 So the thing with oxalates is, 23:39 oxalic acid is highly soluble in water. 23:42 So when we steam or we soak, we properly cook these foods, 23:47 modest amounts of spinach, things like that. 23:50 Swiss chard should be acceptable. 23:52 And most people there is, however, 23:56 a small percentage of people who are hyper absorbers of oxalates. 24:02 And there may 24:04 be some translation over into kidney issues. 24:08 You know, this is a little bit debatable in the literature because it seems like 24:13 what the the stones could be signaling 24:16 is actually a mineral insufficiency or imbalance. 24:20 So when we have adequate calcium and magnesium in the diet 24:25 and even are consuming some of these oxalate containing foods 24:30 with things that contain calcium and magnesium, especially calcium, 24:35 that we may not see that same effect, 24:36 but there is a small percentage of people that may be hyper absorbing. 24:41 So we just we should probably have that in the back of our minds. 24:44 There are laboratory tests to look at, oxalic acid and kind of look at levels. 24:49 There's also the phrase the connection to the gut microbiome. 24:53 There's the term oxalate biome. 24:56 So there are certain microorganisms that seem to metabolize that Celik acid. 25:02 So again is it signaling a gut dysfunction a mineral imbalance. 25:06 Or maybe we just shouldn't be doing such large amounts of these raw juices 25:11 without the balance of other things in the diet. 25:15 I think there are many different things to draw upon, 25:17 and not all greens are equal in terms of their oxalate concentration. 25:22 I think spinach happens to be very high, whereas kale and arugula are not. 25:27 So we're going to follow your rainbow diet. 25:29 We probably even should vary our greens. 25:32 Absolutely. 25:33 We cannot get stuck on one green all the time. 25:37 And particularly maybe we make sure that's not spinach we're stuck on all the time. 25:41 It's great to have some, but, moderate it with other greens and, that will, 25:46 you know, eliminate for all the patients I've talked to over 25:49 the years, consuming large amounts of greens. 25:52 You know, I've not seen the Liam Hemsworth story, 25:56 with any frequency, you know, very good to be seen with all the celery juice. 26:00 Have you seen any repercussions? 26:01 I'm not a fan. 26:02 No, I'm not here to slam. 26:04 The celery just yet. 26:06 I was just curious, because it's kind of. 26:07 I've not seen a detriment to it, but I haven't had a lot of people 26:12 do it in my practice. That's a lot of patients. 26:14 I mean, 26:15 I think the phase is wearing out right now, and I don't see many people 26:19 bringing it up. 26:20 I did come up a couple weeks ago in the clinic. 26:23 Let's talk about a hot topic. 26:25 Also vanity, nutrients. 26:26 And, you know, just give us your, academic perspective. 26:30 What do you tell your clients? 26:31 But soy based foods. 26:33 And let's talk the whole, you know, close to nature, 26:36 edamame beans, tempeh, organic. 26:39 So, you know, I mean, I do 26:41 we should we run for the hills as so many people have heard? 26:45 Or do we enjoy them mixed with other foods? 26:48 So there is a spectrum of soy, in my view. 26:52 You know, we have taken, a perfectly healthy legume 26:56 and we have created soy looking 26:59 products, right where we have processed soy. 27:02 So if we were just speaking 27:04 to the ones that you mentioned, so the miso, tempeh, tofu, 27:07 you know, the Whole Foods soy edamame, right? 27:10 I mean, these historically, over time have been associated 27:13 with cultures that live long and have reduced rates of chronic disease 27:18 and soy, soy, isoflavones and many of the things that are 27:22 within soy, these flavonoids and such, they're modulating so many different 27:26 pathways and beneficial ways or helpful for metabolic detoxification. 27:31 It's a great protein source. 27:33 So I'm not against soy as long as it's good quality 27:36 and it's not processed, it's in its whole food form. 27:40 I think it can be a healthy food for many people. 27:42 And I and again, I think it's important to rotate proteins. 27:46 So if you're only eating vegetable protein, then I think 27:49 the host of different types of legumes that you have accessible to you, 27:54 I think it's really important. 27:54 So, I eat soy, I eat soy products. 27:57 And I think that, I just got through teaching the detox module for clinicians,
Oxalates, Soy, and Food Diversity 28:03 and we include soy on that particular detoxification module 28:07 because those isoflavones are pretty potent. 28:10 Now, the only thing I want to mention 28:12 is that some people might have mixed reactions to soy. 28:16 I mean, if they're allergic, they obviously can't consume soy. 28:19 So that's something we just have to put down for all foods. 28:22 If you're allergic to a food, then no matter what, 28:24 you know you wouldn't want to consume that for for women. 28:28 Let's just take perimenopausal menopausal women for them 28:31 in order to reap the benefit of some of the 28:35 the effects of soy for perimenopause, 28:37 that requires a certain gut microbiome to effectively convert 28:43 some of those soy compounds to even more active compounds 28:47 to get the benefit for things like the heart in the bone. 28:50 So there's a compound called equal, 28:53 which can be created from the gut, microorganisms connecting 28:58 and metabolizing some of those things, and soy that can give benefits 29:02 for the skin for a number of different things. 29:04 So if somebody has again, an unhealthy gut and eats processed soy, 29:09 I wouldn't expect a very healthful result. 29:13 But if somebody is fostering a good, healthy gut, 29:16 they're eating these whole soy foods. 29:17 I think that that is that's excellent. 29:21 And again, bringing in different legumes okay. 29:24 And obviously sort of a white food in your rainbow. 29:28 You do have some white foods like cauliflower. 29:31 So we can get one more color on our rainbow. 29:34 Well, there, if we occasionally use some organic tofu, I guess Adam, 29:38 mommy gets us back to green colors, but it does nice. 29:42 Well, and when I when I talk about white, white is, you know, 29:45 somebody recently commented to me that I should have a clear in the rainbow. 29:49 And I said, well, that's actually 29:50 white in the way that I see white is that it's connected to fasting. 29:54 No food, blank slate. 29:56 It's we let go. 29:58 We have a clarification purification process. 30:01 And, you know, I grew up with a health nut mom in the 1970s. 30:05 And I remember her saying, the whiter the bread, the quicker you're dead. 30:09 And I think she got that from like Adele Davis or somebody during the 1970s. 30:13 So I always had in my mind that white foods, white flour, white sugar, 30:18 whatever it is, white salt was bad, but there are some good white foods. 30:23 And white, again, I just feel like clarifying 30:26 and purifying the body, having a little bit of fasting. 30:29 Okay, I don't know that we've talked enough 30:32 not just this interview, but with other, wonderful conversations 30:36 about the role of inflammation in creating heart disease. 30:39 The goal of lowering inflammation to halt and reverse heart disease. 30:44 I mean, what's your comments about the rainbow diet, rainbow plants, 30:49 and what impact it has on inflammation or specifically vascular 30:53 blood vessel inflammation? 30:55 Inflammation is cornerstone to so many chronic diseases, especially 30:59 heart disease, heart disease, in my mind is an inflammatory type of condition. 31:04 You know, body on fire, vessels on fire, heart on fire. 31:08 And so when we eat the rainbow, we get that balance. 31:11 I mean, you can't have inflammation if you've got all of these beautiful 31:15 whole nature based colors. 31:19 Coming in. And those phytochemicals 31:21 are putting inflammation to rest at the cellular level. 31:25 So one of the things you might be, a little surprised by this, 31:28 but I'm not going to, 31:29 I want to focus on not the foods, but the ways of cooking foods. 31:33 I think this can be very inflammatory. 31:36 So when we see grilling, broiling, and frying, 31:41 this causes inflammatory compounds to form in the food. 31:46 And when we eat those inflammatory compounds, they upregulate 31:50 inflammation in our bodies. 31:51 So sometimes we can have healthy rainbow foods 31:56 that we make inflammatory just through the cooking process. 32:00 So better methods of cooking would be steaming, poaching 32:04 just lightly, perhaps sautéing. 32:07 Although my PhD was an essential fatty acid, so it was all about fat. 32:12 And I am not a huge advocate of cooking with 32:17 large amounts of fat. 32:19 I think you damage, and it's nothing to do with, you know, being low 32:23 fat or anything. 32:24 Like it's just really you don't want to damage the oil. 32:26 Even some of these high smoke point oils. 32:28 So my preference and what I advocate to people 32:32 is when you're cooking, use water whenever you can. 32:35 Water is a great conductor of heat. 32:38 Try to refrain from the oil until after the meal is cooked. 32:42 The other thing to help with inflammation is to include spices. 32:47 As you're applying heat to the food, the spices help to offset 32:52 some of the formation of these inflammatory compounds. 32:56 So when people say, well, Deanna, I'm just not ready to change my diet, 33:00 you know, you're talking about eating the rainbow, 33:02 but I'm eating brown, yellow and white foods. 33:04 What I will suggest to them as a stepping stone is okay, 33:08 you may not want to change your foods, 33:10 but let's change how you're cooking that food. 33:12 If you're going to have bread, I don't want you to toast it. 33:15 You know, you're getting all these inflammatory markers. 33:17 I think you and I are on the same page about bacon. 33:21 I think it is. 33:22 It has like one of the highest advanced like creation and pride. 33:26 I mean eating bacon is like it's aging you right. 33:30 Because of the planetary compounds. 33:32 And you know it's also exciting. 33:34 So there's this term inflammation thing where we have the low 33:38 chronic levels of inflammation. 33:40 Maybe we don't have an injury, but we have like a 33:42 low level of inflammation that's very aging to the body. 33:45 It wears us down faster. 33:47 You probably have seen in the literature there's a new term coagulate. 33:51 Aging that inflame aging is connected 33:54 to greater degrees of coagulation, which is not good. 33:58 We don't want our blood to be clotting and have all kinds of issues with 34:02 blood flow. Right. 34:04 So coagulation, I think is a big thing. 34:06 And keeping our vessels open, having enough 34:10 you know, just even getting back to to water and adequate hydration. 34:14 So with inflammation, as you know it's a big deal. 34:17 Changing how we cook, getting more of the colors, moving away 34:21 from all of those brown, yellow and white high aging foods. 34:25 I mean, so many things we can do. 34:26 And of course, a lot of the toxins like, what do we cook in? 34:30 Are we imparting plastics? You know, 34:34 that some people are entering into the holiday season. 34:37 They're thinking about cooking their turkeys and bags and plastic, 34:40 or they go to the grocery store and they buy those, chickens or whatever 34:44 it is underneath the heat lamps in the plastic, 34:48 or buying processed foods, wraps that are wrapped in plastic. 34:53 Vegetables sometimes are even wrapped in fine plastic in the stores. 34:57 I saw that when I was in in Europe not too long ago.
Inflammation, Cooking Methods, and Advanced Glycation 35:01 All this plastic is not a good idea for our our cardiovascular system. 35:07 This is very disruptive and very inflammatory as well. 35:11 Wow. That was great. 35:12 And probably like we were on the view there for a minute when you, let it loose. 35:15 Bacon very much enjoyed that. 35:18 And just for the people I actually do think of you, I've got to say just 35:22 I know it's, you know, proven to cause cancer, 35:25 according to the World Health Organization. 35:27 And I think we could probably conclude it's proven to cause 35:30 cardiovascular disease just based on decades of, research. 35:34 But you did drop a term there that again, I want to just make sure listeners got 35:39 when you were talking about the method of cooking being inflammatory, 35:43 and then you dropped the scientific term ag advanced glycation end product. 35:49 And certainly one of the most ironic overlaps, 35:51 like I often think endothelial dysfunction is Ed and erectile dysfunction is Ed. 35:59 And the emergency room department is Ed. 36:02 So everything about damaging your vessels have a similar 36:04 but a GE aging and advanced age. 36:08 And Braddock is the technical term for why that toasted bread 36:12 is more inflammatory than under the bread, but particularly animal foods. 36:17 When you fry animal you just turn them into inflammation bombs. 36:21 Yes. I'm not suggesting people start eating boiled chicken because 36:26 despite the fact that it's, disgusting, it's also harming the environment 36:29 and not very nice to the chickens. So we'll leave. 36:32 We'll leave that off the menu. But go ahead. 36:35 But not even just the meats. 36:37 I just recently was looking at a list 36:38 I was teaching on this topic, and I showed the list of ages. 36:41 So, of course, bacon and grilled chicken and fried chicken. 36:45 They're all at the top of the wall. 36:47 You're off the charts and then you have processed 36:50 cheeses can also be high in advanced glycation end products. 36:53 And you know what else is nuts? 36:55 Now for the people that are focusing on, you know, having more vegetable sources, 37:00 roasted nuts are going to have higher ages and raw nuts. Why? 37:06 Because in that roasting process, of course, 37:09 any time you have that color change in the food that can denote 37:12 there's been damage and that damage, even though it tastes better for us 37:17 to have toast versus a piece of bread, that damage 37:20 that has been done is actually, that's very inflammatory to the body. 37:25 So even roasted nuts, I want to toss that into the mix here. 37:28 Okay. Great. Great. 37:29 That is high. Is the grilled meats okay. 37:32 If you're eating roasted nuts all day 37:34 and you're wondering why you're still inflamed, maybe. 37:36 Look at that. 37:37 Yeah, well, I can. 37:39 People struggle that my high sensitivity C-reactive protein is up, 37:44 and it's probably not intuitive that the first question is, do you fry your food? 37:48 Are you barbecuing the heck out of your foods? 37:51 Even a portabella mushroom barbecue drug, crispy B dark, has more inflammation 37:56 potential than a lightly cooked, 37:59 properly cooked portobello mushroom, as an example in the plant based world. 38:02 So this has been wonderful. 38:04 Tell us about you have a book called The Whole Detox, if I remember. 38:08 Yes, wonderful science based way to improve your body's ability 38:13 to handle the environment we live in with chemicals everywhere, right? 38:17 Yeah. 38:18 So in that book it's that is the book. 38:20 Now, the Rainbow Diet is more like a discussion manual about 38:23 like just the questions to ask yourself about your eating. 38:26 But the whole detox book is, I would say it's beyond detox, really. 38:31 It's really about the rainbow. 38:33 And it gives a 21 day program inside 38:36 with tracks to eat the rainbow. 38:40 So the first three days are red foods. 38:42 The days four through six are orange foods, 38:44 and we go to yellow foods and we go to green. 38:46 And through this whole process of exploring color and themes of the day, 38:50 it's really looking at the physical, emotional, mental 38:53 and spiritual aspects of ourselves. 38:55 And I marry the foods to things like emotions, 38:59 thought patterns, physical movement, which is so important for the heart. 39:04 In fact, I was just looking at studies 39:05 right before you and I jumped on, forest bathing. 39:09 You know, being in nature or viewing a forest 39:12 seems to have benefit for helping our nervous system to be more in balance. 39:17 So the parasympathetic and sympathetic balance, which we know 39:20 impacts the cardiovascular system, pretty profound. 39:24 That just being in nature, being in green, can change our psyche 39:30 through the smell, through the, you know, all of those aspects. 39:34 And this is why, you know, nature is healing for the heart. 39:38 I love it that you're a cardiologist, by the way, because I just 39:43 well, the heart 39:44 to me just holds are so much of our life force, right? 39:48 The heart is, 39:50 there's something special about it. 39:52 Even in traditional Chinese medicine, the heart is seen as the holder 39:55 of your destiny, the holder of your consciousness, the seat of your soul. 39:59 It's not the brain. They don't even acknowledge the.
Whole Detox, Nature, and Closing Remarks 40:02 I mean, I'm married to an acupuncturist, you know, Mark. 40:04 Right? 40:04 But, you know, what I've learned from that tradition is that there's something 40:08 really beautiful about the heart. 40:11 The heart space in terms of who we are as people. 40:14 Well, it's, and under appreciated miracle. 40:18 And we should wake up every morning and give. 40:21 Yeah. Thanks that it's continues to work. 40:24 And your great contribution through this conversation, 40:27 your books or your blogs, where can people find you? 40:31 I mean, some of your social media posts 40:33 are some of the prettiest and most creative, but, website 40:37 and your your favorite social media place to find you. 40:41 Sure. 40:41 Easiest is, my name Deannaminich.com. 40:44 And on my website, I've got all my social media handles 40:47 Instagram, Facebook, under Deanna Minich PhD, but, yeah, Instagram 40:52 I, I have some pretty pictures on Facebook, my professional page. 40:55 I have more studies. 40:57 I would say if you're looking for more of that content. 40:59 Yeah, I see a post right here on Instagram probably today. 41:03 And the science and spirituality 41:06 of the cardiovascular system, one of because I tagged you on it. 41:11 Oh. Good try. 41:12 Yeah. I thank you so much. I see that now. 41:15 But all your posts are, you know, this beautiful combination 41:18 of content and science and then art and, there aren't 41:22 too many people that have that skill and, put it all together. 41:25 So thank you for all you do. 41:27 Thank you for taking the time away from, you know, your busy schedule, 41:31 your travel schedule, and going to help a lot of people at night. 41:34 They're going to be a lot of steamers and boilers, 41:37 and we're going to cut down on the fryers and the grillers. 41:41 Okay. 41:42 That's good. Good news. 41:43 I'm glad we can contribute. Bless.
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