"Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.”- Malcom Forbes
Housekeeping
The scars are completely healed on the top of my head so I'm back to a clean-shaven melon. Or as my wife puts it, "either grow it out or shave it, no chia pets".
Tip and Video of the Week
We're going to kill two birds with one stone this week. The tip and the video are all in one place.
We all enter into this gut health game for different reasons. The overwhelming subject I'm asked about most often is weight loss. That's usually right after I get the "are you sick again?" question.
While it's flattering (I think), it's an indictment of how large I was.
I even get the occasional "I liked you better heavier". I usually tell them sorry, but I like the green side of the dirt better!
Dr. Ted Naiman
I focused on two specific areas when I started this gut journey, fermented foods and fiber. The latter, fiber, provides plenty of health benefits as we've discussed here a lot.
None more important to weight loss than satiety.
Satiety is the "full" feeling you get from your body's hormones after eating and let's face it, losing weight is a lot easier when you're not battling raging hunger.
Fiber is very satiating, but protein ranks higher.
There are a couple reasons why I've been interested by Dr. Ted Naiman and his take on eating for health and specifically weight management.
In the diet world today, there are two polar opposites with 100% meat eaters on one end and 100% plant-based eaters on the other. If you listen to hardcore subscribers on either end, you'll probably hear emphatically that their diet is the best diet.
The technical terms for the two polar opposites are carnivores (meat eaters) and herbivores (plant eaters). Residing in the middle are the omnivores, people who eat both plants and meat.
The first reason why I find Dr. Naiman compelling is because he's spent time on both ends of the spectrum. I find it extremely helpful when you can find a range of information from one source.
Afterall, I believe the most precious commodity is time.
Ted wrote a book a few years back called The P:E Diet. In the spirit of transparency, I have not read the book.
But I have listened to many podcasts and watched many of his interviews discussing this concept.
In a very crude summary, the P:E diet basically lays out his philosophy on the relationship between Protein and Energy. Energy in this case refers to the calorie density of food, with high energy being high calorie and low being low calorie.
Prioritizing higher protein with lower density foods is what unleashes a cascading tranche of benefits. Essentially, lean protein coupled with lower carbohydrate, fiber-filled foods is a combination that can be quite healthy.
It's also important to note that regardless of where you are in the spectrum, the relationship between protein and energy can apply to both plant and meat eaters. The only difference is the source of protein from plants or meat.
Ted is in the omnivore crowd, so you'll hear lean animal protein discussed.
The second reason I like this guy is because he has evolved in his approach to eating over the years. He discusses both being raised largely vegetarian and mentions his time on the "keto/carnivore" diet.
Depending on how old his video or interview is, you'll see the older stuff leaning on the "keto" side of life. More recently he has seemed to migrate toward a position of more lean protein and adding more fiber with less saturated fat.
There is a little bit of everything for everyone in his approach. We'll save the plant protein vs. animal-based protein discussion for another time.
He also dives into an easy way to understand the relationship between energy storage in fat cells, blood sugar, insulin, and how the way we eat impacts all of this.
This is yet another case, and there have been many, when I read something that makes total sense to me. And it actually explains in much better detail why my own habits have seen successes and some shortcomings, especially in the battle royale of blood sugar management.
How is this relevant to gut health?
The lower density foods are full of fiber. All the gut health benefits of fiber are present in the P:E Diet, along with the added benefits of blood sugar management, cholesterol, weight management/ loss, etc.
He's a compelling listen and you can find one of his better interviews here.
Read of the Week
In keeping with the topic of protein, here's an interesting article on the relationship between protein AND fiber.
A quick summary of the article is that the combination of protein AND fiber changes gut microbiome composition in a way that is different from just fiber alone.
This ratio/ relationship between protein and fiber fostered a gut microbiome environment where fiber-degrading abilties were increased.
Thereby short-chain fatty acid (SCFA) production was increased.
And we love our SCFA's for keeping the gut barrier strong.
Wrap Up
Learning never stops. I'm approaching 5 years on this journey and while I have enjoyed much success, there is still so much more to learn. My goal is to relay my experiences and learning to you so we can collectively improve our health and save that precious commodity of time.
Thanks for reading,
Jeff
