Ep 60: The Community Conversation Nutrition Edition – Mythbusting Nutrition Myths (Part 1)

Jon 0:03
Hey, welcome to the community conversation. Sam and I are back with another nutrition episode. Today what we wanted to talk about was food myths, we actually pulled up a list that we found on the internet of most common food lists and we’re gonna read him off and we’re going to talk about him a little bit. This might be a part one of part two, because this might be a little bit of a longer episode, but uh, yeah, so I’m starting real time reactions coming out. Yeah, literally Great. Reading up this list. So this list is the

top 20 worst food miss? Um 2021. So this is like current kind of like what Miss are number one in the myth? A myth list is chocolate is in aphrodisiac? Um, I’ve personally never heard that one. The chocolates? Yeah, but I guess if you put two and two with Valentine’s Day, I guess I can see the correlation. Sam, have you ever heard this one before?

Sam 1:06
Yeah, I’ve heard it like with chocolate and cherries. I think oysters are like some kind of weird, gross slimy shellfish thing. It’s like sub posting raise your libido but like, I don’t think that that’s based in science. Like I’ve never heard that from like a scholarly article. I’ve literally only heard it from like, the people selling chocolate on Valentine’s Day.

Jon 1:27
Is there like, is there a bro science myth that you know of? Like, hey, like, eat this chocolate make you feel real good.

Sam 1:35
Honestly, okay, I feel like the first time I heard this was on like,

a show like Top Chef or something they like had a food challenge where they had to cook with, like aphrodisiacs. And I was like, This doesn’t make any sense to me at all. It’s like the same thing with super proof. It’s like eating a pomegranate is not going to like make you superhuman, like, I don’t think eating a chocolate bar is going to like raise your libido enough to change your sex life.

Jon 1:58
Yeah, maybe there’s like a placebo effect like people get people thinking this way the system? We’ll move on. So number two is eating fat makes you fat. This is a really common one. We both hear this all the time. Yeah, I mean,

Sam 2:18
this is what are your thoughts on this one.

Jon 2:21
It’s funny because you hear it both ways, right? Like you need a high fat diet to burn fat. And then you literally have the total opposite is like if you eat fat, you’ll gain fat. Guys, there’s difference between dietary fat and adipose tissue fat, so like, stored fat in our body, and also dietary fats and dietary fat is what you’ll be getting from your food. The only way to gain adipose fat is to be in a calorie surplus over time. And that’s how you’ll gain fat but eating eating an avocado or eating some peanut butter or almonds, like those contain fat in them dietary fat, they’re not gonna cause you to just magically like gain 20 pounds. If you eat it. It’s just it’s not how like, the body works.

Sam 3:16
Just like absorb that fat just through the skin or anything weird like that.

Jon 3:21
Yeah, you don’t even digest you just like as soon as you take a bite of like, you know, like coconut oil or something. It’s just like instantly goes into your like, like, skips the digestion just goes. It goes right. Um, do you have anything to add with that one? I mean, I that’s a that’s that is like a more of a common myth. Definitely more common than the one we read off before. What What are your thoughts on that?

Sam 3:48
Yeah, I hear that all the time. It’s like the the 90s trend was like don’t eat fat because fat makes you fat. And now and like the 2000s It’s like, don’t eat carbs. Carbs make you fat. So it’s like, you can’t cut out to entire, like macronutrients because you think they’re gonna make you fat. Like, it’s, I’m telling you all. That’s not how it works, though getting into deep science right now. Not happening that’s good for you within moderation, you know?

Jon 4:15
Yeah, I mean, there’s more, there’s nine calories per gram of fat per dietary fat than there is carbs and protein. But if you’re managing your overall caloric intake, like you could be on a low carb diet and still lose weight, you could be in a high, high carb diet and lose weight, it all kind of comes to like energy balance. So the best rule of thumb is to eat the foods that make you feel best and to pay more attention to your fullness signals, but we don’t have to really like fear. You know, whether or not a certain food is going to be totally detrimental to your if you have weight loss goals, um, alright, so I’m going to move on. So here’s it, here’s an interesting one. So eating carrots keeps your eyes healthy. I mean, I think we might have an idea of why this is a myth because of certain nutrients in it. But Sammy want to talk about it a little bit.

Sam 5:12
Well, so the idea I think, is if it didn’t come from like the the Bugs Bunny thing, like he’s parents, we can see the dark or something.

Jon 5:21
Yeah. To advertise to kids. So probably,

Sam 5:25
like, I feel like this is where this is coming from. Yeah, like so parents have beta carotene, which get converted to vitamin A, in the body, which like, helps multiple systems in your body, including your eyesight. Does it mean if you have glasses and you eat an entire bag of carrots every single day, you’re generally miraculously able to see no, yeah. I think that that’s probably what this is getting out of like, yeah, there’s no miracles solution to improving your eyesight like definitely having beta carotene on a regular basis, or definitely having vitamin A on a regular basis is going to prevent your eyesight from getting exponentially worse. Again, no, it’s definitely not a magic cure.

Jon 6:09
Yeah, I think it’s funny how there’s always like these superfoods and things like that, that it’s like, you got to have this. Your body has no idea if you’re having a carrot or not. Your body just sees like certain like nutrients in them. Different vitamins and minerals, different carbs, fats and protein ratios and your body uses it to fuel so your body has no idea if you’re eating a carrot, or you could be eating spinach and getting vitamin A your body has no idea. So alright, so anyways, um, oh, I used to I used to love. I still love believing this one as a kid. This is one that I believe for the longest time when I was when I was young is that it takes seven years to digest. That’s a good one. I really like that one.

Sam 7:00
Where’d you hear that one?

Jon 7:02
I don’t know if it was in like a. I don’t know if I first heard it in a TV show. Or if my parents told me it, it. My parents might have told me just because they didn’t want me like, like swallowing gum. But yeah, no, that would be that’d be pretty fascinating. If something could stay into your body for seven years. Like it’s just like, everything else just got pushed out except the gum. Just like it literally stuck inside your like your GI tract.

Sam 7:34
Yeah, because you need to know what

Jon 7:36
else to add to that. Except, like I don’t, there’s no way that that could ever happen. Like you’re like, you can’t go like gum wouldn’t just stick inside your body like that. Like, you know, like kids have pooped out gum before so it just it’s silly to like believe that, like, gum is good. I mean, it if it’s if it came out at the age of 14 then like, hopefully by 14 You’re not chewing swallowing your gum anymore. But anyways, um, no, that’s

if you’re trying to be healthy, you should only shop the perimeter of the supermarket. Sam, I’m gonna let you take this one because I feel like you got a you’re definitely yeah, here.

Sam 8:20
So this one is one. Okay, they’re not wrong, right? Like you can find foods that are less processed around the perimeter. And I encourage a lot of my clients to do this actually, like you walk in, you go to the fruit, you go to the back, get your knee you like walk around. If you haven’t gotten vegetables, yeah. Or like your yogurts, your cheeses, whatever. Like that’s pretty much all that’s around the outside of most grocery stores. The thing is, that’s like not a nutritionally complete diet, right. So if you’re only shopping the perimeter, you’re literally getting your produce. You’re getting your meats and cheeses, so like your protein sources, and then like I don’t really know what else is in most grocery stores around there. Mine has like the freezer section. So like you would go through the aisle with, like the frozen veggies to get out. Um, but like you’re lacking in nutrients. It’s like how are you going to get bread? Are you going to get rice? How are you gonna get past this, like those are on the inside aisles of the grocery store. So it’s like shopping the perimeter is a tool to use to like, fill your cart with things that are more nutritionally sound, but it’s not the end all be all because you will be lacking in nutrients if you never venture into the aisles. Plus the fun food is in the aisles like obviously, I’m walking through the chip aisle or the candy aisle or the ice cream aisle on a regular basis because you can’t I mean, I guess you can live life without the fun foods but it’s a lot less fun.

Jon 9:46
Yeah, I mean, there’s a lot of convenient things to like you can get can produce you can get like oatmeal, like there’s a lot of stuff that you can still get inside the aisles that sometimes can be more affordable and still be able to be convenient ways like instead of getting fresh pears, if you get canned pears and it gets you or your child to eat more fruits, then it can be more cost effective. And yeah, it can have a longer shelf life too. So if you’re overly concerned about wasting food, sometimes we can have some of those things in the house. Cool. So here’s one. Milk build strong bones.

Sam 10:26
Yeah, so like, again, milk is not the solution to building bones. Like, no food is a superfood. No. So the thing that makes milk, the reason milk? Well, I mean, this is like, I think people will get mad at me for saying some of these things. But the reason that milk I’m going to simplify it is a part of like, basically, the food pyramid, which is no longer the food pyramid is because it contains calcium. And so lots of studies way back when found that the American diet was severely lacking in calcium, probably because no one in the world eats, or no one in the US eats enough greens, but people were severely lacking calcium. So when you have milk, you get the calcium that you need. That being said, like literally anything else, if you have too much of a good thing, it’s not necessarily a good thing. So it’s like if you’re just chugging milk to build strong bones, that is, again, not the solution. One, that’s a lot of milk. I’m pretty sure there’s a challenge about drinking a gallon of milk and people grow up all the time, right, buddy? Yeah, yeah, like, eat some greens that also has calcium in it, too.

Jon 11:38
Yeah, I mean, I think we both agree the most, the best way to keep your bone shines, you got to lift weights, like you just said, sedentary and you just like eat a healthy diet, you’re still not really doing much to preserve your body because you’re not. You’re not strong, like you can eat all organic, you can go ahead and eat all the fruits and vegetables and eat the cleanest. But if you don’t exercise at all, like that’s like a huge piece of the puzzle. Um, this one’s very similar to the carrot one is, you know, like, eat a carrot. It’s better for your eyes. When really it’s like it’s a, it’s probably the most common source of calcium is what milk is, like you’re saying. Cool. So oh, that’s a fun one. I disagree with this one. This one is using the five second rule to ensure to ensure your food is still safe to eat. I disagree that you have five seconds to pick up your food. There’s no possible way that bacteria can get to it. Um, they did that. But, uh, what? You’ve, you’ve heard of this one, right, Tim?

Sam 12:46
Yeah, no, it was like literally on Mythbusters which, like, as a child was one of my favorite shows. So like, we should maybe we should just like pull from them. Well, those are they like dropped food on the ground. And like, tested, you know, like they did petri dishes, they swab the food before they swab the food after, like about as scientific as like a TV show science experiment can be and basically they found like, so like wet foods. Like if you drop like a like a piece of that pair on the ground, like you have like point one seconds to pick it up. Like there’s, there’s no hope there’s also like dirt and dust and gross stuff that might end up there. Right? It’s six to it. But if you drop like a cheerio, you’re golden. You can leave it on the ground, you can pick it up, like, I mean, obviously, there’s probably an upper limit to how long you can leave material on the ground before it grows things and you shouldn’t eat it. But yeah, it’s it’s pretty safe if you drop something. That being said, I would not eat something I dropped on the ground.

Jon 13:39
So all you’re saying is if your foods dry, you can eat off the ground.

Sam 13:45
If you’re Yeah, build up your immune system just throw stuff on the floor.

Jon 13:49
It’s dry, it’s fine. If it’s wet. Get some more. I wish I knew something that rhymes with that. Um, alright, so the next one is going to be a juice cleanse is last with a juice cleanse is a lasting way to lose weight.

Sam 14:07
Now, John, I’ll let you take this one.

Jon 14:10
I mean, no. I mean, alright, so most of these juice cleanses are super high in nutrients, but super low in calories. Whenever you reduce your calories, you’re going to lose weight. Is it can Are you going to keep it off that way? Like is that gonna? Is that going to be the solution to keeping weight off and being healthy? No, I would probably argue that it’s going to cause binge eating behaviors because calories like if you’re doing a juice cleanse or something along the lines of that, probably having somewhere around like 800 potentially less calories a day. God forbid like you do that for several days like I hear there’s like seven day glue juice cleanses like people lose Like 20 pounds in a week. Yeah, you’re not going to keep that off. First of all, if you go super, super low calories and people don’t understand too, if your calories go super low, your body depletes stored glycogen stored carbohydrates, carbohydrates hold on to more water, right. So when you eat carbs can retain a little bit more water, your body can store up to 400 grams of carbohydrates. When you go ahead and do something like a juice, cleanse your gut, your body is going to use all the glycogen that you have stored into your body first, okay. And right when your body’s done with that, that’s why I like the first week of doing like a keto diet, like you drop weight super fast, because you’re literally getting rid of all your glycogen, and then all that water that it also binds with that just think like, if you took a piece of bread and like put it in water, like it’s soaked, right, that’s how carbohydrates hold water, your body gets rid of all that like, and then it starts to go off of your adipose. And if your calories are super, super low, what’s going to happen is your body’s eventually going to be like, it’s gonna be like a thermostat in your house, like it’s going to regulate, it’s going to up regulate, it’s going to be like, hey, we need to turn the heat up, or financial visor saying hey, you’re not spending enough money, you have all this money in the bank, let’s invest, spend, that’s a craving, that’s increased hunger, that’s when like, we start binge eating. And then it’s like this vicious cycle of like, oh my god, I can’t believe I just set myself back like I put on like, all the weight that I just lost when the majority of the way the last was water to begin with. So it’s like very mentally, like, oh, it’s like a mindfuck you like lose weight, and then you gain a bunch of weight back because you just finally food again. I

Sam 16:41
we get to a halt. We should do a whole podcast about just juice cleanses.

Jon 16:45
Well, it’s just one of those things go on for days. For the normal person who doesn’t understand this, this type of stuff. You do something like that? And you’re like, Okay, well, it worked. Like I did it and it worked the first time and then you do it again. And guess what it’s gonna, it’s gonna happen again, you’re gonna lose all that glycogen again. So you’re gonna notice like, a weight loss, and then you’re like, okay, the only way for me to lose weight is to do this ridiculously low calorie unsustainable thing. And then you’re just spinning your wheels. Like, like, weight loss is easy. I hate to say it, because like, people are gonna get mad that I say that weight loss is easy. You eat less, you lose weight, especially when you do something like that. The hardest thing is to keep it off. That is like the that is the hardest thing. And if you do something like that, it’s like so unsustainable, you’re not gonna be able to keep your weight off. You have to like create habits and like things on the line to that, that allow you to understand what your needs are, and how to also not feel like absolute trash every time you try to like you try to lose a little bit of weight. How to not feel totally like awful. Do you have anything to add to?

Sam 17:51
It? You’ve got it. So your produce cleanse, right?

Jon 17:56
If that’s what you got? Yes.

Sam 18:00
No, do not ever do a juice cleanse. That’s what we’re telling

Jon 18:03
you. Um, here’s an appropriate one coming Thanksgiving coming up. Turkey makes you sleepy because of the chemicals in it.

Sam 18:14
Yeah, so I like legitimately had a lesson about this when I was in college, like my teacher spent a whole day telling us that tryptophan is not gonna make you sleepy. It’s literally just like the increase in food in your body. So I forget the exact number. But like the research shows that on Thanksgiving, most people eat like about 25% more than like a normal day. And so there’s not like a huge amount more. And I think people just look at Thanksgiving of like, oh, this is my huge payout day. And it’s really not. Like I think 25% is a reasonable amount difference. It’s just because they’re the higher volume of food. So it’s like your stomach is more full, you have more things in your body. It’s pressing against your diaphragm and your other organs in different ways. And so the body needs time to digest it. And so when you have a smaller meal, and it can go through the stomach and like get attacked by all your stomach acid and pass through the GI tract pretty easily, like when you feel your stomach to the brim, it’s going to take a little longer for all that process to happen. So just like slows down. I mean, I mean slows down allowing your body it just makes you tired because of the volume of food you’ve been eating.

Jon 19:25
Yeah, I mean, when you eat a lot of food too, right like your blood sugar and blood pressure is going to acutely go up which also needs to like re stabilize So what goes up must go down. So when you have like those, like big waves of like increased like carbon take and just increase food in general like your body needs to kind of get back into like it’s normal state of not being overly full. But it’s it’s the tryptophan which is the rumor, right? That’s the myth is like the tryptophan but it’s just like a ton of food. Since like, I mean, I don’t know people that have like turkey sandwiches for lunch at school that are taking naps all the time. I mean, some kids take naps just because they don’t sleep much. But we only think of that myth on Thanksgiving and like holidays. Um, alright, here’s number 10. And this is going to be the last one, we’re gonna do a part, we’re gonna do a part two, but this is gonna be the last one. Because there’s 20, we’re going to do 10 Today, this is a good way to finish. So you have to count your calories to stay healthy. This is a great one. Because a lot I mean, a lot of people don’t know that I track my food I have some of my clients track their food. So sometimes you think that they have to do that in order to be healthy in order to lose weight. I don’t think that is true. And I know that you don’t, you know, agree with that. Either that tracking your food is like necessary for everyone. So Sam, I like that a little bit.

Sam 20:58
Um, I mean, yeah, like, we know, it can be a really good tool for a lot of people, right? There’s like literally like a, like National Weight loss or industry of people who use things like My Fitness Pal and like, are working to like live a healthier life. And so they track everything to like hold themselves accountable to what they’re eating, where they’re going from. Eating something that like really doesn’t include any fruits or vegetables, but when they track it, they think about okay, like, I’m going to actively choose an apple for my snack instead of like my six candy bar the day, you know what I mean? Um, I also have had lots of clients like in my time as dietician that have used calorie counting as an extreme, and it’s like led them down a disordered eating path and into eating disorders. So I think it’s like, and I think we’ve talked about this in other podcasts, it can be a great tool, or it can be a detriment. And like, it only is what was the myth that it’s the only way to lose weight or something.

Jon 21:59
Yeah, it said that you have to count calories to be healthy.

Sam 22:03
Yeah, there’s so many different definitions of health. And I think if it works for you, it’s a great way for you to maintain your health. And if you’re someone who obsesses over it or is like very disordered in your thoughts around food, then it is not leading you to health. Because health isn’t only physical health, it’s mental health as well. And if you are obsessing over every single bite of food that you’re putting in your mouth, because you’re tracking your food, and that is not a healthy, healthy relationship with food. And so calorie counting is not for you. But for some people. It’s awesome.

Jon 22:33
Yeah, I mean, I like it for like the education purpose, I haven’t tracked my food in about three months, people think I still do it like religiously, but I feel like it’s a, it’s a great way to educate yourself and get yourself to the point that you can better approximate serving sizes be able to go ahead and I mean, track without needing to track in a sense, like you can kind of look at like, okay, like that’s roughly 40 grams of carbohydrates, or that’s roughly, you know, 25 grams of protein, like kind of having a better idea of getting what your needs are without necessarily having to use a food scale anymore, having to use like an app and doing all that. But some people,

Sam 23:13
I think it’s really useful for protein. A lot of people don’t realize what foods are super high in protein, what foods are not right in, like, by the nature of what we do, I think like, I could rattle off the protein contents of a whole lot of foods right off the top of my head, but that’s because I’m in nutrition, right? Like, my husband knows nothing about nutrition. So like, I’ve heard him say that there’s protein in spinach, like, spinach is not a high protein source, right? Like, if you’re not one of those people who thinks about like the protein carton content of food all the time, like, it could be a really good tool to kinda like tell you how much protein you’re getting in a day.

Jon 23:47
It’s funny, though, like, so we are. Like, we just jumped right to tracking your macros. So when this is really saying that you have to track your calories or count your calories. And yeah, I think that we look at things different than how a lot of people look at things, right? Like a lot of people look at like calories, calories calories, but don’t understand where the calories come from. They come from carbs, fats, and protein. So that’s what we’re kind of saying when we talk about carbohydrates, fats and protein as it’s going to make up your calories. And you know, you should be able to have like a general idea of like, how much of each one of those macronutrients you need to make yourself feel your best and perform your best in the gym. But that’s what’s gonna actually make up your calories. I just want to clarify that because a lot like some people, like don’t know what macros are, right? That’s fine, John. Yeah. Um, but I think that’s a good place to stop and then we’ll do we’ll do part two. We’ll probably do it after Thanksgiving because I think next week, I don’t think we’re gonna have too many people that are going to tune in so we’ll do we’ll do part two the week after, after Thanksgiving, but I think this is gonna be a fun episode. Hey guys. Yeah, it’s yeah, it’s week part two of the next 10 Food mess. Um, you guys have anything you’d like Sam and I to ever discuss on the podcast? Let us know. We’re always looking to help if any of you guys have any questions about your own personal experience or nutrition, free nutrition consults, reach out to Sam or myself. We’re happy to set some time to talk with you. And Sam, do you have anything you want to add before we close out?

Sam 25:34
Yes, thanks for listening. Thanks for making it this far and happy Thanksgiving since we won’t be on next week.

Jon 25:40
Yeah, have a great Thanksgiving everyone. Have a great rest of your day.