Summary How to heal your gut health after taking antibiotics | Prof. Tim Spector (Youtube) www.youtube.com
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Prof. Tim Spector Fermented foods are basically probiotics, live microbes, but actually in food as opposed to in a cat or or in some synthetic version. So these are things that have been... We've had them for thousands of years in our in our diets, and we're talking about the live cultures they're in yogurts, they're in cheese, that are in cafe, which is fermented milk. We're talking sa route, which is fermented cabbage. We're talking Kombucha, which is fermented tea, Kimchi, Miso, etcetera, etcetera.
Prof. Tim Spector All these ferment. And compared to pro probiotics, they generally have lower doses, but but most of them apart from maybe cheese and yogurt have there's many more species, many more types, may more diversity, of microbes than you'd find in a probiotic capsule. So the average Yogurt has maybe 3 species, but in once you get to ke ears and kimchi and kombucha, you can get ending between 20 and 40 different types. Of microbe mainly bacteria but also some yeast.
Jonathan 20 to 40 versus 2 or. So there's like an enormously more different type. About.
Prof. Tim Spector Exactly. So my way of thinking is that probiotics when mutated capsule like, you know, sac. It may be very individualized whether it's going to work for you or not, depending on your community? Is it going respond to that guy? Yes or no?
Prof. Tim Spector And that sort of... We sort of see that in the results. Not every... Not... You don't get a hundred percent response because, you know, some people just don't have the gut community that's gonna be receptive to this new guy coming in and, you know, telling them what to do.
Prof. Tim Spector Whereas my view is that fermented foods give you a much broader choice. So that you got all these different microbes that are quite happy living together in the food. And collectively, they they're gonna have a better chance of having an effect on on your gut and restoring it to health. And we know from other studies, randomized controlled trials of fermented food that getting 5 or 6 little portions a day in a few weeks can actually reduce inflammation and boost your immune system. So there is now science behind these fermented foods.
Prof. Tim Spector So that was my rationale for saying to you, get as many of these different ones you can, go for diversity because that way, you get different bugs, in your cafe as your your kimchi and your kombucha. And hopefully some of them are gonna to work. Right? I was just storing the kitchen sink at your problem. And saying, well, you know, I we don't know which ones are the best or not.
Prof. Tim Spector We don't really know yet how to personalize it for you yet. Hopefully, Zoe will sort that out in the future. But we don't know that yet. So that was that was the thinking. And there have been some...
Prof. Tim Spector And there are some studies showing that fermented foods do work in people with gut problems and diarrhea, etcetera. It's not as well documented as probiotics, but there there is there's some data.
Jonathan So I immediately bulk ordered the Kombucha and the Ke and the Kimchi. Tim that you recommended, and I was in I was in London at the time. How do you figure out whether this is gonna be something that is gonna be full of these live bacteria or actually like, it has the stamp on it. And I know that sadly, there's actually there's a lot of things out there that say, for example, kombucha on it, but don't really meet the criteria? Can how how did how do you differentiate that?
Jonathan Then maybe just tell me, you know, how did you advise me specific 50 want to use.
Prof. Tim Spector The first thing is to look at the label very carefully and if it's got pick so say taking kombucha or water cafes which are generally so fruit caf is, which are sort of similar, you check there isn't huge amounts of sugar in it or large amounts of artificial sweeteners because when know artificial sweeteners have negative effect. On the gut and the gut microbes, so you definitely don't weigh anything with that in it. And you also need to check that it hasn't been pasteur and it might be tiny little letters, you know that it's been pasteur. So it may be perfectly done, but to give it a long shelf life, it's it's been just slightly pasteur between slightly dead. And so...
Jonathan The kid is like, you gotta make sure it's alive.
Prof. Tim Spector Make sure 1 of the
Jonathan things you said to me, is like, there's a lot of ways that potentially stuff might. Yeah.
Prof. Tim Spector And you can tell... It shouldn't have a shelf life of 2 years, for example, That would tell you it's definitely dead. Some of them kombucha can have a shelf life of or on cafes on and Kimchi for a couple of months. Usually it's short on that, but that's the most you should ever get in. And on Kombucha, you should have a...
Prof. Tim Spector Often see a little sediment at the bottom. Showing that it's actually forming something live. It's real. It hasn't just been so filtered and processed that there's nothing left, And the... It shouldn't have lots of fruit and other stuff added to it as well because that also is a sign that it's been ultra processed.
Prof. Tim Spector And isn't real. And often if you you open it, it should fizz. I think the the 1 I said, oh, I know Jonathan, you like chuck goat. Because it's really smelly and it's got a real fizz on it when you open it, And see, renault know it's live, You know, it's like, and it's got a very pungent taste
Jonathan That's right. So I have this experience. You have to actually go and look at a video online for how to open it because when you open it. It explains so much that, like a good chunk of it ends up sort of pouring around the side and you need to collect it. So you don't lose it.
Jonathan So again, quite my my children thought I was mad. Also thought this was really funny. And it was definitely stronger than the average Ke and I felt really good because it felt like it was definitely medicine. This was definitely, but tech this properly. And you also recommended, I think, a kombucha which again, you'd seen made so you were, like, confident.
Prof. Tim Spector That's why Fact. In London, I've seen what was done and they nearly all got a little sediment in it. I knew you're very skeptical the kombucha up to that point, but 3
Jonathan I was I was all in on anything that was gonna help with the. I was not worrying about my blood sugar at this point. Let's say, this is like a hundred percent focus on my gut.
Prof. Tim Spector You can be kind very easily in this game. I think that's that's the message for people. You know, you be taking the best intentions, you're take saying it's past, It's got so many artificial ingredients in it. It's not used it's too sweet. You know, if you can't make it yourself really carefully.
Prof. Tim Spector And realize that if it's really cheap, it's also unlikely to be the real thing because it has a shelf life of a year or so. They Could Mass produce it.
n/a The Sa Part That I grew up on Was In A Can And It was the Second Ingredient Was Vinegar. And that that is not actually fermented Sa crop. When you make pickles or when you make sa... It may surprise some people, but what you wanna look for in the store is that actually the ingredients are, whatever the plant is plus water, and salt. Water and salt is how you actually create fermentation.
n/a So and again, I I feel more confident and it says live active cultures or life probiotics on it.
Jonathan So I'd love to run forward just 1 month? What has happened at this point? And so the good news is that my number of good microbes have doubled at this point.
n/a Yeah. I think if we were to conceptualize, like, where you started in the beginning? What's... Let's used the term eu. Eu is the term that we we would give to a microbiome that's imbalance.
n/a And the good guys are outweigh the bad guys. That's what you had. 38 good ones, 6 bad ones. Right? There the good guys are in control of that environment.
Prof. Tim Spector A Stable, Healthy environment That is Hard To Shift.
n/a But Unfortunately The Fastest Way To Cause A Shift In This Microbiome Is.