#1 Absolute SUPER FOOD For Your HEART Is...

Hello, L champions. Today we're going to talk about the number one absolute best food for your heart. So I came across this list that has things on it like leafy greens and berries, whole grain, fish, nuts and seeds, fruit, garlic, olive oil, legumes and tea. So we're going to talk about these different things and we're going to try to iron out what to think about and if one of these would be the number one absolute best food for your heart. Now the problem with trying to pick one thing out of a group of good things where some may be good and some may be bad is that all of a sudden we think that this one thing has some magic ingredient that it has some incredible medicinal properties that it can magically heal and this whole thing comes from a medical mindset where we think that we can take this thing whether it's a medication or an herb or a food or a supplement and we take that for that condition for this symptom and it just doesn't work like that. That's still symptom treatment and we're still stuck in that medical mindset which is so hard to break out of because we've been trained in that thinking and it's the most common problem in my comments in the clinic. It's the hardest thing for people to break out of and stop thinking in terms of take this for that and instead start asking what helps the body, what does the body need to have and what interferes with the body. So we want to think about there is an upside to things the body needs but more than that it's about avoiding the downside of the things that interfere and screw things up. So when we go to a doctor typically we expect to get a pill and that's all part of this mindset and the problem with this thinking is also that whenever we just want a list we want a top 10 list we want a bullet point list and everyone in the comment sections they always there's always someone who writes a list but what happens then is we never get the full picture. We stop thinking and people are looking for quick fixes they're looking for shortcuts and what we have to understand is about health that the body is self healing and we shouldn't have to worry about hardly anything. The problem is that we have changed our environment we've changed the food so it's not the same anymore and that's why we need to have a little bit broader understanding of how the body works and what the foods do to us. So the real questions when figuring out this list is first of all do no harm because you can't take a pill you can't take a supplement of some sort to make up for the damage that something else does. So it's more about avoiding the bad stuff and then if we're talking about a food does this provide substantial calories because some of these herbs and things that people think are oh these are great foods like tea well it's not really a food because you can't live off of it and some other items it's not just is it good or bad because a little bit might be good and a lot of it might be really bad and when we pick number one best then we automatically fall into the idea that more is better and I'm saying this because I see the comments that I get on my videos I'm really trying to clarify this and another thing would be is it possible to overeat this food because a little bit might be okay but if a lot tends to make us overeat then it's not so good so if food should be pretty much self limiting it should be so filling that we are not tempted to overeat and another really important question when we ask about food being good or bad is good for whom and what we need to understand is people fall on a spectrum it's not that one food is good for everybody or that food is black or white it's that depending on where we are on a metabolic spectrum there's a gradient here so here we might be insulin sensitive here we might have a type 2 diabetic over here we might have a 25 year old and here might be a 70 year old here we might have someone who is super sedentary and here's someone who runs a 10k every day these people the food that is good for them is completely different so we can't just simplify it and ask what is the best food so we want to weigh all of these factors in as we talk about this so let's start out with whole grains and they're different types of grains but one would be the modern wheat which is the vast majority of what's being consumed in terms of grains and I would put a big red X that's not something that anybody should really eat it causes insulin resistance it causes cardiovascular disease so if you talk about a food that would be the best food for your heart well I don't think we can make any sort of case for modern wheat being on that list now there's a different story with ancient grains before we started messing with them then now we could have a whole range of of responses where it might be okay for some and not so great for others so these would be things like iron corn, emmer, spelled, commute, rye, oats and barley these are all ancient grains that we haven't messed with so if it's good or bad now depends on where you are on that metabolic spectrum if you're a type two diabetic if you're very metabolically unhealthy then it would be a big red X this food will make you sicker there's nothing good about it for you whereas if you are very insulin sensitive you have a good digestion you're active then you could probably have moderate amounts of these grains not 60% of your calories but you could have a certain amount several times a week and still be fine so on the good side we need to understand that grains are very inexpensive they're easy to produce it's one of the greatest staples without grains we would not have been able to develop the world and society into what it is today so that's on the upside on the downside we can say that it may be okay for some but if we're going to talk about the necessity then there is no real need we cannot make a case that this would be good for the heart or that you should eat this if you want be healthy etc so when we try to make a case if it's best food for the heart and if it belongs on a list then the answer would be absolutely no next we have legumes and this is a huge range of foods also so legumes could be something like a green bean that I think would be totally fine for almost everybody then we have things like a huge staple which is lentils and again just like we talked about with the grains if you're type 2 diabetic then it's probably not so great if you are insulin sensitive metabolic healthy then we know that it's a staple that helps feed a lot of people and they don't really get in trouble then black beans would be the exact same situation now when we get into soybeans I think it's a different story and I would put a big red X on it maybe a question mark if you make tofu out of it but soy beans is one of the most common allergies it's very difficult to digest for most people especially the way they process it and include it as filler protein in almost every product it's difficult to digest unless you turn it into tofu now it's much much better and all the traditional cultures in Asia that eat a lot of soy they typically eat it as tofu or some other prepared or fermented form of soybeans and if you do eat the tofu which is very popular as a protein source for vegetarians then I would strongly suggest that you get the organic version because if it's not organic then you're pretty much guaranteed that it's a GMO food nuts and seeds I think are a great food I eat nuts and seeds on a regular basis however they are very high in omega-6s we're going to give them a question mark there so to hear it's all about quantity if you have a little bit of seeds or little bit of nuts here and there maybe 10% of your calories then I think that should be fine and I just pick that number out of thin air I don't really know what that number would be but just to give you an idea as long as you don't turn it into a staple if you think oh nuts and seeds they get a green check I can should eat as much as possible no now you're kind of unbalancing things again so I don't believe it's a staple I think it's a great food to have as a snack here and there and next we have fruits so fruits tend to be some sort of holy grail we always told to eat more fruits and vegetables more fruits and vegetables so every time I talk about it I get attacked but it's one of these things where it's good for some and not so great for others and it has everything to do with where you are on the metabolic spectrum and how much you eat so if you have type 2 diabetes I would suggest that you eat no fruit or it's extremely small amounts very rarely. If you are insulin sensitive then I think that you could have some fruit. I think you can have one or two fruits most days. I don't think necessarily the fruit is something you eat the same stuff 365 days a year because that's not how our ancestors ever had it. It's only because of modern agriculture and production that we have that luxury and I don't think that's how it was intended. And we also have to understand that berries even though they're typically in the same category lumped together I think berries are quite different and it's much much more difficult to overeat berries. So I think even as a type 2 diabetic I think you can have some berries and I think that you're all okay to eat almost unlimited berries if you're insulin sensitive. It's very difficult to overeat. Compared to most sweet, fleshy fruit it has much less sugar and more fiber. So I would say you could probably eat three to four times more berries in most cases than you can fruit and get the same amount of blood sugar impact. Next on the list was garlic which I think is totally fine. I think it's an awesome herb. I love garlic. I put it in tons of foods and the problem here is again when people put it on the list they think in medicinal terms. They think it has some magical properties that are going to undo all the damage that they've done over the years and continue to do. And again that's not how it works. Plus garlic is an herb or a spice. It's something that you eat in relatively small quantities so it's not a food in that sense because it's not a staple. And then I know someone's going to tell me that well you don't know how much garlic I eat. In my case it probably is a staple so that might be the exception. Same thing with tea. It's great. It has some flavonoids. It has some phenolics. It has some plant properties, some phytonutrients in it. They're probably good. I can probably help fight off something which is great. So we put a check mark on it but you don't want to expect miracles. It's still not a food. You can't drink a bunch of tea and start undoing. It's part of good things that you can consume but again don't think of it as having any miraculous properties. With fish we also put a big green check mark. I think fish is great. If you eat the fatty fish especially now you get some of these essential fatty acids that are fantastic for your heart and your brain especially if you're deficient. So again what we want to understand is these are not going to undo a bunch of bad habits. What they will undo is if you're deficient and you have health problems then taking more of these will make you sufficient and some of those problems will go away. It also helps normalize inflammation. It's not anti-inflammatory per se but what happens is when you eat more omega-3s then the ratio to omega-6 improves and most people eat way way way too much omega-6s and that's why they're pushing their bodies toward inflammation. Increasing omega-3s will help improve that ratio but you also need to decrease the omega-6s which will come back to a little bit. Fish also has fantastic protein. It is just as good as meat or most animal products. So it's a full value protein and it is very very difficult to overeat fish. It's not like ice cream. You have one bite and you just keep going back for more until the container is gone. Fish you get full, you're satisfied, you're done and that's how it should be with a good whole food. Now the only thing we want to keep in mind is that a lot of fish produced today is farmed fish and they don't have good conditions. They don't feed them right. They give them hormones and artificial colors and they get mold and parasite infections and so forth. So do the wild caught as much as you can. Let me put that in perspective though. So when I say that it doesn't make farmed fish the worst food in the world. So if you're in a restaurant and you're choosing between French fries and salmon then the salmon is far superior. It's just when we're trying to nitpick a little bit we want to understand that it can be a problem with the farm fish but again you need to get the bigger picture. It doesn't make it. So if I'm in a restaurant and there's nothing else really that I'd like to have I would certainly eat fish even if it's farm but when I can I would seek out the wild. And the other problem with fish is that they live in the ocean and the ocean has been heavily polluted with mercury and other heavy metals and PCBs and so forth. So you want to look for the smaller and younger fish. So the large predatory fish like swordfish and tuna are generally much much higher in mercury whereas the flatfish and the whitefish and salmon and sardines and small macro are going to be fairly low in mercury. And then on the list they also had olive oil. So what do we need to know about olive oil? First of all it's mono unsaturated. So it's liquid but it only has one double bond mono unsaturated unsaturated one time which makes it very stable. It's shelf stable. It's difficult to oxidize it and make it bad, make it rancid. It has about 20 different polyphenols so it has certain phytonutrients that can help the body in terms of of inflammation. It also has some vitamin E and some chlorophyll and these are good things for health in general. Again don't think of it as a miracle of any sort. Very often people say that when you eat a lot of olive oil then it's anti-inflammatory. That people on a Mediterranean diet consume a lot of olive oil. It's more anti-inflammatory and it's not really anti-inflammatory. It's just that the other diet is more inflammatory. So this is just normal. It's just neutral in that regard. And what it is is it's natural and it's clean and it's stable like we said. It can sit on the counter. It doesn't need refrigeration. It can sit for months and it doesn't really go bad. And it also is filling. So when we eat it it doesn't stimulate blood sugar. It doesn't give us cravings. It just makes us very satisfied when we eat it together with other foods like vegetables or fish etc. And here's what I find really interesting about olive oil because every year they vote for the best diet and the Mediterranean diet is always top three. It's like we know Mediterranean olive oil it's great. You should eat tons and tons of olive oil. It's the preferred oil. So you would think by now that we're eating some olive oil in this country. Well in the United States we consume one average under one liter of olive oil per person per year. It is almost nothing. In Italy they consume 11 liters in Spain, 12 liters. So obviously these are all Mediterranean countries. In Greece they consume 24 liters and in Crete which has been called the origin of the Mediterranean diet or the original real Mediterranean diet. They eat 30 liters of olive oil every year per person. So that's about six tablespoons per day. It is up to a third of the calories consumed in the entire country. And then by contrast we have the United States where we consume 42 liters of soybean oil. So in a country where we're always told how great the Mediterranean diet is and how great olive oil is and we basically don't consume any. So is there any wonder where in Crete they have some of the lowest rates of heart disease anywhere and obviously in the US we have some of the highest rates. So maybe it's time to understand where some of those problems are coming from and start eating some more olive oil. So I named olive oil the number one best food for your heart. And again I do that reluctantly because there's no such thing as the best food. It's all a good food among many other foods. But if we had to pick one I would be okay making that olive oil. Now again it doesn't have any mirror properties. It's simply good because fat is good food. Fat is good for you as long as it's good fat. As long as humans haven't put it in a lab, haven't screwed it up with high heat and chemicals and high pressure and cleaning and degaming and deodorizing and hydrogenation, etc., olive oil comes from olives. They're very, very easy to get the oil out of it. When you do what's called extra virgin olive oil, that's the first cold pressing that just apply a little pressure and out comes the oil. In that sense, it's basically a whole food. I know that the whole food is olives and olive oil is somewhat processed, but because they do it so gently and because the olive oil doesn't have any other properties of processed foods such as increasing blood sugar or creating cravings or anything like that, in that sense olive oil is still a whole food. And I believe that olive oil should be considered a staple. I sometimes cringe or sometimes laugh when people say, "Oh, I can't afford to eat healthy." And they keep eating fast foods and the processed and the packaged food. Well, let me just put some numbers on this. Olive oil where I get it. I know there's different prices, different places, but it is extremely inexpensive. You can buy two liters of olive oil under $20. That means it's about $1.20, $1.20 for 1,000 calories. So if you eat 2,000 calories and a third of it comes from olive oil, you can get a third of your calories under a dollar. It doesn't get much cheaper than that. So it's more about educating ourselves and being willing to learn about food and willing to experiment and learn how to cook a little bit than actually that food is so expensive. And what I'm really trying to get across in this video is we have to stop thinking about food as medicine, as some sort of miracle that's going to do something. Good food just gives us what we need to have and bad food doesn't. So it's not about the upside of what it does as much as what the downside is taking away from us. And the biggest advantage of good food like olive oil is that it replaces junk. The more of it that you eat of the good stuff, the less you're going to eat of something else. So if you eat more olive oil, you're going to eat less soybean oil. You're going to eat less sugar, less white bread, because you're going to be full from something else already. You're going to eat less processed foods. If you enjoyed this video, you're going to love that one. 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