Let Food Be Thy Medicine: What To Eat For Overall Health & Longevity | Dr. Mark Hyman

Kids who have family meals, they do better in school, have less ADD, are less prone to risky behavior like eating disorders, drug and alcohol abuse, obesity. I personally had two kids, raised them, I was a single father, and I included them very early in the kitchen. I actually have a video of me and my kids in the kitchen. I think my son was like 10 months old. My daughter was about two. And we were making, I don't know, I think actually made bread from scratch. And they were making such a mess, but they had the best time. And I think it's really important to include your kids in the kitchen early on, not just present a meal to them at the table, but include them in the entire process from shopping to cooking to setting the table to cleaning up, the whole thing. It's just basic life skills and they learn by osmosis and when they're little they love it and they love to get involved and they want to be with you so it all works out and you don't have to kind of go off and do the drudgery yourself but make it a family affair and make it a fun thing. So it's really important. So I know there's challenges, I know that raising kids is hard, I know that getting to eat the right thing is hard. I had a friend who was like, All my kids will eat is pizza and pasta. And I'm like, well, that's because it's all you feed them. They're not going to starve to death if you don't feed them that for a while. And they actually will typically be fine and start to eat other foods. So basically, I used to joke at my house, it was only two things on the menu, take it or leave it. And so kids ate what they got. And if they didn't like it, they didn't eat it. And basically, they weren't going to die or starve to death. So it's really important to be flexible. It's important to include your kids. It's important to teach them about nutrition and food early on. And I raised my kids to eat well and live well. And they're both very involved in cooking and healthy food and they really understand it. And it wasn't because I pandered into them or gave them lectures. It was because I included them in the process. So I'm gonna give you my tips for how I did it and how I think also as a doctor, I've learned how to help families and kids include healthier foods in their diet and actually make it fun. So the first thing is, you know, what to eat. Typically, in my house, there was no bad stuff. You couldn't get into trouble. And one time my son said, I want to have friends over. There's nothing to eat. And he was a teenager. And I said, okay, let's go to the grocery store. You can buy whatever you want except for one rule. It can have hydrogenated fats in it or high fructose corn syrup. And basically, he almost could find nothing. We did work that out. But it's important to teach your kids about whole foods, seasonal foods, local foods, go to the farmer's market with them, teach them about how things grow. and teach them about what real food is. You can teach them to read labels. Have them look at the labels, make it a science project. Can they actually pronounce what's on there? Do they know what it is? Is it a food or is it just some industrial food product that actually should not be what we're eating? Basically, I always say, an almond doesn't have a nutrition facts label or ingredient list. An egg doesn't have one either. An apple doesn't have one either. So, eat real food. And ask your kids, was this food grown in a plant? or was it made in a plant, right? If it was made in a factory, probably not a good idea. So real food is grown on plants, is eating plants, like when there's animals. And so less processing, less steps taken from field to fork is really important and you can teach your kids about that. Also ask your kids, try to imagine what this food looked like in its original state. Sometimes it's easy to do, right? If you look at an apple, that's what it looks like on the tree. if you're looking at, you know, something like bread, well, it's a little imagination, but it's not that many steps. You're gonna grind the flour, a little yeast, a little leavening, and then you get the bread. If it's got 4, 000 ingredients, like, what, what was the state of that food? There wasn't even a food. So I think it's really important. Also, model the right Behavior by you modeling how you eat, what you eat, you know, all the little things. The kids will absorb that. and they will understand almost biosynthesis what to do. So I always had meals that I cooked. I cooked my kids breakfast, lunch and dinner. I was a working physician. I was a single father. It's possible. I know it was. And I worked really hard, but it's really possible. And it just takes learning a skill like anything else. You know, most people are great at operating their iPhone or their, you know, smartphone. But, you know, most people don't even have the basic skills of of functioning in the kitchen, how to chop a vegetable, how to peel garlic, I mean just basic skills that if you learn, you can actually learn how to make simple food quickly and easily. So, you know, it's also important to understand that routine is important. I made sure that family dinner was a thing every night. I mean, unless it was some extenuating circumstances, basically coming together as a family, sitting down the table, eating together the same food, and having time to relax and enjoy is a really important thing. There's a lot of research on this. Kids who have family meals with their families are less prone to bad behavior, risky behavior like eating disorders, drug and alcohol abuse, obesity. They do better in school, have less ADD. So it can be a time for engagement, conversation, for discovery and for real bonding as a family rather than stress. And today, most families probably don't eat together. If they do, each one eating from a different package or box food cooked in the microwave, all made in different factories while they're watching TV or on their phones, not talking and not engaging. And that is just bad news for their health and for their emotional health, their physical health, and obviously for your, just the connection of your family. Also, boundaries are important. Like I said, my house, there was only two things on the menu, right? Take it or leave it. and so I didn't have kids food. It wasn't like the adults ate, you know, some dinner, and then I made a bowl of pasta or macaroni and cheese for my kids. They just ate what we ate, and. And they learned to love it. And, you know, what do kids eat in Japan? They eat raw fish and seaweed. Right. Kids will eat that stuff if there's nothing else to eat. Right. They'll actually like that stuff. So it's not that kids won't do it, but if we. are giving them kids meals and Lunchables and all this targeted junk food that's been focused on children, it's bad news. So make your home a place where you can eat real food together. You're gonna get kids exposed to delicious flavors from all sorts of different cuisines. And if they're picky, they're not gonna starve. My mother always just tells the story of my sister who didn't want her eggs for breakfast. And so basically, she said, okay, we don't have to eat them. But she gave her the same eggs for lunch, and she didn't eat them. And she gave the same eggs for dinner, and she ate the cold eggs from the morning because she was starving. So kids will not starve to death. They will eat, I promise you. Don't coddle them. Don't. Don't, you know, dance around them. I mean, I think, you know, it's really important to teach your kids about nutrition and to model the right behavior and have the right approach to eating and then just make sure your kids, you know, make fun foods. You know, you can make fun foods for kids. It was a, I think, a great book that I had for my kids. What was it called? Something pretend soup. It was called pretend soup. It's a great cookbook by Molly Katzen. And essentially, it's all this fun food that you can make with your kids. It's healthy. Right. But it's kind of got fun foods that kids like, and it's all made from real whole food ingredients. So, you know, it really keep in mind that if you can make food fun, it's great. Also, you know, sometimes your kids take a while to get used to things. You know, if you look at, at different flavors, you know, some kids take a while to adjust to spicier things or different kinds of sourness or sweetness. So make sure you give your kids multiple options to eat the food to try to present it to them multiple times. And also make meal times fun. Don't make it stressful. Don't make it a time of reprimand. Or, I mean, when I was a kid, my stepfather was just horrible and mealtimes were so stressful, but I didn't like them. I want to be done as soon as possible, but that's not how it should be. And it led to all sorts of digestive issues for me when I was a kid. Basically went away as soon as I went to college. So the bottom line is make your home fun, make your dinnertime fun, make it pleasant, relaxed, and connect as a family and think of different conversation topics, keep it light, positive. Being under stress when you eat is not good for digestion, absorption, or your metabolism. And also don't use food as a punishment or as a reward. We tend to go, oh, here, have some ice cream. if you're upset or even ice cream if you're gonna celebrate something, no, it should not be like that. Occasional treats are fine, but food should not be used to punish or restrict or reward your kids. It's really important to have a healthy relationship with food and teach them from an early age that it's important to have a healthy relationship and not associate with positive or negative reinforcement parenting. I mean, use games or there are other things, non-food related things to discipline your kids or to reward good behavior, but not food. All right, how can you integrate healthy eating into your family's lifestyle? Well, get your kids in the kitchen. Like I said, I always got my kids in the kitchen. I got them cooking with me. I took them to the grocery store with me. We decided what to eat together. We looked at recipe books together. We would go shopping together. We literally cook meals together. I make them my little sous chefs and we would put music on. We'd have fun and we'd have a great time. So, they just want to be connected. The kids just want to be with you, especially when they're little. So, it helps build their self-esteem. It helps connection to the family. It teaches them basic life skills. I can't tell you how many kids and not even kids, how many families and people have no idea how to cook. I mean, the American food industry has basically hijacked our kitchens and has usurped our own homes in ways that has caused a massive obesity, diabetes epidemic, and chronic disease epidemic. And it's because we're not skill in the kitchen anymore and we don't know what to do. So, really important. So, get your kids involved, help them plan meals, brainstorm about weekly menus, teach your kids about how to compose a healthy plate and what works, right? Like I said, take them grocery shopping and put them on little treasure hunts to go find the good foods and teach them about different foods that are fresh and real. And it's kind of fun. They obviously should be taught about where to shop and how to shop around the perimeter, but important. Help them bring the groceries in, help them put away everything, help them just be involved, get cooking together. They can wash the fruits and vegetables, they can help make simple things, they can track time, they can crack the eggs, they can toast things in the oven. So as kids get older, they can do better things that are more advanced like peeling or grating or cutting veggies. Obviously, you don't want to give a kid a knife, like a knife, but then helping part of the serving of dinner, it's really great. just make them part of an enjoyable dinner time. Set the table and teach them about placemats and setting a table properly, get flowers, candles, and just make it fun so you can enjoy stuff. Also, get them in the kitchen cleaning up. The kids always don't like that and nobody likes that, but make it fun and have a family cleanup after dinner where kids are involved. So they understand the whole spectrum of what happens in creating meals. Also, there's ways to kind of, you know, trick your kids a little bit by helping kind of put things into otherwise what we think of as unhealthy foods. For example, you can make carrot muffins or squash muffins or zucchini muffins, right? You can make all kinds of soups and sauces and dips and spreads or smoothies to sort of sneak in healthier veggies. You can, you know, maybe change the appearance of something. You know, like I had a friend who started a company called Super Sprouts where they would create, you know, Brian broccoli and Colby carrot and they had all these, kind of fun cartooning for the vegetables or you can cut them up differently. So cut them up as, you know, different shapes or, you know, you kind of little, little kind of cookie cutters you use for Christmas, but you can use those for veggies too and it's fun. So there's all kinds of ways to cut fun shapes into food and turn them into flowers or hearts or letters or stars. It's great. Also, you can kind of make plate art, make fun things in the kitchen. You can create pictures, designs, fun colors of food, you know, instead of just a pile of turkey, a sweet potato, asparagus. How about asparagus trees or make the sweet potato sun or turkey clouds or just create a little art project. It's kind of fun. And that'll kind of make them more interested. And also, you know, make the kitchen an inviting place, right? Kitchen is where they'll hang out. So make sure it's fun for them and, you know, get little small things so they can do if they're little. And it's great. So bottom line is you've got to get your kids involved in the kitchen early. You've got to get involved in the kitchen. You've got to learn how to cook. and it's going to help one, keep your kids healthy, keep you healthy, keep them out of trouble, and solidify your family relationships, connections, which is really important to long-term health and well-being. So there's a lot more to this. There's a wonderful book called the Family Dinner by Lori David, who is really just a wonderful woman who actually helped produce the movie Fed Up that I was in about childhood obesity. And the Family Dinner is a great, great cookbook about how to cook with your family. There's a lot of others as well. If you love that last video, you're gonna love the next one. Check it out here. We're taking all the foods that cause inflammation, that are toxic to your system, that are inflammatory, and mess with your gut, and you're putting in foods that actually help reset your system. And it's pretty much a very simple approach. It's lots of veggies.