Pia Winberg wrote:
Some kelps concentrate iodine from seawater way too much for them to be edible in quantities everyday that make it useful as a dietary fibre (notably Kombu (Laminaria or Sugar kelp)).”
Which begs the question, why is the Cleverguts website linking to Kombu on Amazon?
The product page has a “Organic Seaweed Flakes” product:
https://cleverguts.com/shopping-guide-categories/products/
Which links to Kombu on this Amazon page:
I would also like to sign up for the potato starch study.
I would like to be considered for the Potato starch survey
I am just going to start on the reintroduction phase of the clever guts diet, as detailed in the book. Several lunches on the meal planner include an enzyme stimulating salad, but I cannot find this in the book. There is a reference to it being on page 212, but I have the kindle version, which does not correspond to page numbers. I can search the book, but there appears to be no actual “enzyme stimulating salad” recipe. Can anyone help?
Pleasure – let us all know how you get on..
Very interesting article – sounds like a huge breakthrough. Very glad to hear about fasting, I’ve coincidentally been trying Dr Moseley’s 5:2 diet (well, 6:1 so far) so am hopeful I can support that evidence..! Thank you for the advice, it’s motivating and positive :0)
Take a look at KEFIR (available from any polish shop) or better still make your own (its not hard) I followed Michaels lead and did the course at The Fermentarium in London (lots of info on youtube too)
Just to add: There’s a lot of evidence now that fasting has a huge benefit to a raft of inflammatory conditions including inflammatory skin conditions.. Try it!
Hmm So how was your leaky gut diagnosed and by whom? Have you had your micro biome mapped? That’s the obvious next step methinks… Graham
Hi Shelby- buy a copy of Michael’s 5:2 diet book and suggest your GP reads it. It was ground breaking at the time, its still extremely relevant -and it changed many lives including mine!
Its an inexact science, at least for now. I general terms it makes sense tobito avoid high GI foods, especially in large and frequent quantities (unless you have shares in type 2 diabetes that is). But for any individual you really can’t tell what High GI is without knowing the makeup of your microbiota
Interesting read. It would seem that although the idea of GI & GL had good intentions, recent research has discounted it as a general aid to diet. It can vary too much between individuals to be of any practical use.
I am considering deleting the info I have accumulated from my spreadsheets.
As far as adding all the GL results to give a total GL, I’m not so sure. In the example above, what does the total ’40’ actually mean? It does not indicate the ‘goodness’ or otherwise of the intake.
The Moo Goo products are not that natural. The cleansing agents are made by chemical reaction, they do not exist in nature.
True soap is highly alkaline: decimates the skin’s acid mantle and removes structural lipids. The saponified oils bear little resemblance to their parent oils. I would not even use that on healthy skin.
The shampoo is much better ingredients wise, depending on the pH and fragrant oil. But the blurb makes me wince.
Applying olive oil nightly may well have contributed to their test subject’s scalp problems. The main fatty acid (oleic acid) is the prime irritant in seborrhoeic dermatitis (greasy dandruff)! There are studies suggesting olive oil damages the skin barrier when applied topically.
Shaila:
Amazing the difference knowing the ‘whys’ makes! (No, that’s not a criticism – I think we all do it to a certain extent – don’t give all the details because we’re replying to something/posting something on a forum.) Yes, I can see that being in hotels might pose problems, at least when I go to Germany there’s always plenty sauerkraut around! My other diet-and-fitness guru, Leonard Morehouse, said that the best diet anyone could follow would be to eat as wide a variety of foods as they could get their mitts on, but moderation in all things. Even 40 years down the line, his advice not only still holds good, but appears to be confirmed by modern dietary thinking, at least, the thinking of folk like Michael Mosley, not the clowns who dream up faddy diets for the gullible!
And I didn’t fully answer your previous question re potato starch: yes, it is still working! Not only that, I forgot to take it last night (didn’t realise until I got up and found the still-clean glass!) and had a simply dreadful night, far and away the worst I’ve had since starting.
Re your comment on some potato starch being potato flour: my bag is marked ‘Potato Starch (Farina)’, which would suggest that it is, in fact, potato flour. However, I’ve used potato flour before for cooking, and this stuff seems to be completely different, both in texture and in how it reacts. (Now there’s a thought: I wonder how it would work as a thickening agent for rote Grütze? Must try it next time! Sorry, thinking aloud, as it were!)
I would like to obtain my potato starch from actual potatoes. I get making potato salad but what about soups – does it work if it’s in cold leek and potato soup, for example? Does it still work if the soup is re-heated rather than eaten cold? Does blitzing the potatoes affect the resistant starch? Where can I find out about cooking methods and resistant starch?
Thank you very much, Firefox and Graham. It’s difficult not to feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of factors affecting things like the skin – controlling everything is exhausting and…impossible! I will follow the link, Graham, I haven’t yet seen it :0)
I absolutely agree that any sort of fasting helps auto immune inflammatory conditions. That’s how, 30 years ago, I realized the connection. 5 days of not being able to eat lead to being free of pain from being in constant pain. Sugar, in all forms, wheat, alcohol and most fruit, still give me pain. Unfortunately, I’ve never found a doctor who has taken this seriously.
sever dyshidrotic eczema ????
Has anyone been able to buy the seaweed tablets?
I only use natural products. soap and shampoo moo goo
Hi guys thank you for your reply’s yes I have seen 4 dermatologists and they said they could not help me and gave me steroid cream diprosone ov which I applied heavily for three years. I have stopped now and am seeing a naturopath. am now taking the 3 antibotics to rid the blastocystis hominis before I start to reset my stomach. I have also an appointment with Dr. Antony Wettstein at the CDD coming up soon. Most people I have talked to with this eczema say changing my diet with less stress is the best way which I have done with no result. Has anyone been able to buy the seaweed tablets dr pia was referring to in the my clever guts book?
Hi,
I have been diagnosed with Leaky Gut so there are quite a few things I can’t eat. The more I eat something the less my gut likes it. I tried Paleo for 2 years and although it was good for a while I now can’t eat almonds or egg white. Which added to my life long dairy protein intolerance and legume intolerance is quite restrictive. I am giving this a good go and writing out my shopping list.
You would total the sum of the individual GLs. BUT! There’s a problem because the GI and therefore GL vary according to your microbiome.
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-11/cp-fd111215.php
Interesting! I highly-recommend Rob Knight’s Book Follow Your Gut
Thanks for all of the responses!! I appreciate your taking the time. I also appreciate that there are a lot of unknowns and that each individual is different. (Thanks for the video Graham)
Just to be clear, my questions were a function of my natural curiosity and also trying to see how best to implement this in my life. I travel a lot for work during some periods and that means planning. So the source of my food is not always clear to me although I do try to make good choices when living in a hotel.. Fermented saurkraut is not on every menu. I also cook quite a lot at home when I can (lentil soups, curries etc.) but tend to freeze larger batches to re-use the next week. Knowing if this impacts the nutritional/microbial value would be helpful. I also make sushi at home sometimes which (bonus!) seems to be a great food for the microbiome (oily fish (have also made kimchi rolls), seaweed, and resistant starch (rice)…so knowing if the sushi rolls need to be refrigerated for a long time or just cold before eating to make them insulin resistant and extra healthy is actually useful for me. I used to only make this rarely because of the potential insulin response from rice but for my family this could be a really good way to get in a lot of goodness if we can avoid the insulin response especailly as diabetes runs in the family. Anyway, those are some examples of why I’m asking the questions I am asking…but I hear you that there aren’t any hard and fast rules…
Here is an interesting article on Resistant Starch with a lot of references to actual research for anyone else with a curious mind and a Ted Talk video that pretty much summarises some of the key research explained in the book. Enjoy.
https://chriskresser.com/how-resistant-starch-will-help-to-make-you-healthier-and-thinner/
The problem is if I consume four foods of GL 5 each and one of GL 20, do I average the values to give a value of 8 or do I total to give a value of 40?
Graham, It wasn’t me – I didn’t pay- please see my original entry……
You might find this interesting!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/45yhBTSM3x9H6lDZqmHNzCy/could-enzymes-called-endolysins-ease-eczema-symptoms-and-offer-an-alternative-to-antibiotics
BW
Graham
Totally understand.. I ‘d go back to the provider(s) and demand answers! I assume you paid a significant sum? If you want to email me your results (both sets) I’m happy to express a view…
Hello Graham. My original entry details labs used & note not by me so can’t ask the labs anything. Samples sent from same bowel evacuation.
Radically different results will not help someone like me who is trying to asceratin what his/her guts is lacking or has too much of….
Not sure I agree with you Flipstick
Have a listen to this:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07cx2f0
BW
Graham
The 5:2 diet (which first brought Michael to fame!) is extremely helpful for a whole variety of inflammatory conditions including psoriasis and rheumatoid arthritis. Well worth trying. Lots of other health benefits too!
Graham
Hi Jay165 good suggestions made here. Obvious question – have you seen a dermatologist? You might find this interesting as well:
BW
Graham
Were both samples sent on the same time on the same day? It would be interesting to know some more details around the differences? Which labs did you use? Did you ask each of them to justify their results?
Thank you, Firefox 7275 and Graham for your replies.
The results referred to were significantly contradictory, not just a natural variation. As regards the projects being all about contributing data – that’s fine & I am happy to do that but not if I have to pay for (solely) contributing to research.
Hi Everyone I have threaded some replies below La Shy’s questions:
how much saurkraut and or yogurt is a good amount? Do we know that both of these and the other pro-biotics make it past the acids and into the large intestine? Evidence seems spotty as far as I can tell.
GRAHAM: I think you are looking for precise answers where there are none! The human body (+microbiome of course) is too complex to give absolute answers. But that doesn’t leave us clueless. The general advice in Michael’s book is spot on. But the answers vary very specifically by individual:
This is where MapMy Gut (or similar) come in. Only by determining which bugs are in your gut and in what abundance can you answer the question “which is the best diet for me”. I’ve been researching this for years plus I have the advantage of having a health-professional and scientific background. There are no absolute answers which is why I’ve just sent off my own stool sample to MapMyGut in order to understand what dietary changes I should make
The seaweed study was phenomenal for some of us who have psoriasis but also as a nutrient but how mcuh seaweed should we combine into our life and what kind (there are multiple types)
GRAHAM: Find a good and recognised source and stick with it. It’s trial and error (at least for now)
How cold does rice and potatoes need to be to become resistant starch and for how long? Some on the internet say frozen for 8 hours and others just say less than 130 degrees or does the food need to be cold and then re-heated and reltated, what is the calorific impact of resistant starch or (and this is another question) are we no longer living in a calorie counting world and if that is the case, how do we adapt
GRAHAM: In the fridge overnight according to Michael’s study on Trust Me. As for calorie counting? Most people would say its less and less relevant. Get your diet right; move in the right ways and weight should look after itself. Forget calorie counting at least for now
It seems pretty impossible to remove all processed and preserved foods from our life because they are everywhere including in basic things like crackers and often bread or even pasta, (cold or not). What is essential to avoid and what is just okay and what is the impact of some of these products on the microbiome and is there a way to compensate…
GRAHAM: I recommend Prof Tim Spectors book “Diet Myth” for some answers
La Shy: I think you’re trying too hard, and over-complicating things. Dr Mosley’s book will give you a fair idea of portion sizes in the recipes section, and much of the other information is in the book, for example the resistant starch: sorry, but seems fairly straightforward to me – you cook the stuff, let it go cold, stick it in the fridge/freezer till you need it, take out and reheat. Or not, if you’re having it cold! No, unless you’re going to start making your own bread and pasta, you’re not going to eliminate all processed foods, but as long as you buy your meat and fish fresh (though I seem to remember tinned tuna is OK!), ditto fruit and veg, you’re well on the way. And bear in mind, yoghurt and sauerkraut are processed foods, too! But don’t try to quantify everything, an ounce of this and a couple of ounces of that are going to drive you nuts – chill, eat as much as seems good to you at the time, and if you’re still bothered about portion sizes, weigh everything and get a calorie count for a few days or a week – terminally dull, but by the end of a week, you’ll have a very good idea of how many calories each individual food serving comes to. Alternatively, use some sort of measure – I use American cup measures – and once you work out the weight and calorie count of each type of food for a given cup size, you’re sorted.
The Japanese, incidentally, advocate 30 different types of food daily. Sounds horrendous, but isn’t really, as every ingredient counts as a food type, so (for example) a veg soup might be: oil, stock, carrot, cabbage, swede, peas, potato, barley: 8 food types, more if you count the bits and bobs that went into the stock.
La Shy: microbiome changes daily as we poop, eat and drink.If you have a celebration or splurge meal (or day) just get right back on the wagon next meal or next day. Both Dr Mosley and Prof. Tim Spector (British Gut Project) had colonoscopies and got their guts back to normal quickly. Tom Spector (son of Prof.) did a MacDiet – scary results in ‘The Diet Myth’ or somewhere online. Also see blog by Jeff Leach ‘Human Food Project’.
La Shy: I try to think of wholefoods (as close to the original plant or animal as possible) as basic foods, and processed stuff (has an ingredients list) as processed foods or occasional add-ins. I find flavourings/ condiments the most challenging, but easy to minimise wheat-rich foods (cereals, bread, pasta, crackers, baked goods) with a little practice.
Essential to avoid anything advised by a doctor or dietician, or identified by you as problematic in phase one.
If you focus on adding in wholefoods and eating a really wide variety (Dr Mosley says 20-30 varieties mostly veg and little fruit a week) there is minimal room for processed stuff.
Portions check out your country’s official healthy eating guidelines. UK is 80g fruit and veg, 30g hard cheese, 150g yoghurt, dried fruit 30g, meat size and thickness of your palm. Can fit fermented stuff and seaweed into this, personalising over time. It’s fine to have half servings if something is strong flavoured or gives you gas!
On sleep:
I guess maybe there is some confusion because I for one saw the program that Dr M did on sleep on the BBC where he did not use potato starch but instead used the stuff created by Reading University that he references above and the bought and read the book after largely prompted by my own sleep issues.
It took me a while to find it (as no site administrators seem to be answering comments), here is the link in case you’re interested. It’s not cheap but I have ordered a box to see how it works.
I also just started the potato starch (though I ended up buying the brand that is sited in most of the US internet articles that I could find because it seems that not all potato starch/resistant starch is created equal and some potato starch is actually potato flour). Last night was my first try with the PS and first decent night’s sleep in …. ages…. so we’ll see. But it seems that RS is also very good for lots of reasons part from sleep as we know from the book.
The link for the University of Reading stuff (BIMONU) is below in case anyone is interested. You can order online or apparently at boots. It’s quite interesting as it’s been created to mirror breast milk so it’s quite a complex pre-biotic.
Happy experimenting!!
Jay165: but my biggest breakthrough was identifying and eliminating ingredients in cosmetics/ personal hygiene/ home hygiene products that triggered or worsened flare ups. Consider water itself, bubbles/ residues, the briefest contact even rinsed well.
I avoid:
Over wetting or soaking the skin, as weakens the barrier function (gloves when doing all chores, severely limit length or frequency of showers, not always washing hands!).
Cut out all anionic surfactants (in most foaming products, but hidden in aqueous cream, some hair dyes, toothpaste). Shampoo bubbles were the trigger for my large elbow patch of atopic eczema! Now use Simple Refreshing Facial Wash for body and hands (carry a mini tube). Conditioner only wash rather than shampoo hair.
Drying alcohol and fragrances where possible (known irritants/ allergens).
Hello All,
I think that there are a lot of questions that someone could help with. Maybe they are already in the book and I’ve missed them. The contact us function on the site seems to be about marketing questions… but here are a few…(and yes, I have done some research but it’s difficult to find anything that is exact that is backed up by science)
For example,
how much saurkraut and or yogurt is a good amount? Do we know that both of these and the other pro-biotics make it past the acids and into the large intestine? Evidence seems spotty as far as I can tell.
The seaweed study was phenomenal for some of us who have psoriasis but also as a nutrient but how mcuh seaweed should we combine into our life and what kind (there are multiple types)
How cold does rice and potatoes need to be to become resistant starch and for how long? Some on the internet say frozen for 8 hours and others just say less than 130 degrees or does the food need to be cold and then re-heated and reltated, what is the calorific impact of resistant starch or (and this is another question) are we no longer living in a calorie counting world and if that is the case, how do we adapt
It seems pretty impossible to remove all processed and preserved foods from our life because they are everywhere including in basic things like crackers and often bread or even pasta, (cold or not). What is essential to avoid and what is just okay and what is the impact of some of these products on the microbiome and is there a way to compensate…
Hi Jay165: I have several skin conditions linked to a faulty skin barrier/ inflammation (but not dishydrosis). Did far too much geeky research!
I don’t have any known food allergies, mild dust allergy, mild other topical allergies, hayfever and asthma in close family.
For me intake of oily fish/ long chain omega-3s/ vitamin D is relevant to overall skin health and hydration. I eat and supplement *with GP approval*.
There is growing evidence that dysbiosis is linked to a variety of inflammatory skin conditions. There was an episode of trust me i’m a doctor which discussed it. Take a look at the BBC Trust Me website
Hi All,
I have since noticed that when I take inulin, especially twice a day, I get tinnitus. I Googled ‘inulin tinnitus’ and there seems to be a study trying to ascertain whether INULIN does indeed cause TINNITUS in some who take it.
Madeleine
I agree with Firefox7275: Michael’s latest book is superb. The Diet Myth by Tim Spector is the obvious next step and also Rob Knight’s book Follow Your Gut -all available very cheaply on kindle
I’m not clear what definitive answers people are hoping for?
The CG book gives the current (limited) information available, what ‘dose’ Dr Mosley takes and in what base.
If anyone wants to delve deeper into existing published research check out PubMed and Google Scholar, or read one of the books by the Gut Project guys (eg. ‘The Diet Myth’ by Prof. Tim Spector).
HTH!
We got it at Holland & Barrett – but had to ask for it. Between £1 to £2. Still trying to find out how and why to use it, hence coming on the forum. Agree – these would be far better if Michael and his team dipped in to give some definitive answers to save us all flaffing around our own assumptions
Anyone have or herd of eczema dyshidrotic?? I suffer from sever dyshidrotic eczema on my hands