Aaron Hartman, MDFunctional Medicine Specialist | Clinical Researcher

Eating Habits Through The Ages

14 May 2025 · 1 min

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0:33

Excerpt from a YouTube talk by Aaron Hartman, MD, tracing historical meal frequency (late 19th century ~1.5 meals/day; ancient Spartans once/day; 1950s three meals/day) and arguing that modern continuous snacking on carbs/processed foods promotes growth of strep and yeast (candida). The speaker suggests time-restricted eating approaches (intermittent fasting or fasting-mimicking diets) can 'starve out' yeast and help with candidal/strep issues.

Questions this video answers

A meal and a half a day (approximately 1.5 meals/day).

Once a day.

By the 1950s.

Chapters

In the mid-1890s, the average American ate a meal and a half a day. The ancient Spartans ate once a day. And then by the 1950s, the whole three square meals a day. And we started snacking. And now people eat throughout the day. And this pattern of eating carbs, processed foods, grains, sugars all day long feeds strep and yeast. And so when people have candida issues, tend to have strep issues as well. Just an FYI, that's not trending, but that's just the reality. And so just changing what you eat and when you eat, that's one of the powers of interval fasting, or fasting mimicking diets is you basically starve out yeast.