Divine & Healthy Organic Sweet Chocolate without Sugar with Sakiko Reuterskiöld

Hello, lovely listeners.

I'm your host, Claudia von Boeselager, and welcome to the Longevity and Lifestyle Podcast, where I invite pioneers and thought leaders in all things longevity and lifestyle to give you the strategies, tools, and practices to live better and reach your highest potential. Today's guest is Sakiko Reuterskjöld, founder and CEO of NoMoSu, No More Sugar. NoMoSu, the honestly sugar-free and organic brand. Sakiko is a Japanese-Swedish graduate of the University of Cambridge who has a background in investment management and completed a 3-year master's in science in personalized nutrition based on functional medicine. Sakiko is passionate about creating genuinely healthy food products and believes one needs to study and research deeply into food biochemistry, metabolic science, longevity, and functional medicine to have the capacity to create truly health-enhancing food products. Brought up by gourmet parents who exposed her to delicious food experiences, Sakiko was determined that Nomosu's products taste as good or better than sugar-filled equivalents. After much research and development and blind tasting trials with chocolatiers and pastry chefs, she's super pleased to share Nomosu's line of products, objectively delicious chocolates. In this episode, we dig into urban myths and fake news about sweet ingredients, the latest research on taste receptors, metabolism, and microbiota, evidence-based metabolic health impacts of the most commonly used sweeteners, which natural ingredients are not sucrose-fructose and are health-neutral or even health-enhancing, the single sweetener that will finally replace sugar as a healthy alternative, and much more. Before we begin, please hit subscribe to the podcast to get your weekly dose of longevity and lifestyle inspiration. I'd also love to hear from you, dear listeners, so please leave comment below, or you can reach out to me on Instagram @longevityandlifestyle. Please enjoy.

Welcome back to the Longevity and Lifestyle podcast, Sakiko. It's such a pleasure to welcome you back today for round 2.

Thank you so much for having me. I really enjoy speaking with you, so I'm really happy to be here.

Thank you, Sakiko. I'd love to start with, and by way of recap for those who have heard our first round 1 interview, but perhaps for those who haven't heard it yet, Can you talk about how you became so passionate about health and nutrition and learning about the impact of sugar?

Yeah, so I went through my own health issues, as many of us do, who then become passionate. Just nothing really major, actually. I started increasing my intake of sugar sort of inadvertently, and I noticed that I was having severe brain fog in the mid-mornings and mid-afternoons, and also my skin wasn't as nice as it used to be, and I couldn't really pinpoint what it was until a personal trainer I was lucky to work with a bit, he looked at my food log and saw that I was having large amounts of sugar. And I didn't believe him. I was like, what do you mean? I don't eat, you know, table sugar in my tea or anything. But it was actually in the form of dried fruits, low-fat yogurts, inevitably sweetened with sugar, and just a large quantity of fruit. And dried fruit was the main source. And so I did this experiment where I just said, okay, I want to go completely cold turkey for 3 weeks., and I took out all sugar from my diet, including fruit. And I never felt better in my whole life. And that was because my whole life, every single day of my life, I had some sugar intake, as most of us do. And it was a complete revelation because I didn't realize it was possible to feel such high sustained energy and frankly, joy every day. It was crazy what a difference it made. And I just had some more protein, some more fiber and fats, and it was fine. And it was actually quite easy to do the switch. Until I got a bit sad because I did miss having chocolate. And I grew up in Belgium, you know, chocolate is like staple and things like that. So I then went after work, I was working in finance, but I went to the British Library and researched all about sugar, about sweet ingredients and so on. And then I realized, oh, sugar, unlike what I previously thought, that it was just empty calories, is actually actively, proactively toxic. So that was a big shock because I just thought, you know, empty calories, sugar. And so, and so I, it was confirmed that I should be avoiding sugar. But then I discovered that there are a few sweet ingredients that are natural and actually neutral or beneficial to health. It's just not so easy to use them cuz they're not like a one-for-one replacement for sugar on their own, which we can talk about later. But there are a few that are healthy. And then I went through all the artificial ones as well and I had an open mind, but one by one I crossed them out because they were not healthy. And then I decided I needed more fundamental training to really understand all this, which is why I did my master's in science, 4 years of that in personalized nutrition and functional medicine. And I wrote my dissertation on the pathophysiological mechanisms by which excess fructose in the diet can lead to atherosclerosis, which is basically cardiovascular disease. And yeah, so that's how I became obsessed about this.

Yeah. Why did you decide to focus on fructose for your dissertation?

Well, I kept trying to come to the root cause of everything that I was looking at, the root cause of the poor skin that I had at the time that was completely transformed. And I couldn't really figure it out until I started studying. And I realized that really, it sounds simple, but such a major root cause of not only aging skin and so on, but chronic diseases as a whole is excess fructose in the diet that we didn't evolve to be in this environment where so many food items have so much sugar in them. And half of the sugar is fructose. So that's why I really came to fructose. And the reason I focused on cardiovascular disease is because it still is the number one killer of all human beings on earth by far.

So yeah. Yeah. And it's so relevant and topical. So you really found the perfect thing. I mentioned offline to you before I had a conversation with Dr. Pellman, who's bringing out this book, Drop Acid, and it's about uric acid and as the underlying fundamental driver. That when uric acid levels are too high in the body, that's a fundamental driver for various chronic diseases. Yes. And one of the main drivers of high uric acid levels is fructose as well. So, so topical and so important. And maybe just for listeners that are not that familiar and aware, I mean, we're taught really, you know, fruit is good for you, right? And there are different types of sugars. Could you break down for people interested just what are the different sugar groups and why fructose in particular is so toxic.

Yeah. So I think the word sugar is really abused, and it's really unfortunate because it's hard for people to understand what anyone was talking about on the same level. So many people say sugar when they mean carbohydrates, and carbohydrates is an enormous category. It includes broccoli, it includes like a ripe banana, it includes, you know, so many things. So carbohydrates just means like there are carbons, hydrogens, and oxygens in the thing, you know. So it's not sugar. So I like to define sugar as what we normally think of sugar, which is sucrose, which is a disaccharide, just means it has two parts to it. One is glucose and one is fructose, and it's tied together in a bond. That's sucrose. That's table sugar, that's coconut sugar, cane sugar, et cetera. And in all these sort of different alternatives to use in your baking that are natural, but they're all still forms of sugar, you have varying amounts of glucose and fructose free floating around and bonded together in sucrose. So that's, you know, coconut sugar, maple syrup, honey, dates, agave syrup. All of these have— basically, they're made of the same things, just in slightly different ratios: glucose and fructose. And so glucose is found in all carbohydrates, and it's like the blood— when we talk about blood sugar, we talk about blood glucose because that is the relevant sugar in the blood that we use to create energy. And it really is part of energy metabolism. We need glucose to make energy. And in fact, it's so important to have a certain level of glucose in the blood that even when you're not eating, your body will take it from glycogen and basically create more glucose to regulate that blood glucose in a very tight range. And then, so fructose is this other part of the sugar molecule, and that is what makes sugar sweet. So if you had no fructose in table sugar, it wouldn't taste very sweet at all. So you can really tell if something has fructose in it by the sweetness level, if you're not talking about artificial or natural non-sugar sweeteners. So like if you have a banana that's green, it's gonna have less fructose than a banana banana that's brown, which has formed more fructose. So you can really tell by your taste. And the problem with fructose is there's some fascinating research. The main researcher who has helped to uncover all of this, his name's Rick Johnson, and him and with evolutionary biologists and geneticists and so on have identified that this was an advantage to us. So basically fructose is a fat storage molecule. So whereas glucose, we use it for energy, and then if we have too much, we store it. But fructose is like really shunting and upregulating the fat storage pathway. And this was useful to us when we were in periods— well, not even Homo sapiens, but our ancestors— that they didn't have, you know, access to lots of food all year round. And as the apes sort of migrated towards Europe when there was a land bridge formed, basically it was colder climates and they had no like food during the winter. And they were actually fruitarians, like they naturally just— that was their diet. And so when they got Further north, there was less fruit in the winter. So something happened genetically, which is basically the enzyme called uricase, which breaks down uric acid— there was a mutation so that we no longer have that enzyme, our species. And that was a benefit then because that meant that uric acid levels could go really high in the autumn. They were like gorging on loads of ripe fruit. That allowed them to exponentially like multiply their fat storage capacity. Which was a great thing then because then they could survive the long winters with extra fat. And in fact, that might be a key to why they were able to survive. So it was great back then. But you've got this like mega superpower of being able to store fat really quickly from fructose via this uric acid pathway. And now we're surrounded by fructose and we've still got this lack of this enzyme. So our uric acid levels can still go up really high. Which is not the case in some of the laboratory animals where they do testing on fructose. So in the laboratory animals, they already see, you know, lots of negative research results from having excess fructose, but it's even worse for humans because we don't have the uricase enzyme. So yeah, that's another thing to keep in mind when looking at research results and stuff. And then the elevation of this uric acid, okay, it makes you store fat, but it also has other consequences. So it has a basically a cascade of metabolic effects that leads directly to insulin resistance, storage of fat, as I mentioned, and basically diabetes eventually, metabolic syndrome, and hypertension. So blood pressure increases.

So it's really so detrimental. I think, I mean, we discussed it before, but also for people wondering, I mean, do you just then stop eating fruit? Is that what you do, or what's the right amount? And obviously, you know, even on things like the keto diet, you can have some organic blueberries or berries, they're lower glycemic index. But what would you say is the sort of recommendation around avoiding fructose?

You have a great detector in your mouth. You can tell how much fructose is in the thing you're eating. You know, nowadays we have like this fruit that has been crossbred and crossbred and crossbred to create super sweet blackberries or something like that. So, you know, maybe go for the organic, like farmers market tart blackberries and definitely berries like the, cost benefit, you know, is they're really high in very healthy polyphenols, vitamins, and so on, and pretty low in fructose usually. Whereas mango, pineapples, you know, ripe bananas, you can tell that they're quite high in fructose. Grapes, almost no fiber, pure sugar. So that's how a handful of berries I think is totally harmless, like, but it's not fundamentally necessary for survival either.

Yeah. Yeah. And then from our first conversation, obviously fruit juice, which I think is such an important thing because that's what so many of us are giving to our kids, right? Is pure fruit juice, which is just such high levels of fructose.

Yeah. And I think we talked about that last time, how like some easy low-hanging fruit— sorry for the pun— but is like, if you want to lower your damage of sugar, is don't drink it. Like liquid is the worst because it really accelerates all the things I just mentioned. And being metabolized by the liver, accumulating liver fat, etc., etc. Like having that big amount in one go in a liquid form is much worse than having it like as a dessert in a cake after a high-fiber meal, for example.

Yeah, no, that's pretty helpful advice. Sakiko, what are the main urban myths or fake news regarding sweet ingredients, and why do you think there's so much confusion about sweet ingredients, artificial or natural?

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, there's politics, there's business interests, there's all these things that have, you know, been able to infiltrate what the science actually says. So basically, there are different types of sweet ingredients. Some of them are metabolized as energy, and some of them are what they call non-nutritive or non-caloric sweeteners. So one of the big urban myths is that, oh, if we have a zero-calorie drink that is sweetened with a sweetener that doesn't have calories, so it's not metabolized, then it'll trick your brain into thinking you're getting energy. Then when it doesn't, it gets really upset. And it's like, none of this is like explained metabolically. None of it's been researched or demonstrated in any way. So you really have to look at each artificial sweetener, each natural sweetener. What is its biochemistry? What is its metabolic pathway? And what are the downstream effects of it? And so there have been no studies showing that that is an issue for these non-caloric sweeteners. I have an issue by reading all the research with the artificial sweeteners for different reasons, but not for that reason, which is some kind of urban myth. I think there's this saying, I think it was Kennedy or someone who said, the people like the convenience of opinion without the inconvenience of thought. And I really think that's true when it comes to this. But people also find it difficult, of course, to make decisions about what to eat. And it's much easier to sort of categorize and compartmentalize and generalize rather than like looking at the research and understanding metabolic pathways and all of that. So I hope I can help to share more.

Yeah. I'd love to— maybe later you can talk about some of your top tips of sweet food if people are looking for some suggestions, because not everyone is so keen to read food labels and then look at what they exactly mean. Sakiko, what are the evidence-based metabolic and health impacts of each of the most commonly used sweeteners?

So the artificial and natural. Yeah. Okay. So I'll just start with the artificial sweeteners and just like taking a step back. This is my personal perspective is I assume that if it's not found in nature at all and we didn't evolve with it, there's a higher risk that it's not going to sit well with us. But I still was open-minded and went through the research on each artificial sweetener to understand. And so like one of the most common ones is maltitol, which is used in many sugar-free snack bars and biscuits and chocolates. And maltitol is actually very great for the food companies. In fact, it's funny because the way you research these things is you research like from a health perspective, the metabolic journals and so on, and then there's the food science journals, you know, which are all about like how to make, you know, more palatable food, and it helps the food industry. And when you look at both of them, it's really fascinating. And like where I first discovered maltitol's metabolic pathway, I couldn't find it on Google or Wikipedia at the time. This was years ago, but in a food science journal, they really discussed in depth, like, this is fantastic. It tastes like sugar. It has the same functionality, it has the same effects in baking and blah, blah, blah. And I was like, wow, it sounds a lot like sugar. And but on the label, it's sugar-free, but inside the body, it breaks down into glucose and sorbitol, which is then broken down into glucose and fructose. So remember when we talked about sucrose, it's glucose and fructose. So outside the body, not sugar, inside the body, sugar.

Wow.

And not only sugar inside the body, but the steps, the pathway that it takes to create the fructose from sorbitol, that creates a lot of reactive oxygen species in that process. So yeah, not good, not helpful for people wanting to avoid sugar for health reasons. So that's the main problem with maltitol. Isomalt is another one which is very similar to maltitol. It also breaks down into glucose and fructose, essentially.

Would you find that on food packaging?

Oh yeah, in some snack bars or chewing gums, often chewing gums, you'll see it. Yeah. And then there's sorbitol, which I just kind of spoke about because that's one of the breakdown steps of maltitol, which eventually becomes fructose as well. And we don't have to go through the fructose issues again, but it Basically, this pathway has directly been shown to cause inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, aging, creation of advanced glycation end products, diabetic complications as well, nephropathy. So sorbitol also not good, but it's kind of like the same category as this. And then you have ACK, which is very, very, very sweet and has a bitterness. So it's often combined with other artificial sweeteners, often in soft drinks and diet drinks. And it's shown that through epigenetic changes that it does increase weight gain over time in animal studies. And it also increases the endotoxin lipopolysaccharides, LPS, which is a toxin that's produced in the body. And also that there are some studies that show that it has some kind of effects on cognitive impairment by altering neuro metabolic functions. And this is in mice, but it could be via the fact that it does trigger inflammatory cytokines through these elevation in LPS and this bacterial toxin called virulence factor. Also stimulates incretins, which lead to increased insulin. So all of that stuff is not good.

And so that's what's found in like diet sodas, like diet Coke, diet Sprite.

Okay. Yeah. You often see ACK or aspartame, which like many, many studies have been done, but most of them are done in mice, which actually hydroxylate aspartame 5 times as fast as humans. That means like you test like the equivalent proportional amount that a human would have in a mouse. It's not really equivalent because they can deal with it like 5 times faster than we can. So unfortunately, there are a lot of studies like that, so that's not very helpful. But even at the like average daily intake that they calculate a human might take, it's shown that it does have cytotoxic effects. I mean, toxic to cells effects, causes cardio— oxidative stress, has mitochondrial damage, which then impairs fat metabolism because, you know, mitochondria are important for fat metabolism. And also that it impairs GABA production, which is why there are lots of studies about how it impacts on mood and neurobehavioral changes as well, which is really freaky. I think a lot of people, when they talk about these things, they're like, oh, it causes changes in the gut microbiome. And I'm sorry, but every single thing we eat and drink causes changes in the gut microbiome. So that's not really a helpful, like, you know, thing to say. But in this case, it actually increases bacterial strains that are associated with pathology. And it increases this bacterial end product called propionate, which is very gluconeogenic, like, i.e., it helps to increase glucose in the body, basically elevate glucose, which you don't necessarily want. So yeah, the whole mitochondrial impacts of aspartame really worry me. And then also the mood impacts and neurotransmitter changes. It's like pretty heavy stuff, even at regular intakes that you might have as a human. So, and then there's saccharin, which is not used as much, but you still see it. I think this increases uric acid. So I mean, there are other research studies showing that it causes DNA reactive aldehydes, excess reactive oxygen species, and that it upregulates these oncogenes, cancer genes, and downregulates the tumor suppressor genes. So that's not a good combination either. But even just from the first, like, research showing that it increases uric acid, your alarm bells should be like, okay, I don't want to increase uric acid because that's what fructose does, right? Same thing with this one called D-tagatose, also increases uric acid. Again, just like there is other adverse research, it also increases liver size in the animal studies, GLP-1, which raises insulin, so on. But as soon as you hear increases uric acid, you're like, okay, no. And then the other final artificial sweetener that is commonly used is sucralose, which never degrades in the environment. They use it to measure water pollution because it just doesn't degrade at all. And it has lots of— yeah, and there aren't many studies related to cancer, but so many people say like, oh, these cause cancer, but actually that's not it. What it does is it increases fat cells' size through activating this gene called SREBP1, which fructose also activates. So it basically activates fat storage and encourages the accumulation of white fat. I'm sure you've discussed like white fat and brown fat probably before, you know, so we'd rather have more brown fat than white fat. And then over time it leads to insulin resistance and weight gain and hyperglycemia. So one of the ways it does this is it activates these genes, like there's one called CJNK, which also is associated with insulin resistance. And this is seen in human studies in in normal weight people and also in obesity. There is some research showing that it worsens inflammatory bowel disease and Crohn's disease and intestinal permeability. And also another just fundamental feature of it is that, as I've said, it's never degraded. So they find it in water environments and when they're measuring water pollution, and it's bacteriostatic in a dose-dependent manner. That means it like stops bacteria from growing, which is sometimes good, but generally we have a lot of bacteria in us, you know, and they help us a lot. So that's not a great sign. And then the other important point is that in the presence of glycerol— so often when baking there is glycerol— that together with sucralose creates these very toxic chemicals called chloropropanols. So you definitely don't want to have any baked goods with sucralose in it. So those are the main artificial sweeteners. Do you have any questions about that before I go on to that?

No, that was really helpful. Maybe you could just for the audience say where typically these different unhealthy ones are found. We talked about obviously some, but just to give that and then talk about alternative.

Yes. Okay. So maltitol, very often in sugar-free chocolates and snack bars. Isomalt, also in the same types of things as well as chewing gum often. Sorbitol, often in candies, also in some chewing gums. ACK, most often in drinks and combined with one of the other artificial sweeteners. Aspartame, often in drinks. Sodas, maybe combined with ACK. And then you have saccharin. I've seen it in some sugar-free cereal bars, I think, but more often in chewing gum as well. Tagatose— there's a lot of like people trying to promote it right now. I haven't seen it in products myself, but just like, I hope everyone can just stop trying to promote it or trying to use it because they need to just look at the effects are almost identical to fructose. Sucralose is found in all types of foods that are sugar-free and artificially sweetened, but drinks, and more in the US though. I think when you go to the US and the stores, you see a lot more products with sucralose in them.

Yeah, in the US I even found there was bread and I was looking at it, there was sugar content in the bread and I was thinking, how can they even throw sugar into bread? It's just, it's crazy. With all this sort of things to avoid, Sakiko, yes, what are the things to focus on instead?

Yeah, well, I would really recommend people try the experiment first of maybe even just one week of like no sugar and no sweetness, you know, hardly at all, you know. And I know it sounds dramatic, but you know, in the context of chronic disease and all the suffering that excess sugar in your diet can cause, it's not that dramatic to just do an experiment for 1 or 2 weeks of really like avoiding anything sweet. And that is wonderful because you basically add in more proteins, more savory foods, and you really calibrate your taste for sweetness dramatically. I found that it happened within 3 days for me where I just found the things I've liked before were just too sweet. And I would do that first because that's nice. And then you can also appreciate all the characteristics of foods that can be like a sweet chocolate cake that's not too sweet, and you can taste all the different flavors of the cacao and so on. So it really helps to calibrate your taste and make you love more food that is low in sugar. And then after that, there are some sweet ingredients that are not sugars, and they are naturally occurring. I'm not saying that everything naturally occurring is good— sugar is naturally occurring, it's not good— but again, although there's a lot of research on these, you know, the fact that they're natural gives me a bit of comfort, just evolutionarily speaking. So these sweet ingredients are stevia, which is a plant grown in South America, Central America. It's been consumed by human beings for thousands of years, probably longer than refined, like, table sugar, you know. So actually, when people say, oh, just stick to sugar, well, human beings have been eating stevia for thousands of years. There's clear evidence for that. Then there's monk fruit extract. So this is an extract from a fruit that the extract does not contain sucrose or glucose or fructose. It contains these mogrosides. It's a weird chemical name, but basically they're non-sugar sweet molecules just like stevia. And, uh, then you have erythritol, which is naturally found in fresh fruits like pears and melons, and also in some vegetables, also found in mushrooms and fermented foods. So it's a naturally occurring molecule. It sounds like a chemical, but it is naturally occurring and it's totally metabolically fine, if not beneficial. Then you have xylitol, which I think is good. It's like my last on the list, not because it's harmful or anything. It is naturally occurring. It does have some calories, and the calories are coming from when it's metabolized. Some of it is metabolized into glucose, but it's still less glucose than pure glucose. So that's why it's not last on my list, because I feel like the other ones you can take care of everything with— you don't really need it. But it does have really beneficial effects on oral bacteria, that it's proven that chewing gum with xylitol really helps to prevent pathogenic bacteria in the mouth. And erythritol has that effect as well, but even more. So it really is good for oral health. Basically, those are the 4 main ones. There is this other one called allulose, which is naturally occurring in small amounts and does seem to have this blood glucose lowering effect. And I just not have found. I don't know why there isn't more research on it to explain how it does that, because that's quite a profound effect. It sounds like a good effect, maybe it is, but I want to understand like how it's doing that and what are the side effects and so on before like accepting it.

Wonderful. So just to recap for people, so stevia, and ideally organic stevia, and then xylitol, which is great for oral health, because erythritol is for baking, and monk fruit extract as well, which I think, you know, in global cities is available. I know Amazon actually even sells some of them as well. And then xylitol would be the fourth, kind of a little bit, but still okay. Yeah, just a caveat, what I've understood is that the xylitol, if dogs eat it— yes, so somebody told me sadly that their friend's dog ate a birthday cake that was made of xylitol and actually died. So I think that's the only caveat with xylitol, that, you know, if you have a dog, keep it away from a dog. Yes, because it poisonous to them, but obviously not to humans. So, you know, just for people to recap what to focus on, actionable things, you know, the stevia is great for coffees, for teas, or whatever it is that you like to sweeten. And then for baking, I think the other three are really great, right?

Yeah. And just to help people out a bit, like functionally, so the thing is stevia and monk fruit extract, the first two I spoke about, are like about 300 times as sweet as sugar. So that means you need a tiny amount in your recipe to have the same sweetening power as sugar. I can talk about forever how that's actually much more sustainable for the environment. You know, do you know how much rainforest is cut down for sugarcane plantations? Like, you need a much smaller landmass to have the same sweetening power from these ingredients. So because of that, you can't just like have your cake recipe and somehow like switch the sugar for stevia because you need like texture and weight. And you know, the sugar is a lot of weight in terms of creating a nice texture. So that's why when you see— there's more of these in the States, and hopefully you'll see more in Europe— you'll find combinations of ingredients that will replace sugar. And often, like for example, stevia will be combined with erythritol, which unlike stevia is only 60% as sweet as sugar. So it has a bulking element, which is helpful because then you can just pour the same amount, similar to using sugar basically. But a lot of the sweetness is coming from the stevia, but it's a tiny amount, and the erythritol makes up more of the bulk amount. And just to mention, just in case people are still worried about erythritol, so the point is that erythritol is unlike the other sugar alcohols. Unfortunately, it's in the same biochemical category. It's totally different in terms of what happens to it in the body. Erythritol just— it's such a small molecular size, it literally like washes through you and comes out in the urine. There's like 95% it's just like that. It comes out unchanged, doesn't get metabolized, doesn't influence anything. 5% is fermented by gut bacteria, as many other foods are. So it really is completely inert in terms of metabolism. So really, I think people should be comfortable with that. And that's why you will often see stevia with erythritol in a bag of like a sweet mix kind of thing mixed together.

Okay, so basically we know that there are these healthy sugars or sweeteners, if you will, But why don't the big food companies start adopting this more and more? Why is there such a lag in bringing these to market? In essence, it would resolve so many health issues that people are suffering.

Yeah, so I think there's a few, like, very practical reasons and then more, like, sinister reasons. But the more practical is they literally have these enormous factories that are set up to have sugar coming in one tube into the factory and using it as it is used. So you can't just like, okay, say I'm gonna stop using sugar and switch to stevia. You have to basically rebuild your factory. So they have a lot of legacy, you know, CapEx that has gone into these factories that are dependent on sugar. I mean, that's just like a simple practical reason. But then also, unlike sugar, stevia does not have any sort of addictive properties according to the research shown. So Sugar is addictive, and that's nice for food companies who want to sell more products, right? So I think there is that sinister— I mean, literally, I've heard now that I work in the food industry that they admit, you know, and insiders have admitted, like, that's their main goal. It's like, how do we make this more addictive? Like, we'll put a bit of salt into the Coca-Cola to make you more thirsty, but we'll mask it with the sugar so you don't taste the salt, but you get more thirsty and you drink more. I mean, it's like Everything is geared towards that. So I think that's one of the main reasons they don't want to switch. And then of course, it's more expensive to use these ingredients. It's more expensive than sugar.

Yeah, it's so sad. I mean, I look forward to the day that one or two or more companies take a stand and say, okay, health above profits and, you know, winning long-term customers because this is such a great marketing piece for them as well, right? You know, to really save people from this pandemic of, you know, diabetes heart issues, etc., etc. There's so many derivatives that come from these high sugar levels that we've really seen from— when was it, was it in the '70s that the American food chart came out and flipped it around and said fat is bad? Yeah, even the good healthy fat. And let's top it up with sugar instead. And then from that, the low-fat diet range— there's a direct correlation between diabetes, Alzheimer's, and obesity. So, you know, it's just having that awareness Yeah, so important. Let's talk about stevia just a little bit more in depth and what I find the challenge of finding good quality stevia to use as a normal consumer. Let's say, what is happening in the industry around that availability?

Yeah, so unfortunately most stevia— so there are two ways of making it industrially. So one way is that they grow the plants, and they take from the leaves the sweet molecules, but they take them out using chemicals. And this actually alters literally the molecular structure of those sweet molecules so that basically that changed structure— and sorry, we do our own internal research on sweet taste receptors, and we see that the chemically extracted stevia sticks to your cell's sweet taste receptors, doesn't allow it to recycle, and then you get this long-lingering weird aftertaste. Taste. So that's like the mechanism, and nobody wants to switch away from sugar to something that doesn't taste well, right? But there is one company that has created an engineering process using just filters and water to extract from the leaves, and that maintains the natural structure of those sweet molecules. And actually, the leaves taste really nice, and this tastes really nice when it's just water purified instead of chemically purified. And that company is growing a lot now and sweetening many different companies and helping them to reformulate to reduce their sugar and switch. And so hopefully you will have more and more products with stevia that taste good. And then my company, we're working on a sweet mix that we've tested with pastry chefs that uses this water-purified stevia, and the pastry chefs are like blown away by how it really tastes like sugar but isn't and doesn't give you a sugar hangover the next day. And yeah, it's great, but unfortunately, yeah, it's still early days in terms of getting really good tasting stevia apart from this one company that just sells B2B right now. But hopefully my company is trying to help make that more accessible to people.

Exciting. And we'll dive into your company soon because there's lots of exciting things to discuss there. But just to cover a few more general points here, with increasing focus on the blood glucose impact of foods, is there anything being missed?

And if so, why and what. Yeah. So in general, I totally agree. And it's clear from the evidence that having fewer frequency of blood glucose spikes and less high blood glucose spikes in general is good for you. But some of the research, like for example from Rick Johnson, that really shows that having too much glucose, so carbohydrates that are not sweet, like rice, potatoes, etc., and that spikes your blood glucose. And so having too much of that actually causes your body to also create fructose, and that leads to the problems. So it's really the fructose that's the problem. But fructose does not acutely elevate your blood glucose. So you could have a diet that is like full of like fruit juice and so on, and you won't notice it on your levels app or whatever, because fructose does not spike blood glucose in the short term. But over time, it leads to your body metabolically dysfunctioning, so that over time your body gets this thing called insulin resistance, which doesn't allow your cells to take up glucose anymore. And that leads to, over time, elevated blood glucose in general, higher spikes in general with meals, and so on. So if you're just focused on like checking your blood glucose with response to what you're eating and drinking, you might miss the fact that you're actually having too much fructose but you're not seeing it acutely in the blood glucose spiking issue. So it's really important to keep that in mind. Um, I would, yeah, still track the blood glucose, but remember that fructose does not trigger it, but you don't want to have too much fructose in your diet.

That's so interesting to say that because I have tried like the Levels Health and I wear the continuous glucose monitor most of the time, and you almost think that that's kind of the holy grail in terms of that will tell you exactly what's happening with your blood glucose. But very interesting that fructose won't actually impact those levels but still has that big detrimental effect. So I think people just need to be very, very, very wary about where there is fructose in it and just knowingly eat a very sort of small handful amount of, say, organic berries that are tart versus, you know, the oversweetened ones.

Yeah, and you can't go wrong with adding more fiber in your diet in general. That'll lower your blood glucose in general, and it'll also dampen the impact of the fructose. Just adding more fiber to your diet is always good.

It's always great, right? Yeah. You mentioned that you do your internal research. Can you talk about some of your latest research and findings that you've been working on?

Yeah, so we test individual ingredients and combinations of ingredients. And so one of the interesting areas we're focusing on are taste receptors. And it turns out you have these taste receptors in your mouth, but also in throughout your body, and they have different functions. You have sweet taste receptors, you have bitter taste receptors. The bitter taste receptors in your intestine, like, be activating those causes all kinds of healthy immunoregulatory things to happen. And it turns out that, for example, stevia has a bitterness inside it as well, and that will activate the bitterness taste receptors and have probably these beneficial effects. So we're looking at that. We've also tested the artificial sweeteners, and we see that this, this issue with the recycling of the taste receptors really important. So sucralose is another thing that doesn't allow— it latches onto a position on the sweet taste receptor, doesn't allow it to recycle, and thus keeps it activated. We don't know all the downstream, you know, consequences of that, but it could be a reason why sucralose has all these negative effects, because it's basically activating the sweet taste receptors in your mouth, in your intestine, because sucralose again doesn't degrade, so it's like circulating around and just activating all these sweet taste receptors around your body. And we don't really know the full consequences of that, but it's not a natural state. So that's another interesting thing. Also, we're doing microbiome research, and the latest research we saw is that maltitol really increases the levels of pathogenic bacteria, reduces the levels of the healthy bacteria, whereas when we do the research on stevia, we see that it increases the diversity of your microbiome and increases some of the health— known as healthier ones, like lactobacillus and so on. Again, I think, like, people generalize way too much about the microbiome, but you have, like, trends where you think, like, okay, this looks, like, not helpful, and this looks, like, healthy. You know, the more diversity, usually the better, and so on. So that's some interesting research.

Yeah, I mean, we've had a few gut specialists on the podcast as well. It's so essential. There's so many correlations between an unhealthy gut and other things as well. So yeah, anything you can do to support good gut bacteria, gut health, like using stevia, is phenomenal. Before we jump into NOMOS2, your amazing company, I'd like to ask you some rapid-fire questions, Tsikiko. Okay. Thinking of the word successful, who's the first person to come to mind and why?

Oh, it's so cheesy, I guess. My grandmother. Sorry, that's just the person I, you know, go by. Um, she was amazing. She was like a serial entrepreneur, a Japanese tiny little lady raising 5 kids effectively on her own in Japan, also during the Second World War. And she lived until just before her 100th birthday, and she was completely cognitively perfect until then, and giggling and cheerful all the way, despite having really hard times in her life and really a difficult times. You would have never thought it. She had zero grudges. She was just always like giggling and happy and generous and kind. What was her secret?

She said—

she told me a couple of secrets. One was that she sang karaoke twice a week and in a choir as well. And the other is we used to go for walks and she would take me to this like children's play park. I mean, this is when she was like 98 or whatever, 97, and she would swing on the swings, and she could hardly get up on them because she was so short, but she swung on the swings and said that it's really good for your health to swing on the swings. And a lot of food, I mean, Japanese diverse food. She didn't like avoid anything in particular. And yeah, lots of seaweed and different fish and lots of vegetables, lots of fiber, and green tea all day long.

Amazing. So some amazing secrets to longevity and She's born in what? Was she born 1900?

She was born in 1905, I think.

Wow. Yeah. And she lived almost 100. So I think we definitely, if we do it right, have a chance to live to 150 easily knowing what we do. But we have to implement it as well.

Amazing.

In the last 5 years, Sakiko, what new belief or behavior or habit has most improved your life?

Definitely. I mean, the sugar happened like a couple of years before that, so it would have been that. But other than that, I guess in the last 5 years I've really emphasized my meditation practice. And I think we shouldn't underestimate the impact of just that practice of meditation, not only in the meditation session, but the rest of the day being slightly more aware, slightly more like able to catch yourself while you're doing something automatic, you know, such as eating. So I think that we often eat too fast. We don't think about what we're eating. We don't look at it. We don't appreciate it. And just having that like slightly higher level of mindfulness can really help our diet and well-being and just enjoyment of present-day life.

I love that. What has been your most exciting purchase in the last 6 months? I love specifics like brand and models.

And God, I'm not a very good consumer. I don't really— I think I might have said this last time because I just bought a new one, but it's basically like a lamp that you put on your book. I can find the brand and let you know, but it's basically adjusted so that it's really warm yellow light that doesn't stop your melatonin from being secreted. Oh, great. Like a reading lamp, basically, but like a really kind one that doesn't ruin your melatonin secretion. Yeah.

Okay. I love stuff like that. Yeah. So what are some of the daily and weekly routines and practices that you have that help you to perform at such a high level?

Yeah, well, I mentioned the meditation one. Then also, like, decision fatigue is a big thing. I think, you know, probably many other people interested in biohacking are like, just remove a lot of decisions. Like, I exercise every morning and it's not like a choice or, you know, it's just kind of an automatic thing. And So that really helps. I also really advocate like mixing it up with exercise, you know, doing strength training for sure. For women, for bone density, for longevity, so important to do weight training. But not only that, doing also some, you know, cardiovascular zone 2 training and maybe some Pilates or yoga to ensure you can be flexible and strong in flexibility as well. So mixing it up is really, really helpful. And then diet-wise, really, I can't emphasize enough the importance sense of fiber. And people think, oh, you know, because of all the marketing, it's like fiber comes from cereal. I don't have any cereal, but I have a lot of fiber in my diet from fibrous vegetables, leafy greens. And also I use this Japanese traditional food which is called konjac, which is not the alcohol, but it's also called glucomannan, the technical name. Shirataki noodles is the same thing. That is a really high fiber thing that you can incorporate into your diet. Been totally helpful. And then also a lot of bone broth, which is great as well. Those are some key items.

So helpful. Thank you, Sakiko, for sharing. Let's change gears and dig into the incredible work you're doing at Nomosu. So for people who aren't familiar with it, Nomosu— can you explain where the name came from and what you're doing at Nomosu?

Yeah, well, I was already working on these sugar-free recipes of items that could eat that were not forms of sugar and that were healthy using stevia. And I was thinking of lots of crappy names, and then I meditated one day, and 15 minutes later it just popped into my head, Nomosu, which stands for no more sugar, but the name is Nomosu. And our purpose is to really help to transform human health because we think that removing sugar is like the biggest step most people can take to completely improve their health and longevity. We want to be there for people in terms of when they do want a sweet occasion, that they can rely on Nomosu to provide something that's genuinely healthy, organic, high in fiber, keto-friendly, et cetera. And that actually tastes really good. So we really emphasize the gourmet deliciousness. That's why we do taste receptor research, but we also back that up with blind taste testing panels comparing to the most premium. So our first range of products are organic. Chocolates that are also high in fiber. So as I mentioned, the fiber aspect. So they're not just sugar-free chocolates, they're high in fiber, they're really high in polyphenols. We do research on fermentation to improve the polyphenol content, which are really good for longevity. So it's like really healthy, sweet-tasting, delicious non-sugar foods. And we have a lot of different products in the pipeline— chocolate drinking powders, chocolate spreads, the sweet mix that you can replace in your baking, replace sugar with. Yeah, we really want to be there for people who want to switch away from sugar. Amazing.

And what are some of the exciting projects that you're working on now as part of NOMOS 2 and your vision for the future?

Yeah, I'm really excited about the research that we're doing and collaborating on because— sorry, there's wonderful researchers out there, amazing studies that have helped me so much to learn so much. But then there's a lot of crappy research in nutrition, especially like For example, I know it's just like just a simple example, but sometimes they give the animals, for example, doses that are way higher than humans would ever eat. But not only that, they'll do an in vitro study on cells and they'll incubate the cells with the ingredient for like 24 hours. And I'm sorry, when you eat something, it doesn't sit there next to your enterocyte for 24 hours. You know, all these details matter when you're doing research. So I'm really excited about the research we're doing, both on taste receptors We have this type of simulator of the whole intestinal pathway, intestinal permeability, integrity. There's this system that's called the Chime system, which basically allows you to really emulate like what happens in digestion metabolism. So I'm really interested in all that because again, you know, if you're going to create a health food product, a health food business, I think you need to as much as possible really verify that it is healthy. So I'm really excited about that and I'm also excited about collaborating with chefs which we've started doing a bit with the sweet mix because we've proven with these amazing Michelin-star pastry chefs, for example, that you can totally in many desserts replace sugar with this sweet mix that we've created, which is high fiber made with a water-purified stevia. And it really emulates the taste of sugar, but without any sugar. So I'm really excited about that as well.

That's really exciting. And also your expansion plans, right? So currently you're in which countries?

Where are you going to next? Yeah, we're in the UK and just started in the US this year as well, in California. That's going to launch in Texas early in the new year. And yeah, we're being very selective about which retailers to work with because we really want to showcase that our brand is organic. And many people think sugar-free and non-organic because of all these artificial sweeteners. So we're taking it a bit slowly, but we hope we will be able to expand more rapidly from next year. To many other countries and markets and help more people to reduce their sugar intake.

Maybe you can talk about the different types of chocolate. And just for my audience, I'm obsessed with Nomosù and I love some of the different— well, pretty much all of them, but I think that the sea salt one and the almond butter chocolate is just— I could literally eat the whole bar. Can you talk about the different flavors and brands that you haven't worked people find them?

Yeah, so the brand is Nomosu, and you can buy them on nomosu.com in Europe and the UK. It's easier in the UK because that's where we're based right now. And we also sell in Planet Organic stores in the UK and more independent retailers as well, more and more. And there are 8 different flavors currently. There's an 80% cacao, 72% cacao, and then all the darks are also 72% cacao— dark with sea salt, dark with hazelnut, dark with orange zest, Then you've got almond butter, and then you've got milk and matcha, which do contain grass-fed dairy, which is also amazing, by the way.

I forgot about that one, but it's white chocolate with matcha, and it's so amazing.

It'll be even more amazing next year. We're always trying to improve all of them, and it's so expensive, the matcha we use, but it's divine, so we're not going to switch. But we're basically increasing the matcha content even more, so I'm really happy about that. So next year that'll be even better for health benefits. Yeah, also, yeah, it's much as amazing.

So yeah, very exciting. What excites you most about the future of health, well-being, and longevity over the years to come?

So, Kiko? Well, I'm obviously like biased and in my world of Nomos, but because we focus so much on the gourmet deliciousness aspect, I'm really excited about that. I think that too much focus has been on functionality, functionality, like here's a keto bar with, you know, MCT oil and it's like really chewy and it, whatever, I can eat it, but it's not really like, oh yes, you know. But I think we're really trying to push that and invest in that because it is possible to make gourmet, you know, mind-blowingly delicious foods that are healthy and functional, you know, as well as being delicious. And I think that's the only way to really get the masses to switch away from unhealthy eating practices is to make it taste delicious and be really characterful and flavorful and so on. But not artificial flavors, you know. And so there is a way to do it in a really natural way that you really appreciate the nuances of the cacao from which, you know, places it comes from. So in general, for the health food industry, I'm really excited about, I think, hopefully a movement towards really emphasizing cooking skills, techniques to really make delicious foods at home and also packaged foods in a way that really you don't feel sacrifice at all. You just feel like yum and you're your body is like rejoicing, you know, when you have a really wonderful bone broth or something, you know, there's something like you really feel good about eating healthily. So yeah, I'm excited about that.

That does sound exciting. Some rapid-fire questions before we close, Takiko. What are some of the learnings or insights that your customers have found the most valuable?

Yeah, I think, yeah, just what I was mentioning, like taste. They're blown away by how delicious it tastes and how they can taste the very carefully selected cacao that we've chosen from these two plantations mixed together. That tastes so good. You have notes of like caramel, you have notes of like whiskey, like different, you know, flavors. And you can really taste it because we also calibrate the sweetness level so that it's not too sweet, but it is sweet enough. I mean, we just won an International Chocolate Academy Award for our 72% dark. I don't think it's coincidence. We've so much to make it taste really delicious, and we've done it all by, you know, choosing incredible raw ingredients. So that's the most common feedback that I get. Many people who are interested in Namastu, you know, have been on keto diets or low-carb diets and have searched around for things to satisfy a little dessert or sweet tooth moment, and they've been really disappointed by— I mean, sometimes, you know, you try something and you don't know how a food company panel can be like, okay, let's cellulose because it tastes horrible sometimes, not just neutral. So yeah, that's the most feedback is that people are so happy that it tastes great and that they don't have a sugar hangover afterwards at all and they feel good.

So that's amazing. If you could get a message out, hypothetically speaking, to say a billion people, what would it be and why?

I mean, the obvious one is a bit boring, but I would really say like try quitting sugar for 2 weeks and that's all, you know, and then they can go back to exactly how they were before. But I bet that most of them won't go back to exactly how they were before.

Yeah, I agree with you on that. And also to really learn how to read the food label. No, it doesn't always just— it's not going to say sugar in the ingredients. There will be a lot of different versions of it. So it's looking at which sugars, you know, you'll have the carbohydrate of which sugars in there. Really trying to get it below 5 grams, like 3 grams per 100 grams. This is another trick that they do on the food label that they make it a 30-gram serving, but it's only 5 grams per 30 grams. But actually, you know, multiply that by 3 and that's 15 grams and already you're too high.

So yeah, so I'm glad in the States they're now forcing everyone to do it by per 100 grams again, because for a while it was just per serving and so confusing, whereas here it's always per 100 grams. So you just think of it as percentage. You want it less than 5%, you know, always. So the thing I check on the food label is the sugar content, less than 5 grams per 100 grams, and the ingredients. You don't want any of the artificial sweeteners I mentioned in the ingredients list. So if it's organic, it won't have them, so that makes things easier. If you just eat organic, that's easy. But yeah, those are the two things I check. And then also the vegetable seed oils, that's the other one thing I avoid.

Yeah, which is great. What is one of the best or most worthwhile investments you've ever made? It could be investment of money or time or energy.

Education. Yeah. Really boring kind of thing, but actually really useful. I mean, it's really, it's not boring. It's really fascinating actually learning about biology and biochemistry and metabolism. And it just arms you to then when you read research afterwards, you know what to look for. You learn a little bit about statistics, you know where the pitfalls can be and where the biases can be, and you can really just learn and then apply that learning to your life. And it's just the best investment.

Amazing. What advice would you give to a smart, driven 20-year-old about to enter the real world, and what advice should they ignore?

My experience is that I was told, and many people were told, like, follow your passion and do what you love to do. But I don't necessarily think the best thing. I love dancing and I don't think I would be the best dancer in the world if I did that. And I probably would, I don't know, maybe lose my enjoyment of dancing. So instead of focusing on what you love doing currently, just focus on maybe what fascinates you and then what you could be really good at, skillful at. Because as you become skillful at something that you're naturally talented with, then you get so much motivation from that and also like purpose-driven. So something where you feel like you're doing something useful for other people is a great driver. And if you follow that kind of passion angle rather than just pure enjoyment, I think you'll make, you know, better decisions for the long term. And that in the long term will make you happier, actually.

Such wise words. That's great advice. For my listeners interested in understanding sugar, chocolate, and longevity better, Sakiko, what online resources or books would you recommend they start with?

There are many, but Fat Chance is like a key one about sugar. Dr. Robert Lustig. And another one that is also very interesting to read is Pure, White and Deadly, which was written in the 1970s, just before this turning point where the American dietary guidelines went the wrong way, I think, and just went anti. This is a British doctor who was doing research on fructose. Like in the '70s and sugar and was like flagging to everyone like, oh, this is causing high blood pressure, this is causing cardiovascular disease. This is— and he was just shut down by the sugar industry and funding taken away. And it's just fascinating that it's a very short read and really interesting and scientific and also personal. He's— he explains. And then yeah, I love Dr. Perlmutter's work, Grain Brain, and I'm sure I haven't read his most recent book, but also useful. And yeah, those are the 3 main ones around carbs, sugar. The researcher I mentioned, Rick Johnson, he has a relatively new book out. I can't remember the name, but Rick Johnson, all his research on fructose, fascinating, really useful. Those are the main ones. And then I spent like a, a lot of time on nomoso.com. We have a section, a science section, and there's a section on sugar, on fructose, and on artificial sweeteners, all the references there. And then also the ingredients that we use and the reference evidence is there about why we use them. And so there's a lot of research that I've tried to like summarize in bullet points and so on. So if people really want to get into that, they can do that there.

I agree, it's a great resource. I've checked it out several times myself. That's nomosu.com. Yes, for people. Nomosu is spelled— yeah, so no more sugar. Nomosu.com. Yes. For people who want to follow what you're up to and subscribe to your newsletter, obviously from the website, how can they reach you on social media?

What's your handle? Yeah, so it's @nomosu is the nomosu Instagram, and we're still, you know, a small brand. So if you direct message there, I'll answer. So that's the main one. I also have a personal one, but I hardly use it much at all. So perfect.

Do you have any final ask or recommendation or any parting thoughts or message for my audience, Sakiko?

Yeah, I would say two things. Like, one thing is just be open-minded about food and nutrition. We all have very strong emotional, psychological attachments to certain ways of eating and what our grandparents ate and, and so on and so forth. And I think just keeping a really open mind is useful. If you have a question, you know, go to PubMed, like look up the key ingredients, molecules, read the research, you know, get an idea yourself. Yeah. So be open-minded, but also a little bit skeptical when you just have like headline news because not only like journalists, but even researchers themselves themselves. It's really shocking sometimes where you see the, like, summary and the conclusions they make that are, like, you know, huge leaps of faith from what the actual results show. You're like, what? You know, so really, like, don't just take at face value the summary of research journals or research papers. Really read the whole paper if you're interested in that topic to make up your mind.

Thank you so much, Tsukiko, for this amazing wisdom and advice and information. Such a pleasure to have you on today.

Thank you for coming. Thank you so much, Claudia.

Hey everyone, it's Claudia here. Before you take off, I hope you enjoyed the episode and learned as much as I did. If so, please hit subscribe so you don't miss out on our next episodes. I would also love to hear what you thought, be it your favorite part, quote, or other feedback from the episodes. So please leave a written review on Apple Podcasts or on social media. And if you think this episode will help someone in your own life, share it with them. Together we can change our own lives and the lives around us for the better. Until next week, goodbye, farewell, and choose to live well.