Episode #63: Nutrition in a Pinch, with Chef James Barry

Hi, I'm Dr. Tabitha, the functional gynecologist. I'm a board certified, OB, GYN and functional medicine physician. I've embraced the world of functional medicine and wellness through my own personal health journey. And I'm super excited to share my wisdom and unique perspective as it pertains to women's health. So if you're struggling with hormone imbalance, weight gain period issues, anxiety, insomnia, you name it, then you've come to the right place. I want to be your functional gynecologist. So welcome. Oh my gosh. Today's going to be such a fun episode because we are going to be talking to a chef. I can't tell you, I'm kind of obsessed with celebrity chefs, famous chefs. I watched Top Chef forever and I just love food. I think food is nourishing and comforting and enjoyable. I just love everything about food and I just think it's such a beautiful art when people know how to mix different flavors together and create new things. It's just beautiful. So I'm really excited that Chef James reached out to me about being on the podcast because he has an amazing new product that he wants to talk about. And it's very cool. It's an all purpose seasoning, but it is made with freeze dried organ meat. So it actually has really good nutritional value. And so I'm really excited that there's this new option or this new way to get the benefits of organ meat with without necessarily having to prepare them or eat them. You know, we're going to talk about all that. So I'm really excited because, you know, I understand why some people are vegan and vegetarian and if that's you, that's great. But for those of you who are not, I would argue that we need more organ meats in our diet. You know, especially people who live in places where winter happens. You know, back in the day, we used to eat a lot of fatty fish and cold water fish, so we were getting more of our vitamin D, vitamin A, things like that, fatty acids through our food. But now that we don't eat that as much because we don't live off the land the way that we used to. We have grocery stores on every corner and shipped delivery services and all these other things that we have gotten away from that nutrient dense food and we are very deficient in fat soluble vitamins. And so organ meat is very dense in those nutrients and so not eating those has also depleted us. So I love that he's bringing this back and it's just very cool. But he's also super knowledgeable about how food affects our body. You know, he's been in the industry, he's done so much research. He works with his functional nutritionist wife who, you know, has an amazing whole career herself. And so he's just a wealth of knowledge. This is a great episode, you know, Please stay tuned and listen. And remember, the awesome thing about podcast is that you can push pause and then come back later, later so you don't have to have the entire time to get through it today. Do what you can. Come back. And then if you feel like you're getting value from this, I would love for you to hit the subscribe button or even take the time to leave me a quick review or hit 5 stars because I need itunes to know that you guys find this helpful and beneficial and that you're getting value out of this. So that keeps me going and then share it with everybody, you know, because the more people that listen, the more lives we can change. Right. So love it. Thank you. So before I go on, let me just sing James's praises. Chef James Barry. He's been doing this for over 16 years. He was a private chef for a long time. His inauguration into the restaurants style of cooking came later when he was the vegan vegetarian chef on Van's Warp tour. That's pretty cool. They traveled to 50American cities in 60 days. I can't even imagine cooking for that. But upon returning to Los Angeles, Chef James continued to privately be a chef and had the fortune of cooking for celebrities such as Tom Cruise, Mariska Heredit, George Clooney, Gerard Butler, Sean Puffy Combs, Barbra Streisand and John Cusack. Wow. Like that is so cool. So not wanting to limit the audience of his healthy and tasty style of cooking, Chef James started Wholesome to Go, a healthy, high quality food delivery company that served under his leadership in the Los Angeles area for eight years. So most recently, James launched my first functional food product, Pluck. Let's see. It's an organ based all purpose seasoning like I said and we are going to talk about that today. It's the first of its kind and it's amazingly easy and delicious way for people to get organ meats into their diets. James also call co authored the recipes in Margaret Floyd's book Eat Naked and co authored the follow up cookbook, the Naked Foods Cookbook. So check those out. Those, he said those might be harder to get, they might not be available, but if you can, they have really awesome recipes in there. We'll have the links in the show notes for their websites. He most recently co authored the recipes and Dr. Alejandro Junger's book, Clean Seven. So let's talk to Chef James. And it's more than organ meats today, you guys. We talk a lot about the food industry and how food affects our body, and you're gonna be surprised at some of the things you hear. Like, really, there's a lot going on that you don't know about. I was surprised. He taught me some things, so this is a really great episode. So here we go. Well, welcome, James, to the Functional Gynecologist podcast.

Thank you so much for having me.

I'm so excited. I was just mentioning to you before we started rolling that I used to be obsessed with Top Chef. I love chefs. I think cooking and creating in the kitchen is just such a beautiful art. And I'm kind of jealous that you know how to do all that.

Yeah, it's been fun. It's funny how it's such a celebrity culture now, isn't it? Like, just chefing. Right?

Yeah, exactly. Because food can be so fun and enjoyable, and that's what I love. Like, I go to these foodie restaurants and just get the tasting menu, like, eight courses, and all these surprises just come to you, and it's, like, such an amazing experience. I just. I love it.

It is. So have you heard of the Carnivore diet?

Oh, yes. My friend Ben Izadi actually did the carnivore diet for 30 days, and he documented everything. That was pretty cool. So, yeah, I'm excited that we're going to talk about meat today.

Yeah. Because I'm actually doing the Carnivore diet right now. I just started. I'm in my third day. And so when you say, like, food is so fun, I'm like, not when you're on the carnivore diet. It's, like, so boring.

Are you already out of ideas?

Well, no, there are no ideas. It's just, like, it's animal, so it's meat or seafood, and then salt. Like, that's it.

Yeah. Breakfast, lunch, dinner. That's it.

Yeah. Like, we're using Pluck the product. We'll talk about, but it's like, that's it. So there's really nothing. You can't braise the meat in, you know, in some kind of sauce or anything like that. You can't add lemon and all this stuff. We're just. It's just salt and meat now.

Are you doing this just because of the product? You have Coming out or did you have other motors?

They're connected. So it's primarily because our product, so it's pluck, it's an organ based seasoning and that product has been getting a lot of play in the carnivore world. Like we've had a lot of influencers that are carnivore dieters, really enjoy it. And so because of that we're learning about the carnivore diet and we're like, hey, well you guys have been so generous and sharing. We're going to try it. Like we'll do it, you know, and so we're just documenting it and doing it. So it's, it's, that's really it. It's not, it's not because I have like a specific health, health ailment or anything like that.

How are you feeling on it right now?

Surprisingly good. I mean honestly I've, I've rarely have found a diet except for maybe the. What's that one? The master cleanse. I've done, I've done them all by the way, like, because I've been, I've been a chef for over 16 years and so I have. Part of my job is understanding diets because I'm cooking. I mostly was a private chef and I owned a meal delivery service at one point. But as a private chef, I mean I was working for top celebrities, but people that were doing crazy diets. I remember when I first got into industry, the diet trend at the time was the fat flush. So I had to understand these diets and the best way to understand them is to do them, you know, so, so I, my entire career I just, I've been trying diets and honestly most of them, you usually do feel good the first few days, you know, because you're detoxing, you're, you're releasing, you know, inflammation and you, so you feel lighter and all this stuff. But the one that always destroyed my digestion was the master cleanse.

Yes, I've heard that from other people. Very interesting.

That one. For those that don't know that's like where you drink like it's maple syrup and lemon and water and it's just, it's just horrible. I don't recommend it. It's really bad.

Well, cool. So you are eating only meat right now and you are putting your new product on it. Pluck. I'm super excited because you're saying that this is an all purpose seasoning to cook with, but it has organ meat in it, right?

Yeah. I mean, so, so organ meat I mean, let's just touch base on that. So organ meat separate from my spice. Organ meat in general is one of the most nutrient, nutrient dense foods on the planet, and yet the majority of us are not utilizing it. To me, it's like, it's like literally there's a, there's a bag of money right there in front of you and no one's taking. It's just. Everyone's just walking by going, oh, isn't that pretty? You know.

Yeah, yeah. Why is that?

Well, I mean, there's the reasons I've identified. There's about three. So one is we associate that it's going to taste gross. And, you know, honestly, I think to a degree, that's correct. Because they don't all taste the same. We assume that all organ meats taste the same and they don't. Like, for example, chicken hearts are actually sweet. They're not the same as the liver or the kidney. And the textures are all different as well. Because that's the other thing is people kind of get icked out by the textures, but we associate this kind of icky taste with it. So that's one thing. And then the other thing is we don't know how to cook it. We're intimidated by cooking it. I mean, most of us don't even have time to cook, let alone dealing with new fangled foods. Right. So definitely the cooking learning curve is huge. And then the third is people that know they need it, really, there's only a handful of ways to get it. You can supplement it in capsules or you can buy the organ meat. I mean, that's really it. I mean, there's only two. The main sources of organ meat in the US are coming from Argentina and New Zealand. And it's because they're very clean sources of it. You need your animals to be very healthy when you're using the organs. And basically the main reasons those sources are coming in are for dog food and for supplements. So that tells you right there that we're just not eating our organ meats. But it's fascinating because 30% of the world's population is nutrient deficient.

Yes.

Right. So nutrient, we know, you know, you see that, you work with people. So nutrient deficiency is an issue. It is a, it's a, it's an epidemic. It's a pandemic, really. Right. Is nutrient deficiency. But the other issue is that particularly in the U.S. we're also dealing with the issue of overweight and obesity. So it's clearly not. We're not nutrient deficient because we're not getting calories. We are getting calories. We're just not getting nutrient dense calories.

Yeah. I mean, we've created this whole new picture of malnutrition, this obese, malnourished person. It's like we've created a new situation in this society. Right. Like when I was little, I thought malnutrition was scrawny little Ethiopians with big.

Bellies with Sally Struthers. Right.

Right now malnutrition looks like £300. You know, with skin conditions and joint issues and all that other stuff, it's just that we aren't realizing it. So I love that you are bringing this organ meat back. And you and I were talking before the show like our great grandparents, our grandparents, they ate organ meat. And I think you made a really important point. Like our meat is so contaminated now, I can see why it's not pushed to be eaten. But if you can get clean organ meat, tell me more, like, why is it so important?

Well, so organ meat, it has vitamins A, B, C, D, E and K. Organ meat has all that. It also has phosphorus, iron, potassium, particularly for women listening, anyone that's trying to get pregnant, it's basically all the new, all the minerals and nutrients you need to help get pregnant or just to stay healthy in general are in organ meat. Yeah, phosphorus, right. Everyone. When you're trying to have a baby, you need to have phosphorus or even. It's a lot of prenatal vitamins have that. I mean it's incredible. And you stack organ meat against any other food. So I mean like off the cuff, I think of, well, what do people think are nutrient foods, nutrient dense foods? Well, kale, I think they associate that, they associate blueberries, they think of acai berries, they think of even grass fed beets, like the muscle meat. They associate all those things as being nutrient deficient or nutrient dense. But you put those up against like beef liver, blows them all out of the water. It's the only food that ticks off every, you know, every box of what the measured nutrient is. It's amazing. It truly is amazing. But what's what I came up with though, with this product. So pluck, as I said, is it's an organ based all purpose seasoning. So it's a seasoning. It's not something you have to keep in the refrigerator. You just put it in your cupboard or in your drawer, your spice drawer. I even like to say, well, leave it on the table because you should be using it every day. Just like salt and pepper or something like that. But point is, is it's shelf stable, it's all natural. So there's, it's not synthetic, artificial, it's, it's, we're getting the nutrients from the organ meat. So it's freeze dried powdered organs. The reason they're freeze dried is because they, that process maintains as much of the nutrients as possible. Because whenever you heat up, you know, any food up, you're going to start to lower the nutrient value right from the, from the heat. But by freeze drying them, you maintain as the highest amount of nutrition in the food. And because it's a whole food, it's, it's not some isolated lab, you know, fortified vitamin that our bodies don't recognize nor do our bodies assimilate. So this is for example we were talking about like for women that are low in iron. Like beef liver has heme iron, which is not just, you know, it's not just high in iron, it's, it's highly absorbable iron.

Yeah.

You know, so if you're taking iron pills, stop that and focus on, you know, eating organ meat. And so what I did was I created because organ meat can kind of have a metallic taste or kind of a icky taste to some people. I paired it with all these organic herbs and spices to offset that taste. And so when people say what does it taste like? Well, it tastes, it's very umami, which if you know, mom, umami is like a full body flavor. It's, it's something that's natural to the organ meat. And what I did was I complemented that. So umami is, it's in, they put it in a lot of products. So actually when they put MSG in products, they're really trying. Why they're adding MSG is because they're trying to capture the umami. Because there's five, we all have five tastes. We have, you know, sour, we have sweet, we have bitter and salty. But the fifth one is umami. And so they're all unique too. Right. Like if you eat lots of salt but then, then you want sweet, like it's like they kind of counterbalance. Well when you get umami, every other flavor profile kind of brightens. So it actually makes. When the people that are using our product right now and sprinkling it on their food and you can just treat it like salt and pepper, you don't have to know how to cook, just sprinkle it on, you know, after or before, it doesn't matter, both. And what's happening is it's making everything just taste better. It brightens the food. It's just incredible.

That's so cool. That's awesome.

Oh my gosh. It is. It's really. I'm enjoying it. I mean, because I, you know, I made this because I have kids, I have two young girls and I made this, in a sense them. Like, I was just like, as a parent, I'm like, I want to get nutrition in my kids, but I don't want to deal with fussy eating and, you know, extra issues and all that stuff. And I was like, how can I do that? And this, that's where this came from.

Wow, that is so cool. So is it also something that you can cook with or does heating it ruin it?

Well, anytime you heat anything, it's going to lower. So what I tell people is like, you still can put like, let's say if I'm making hamburgers, that's just a simple example. If I'm making some ground hamburger, I'll put it in the ground meat, I'll mix it together, I'll put like a, you know, in about a pound of meat, I'll put like a tablespoon and I'll get the flavor in there. And it is protected by the meat a little bit, but it's going to probably, it's going to lose some of its nutrient density. But then what I'll do is I'll sprinkle some on after it's cooked. So I'm still getting the flavor both ways. And if there's anything that is kind of destroyed by the heat, I'm just replenishing it, you know.

Okay.

So I recommend, you know, doing both.

Yeah.

But either way, even though the heat is going to be more protected because it's a whole, it's coming from a whole food. It's when vitamin, when food is fortified with synthetic vitamins and they're not protected, it's just, they're just lab created vitamins. That's when the heat just destroys those immediately.

Yeah, exactly. Well, that is really cool. So I would love for you to touch on a few things for my listeners. I mean, so many of us are feeling like we don't have time to even cook our food. And why do you as a chef think it's important to cook your own food?

Well, I found. So in my time, my 16 plus years, my focus as a chef has always been around health. Like I got into the industry mostly because I loved cooking. I mean, that's where it started. But what I was really fascinated by Was that it's really kind of comfort foods. Like, I looked at, like, the foods that in Covid is a perfect example. This. When Covid happened, where did we all gravitate towards? We didn't all gravitate towards eating more kale. We gravitated towards, you know, comfort foods.

Yeah.

And drinking. Right. Alcohol consumption went up. Any kind of comfort dessert foods, baking, you know, breads. That all went up, you know, in terms of people eating and cooking them. And I think whenever emotion and emotional things happen, we default to comfort food. So I was always looking at comfort foods going, how can I make those healthier? Because those are going to be. That's what we're going to be eating. So how can I make that? Okay. So early on, I was looking at things like, well, fermenting salsas and ketchups, like, fermenting, like. Like condiments, things that we use every day to make them healthier, to help with digestibility, things like that. And so I've learned, though, over the years that there's really a few markers that truly move health the quickest, and I say the easiest. But I know that it's going to be. Some will be easier and some will be harder for the person. It's all, you know, individual, but one is water intake. Right. So you got to be drinking lots of water. I've. I've watched people like. There was this kid who I was really good friends with, but I met him when he was, like, 19, and I was in my late 20s then. I mean, 30s. And he worked with me for my company, and he came and he had horrible acne skin. He was smoking at the time. He just. He was, like, really on the verge of, like, he was young, but he was. He was basically set up his whole life to be really hard. You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah.

He also had add. He was. He just couldn't relax. And he. He. At one point, he saw us cooking this healthy food, and he was like, hey, James, what's one thing that I can do to start getting healthier? And I told him, I said, I want you to stop drinking the sodas and all that stuff and just simply replace it with water. That's all I told him to do because I really believe in, you know, you got to take baby steps, right?

Yeah. Yup.

That's all I said. And we never really had another discussion about it. And now, many years later, and even within a year, I mean, a few months, his skin started clearing up. He stopped smoking. So just his skin clearing up made him want to get even healthier. It was like the gateway to wanting to do more. So I always say water, first and foremost. Second thing that is a real. Moves the needle a lot is basically meal planning.

Yes. Yes.

Huge. And people don't realize it, and I know that we're so busy, but it's just. If you just take one day a week, and what I recommend is you grab like a. Like a Bon Appetit or some kind of, like, cooking magazine with recipes in it. Just get that. Just get that monthly. Right. And so go through that magazine, pick recipes from that magazine, and then write down the ingredients. And so you create an ingredient list based off of that magazine's recipes or whatever your favorite recipes are, and then that's the list you take to the grocery store and you don't buy anything else. So no more. No impulsive buys, no following your emotions. It's like. And you only. And that's kind of connects to one of the other movers is you only have in your house what you want to eat.

Yes.

Like, so if you don't want to eat ice cream, don't have it in your house. If you don't want to eat chips, don't. And the same thing. Parents with kids. You know, I have kids. I get it. But I've worked a lot with parents and kids, and I'll tell you right now, it's really ironic, but parents will say, I don't understand it. My kid's so. He or she is so addicted to Cheerios. Well, it's not like they can walk outside and pull a Cheerio off a tree. How did they get into. How did a Cheerio even get in their hand? How did they get access to it? And that's the sad truth is we. We introduced it to them as a parent. We were feeling, oh, I want to give them a treat, or, oh, I'm so busy, or whatever it is came up, and we were like, here, take this.

Yeah, that was a game changer for me when I just decided, I can't have that stuff in the house. I don't have willpower when it comes to food. You know, you just. I just don't have it in the house. And it took my kids a while to get over it. And they still complain sometimes that, you know, we don't have good food in the house. But when they can't make bad choices because it's not in the kitchen, I'm doing them a favor. And they get over it a lot quicker than if it's in the Cupboard. And I'm telling them they can't eat it. I mean, I just find that to be cruel.

Right.

Like, you can't buy the junk and then tell them not to eat it. It just doesn't work.

Or what a lot of parents do is they. They eat it themselves and they say, but you can't eat. So then they're not modeling. Right. I mean, I see that a lot, too.

Yeah.

Like, if. And that's how kids learn. Right. They watch what we do and then they follow suit.

Yeah.

The first way to make your kid a smoker is for you to be a smoker. Right. It's like, it's not. It's not brain, you know, it's not. It's not like that complicated. But yet we make it complicated because we get tied emotionally to, I want to reward my kids or I feel bad or whatever it is, and it's like they'll feel worse if they eat that food. And you know that.

Exactly, exactly. And the other thing that helped me so much was to make my own food, like to take that time and actually nourish myself. I had a much. I had a huge appreciation all of a sudden for food and the work that it requires just to grow it and prepare it. And I felt like I was doing something loving for myself and that fueled the desire to keep doing it, you know? And so I would. Do you have, like, any quick tips that what would be something easy that someone could start doing to get more whole foods in their diet?

Yeah, absolutely. So that was going to be my next point. So I'm glad you said that. Which was making your own food and one of the easiest, because once again, we can talk in theory about, oh, make your own food, but if someone doesn't have the patience to do it or doesn't make the time or just doesn't have the know how, or is making it more complicated than it has to be for whatever reason, then it's going to feel like a big mountain to climb. So I like to sometimes even break it down and say, okay, okay, let's not even talk about the whole meal. Let's just talk about one thing. If you can just make one thing, this is the one that's going to move the needle a lot, which is make your own salad dressings or sauces. Just make your own. And it's really simple. And here's how to do it. So basically, it's three parts oil to one part acid or vinegar or lemon or lime. Because an acid is anything acidic. Right. So lemon Lime, even orange, is technically acidic. Or any kind of vinegar. So three parts oil to one part. And when I say parts, I mean, like, you could use the cap of the olive oil, let's just say. Right. So I pour three, three of those caps into, like, a mason jar of olive oil. Here's the basic recipe for a simple balsamic vinaigrette. So three of those caps or three tablespoons of. Three tablespoons of the olive oil, and then one tablespoon of the balsamic vinegar, put it in a mason jar, shake it, and you're done.

Yeah.

You can add a little salt, you can add a little pepper to taste, but that's how fast you can make your own dressing. And I promise you that's going to move your health the fastest just by doing that one thing. Because if you read the food, the ingredients of any bottled dressing, it's horrendous.

Yeah. Those inflammatory oils are toxic. You know, the salad dressings and, you know, right after that is the coffee creamers. Like, if I always say if you can get rid of those two things, you're gonna decrease your inflammation so much, that will be a game changer. So I love that. So people don't even have to necessarily cook their meal yet. Just start with your switching out salad dressing for something they've made. Throw it on some romaine lettuce if you can't handle greens yet. You know, that's how I did it. I started out iceberg lettuce as a kid, finally graduated to romaine. Then I added in the spinach and the mixed greens. Because your palate does take a while to change and develop. Right.

Oftentimes, I mean, do you remember being. I mean, at least. At least when I grew up, this is how it was. Like, do you remember kind of the first time where you mostly drank water? Like, but, like. Because before I was growing up, like, drinking juices and sodas, and then when it was like water, I remember it just tasted so plain.

Yeah.

Like anyone that is in that place of, like, where natural, real food in its state tastes plain, then that right there is an indicator that your palate is off.

Oh, yeah.

Like you said. I love how you said that is just be patient with yourself. Continue. Just keep eating that plain, you know, real food, and wait for your palate to catch up. It just means that, you know, all these artificial and natural flavors, which I call synthetic. Right. Synthetic flavors are blowing out our taste buds.

Yeah. They're so concentrated. You know, I remember when I gave up sugar, gosh what, six years ago, maybe. I mean, I was an OB gyn. I didn't sleep. I lived on Mountain Dew, donuts, coffee garbage. When I gave that up, all of a sudden strawberries and blueberries tasted amazing, but they didn't before when I was eating that crap because my taste buds were so hypersaturated from those artificial sugars. And so I'll never forget one day just realizing, oh, my gosh, this fruit is so sweet, and realizing that shift had happened. But it did take months, you know, it took a while, you know, and so I love that you're saying baby steps. Get to know your palate, encourage it, and just keep trying new things.

The thing actually I would offer is that. So you're in a sense to talking like a sugar detox, right? So once you get off sugar, right, you can shift your taste buds in 14 days. It doesn't have to take months. Like in 14 days, if you just remove all sweeteners. I don't mean just honey or maple syrup. I'm talking anything that has added sugar, any sugars, and even starches. Right. That convert into sugar quickly. Right. But if you remove all those things, it's. It's amazing. So in 14 days, let's just say you're someone who usually drinks three glasses of wine. And I. Or even two. If you do a sugar detox for 14 days, when you go to try to have a glass of wine, you'll barely get through half of it.

Exactly.

Like, it's so sweet. It's so sweet. And it's the same thing that you experience. It's like, we don't. We have to be patient with ourselves because we. Our bodies are eating foods that they're not. That our bodies weren't designed to eat.

Exactly.

So we're just. We're just these artificial flavors. These things, they're. They're blowing out our taste buds. They're affecting our psychology. And when we get out of the. When we get off of that bus or when we get off of that train, you just. You got to take baby steps and get back your natural, you know, your natural state, if you can. If that's even possible these days. It's really.

So share again the story that you were telling me beforehand because I'm kind of angry now. Like, the bars that they have the ingredients on the front of the label, like six cashews, three egg whites, blah, blah, you know, dates or whatever. Like, I literally thought those were the ingredients that I was about to eat in those foods. Luckily, I quit eating Them because I respond to Cashews. But you're telling me that if I would have turned it over and looked at the label, it would have been different.

Yeah. So that we're talking about RX bars.

Yeah.

And that's just one example. But we. You know, we can never forget that the food on shelves and packages is there. It's designed for shelf life. You know, so it's designed to be as cheap as possible and then designed to last as long as possible, because those two factors allow the people that are making the food and the people selling the food to make the most money. Right. And so we can never forget that. So the two ways that they kind of counteract is there's marketing, and then there's what's actually in it. And RXbars are a really great example because the way they present the brand is by putting those ingredients on the front of the packaging. They're creating this feeling of like, oh, this company's transparent. And, oh, my gosh, look, they're breaking down every ingredient right there. So I don't have to read the back, but if you actually turn it around and read the back, every RX bar has this ingredient in it called natural flavors. And you might think to myself, oh, well, that must be raspberry, because the bar says it's raspberry. Well, not exactly. Basically, natural flavors are. They're synthetic flavoring. It's flavoring that has been highly processed and highly messed with. It's a chemical compound that's created to kind of initiate or make you feel like it tastes like, let's say, raspberry. And I was sharing with you. There is an ingredient that a lot of people don't realize in these natural flavors, and this is what dictates it from being a natural flavor versus artificial. So it's. It's basically the anal gland from a beaver.

That's so crazy to me. Like, it's one thing to wear skunk as a perfume, but now we're eating, you know, stuff coming out of beaver anal gland glands.

Good.

I don't know if I wanted you to tell me that, James.

So vanilla flavors, strawberries, raspberry flavors. That's usually that. The. That anal gland helps to flesh out those flavors because there's. There's a robustness to any flavor. It's never one note. And so when they're in the lab trying to create flavors, they're not just. It's just like wine. They're not just focusing on one. And, like, you can't just extract Strawberry flavoring. And then now you have a strawberry. It's very different from that. They have to take all these other notes, these other compounds, to achieve the feeling that we get when we eat a strawberry. Because it's not just about smell and the olfactory piece. It's also the feeling. We associate it with it. And they do. They capture the industry, the flavor industry. Humongous. We don't realize it because it's not a transparent industry. So the FDA does not oversee it. They basically, they oversee themselves. So we don't know what's in all this stuff. But the way that they call like beaver anal gland natural is because it's coming from a beaver.

Right.

Which is absurd. Right. It's still artificial because how they're extracting all these things and putting them together and the different chemicals are using to pull them out, and it's all synthetic. But the way that they like this is a good. There's a great book called the Dorito Effect. And the author kind of gives an example of what artificial and natural means to the. To us as marketed. How it's marketed to us. The industry sees it as the same thing. But how it's marketed to us is basically this. If I was going into San Francisco and I'm crossing. If I walk across the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco, that's natural San Francisco, because I walked. But if I take a cab across the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco, that's artificial San Francisco. But the point of this example is that you're still in San Francisco. And that's the whole point is whether we call it natural, artificial, the end product is the same, if that makes sense.

Yeah, yeah. So make your own food, people, because you don't know what you're putting in your bodies. And. And, you know, I get it. We're all busy. It's fine to eat that stuff once in a while. But so many of us rely on that as our mainstay. Like, that's our lunch every day or that's our breakfast. Those bars that are created to last on the shelves forever, and it's nutritionally deplete, and it's got other toxins in it that our body doesn't want. So I love that you're pushing the idea of just getting back to basics, you know?

Yeah. Real food. I mean, you know, as I mentioned, I've been in the industry a long time. I've seen lots of different diet trends. But the one thing to me that isn't a trend is just eating real food. Like, I Always just default to that. And, you know, I'm a whole believer in the diet we choose to eat. It's a choice. Like, I'm not going to tell you how to eat. I'm not going to tell anyone how to eat because we're all different and we all have different backgrounds, we all have different intentions, different things we need in any given moment. So I always try to tell people, it's like diet is a choice. What's not a choice is how your body responds to what you're eating. So, like, if you want to be vegan, I don't personally agree with that, but if you want to be vegan and you want to eat that way, then that's a choice. But if your body starts getting, you know, if you start having inflammatory responses, if you notice that you're just gaining lots of weight, if you're skin starts to get bad, if you, if your body reacts, then you need to listen to that.

Yeah.

And that goes for any diet, because the way the body reacts, that's the truth. That's going to tell you what your ideal body is. Your specific ideal diet is.

Sorry. Well, I think so many people, this is a new concept to them because it's been ingrained in us that it's not the food, the food couldn't possibly be causing the problem. You know, I'm a conventionally trained physician. I come from a world where cancer doctors tell patients that their diet doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what they eat. And it makes me freaking sad now that my eyes are opened. But that is because the food industry controls the medical system and the healthcare system and the insurance companies and everybody else. And so that has been pushed on us for decades. That it's just about calories and it's just about satiating hunger. We're not hurting ourselves, we're putting in garbage and chemicals. And so I'm out in the Midwest and some people aren't on board with this idea yet, that it actually does matter. And so I. That's why I do this podcast. That's one huge reason is people need to realize that every time you put something in your mouth, your body has a response or reaction to it. You know, just like you're saying, like there's a whole chemical reaction every time you eat a Twinkie or a Dorito or a banana or a pepper, you know, there's a response and we need to start listening to that.

So I'm so glad you're doing the work you're doing. I mean, I Really, I really honor you for that because you just nailed it on the head about how the way that doctors are taught versus the reality of what we're all experiencing. So the reality is the food we're eating is hurting, like we are being affected by it. But if the industry that we're looking towards to help fix it doesn't recognize it as a problem, that is the problem, you know, so the fact that you're a medically trained doctor who sees that food does affect your health is key. I mean, my personal experiences. So my initiation into that was I was in college and I was, I used to be an actor and involved in entertainment business stuff. And I had graduated in a flurry to go and attend the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts. And in that flurry, I had to finish all my finals. I'd do all these things just to get over there in time. And I was, when I got there, I was two weeks in Massachusetts on my own. I was still young, you know, 19 I think at the time. And I got a kidney stone. It was the most painful experience I've ever had as a male. I hear the only. It's the closest men can get to having a baby.

Right, right.

So painful. And it was scary. And when I, when it came, when I passed it, I asked doctor, how did I get that? And he said, well, what have you been drinking and eating? I said, well, I was like, I've been drinking root beer and eating pizza. Like that's all I was eating and drinking. And he's like, well, that's why you're not drinking enough water. And I was like, what? I mean, I literally had no concept. I'm like, you mean the food I eat is going to affect my body? Yeah. No concept of that.

Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Like the work we're doing is so important. And if anybody takes anything from this episode, take away the fact that you need to eat real food, you really do.

And you know, going back to the pluck product, the all purpose seasoning and using the organ meats, what's really powerful about that is we kind of touched on it is like you really do need to read food labels because if you're assuming what's in the food that you're eating, then you're going to be, you're basically letting the food industry dictate what you eat. And they're not, they're not here to take care of you, they're here to make a profit. I mean, I'm sorry, that's the sad truth. They may have started with good intentions, but ultimately the major food industry companies are there to make a profit. And so they don't really care. They want you to be addicted, they want it to be cheap, they want you to eat it a lot. So you need to read those ingredients. The thing about pluck is like you're getting the nutrients, but it's not synthetic vitamins and nutrients that you would be getting from fortified foods, you know, like cereals and milks and whatever. Any of those kind of foods that you see fortified vitamins and minerals on, those are all synthetic. Those are not real food based. But this is.

They have to fortify them because there's no nutritional value in them.

Exactly. Because it's dead. Yeah, exactly. The more you can look for foods that don't have any fortified vitamins or foods that are in their natural whole state, you know. And you know, just to share this real quick, we make home cooking very complicated. If you're someone that gets overwhelmed by recipes, don't follow a recipe. Here's the component. Just look at it as a formula. You need a vegetable, you need a protein. And then if you want, you can have a starch, but you don't necessarily need it, but if you want, you can. Right? And you want to pick, you know, ideally like resistant starch stuff, you know, so, so you want to think of like sweet potatoes, parsnips, cell urac. You want to think of like foods that are in their vegetable state still. So they're not necessarily grains or starches or breading or anything like that. It's just, it's things that are starchier vegetables. That's kind of.

Right.

A rough idea of what resistant starches. Right. But so when you think of it, you want your plate to mostly be vegetables, right? So if it's a plate and it's, or it's a clock, you know, at least three fourths of it. So at least from, you know, from 2:00 clock all the way to 6, you want to have vegetables. And then from basically like the size of your palm is what you want to think about for your protein. Any protein you want could be eggs. If you're just like, I don't have time to cook, you know, this chicken, whatever. So just scramble some eggs, you know, whatever it is, just whatever, just choose a protein and it's about the size of your palm and then add some fat or some dressing or sauce or something to it and hopefully you're making it yourself or you just, you could simply Even add like a little bacon fat. Like lard. Like, lard has a lot of flavor to it, you know, I mean, so add a little fat to it. And then if you want to resist starch, that's like, from, you know, I said still six, so maybe that's six to four. So that's only two. Two pieces. And then the other part is the protein. I mean, like. But it doesn't have to be that complicated. And all you do is just throw that all in a pan. Throw it all into a pan. You can let the fat from the protein cook everything else. You don't have to do anything else to it. You can cover it for a little bit so it steams and cooks faster. And then remove the COVID and let it then caramelize a little bit. And that's. That's really it. I mean, we do not have to make it harder than it is, particularly if it's already, you know, challenging for you.

Yeah, Yeah. I love that. That's so good. And people can find all your recipes and everything on your website, right?

Yeah. So Eat Pluck is where you can buy the seasoning. And we have some recipes there. I have a cookbook out there, but I think it's out of print at this point. The digital copy still available. It's called the Naked Foods Cookbook. And that's available on Amazon and, and Barnes and Noble. And basically in that cookbook, you know, I was talking about making your own dressings. We have like 10 salad dressings. They're all mason jar dressings. So you just put the ingredients in, you shake them, and you're done. I always call them my 5 minute or less dressings. Because anyone that thinks that buying dressings in a bottle is better or that it's faster, I'm like, no, it's not. I can show you how to make a dressing in three minutes, two or three minutes. And that's faster than you could ever go to a grocery store.

Yeah, that's so awesome. So I will have all those links in my show notes because I definitely want people to follow you and check you out. I think you have so much good information, and I think this seasoning is going to be a game changer that, you know, you're actually putting something on your food of nutritional value, especially for us women, you know that you mentioned the iron. I mean, we are so anemic. As women, especially women in their 40s, their periods start getting heavier, they're losing more blood, and. And you are saying organ meats just have more bioavailable iron like it's going to be to absorb it. So I love, you know, the idea of getting some organ meats in there and doing all that.

So we call it like nutrition in a pinch because everything you add pluck to you now just turn that food into something that has more nutrients than it did before. I mean, we have families loving it because kids love this. Spices, love it. And so we have families putting on popcorn on movie night. You know, they don't even have to tell the kids that it's organ meat. They just put pluck on. The kids are like, what is this? Oh, it's just this new seasoning I got. Oh, it's so good. And you know, you never have to cross any barrier that's going to create any kind of discomfort. Like just don't tell them, they won't know.

I'm thinking I'm going to put it on french fries as soon as they come out of the oven, you know.

So good on potatoes. So good on potatoes. I even sprinkle sometimes I make like a gluten free toast or something because we're gluten free. And so I'll make a toast, I'll sprinkle on that. I love it. It's so good.

And I'm glad you mentioned that because the spice is gluten free, right? The seasoning, that is so awesome.

And it's, it's GMO free. The organs come from pasture raised animals. So they're grass fed and grass finished, which is key because all animals are grass fed but they're not necessarily grass finished. New Zealand, they come from New Zealand cows and they come from farms in New Zealand that really New Zealand's an island so they're able to control things that we aren't and they control the heck out of their industry to ensure that it's really high quality.

Oh my gosh, I'm so excited. This is such an amazing product. So definitely want everybody to check it out. The links are in my show notes and where can they follow you? Are you on social media at all?

So for the web for to buy the product go to Eat Pluck P l u c k.com and if you, I'll give you this. But if you use Pluck 10, so P L U C K10, you'll get 10%. Your listeners will get 10% off their first purchase. And you can follow us on social media, Eat Pluck. And then if you want to follow me personally, I'm at Chef Jamesbury. That's B A R R Y Like Barry Manilow, Chef James Barry. And you'll find me on Instagram, but I'm constantly posting about food and food labels. Like that, the bar thing that we talked about, that's on my Instagram. And I break it all down for people. So I'm always trying to give value and help people make different choices, or not even different choice, but informed choices. Because I'm not here to judge anyone. I always say make your own choices, but make them informed. Make informed.

So important. I love that. Well, thank you, James. This has been awesome and I hope everybody follows you and tries pluck. I'm super excited for it. So I'll have those links and I just think you're gonna blow this whole situation up. This is so exciting.

I hope with your help. Yes.

Awesome. Well, it was great to connect with you and hopefully you'll be back on again soon.

Thank you.

Okay. That was a great episode. We got so much good information and golden nuggets.

Right.

That we can start incorporating and adding to what we're already doing on a regular basis. Remember, it's baby steps toward the new you that you want to create. So I love the ideas that he gave. Just the salad dressing, Making your own salad dressing so that you're not getting all those inflammatory fats in your diet. That is a great thing to just start swapping out and then adding his seasoning with the organ meat in it for more nutritional value. I love that. Especially, you know where I'm at. We are way above the equator. We're all very fat soluble, deficient in our vitamins. So D A. Okay. That kind of stuff, those need to be replenished and why not get it with a little bit of seasoning? So definitely check that out. The links are in my show notes, but shoot me your questions. I want to hear what you're thinking. I want to hear what you want to listen about. So send me you know what topics you want to hear about because I'm here to serve you. I'm doing this for you. I hope you enjoyed it. So take one little golden nugget from this episode, add it to the other things that you've already incorporated, and keep walking in the right direction on your health journey. Okay? So thank you so much for your time. I am honored that you're here and you're listening. I appreciate it so much. So share it with your friends and keep listening and go have an amazing kick ass week. All right. Bye, ladies.