Dr. Cowan's Garden co-Founder and CEO Asher Cowan discuss a new alternative to healthcare

Hey. Hey.

There it is.

There it is. Happy almost New Year.

Yeah, New Year.

Cool. This is already recording, just so you know.

Oh, got it. All right.

And we can go right into it. Thank you for sponsoring, once again, Organuary 2024.

Yeah, happy to. I think it's great. Obviously, organ meats are a very important part of a healthy diet, and I think your product pluck is a great way, a great vehicle for that because I know organs. Organ meats are challenging for a lot of people to eat, myself included, to be honest.

Yeah, no, yeah. Talk about that a little bit because you grew up probably eating them, right? I mean, your dad clearly knows about.

Yeah, he knows. I mean, I don't know. I don't. We probably ate a little bit, but. But honestly, no, not. Not much. I'm. Now I actually have a really good solution for it, you know, in addition to the pluck, obviously. But I get my, my beef basically by the cow. And so the. Because I have a relationship with the farmer and the butcher, they're able to grind up the liver into the ground beef. So, yeah, that's a. Yeah, so I get it into everyone's ground beef kind of without the flavor.

So are they only doing the liver or are they doing heart and, you know, other organs as well?

Only the liver for now, but the next time we can, we can make adjustments to that. So, yeah, I did get the heart, so I'm gonna do something with that hopefully soon.

But we have on our website we have a. A heart jerky that's pretty darn good, I gotta say.

It's.

It's a recipe from Ashley Von Hooten. Who did it? Takes guts.

Oh, yeah. Cool. Yeah.

Well, I'm super happy and excited to talk to you. I mean, we've known each other for many years now and, and there's so much alignment in terms of mission and just ethics around the food industry in general. But I'm. I'm really kind of promoting you guys in, in the email about how you're.

You're.

You're not only, like. I definitely want to talk about the mission, specifically with the vegetable powders, but you're also on a mission to kind of change healthcare as we know it. And so I would love to dive into that as well.

Yeah, happy to. Happy to talk.

But let's start. Let's just start with the product and then we'll get there. But, you know, one thing, I don't know if you're, you know, if you check social media much, but I'm, you know, I, I've been in this, this, this food business now as a chef for, you know, 20 years, and I, I can't even tell you how many. I mean, I'm sure you've, you, you, you experienced it as well. But like, the trends, right, the eat this, don't eat that, how much they change over the years. And the one that we're hearing a lot now is like, vegetables are bad for you. And, and I really would really love you to address that because I think, I think we're only hearing one side of the story, and I think it's a very limited perspective. Like, they're not, it, it, it's like they're, they're not explaining the subtleties of why actually you can make vegetables very, very good for you and how you can actually the value that they do bring. All we're hearing, particularly from many carnivore advocates, is like, don't, don't eat them. They just cause harm. So how are you addressing that these days?

Or are you? Yeah, well, first of all, I, I think, yeah, I was gonna, I was gonna guess like, who, who, who that message is coming from. You know, it's, it's probably the carnivore, primal, you know, type diet followers out there. And, you know, the question for those people, in addition to the question to the vegans, would be, can you name me a successful tribe, ancestral tribe, that, you know, that didn't have the access to the modern foods that we now have access to? Can you name, can you name any of those? Or do you think any of those didn't eat literally every edible thing in their environment? You know, so like, whether it was, you know, plants, seafood, if you're on an island or near a body of water or animal, animal products, animal, you know, the organs, the fat, every, every part of the animal. There's no ancestral tribe that didn't make use of every edible thing available to them, including the, you know, the cavemen, carnivores, you know, you're telling me they didn't walk by a raspberry patch and stop to eat the raspberries? I don't think so. I'm pretty sure they, they would stop and gather up all the berries or vegetables or, you know, edible greens or anything like that that they could get their hands on. And I think so. So that's number one, is that for human history. We've made use and eaten everything in our environment that was available to us. It's only been in minds that we, we could sort of pick and choose, you Know, well, I'm on this diet, or no, I'm on that diet. And so. So basically, a foundation, you know, foundational belief in. In our company and, you know, our philosophy on food in general is that you get the ingredients to where they should be eaten. And that's. And that's how you can make, you know, most, at least, whole foods healthy and nutritious part of your diet. So what does that mean? Well, for grains and nuts and seeds and those types of things, you're sprouting them before you're. Before you're, you know, processing. Well, that's part of the processing, yeah.

Before you're preparing them as a meal.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, you know, we. We carry nut butters and nuts, and so those are sprouted, then dehydrated, and then ground into the. Into the, you know, sort of paste that becomes a nut butter. And the same principle is true for the kale or the butternut squash. In our vegetable powders, we blanch or steam the vegetables prior to dehydration. That breaks down the oxalates or goitrogens that are present in raw form. And it also helps the food become more bioavailable or the nutrients become bioavailable, meaning that you're better able to absorb them. And so in this way, no, we don't have to fear vegetables and no, we don't have to fear, you know, fruits and grains and seeds and nuts and all those types of things, you know, assuming they're grown properly and all that stuff. You know, underlying. Underlying this conversation is the assumption that you are buying, you know, at least organic or better. And, you know, you're not buying food with chemicals and pesticides and those types of things in them. So, you know, you have your heirloom variety wheat or something like that that can be, you know, ground into a flour, fermented, you know, sourdough type and baked into a bread. And there's, you know, there's basically nothing wrong with that. A lot of people are able to tolerate that. Um, and so that's a way. The proper processing is the way that you can get all these foods into your diet in a healthy way.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And then can you share a little bit about the process you guys do with your vegetable powders? You mentioned you. So you blanch them before you powder them. But aren't you specifically choosing certain heirloom varieties? Like, can you tell us a little bit about that?

Right, so, you know, instead of butternut squash, we're using honey. Honey nut squash, which is similar to a butternut squash, but it's an heirloom variety and it's a little bit sweeter. And, and we find it, you know, better. We're using a lot of heirloom variety vegetables. We're using a lot of, you know, and, and also the important thing for us is we're not sourcing our powders from a powder manufacturer. We're sourcing our vegetables from a farm that's 45 minutes away from our processing center that ensures the freshest possible vegetables make it to the processing center. And then we go through our process of blanching or steaming the vegetables that need that. Need that, you know. So, for example, peppers don't. But kale, beets, carrots, squash, they need that blanching step order to break down the phytic acid or the oxalates and to, to, to make it a healthy product to, you know, sort of remove those toxins.

And then you're, you're, you're, you're basically also, as you mentioned, you're incorporating other products. And I, and I love that you're doing this. You know, for lack of a better comparison, I think of you as becoming, as Dr. Cowan Garden's website is becoming, kind of like a very curated thrive market, you know, so it's, you're not trying to cover the, the, the gamut that thrive is, you know, because, because it's arguably they're. They're going in kind of. That's. I think they almost started out one way and now they've gone a totally different way. Or they're just. They're almost like trying to do too much. And so now it's like, I don't even know what they stand for. Whereas it's very clear when you go to your sites. Like, no, you, you guys are very clear on what you stand for. Can you talk a little bit about how you choose products and why you choose the products you do? You mentioned a little bit about the sprouted aspect of it.

Yeah. So we're, I mean, we're only looking for the best product in the category, whatever it is. So whether it's granola or nut butters, we're only looking to partner with manufacturers and other sort of boutique brands who are going about things in the way that we would them, in what we would call the right way. So number one, first and foremost is you have to have the best possible sourcing. So beyond organic, we use the term beyond organic. And basically what that means is the farms that we're sourcing, our ingredients from are going above and beyond the typical USDA or organic standards. And the reason for that is because, you know, they continue to slip over time and continue to be more and more relaxed. And so there's things that can slip through the USDA organic cracks that we don't feel should be in our food. And so we partner with farms that are going above and beyond. Many times they're small, local, local to our production facility. Organic and biodynamic farms. And so that's the first step, the second step, as we mentioned, it's the proper processing. So if it's kale, kale needs to be blanched before you eat it. And you can kind of taste it in, in the, in the, in the final product. If you, if you blanch kale and then drink the water that it was blanched in, you'll taste this kind of like bitter kind of gross water. And that's the, that's the anti nutrients, sort of cooked cooking off of the kale. And what you're left with is, you know, a little bit sweeter, more sort of softer flavor. And, you know, that's what we should be eating. It's also more bioavailable. You know, the part of the digestion process has been started for you in the cooking process. And so the nutrients are more bioavailable. And so it's the same principle with the, with the vegetables and the powders, with the nuts and seeds or the nuts and the nut butters, the olive oil. You know, we partnered with a, it's literally a family who's owned the olive groves in Greece for decades, and they've refined their growing techniques and pressing techniques and processes and to the point where they literally won the gold medal for the highest polyphenol content of any olive oil in the world. And so it's that it's partnering with someone who's like vertically integrated. They own the trees, they own the processing, they own the bottling. And so if we can control every aspect of that, of the process to where, you know, from the, from the soil to the, to our fulfillment center, you know that. And we can see every step in that process. That's the products that we're looking for.

Yeah, that's really attractive. And, and you guys, you guys are becoming more than. And this is what I mentioned earlier. So you're, you're really. Well, actually, before I go there, let me ask you this. And I know it's your dad, but maybe you can speak on it. Your, your dad has. When, when he was practicing medicine. What, what Kind of. He, I know he dealt with a lot of cancer patients, right? A handful.

Off the record. Yes.

Yeah, off the record. Right. But what, what diet, what would you like, could you classify or is there kind of a predominant diet that you kind of noticed that he was advocating in general? Is it consistent with what you guys are still advocating or has it changed, you know?

Yeah, more or less. I mean, it's, it's still consistent. I mean, he, he advocates everyone for the, you know, the quote, nourishing traditions diet, which means that you're including, you know, basically everything as long as it's a whole food that's grown properly. You know, we're not including, you know, non organic foods or GMOs or anything like that, but we're including, you know, whole foods and all food groups. So if it's grains or, or seeds or nuts, again, the same, the same principles apply in the Nourishing Traditions diet, as in our business, is that it's the proper processing. So there's sprouting, there's, you know, they're making sourdough breads, they're doing those types of things. And, and then, you know, animal fats are, you know, maybe the biggest part of the nourishing traditions diet and a huge focus of it. So it's raw butter and cream and raw milk and a variety of animal fats. And obviously organ meats are a big component of that as well. And then, you know, your sort of fruits and vegetables, those are kind of like your vitamin pills to go along with the, the building blocks, you know, which is the animal fats and proteins and organ meats in your diet. So that, that's basically the diet that he recommends to just about anyone. There might be some variations to that based on a certain condition, to be honest. I'm not really sure. But generally speaking, he, he advocates a ne. Nourishing traditions diet.

Yeah. And, and then now let's go into. So, so you were telling me when we were at the Wise Traditions conference, how you guys. Well, because he, he's retired now, you guys were still getting people calling the business and saying, hey, I want to talk about Dr. Cowan, I want to talk to him. I need, you know, I need, I'm looking for a doctor. And, and so instead of just turning them away, you. That it kind of inspired a, a whole spin off.

Can you share? Yeah, yeah. So we're, we're basically, we're trying to recreate the model that he used in his practice when he was practicing medicine, which was sort of a membership model and you get to come and see the doctor when you needed and you paid a monthly fee. And you know, there's some people who paid per visit, but a lot of, a lot of it was, you know, just memberships, paying what they could on a monthly basis and being able to see him or talk to him as they needed. And so we started with roughly that same model. It's a little bit different because it has to be exclusively online. And so you basically sign up for a member. We have individual small family, which is up to four people, and large family memberships which is five or more. And you get to choose your sort of. We don't like the term primary doctor, but that's basically what it is. So you, we have four of these primary doctors that you, that you select. All of them have interviews on there. So you can get to know them a little bit before you select your doctor. And then you're, you know, the doctor gets to know you and your story. So his view on, you know, a quote diagnosis is it's not a diagnosing of a disease, it's learning the person's story. So for example, three people could come into a doctor, a regular doctor's appointment, and they're all complaining of joint pain. Now the doctor in a traditional practice or a traditional minded doctor would say, oh, you have arthritis, I got a pill for you, let me write your prescription. And your arthritis will be managed by this drug, which may have a bunch of side effects, but we don't need to talk about those. And then they all go on their way and they fill their prescription and now they're basically, basically not hooked. But they're on pharmaceuticals for the foreseeable future. The drugs are not doing anything to cure the underlying condition. And then they go, and then they're on these drugs for however long. Now the, the different, the difference that we're, the approach that we're taking is we're going to get to know the person's story so that we can figure out what the underlying issue is. Now in this example, we might have a situation where one person comes in because they're a vegan and their joints are breaking down. And vegans probably don't get a lot of collagen in their diet. And so getting to know them and their story, we might say, well, you know, if you're a vegan, you know, how do you expect your joints to perform well when they're made of collagen? Don't you need some collagen in your diet? And we might be able to suggest some things that they might be able to do in their life to support them actually. Healing versus managing the symptoms. Now the next person might come in and they maybe had an ankle injury 10 years ago and now they're living a more sedentary lifestyle and they need to get moving more than anything else. They need to learn how to move properly and have an exercise routine that would help, that would help them with their joint pain. And the third person might have heavy metal toxicity and it's showing up in their joints and now their joints are inflamed and they're causing some issues. So you have what essentially is three identical symptoms but three very different causes for those symptoms. Three different causes require three different customized personalized solutions. And so that's the difference that we're going to get to in the, what we're calling the new Biology clinic is the doctor is going to get to know you and your story so that he can or she can help you can help tailor a plan to actually heal you rather than create a dependency on pharmaceutical drugs. So that's the relationship part of what you get with your membership. Now we other. We also have what we're calling enrichment services. Now these are specialty practitioners that offer a, a sort of special healing modality or service or a lecture or something like that, something that gives value to the, to the members. And these are people are able to participate in a group setting. So for example, the first one we started with was fitness coach. So he actually, he was actually, I don't, can't remember how we got connected, but he started off as my personal trainer and I worked out with him for probably six or eight months before we started the clinic. But very soon after working with him, I realized that this, this really is the way to work to, to move your body and to work out and to get stronger and more fit. And this needs to be part of the clinic. So all members have access to group workout sessions and you can basically do you, you can basically get a full, you know, it's basically a cut, you know, coached fitness session. I think he does like six or eight a month and all of that is included in your membership. We also have recently added a biofield tuning session, an EFT or tapping session, Emotional freedom technique. Tapping it's called, where you basically tap on these acupuncture points and it sort of releases the healing properties and the healing pathways of your body. We have guided meditation, we have and guided breath work. And very soon we're going to be adding a vet who's going to be giving monthly lectures on how to take care of animals and this all, all with the sort of new biology principles in mind. You know, she knows the new biology health principles from the animal perspective. So we're going to be able to add that as part of the enrichment program. So she's going to give monthly lectures on taking, taking care of pets. And also we're going to make sort of vet or pet memberships available to people. Also we're going to be adding a qigong class soon and other enrichment services. So for a very reasonable price, you get to have a relationship with a doctor who really knows their stuff and who's really going to get to know you and your story and if you're dealing with a health issue, help you navigate that and, and hopefully come up with a customized plan for you. And then we have all these other things that, I mean, right now there's probably 18 events on the calendar per month, something like that, 15 to 18 events that you can go to and it's all included in your membership. So that's incredible.

And, and so most of them are live, but you can, but then if you don't attend live, you can still access it in, in like a video library.

Y.

That is incredible. And then when someone is working with a doctor, are they getting, are they able to do testing and that as well?

That's a good, great question. And the answer to that is no. So we don't actually do tests. And it, and it sort of, it's in line with the, the, the st story. And getting to know the person and their story, we feel, is more important than seeing the results of the test. And I'll give you an example. So let's say you, you know, you're going to your functional medicine doctor and they're going to order a hundred, you know, dozens of different tests and they're going to cost a bunch of money. And, and one comes back and it says, oh, you have heavy metals in your hair. Now what do you do with that? Well, how do we, first of all, how do you interpret that test? So we know we. One of the foundational principles of the new biology is that we are. Our bodies are constantly healing, you know, constantly healing like that. That's what we're always doing. And an expression of sickness is actually your body's attempt to heal. And an example of that is, let's say you get a splinter. So you got a little piece of wood in your, in your, in your finger. Now if you don't do anything about it, you might, it might get red and then might get, like, start developing pus. Now if you take that to a doctor, they would, they might give you an antibiotic to, to, to take away the pus and the infection. But if you don't do anything about the underlying cause, meaning the splinter, it's just going to come back. And so if you, you know, and the same, you know, take that to, let's say, bronchitis, so you're, you're a smoker, and then four times a year you have these amazing coughing fits and then you go to the doctor and say, oh, you got bronchitis. Well, what, what, what's your body really trying to do there? Your body is trying to get out the toxin that you've put into your lungs. And if you stop your body's, if you stop your body from, from getting rid of those through, you know, producing phlegm and then hacking it out. If you stop that process, what's left? Well, the toxins remain in your lungs and soon you're going to develop lung cancer. And so I went on a tangent to say, well, what is the test of heavy metal toxicity in your hair actually mean? Does it mean that you are actually high in heavy metals, or does it mean you had an exposure recently and your body is detoxing that? One of the common ways it does that is through the hair. And maybe in a week or so it'll, it'll sort of resolve itself and you'll sort of be back to normal levels. Now, if you had a test, you're reading one reading at one point in time, and you don't necessarily know what that means. Are you, are you heavy metal toxic, or is your body just releasing that and it's, you know, sort of in that process and gonna resolve itself in a week? We don't know. Right? We don't know from that test. And so I, I say that to say the, the story is the important thing. It's the story of, of how you're feeling, what symptoms are you exhibiting, and then tracing that back to when it started. And it could be so physical trauma, it could be an emotional trauma, it could be a toxic exposure. It could be a lot of different things. Our job or the doctor's job is to get to know you so they're able to have you actually pinpoint. Yes, it was that thing that I took. Yes, it was that, you know, that place that I went to and then I started feeling bad and it had all these fumes in it and, you know, something like that, that's, that's really the essence of what we're trying to get to. We're trying to get to know you and your story. And the test only shows, you know, a couple different things at one point in time, and we, we can't really know what they mean.

How are people using the new biology clinic services? Are they using it in conjunction with something else? Or are you finding that a lot of people, this is kind of all they need? You know, what are you seeing? Because I know it's relatively new, so you're probably still learning. Yeah, people are using it, but what are you seeing so far?

Yeah, kind of a mix of both, actually. So we, we're careful about, you know, sort of our legal standing. So we're not actually giving medical advice and we're, we're not actually writing prescriptions or doing anything like that. So someone might come to us because they're dealing with an issue and they've been put on medicine, on prescription drugs and they're trying to get off them. So a good strategy there might be to work with us, work with a doctor in our clinic and with your current doctor, because you're going to need to sort of step down your intake of those drugs as you wean yourself off of them. So a good thing there would be to sort of work with both of us, our doctor and your current doctor, to get off those drugs. But for a lot of people, it's really all you need because, you know, we're not going to be able to deal with an emergency situation or a physical trauma or anything like that. Those are for the emergency room or, you know, urgent care or something like that. But we can, we can, man, we can help you with pretty much any chronic condition that you're, that you're dealing with. We can, you know, just kind of be your family doctor. You know, if you, you know, you have kids, you want to have a checkup or, or anything like that, it's a, it's a great way to, you know, sort of build a relationship with someone who really knows what they're doing and, and can help guide you through any issues that may come up. But obviously, you know, like the acute injury type things that, that's, we don't have a way of dealing with that.

Yeah, well, it's very exciting and I'm really glad that we were able to share this with, with.

Yeah, I appreciate you asking about that. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I think it's important. I mean, you know, we can talk. I think food is definitely a piece, you know, and we're obviously both trying to support people with their nutrition, but we, we do have to look at, I think, holistic care in general. And, and I think it's, you know, these new, newer models or these, these services, like the new biology clinic, are exciting to me because I think the industry has been needing a different perspective, needing a different. People in general have been needing a new avenue to go down because clearly, you know, the system's broken and it's not working very well. I mean, it's not like, you know, people are. Are increasing, the health is increasing over time, it's declining. So clearly it's not working.

Yeah, and one aspect, sorry, one aspect that I forgot to mention is a community aspect. We actually have community calls where anyone can just, you know, join and, and, you know, it's basically just a discussion on getting to know each other. And the reason for that is we realized that especially coming out of COVID and that kind of stuff is people are isolated and lonely. And that has, you know, you might not think of it, but that has huge health impacts. I mean, huge think about the, you know, elderly person who doesn't have anyone to talk to and just, you know, like, it's not a fun life. And that can lead to a bunch of health issues. And so we're trying to be there for, for people in all aspects of their health, and emotional, communal health is a huge part of it, not just, you know, not just food and exercise and diet and nutrition. And it's. It's the whole. It's the whole emotional state of the. Of your being.

Yeah. I mean, on a certain level, you, you might even be able to argue that it's the most important because the other ones, sometimes they fall by the wayside without the community. You know, the community helps to hold your hand and hold you accountable in both regards, so. Well, Asher, it's been fantastic talking with you. It's been fantastic sharing the gifts that you guys are providing to the world with everyone. We're going to have all the links in, in the notes here so that people can check out newbiologyclinic.com they can check out drcowensgarden.com where, where can they find you on socials?

We're at Dr. Cowan's Powders on Instagram, Dr. Cowan's Garden on Facebook. I think those are our main ones. And New Biology Clinic on Instagram as well. Yeah, that's. That's where you can find us.

Well, fantastic. And for those watching during or January 2024, you also will be able to win a organ. Like a box?

I think it's a box, yeah.

Is it specifically all organs?

Yeah.

Organ box from Polyface Farms, who you partner with for your meat boxes. And. And then you can learn more by going to the Dr. Cowan's Garden site and new biology clinic site. So, thank you again, Asher. I appreciate you taking your time out of your busy schedule. And I hope to see you soon.

Yeah, happy to do it. We'll see you in. Sure. November.

Yeah. Right. All right. Take care.

All right, take care. Bye.