53 The 3 food groups you are NOT getting in your diet

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Disclaimer: The information in this Podcast is for educational purposes only. Vaishnavi Sarathy, Ph.D. is an educator, not a doctor, specifically not your child’s doctor. Please consult your physician before implementing any supplement or diet recommendations.

Audio Transcription:

Vaish:

Today on account of the 10, skipping holidays, this is a super short podcast and we are going to talk about three food groups you’re not using. I’m going to tell you right off the bat what they are. And you’re probably going to disagree with me, at least for one of them. Welcome again to functional nutrition and learning for kids. I am so thankful and grateful for your presence and your love here.

I am Vaishnavi Sarathy, some people call me Vaish. And I am a chemistry math educator, a functional nutrition practitioner, a TEDx speaker, and I used to be a chemist. Let’s jump right in. The food groups that I’m talking about are number one bitters. Let’s take a step back with me. When was the last time your child or you had something better? I actually had this discussion yesterday with my very picky husband. And it turns out that he can’t remember when spices number two, I know you think your child eats spices and you think you eat spices, and I think I eat spices? And my answer is that for all of us, this is probably not enough, given the enormous epigenetic hormonal disease reversing effects of spices.

This is one question that should always be on our minds. Can we spice this meal up further? Number three is education about bitters and spices and food. And I know that’s cheating because that’s not really a food group. And yes, maybe people have told you that your child can’t understand that sort of stuff. But here again, we encountered the gap, the gap everywhere the gap in functional medicine, the gap in the medical model of autism, or Down syndrome, the gap and the gap style, you know, and that gap is that there is a limit to how healthy our children will eat, especially as they grow older if they are not taught about the intricacies of food.

We are not just talking, eat this and I’ll give you a gift or the gods whichever their blessings on you know, we’re not talking that at all. We are talking about educating your child about the basics of epigenetics of food as hormones, about inflammation about body discomfort how this may have a correlation with their diet, and how their lack of focus or their inability to sit still may be correlated with their diet, and therefore about correlations and causations. About statistics. This is so exciting about food statistics, math, probability, and biochemistry, man, this is nonlinear education at its best. And this is the third thing that we need to feed our children. How fun is that? Not that we’re just taking input.

You can always set the tone for conversations with your child to be mature, educational, and to be presuming competence at all times. Backing up our top three for this week are bitters number one, the unrepresented taste in our culture today. The bitter receptors on our tongue that don’t get used are the receptors that trigger the release of hormones that stimulate appetite and counter-intuitively also promote satiety that helps regulate blood sugar levels that protect against intake ingestion of toxic compounds that may even help allergy-induced they may help reduce allergy induce inflammation in airways and more and more Okay, so that’s important.

Number two spices, no, not just spices, more spices, there are more spices in the world than turmeric and ginger. More of these if you can tolerate them but also more of the others coriander, cumin, pepper, KLove, long pepper, more ginger, cardamom, ajwain, fenugreek, hing, chilies, sometimes more cardamom, cinnamon, and more cinnamon.

We’re looking at blood sugar modulating effects, anti-inflammatory properties, anti-tumor properties, reduction in Alzheimer’s Liske risk, I’m sorry, and more immediate stimulation of digestion in every part of the digestive tract starting from your mouth and your salivary glands all the way to your microbiome. action steps for today. Number one, ask yourself how can I get a serving of bitters today, think of digestive bitters dandelions, most greens, and cruciferous vegetables, citrus peels, even coffee for adults. My favorite is bitter melon.

Number two, ask yourself can I spice this my meal more? And remember that spice does not mean spicy. Number three, lastly educate, educate, educate and learn along with your child. Let’s get rid of this gap. Assumption of intelligence leads to equal and appropriate education and education leads to good choices. Happy Thanksgiving this week and I really look forward to meeting you again next week on Friday.

Until then, this is Vaish and the music was by my daughter Maitri Gosh. You can join in on more of this discussion and get access to Facebook Lives in question and answers by requesting to join my Facebook private group@facebook.com/group four/functionalnutritionandlearningforkids. Until then onward…