Tag Archive for: nutrition

Get a Guest Pass

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Have you ever wondered what being an Insider is like? One of the benefits is our monthly conference call, and I’m giving everyone an opportunity to participate for a small fee. You’ll be able to participate two ways: you’ll be able to listen to my presentation on the nutrition topic I’ll be talking about, plus you’ll be able to send in your questions before the call just like every Insider.

This month’s topic is a review of the important nutrients over time. I’ll explain why they were so important then and why they’re still important today. I’ll end with what I believe is the most critical nutrient we all need to supplement.

After that, I’ll answer the questions submitted in advance—that gives me time to research any specific conditions. No promises of cures and such; just what nutrients may help if there are any.

You get access for only $9.95 for a wealth of knowledge. You’ll learn about the critical nutrients of today, and you’ll be able to hear answers to everyone’s questions, anonymously of course, and you’ll learn a lot from that.

InsiderGuestPass

So join me on Wednesday, August 19, 2026, at 9 p.m. Eastern Time to learn live and in person; you’ll also get an opportunity to listen during the following week.

Click on the ticket to sign up!

        Dr. Chet

Questionable Comments on Dietary Supplements

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I hope you had a chance to read the article I referred you to on Tuesday; you can still read it by clicking on this link. For the record, I’m not a fan of the AG1 product. In my opinion, supplements should not mix herbals from medicinal plants with vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals. That aside, there are three main points I alluded to in Tuesday’s Memo so let’s take a look.

Pharmaceuticals vs. Supplements

First, dietary supplements are regulated by the FDA, just not in the same way as pharmaceuticals. Here’s the difference:

  • Medicines have to prove they are safe before they are released for use by the public, but they can claim they will prevent, treat, or cure diseases.
  • Supplements cannot make such claims; they can make only structure-function claims: “This product may help digestive health,” for instance.

This “fact” as the writer proclaimed is the mantra of the American Medical Association and FDA. It seems worse now that they’re producing videos together for the general public. There’s a lot more arguments here, but that’s for another time.

So Much Beta-Carotene

The author brought up the beta-carotene and smoking studies, but I don’t understand why he didn’t question the amount of beta-carotene used in either study. The studies used four to six times the actual intake of beta-carotene at that time. These made these studies suspect because of the extreme use of beta-carotene in the studies. That’s what should be questioned.

Inadequate Nutrition

The proof was poor that he used to suggest that over 75% of the adult population get adequate vitamins and minerals from the food they eat. It was a study based on data collected via food-frequency questionnaire from specific segments of the Hawaiian and Asian populations in the mid 1990s, and I think we all know that those diets differ from the typical diet on the U.S. mainland or Europe. There are data from the 2021-2023 NHANES study available. It’s difficult to compare the data because of the way they were analyzed in the prior study, but a look at the nutrient intake from food looks more like we get 66% of the RDA, at least for some nutrients such as vitamin A, and worse for other nutrients.

Are there more problems? Yes, but that’s enough. This was a rehash of old arguments to say supplements are not necessary. But there’s one question that no one ever asks in any studies. I’ll leave you in suspense until next week when we look at what one physician said about creatine. I think you’ll be surprised.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Let’s Talk About Dietary Supplements

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I’m in a constant state of frustration over comments about the use of dietary supplements. Not by gurus and influencers; I don’t expect much from them except promotion of specific products for monetary gain. I mean the people with the credentials, with the scientific background, who say things that are simply not accurate. They seem to become bolder every time they punch letters on a keyboard. In the next four Memos, I’m going to provide you with a link to read what I’m talking about along with an overview of what stood out to me. On Saturday, I’ll give you reasons behind my frustration. But it’s not all bad.

The first was an article from one of the writers at McGill University’s Office for Science and Society. This is a well credentialed university department with this mandate: “to demystify science for the public and separate sense from nonsense.”  They go on to say they have a history of tackling fake news in the world of science well before the term “fake news” even existed. They cover everything with science behind it including diet, nutrition, and medicine.

In this article, the writer went off on a specific product you may have heard about called AG1 powder back in March of 2024. The premise of the article is that vitamins, minerals, and herbs are not necessary in the first place and certainly a not a green powder that has 75 ingredients in it. But in his criticism, the author says at least three things that are not accurate. He cites the beta carotene and smokers study, studies on vitamin K and anticoagulants, and that dietary supplements are not regulated in the US! I’ll give you my thoughts on Saturday. The link to that article is below.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/critical-thinking-health-and-nutrition/you-probably-dont-need-green-ag1-smoothie

You’ve Got Another Chance

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Did you assess your time spent investing in your health as I outlined in Tuesday’s Memo, counting up the time per day, week, or month you spend in the activities that will benefit your long-term health? How did you do? Did you think of more than the short list I provided? Did you come away disappointed with your efforts? I know that I did in some areas.

Life is giving you another chance—in fact, it’s giving you more than one. As long as you draw breath, you can always start. You don’t even have to wait until the new year; pick one thing and begin working on it today. Then, when that change becomes a habit, start on another one. You don’t have to begin everything all at once; in fact, it’s better if you try one change at a time and see how that works before adding more.

If you fail, start again. As Seth Godin said in a recent post, everyone needs more chances. But whether this is the time you actually lose the weight, lower your HbA1c, add that muscle, or whatever is important to your long-term health, taking that next chance is determined by only one thing:

What are you going to do with that chance this time?

It doesn’t matter what you haven’t done—you need to succeed only once at changing a poor health habit into a good one that you will maintain. Take that chance and do something with it this time. Next year, we all could be having completely different conversations. So, really:

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

How Much Time Did You Invest?

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As the new year approaches, it’s a good time for reflection. Regardless of your age, taking care of your body should always be a top priority, so let’s assess 2024. Here’s a series of questions—not a complete list by any means, just a place to begin. The overall question is this:

How much time do you spend each day taking care of your body?

How many minutes do you spend on aerobic exercise?

How much time in resistance exercise to maintain or gain muscle?

How much time stretching to maintain flexibility?

How much time massaging your aching muscles?

How much time do you spend cooking foods with natural nutrients?

How much time recording the foods that you eat?

How much time flossing and taking care of your teeth?

How much time caring for your skin?

How much sleep are you getting?

These are not just rhetorical questions. Spend some time thinking about it. Add other questions related to how you take care of your body or issues you’ve been having. Write down the minutes per day you spend in each one of those areas. Do it for the next three days, and you’ll see where you stand now and where you can improve.

You get out of your body what you put into it. You need to think and assess so you can identify what you need to work on in 2025.

This year’s final Insider Conference Call is tomorrow night. The main topic is going to be why research on science should never stop or slow down. This is the time to become an Insider to help you achieve your health goals in 2025. Join by 8 p.m. ET tomorrow night and you’ll be a part of the call.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Should You Put Probiotics in Your Smoothie?

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Continuing with smoothies and shakes, another popular ingredient most people want to add are probiotics, either from yogurt or a supplement. Would there be any issue with adding probiotics to smoothies? No, as far as I could find. It’s the same idea as with the digestive enzymes: the probiotic will start to do its job, which is to ferment once it’s fed. Starches, prebiotics like inulin and dextrin, and fructooligosaccharides (FOS) are the preferential foods for the microbes.

Adding fruit or vegetables to the smoothie would be adding some FOS as well as some naturally occurring fibers. Again, just like the digestive enzymes, the shake would have to be left out a long time for any reasonable fermentation to occur. One more thing: while the probiotics would have fluids and food, the one thing they would not have in a smoothie is heat. Probiotics are not likely to start fermentation when they’re closer to refrigerator temperature than internal body temperature.

And one more thing. Would putting the probiotics in a blender at high speed damage the bacteria? The answer appears to be no based on comments from scientists who do research on bacteria. Imagine slicing a mosquito with a chainsaw; the blender’s blades aren’t small enough to slice and dice the bacteria, and the heat the blades generate isn’t enough to damage a significant amount of probiotics.

The one thing that will destroy probiotics is heat over 165 degrees, so don’t put them in soup or hot drinks. More to come.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

What Do You Want to Know?

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I’m back from a weekend in Louisville where I talked to many, many people about their nutrition questions. One of the great advantages of these trips is that I know which nutrition questions are most important to people right now. So let’s talk about shakes.

I prefer chewing my food. I’ve tried shakes and smoothies, and they just don’t do it for me, but it’s become a convenient and nutritious way of life for many of you. I’ve gotten a number of questions on what you should and maybe shouldn’t put into smoothies, so let’s cover several of them as well as other questions in the next few memos.

Let’s begin with digestive enzymes. The typical digestive enzyme supplement has several different enzymes to digest food. There are proteases to digest protein, lipases to digest fats, several enzymes that can break down different classes of carbohydrates, and many also have lactases to digest lactase, the milk sugar.

What would putting digestive enzymes in smoothies do? Some enzymes require stomach acids to activate. More than likely, other enzymes would start to breakdown the nutrients they’re designed to digest. Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily, unless you leave the smoothie to sit for hours—which is exactly what you probably wanted to avoid. It may change the flavor if it sits too long but otherwise, it should be fine.

More on Saturday. And if you have any questions about nutrition or supplements, let me know and if I think it applies to lots of other people, your question could star in an upcoming Memo!

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Ice Cream, the Health Food

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Paula gave me an article to read from The Atlantic written last summer, in which author David Merritt Johns tackled the issue of outlandish results in nutrition-science studies. In this case, the issue was research demonstrating that eating ice cream regularly reduced the risk of developing type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. He interviewed the chairman of acclaimed nutrition research schools and departments. He interviewed the scientists who published the results of the studies—or not, in one case, because they wouldn’t talk about it. No one could explain it, it didn’t fit their model, so the results got buried.

I reviewed the studies in question, including the dissertation of the researchers who wouldn’t talk about the study. Any way you look at it, two servings per week of a half cup of high-fat ice cream reduced the risk of the aforementioned conditions between 12–54%. The researchers didn’t want to talk about it or acknowledge it, but the data is the data.

Five Reasons the Data Should Be Accepted

  • The assumption is that the Dietary Guidelines are correct for everyone. Maybe they aren’t.
  • The studies used a food frequency questionnaire. They’ve been used forever and are still no better than they were when developed, like trying to paint the Mona Lisa with a 6-inch brush. For example, how many servings of carrots did you have in July? Few people could answer with any accuracy, so why are we still depending on these tools?
  • They could have assessed the data differently. Divide the subjects by caloric intake first, then by foods or macronutrients. They used the same approach as I’ve talked about before and statistically added a percentage of calories to see how it would impact the results.
  • Maybe the results are just the results. It really confirmed prior studies. Why would you ignore data just because it doesn’t agree with your view of how things should be?
  • Maybe it’s time to stop parsing the imparsible. When the data tell a different story, quit trying to make it fit your theory of nutrition.

Maybe what they should have done is find out what is found in full-fat ice cream but not in high-fat milk or cream, which do contribute to CVD and T2D. Maybe it’s a microbiome issue. Stop saying it’s an outlier and find out why it appears to work.

The Bottom Line

Nobody asked me, but I think it’s portion control. Two half-cup servings per week is very different from two pints a day. That may be the real reason behind the positive results. If you want to have a couple of half-cup servings of ice cream a week, I don’t think it will harm you and just may help. Just pay attention to the portion size.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

References:
1. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:37925665
2. Arch Intern Med. 2005;165:997-1003
3. JAMA. 2002;287(16):2081-2089. doi:10.1001/jama.287.16.2081
4. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/05/ice-cream-bad-for-you-health-study/673487/

A Closer Look at Ultra-Processed Food Risk

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I think the results of the UK Biobank ultra-processed food (UPF) study were interesting, as I relayed on Tuesday, but the researchers went further. They estimated how substituting non-UPF plant-sourced foods for any of the other three sources of food resulted in a reduction of cardiovascular disease (CVD) morbidity and mortality. Further, and what got the headlines, substituting UPF plant-sourced foods for any of the other three increased the risk of CVD morbidity and mortality.

That led some experts to speculate about how processing destroyed fiber and phytonutrients and may even increase the amounts of negative chemicals that have been associated with disease in UPF plant-sourced foods. The problem is that there are no randomized-controlled trials to prove that. Here are a few things that stood out to me.

Theoretically…

The most important issue was this: The determination made about UPF increasing or decreasing the risk of CVD was theoretical and based on calculations. They used a 10% substitution for the non-UPF or UPF plant-sourced foods to calculate the expected raising or lowering of risk. What they could have done was divide the subjects into actual groups based on percentage of nutrients they actually ate instead of running theoretical statistical formulae. My impression is that so few people were diagnosed or died from CVD during the nine-year observational period that they wouldn’t have enough subjects for each group.

So few subjects were diagnosed or died? In the entire subject population—over 118,000 subjects followed for nine years—there were only 7,806 people diagnosed with CVD and only 529 deaths from CVD. Only? Most of the subjects were between 40 and 70, prime time for being diagnosed with some form of CVD.

When looking at the percentage of UPF-plant-sourced foods, the highest percentages were from industrialized packaged breads (9.9%),

pastries, buns, and cakes (6.9%) and biscuits (the kind called cookies in the U.S.) at 3.9%. That’s over half the amount of UPF-plant based foods on the list provided in the research paper. While wheat and other grains were certainly stripped of nutrients in the ultra-processing, that’s nothing new—that’s been happening to flour for over 100 years. What was missing were any fruits or vegetables processed in that manner.

The Bottom Line

Should you take the corn chips and vegan burgers out of your cart? Don’t get the impression that I think UPF plant-based foods should be eaten in mass quantities. I don’t. But I don’t think this study provided much direction in a reasonable response to the issue. On top of that, the analysis of the data may be just plain wrong. We’re not done yet, but we’ll get to that after the 4th of July. One more holiday challenge coming up on Tuesday.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanepe.2024.100948


Is Ultra-Processed Food Worthless?

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Ultra-processed food (UPF) has been in the news again: researchers have found a relationship between plant-based UPF and cardiovascular disease (CVD) and mortality. Health news writers were brimming with opinions on what the study meant. The comment that got my attention was that UPF manufacturing destroyed good nutrients found in plant foods to the point that there was no benefit to eating them. For example, store-bought cereals and cookies are worthless no matter how much fruit or nuts are added.

Is that true?

Let’s begin by looking at the study. Researchers used data from the UK Biobank database. They selected only the participants who completed at least two 24-hour dietary recalls—118,397 subjects. All participants were part of the healthcare system in the UK, so the researchers were able to collect diagnostic and mortality data from electronic medical records.

Researchers divided the dietary data into four groups:

  • Non-UPF plant-sourced foods (fresh grapes or canned corn)
  • UPF plant-sourced foods (corn chips or vegan burgers)
  • Non-UPF animal-sourced foods (ground beef or canned tuna)
  • UPF animal-sourced foods (chicken nuggets or ice cream)

The two main findings were that the more UPF plant-sourced foods were eaten, the higher the risk of CVD and CVD mortality; second, the increase of non-UPF plant-sourced foods reduced the risk of CVD and mortality. I think those results were to be expected. In Saturday’s Memo, we’ll take a closer look at whether the expert diatribes about negating the benefits of UPF-plant-sourced foods were warranted.

Don’t forget that the Men’s Health Webinar is this Wednesday evening. If you want to participate, respond by tonight to get the login information. The live webinar is free.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lanepe.2024.100948