Greetings, It's Eric Bakker the naturopath from New Zealand.
Thanks for coming back and checking out my video.
I've made several videos in the past few years regarding foods that are good for your digestive
system.
But I've been asked many times, give us a list of say eight, nine or 10 of the best
foods to, well in your opinion, the best foods that really help to boost gut flora.
So that really help to multiply bacteria in your digestive system.
I've made many videos on crappy foods that actually do the opposite, that reduce and
destroy gut bacteria.
We've talked a lot about that.
Like Diet Coke, going out and eating crappy food all the time.
Not a good idea.
So here's 10 solutions for you, in no particular order, by the way.
But these are 10 foods I eat all the time.
I enjoy them.
I make these foods.
I enjoy them.
I think these foods are key.
If you want to have no bloating, minimal gas and just have a really nice, calm digestive
system and well-formed bowel motions and all of the health benefits that come from having
those bacteria, then these are the 10 foods that you want to include in your diet as well.
All right.
These are probably reasonably similar in terms of my anatomy physiology than you are, regardless
of whether you live in Indonesia or China or the US or Pakistan.
I don't really care where you live.
I mean, these foods are going to benefit.
Not all these foods will be available where you are, but many of them are.
So, let's have a look at number one, is olive oil.
Now you wouldn't think that olive oil is actually a food that's going to help to multiply gut
bacteria, but studies have shown actually that it does do that.
It reduces inflammation.
And we're talking EVOO, extra virgin olive oil, EVOO.
So extra virgin olive oil has been linked with reducing inflammation in the gut, helping
to decrease bad bacteria, improving how the liver and gall bladder function and also boosting
numbers of beneficial bacteria.
And they don't actually boost the bacteria direct.
They do so by reducing inflammation and also helping to eradicate some of the bad guys.
And that allows room for the good guys because EVOO doesn't affect bifidobacteria or lactobacillus.
So it's a good food to include in your diet.
I like people to have about a tablespoon per day, actually off the spoon, or dip their
sourdough bread in it.
I think it's a...
Is that microphone on.
It's on.
So, I just think it's a really good thing to have in your diet.
Get a little oil can so you can pour it on things.
The number two will be almonds, something you wouldn't think of.
Because most people think beneficial foods for the gut, they think about sauerkraut and
they think about yogurt, foods that we'll talk about after.
But almonds contain lots of good fibers in them, and even prebiotics had helped to build
good levels of bacteria.
You only need about three or four or five almonds per day.
You don't need to eat almonds like that, like some guys do at parties when they've had a
beer.
They'll have a few beers and they'll have handfuls of nuts.
Don't eat nuts like that.
Two or three nuts.
That's all you need.
Chew, chew, chew, chew.
We talked about chewing.
Chewing leads to, well, I won't use the P word, but you know what I mean.
Pooping.
I'll say it there.
So almonds are good.
My other favorite nuts would have to be macadamias or macadamias, especially fresh ones.
They're very, very good.
They've got really good oils in them to help reduce inflammation.
And of course Brazil nuts.
Brazil nuts are fantastic.
So two or three Brazil nuts per day.
Almonds, also full of calcium, full of B vitamins, full of chromium.
Many different minerals that are hard to get, you will get in nuts, especially fresh nuts.
But remember, you don't need a lot.
But you need to do it regularly.
Third one would be homemade yogurt.
One of the best foods for the tummy is homemade yogurt.
When I spent time in India, nearly everyone there makes their own homemade yogurt from
fresh milk.
It's a really good food to eat.
So try and get some good sour yogurt, the natural sour yogurt.
I don't need to talk about the benefits of yogurt because I've made many videos regarding
yogurt, but a small amount per day, even two tablespoons per day is enough.
It's really going to work, but you need to do it regularly, regularly, regularly, regularly,
regularly.
Preferably daily, a small amount.
If you're not used to sour foods, get used to them slowly.
All right.
The seventh, actually the fourth one is kimchi.
Now this is a really, really popular dish in Korea.
Many people in the US now eat kimchi, and also all throughout Europe.
It's a fermented cabbage.
I think they use Napa cabbage.
It's the long sort of cabbage, the tall one.
It looks a bit like sort of an Asian kind of green.
But kimchis often are fermented with chili and with a bit of pear or apple, a bit of
the sugar in there to increase the fermentation.
It's a delicious food.
Can be a bit spicy.
Very similar to sauerkraut.
Going to confer lots of benefits to the gut.
Sour foods always do.
Now, it's interesting that sour foods are so good for you.
And they're opposite of sweet foods, which are so bad for you.
So kimchi also will contain lots of minerals and vitamins in it.
So I'm not a fan of kimchi personally.
My wife likes kimchi.
I like sauerkraut.
But one of these foods is a nice, kimchi or sauerkraut is a very good accompaniment as
a side serve on your plate if you're having something for lunch or dinner.
So generally every day, if I'm having dinner or lunch, I'll have some sauerkraut with either
lunch or dinner.
The next one is apple cider vinegar.
Cider vinegar, again, has a long history of many incredible uses in the body.
People use it externally for reducing inflammation like on bruises or things like that.
You might remember the old nursery rhyme Jack and Jill Fell Down the Hill, and vinegar and
brown paper is what he used for the bruising.
So poor old Jack had to get wrapped up in brown paper and vinegar.
So vinegar does work on a sprained ankle, but also it helps to reduce again inflammation
in the gut, stimulates the production of digestive enzymes, encourages the production of lactobacilli
in the bowel.
Studies again have shown that it works quite well.
And it discourages parasites and bad bacteria.
So make sure you get a good fermented apple cider vinegar, a good quality one.
And I really like ACV, apple cider vinegar, with some fresh tomatoes and some fresh cucumbers
and some fresh red onions, kind of a salsa mix in summer.
It's a beautiful dish.
So cider vinegar, again, is going to increase lactobacilli.
The next one is garlic, probably one of my favorites.
So garlic is an exceptional food.
Many people still kick it in the guts.
They say, "It's bad.
You shouldn't eat it.
It belongs to the underworld.
The devil loves garlic."
And I've had all sorts of weird comments on the YouTube channel.
"Are you crazy?
Why are you telling people to eat stuff that poisons the gut and causes cancer and things
like that?"
See, this is the problem with the internet.
There's so much dumb information on there.
Garlic is an exceptional food that you want to eat every single day.
Just a few cloves, one or two, chop them up.
I tend to put about eight or 10 in there, so go a bit overboard.
Now garlic contains a lot of inulin, which is a really good natural sugar to increase
production of bacteria.
Garlic also contains a substance in it that is called allicin, which helps to eliminate
a lot of bad bacteria.
So this is a powerful cleansing medicine.
Also has many different other actions on the body, blood thinning, for example, and many
other things.
Nutrient packed, it's full of selenium.
I think there's manganese in it.
This hard-to-get minerals in garlic.
Now garlic is preferably grown organically if you buy it, not commercially, because garlic
does uptake heavy metals quite readily from the ground.
So do a lot of the allium family like onions.
So be careful where you buy onions and garlic from.
For example, not a good idea to buy onions and garlic that have been grown on fields
right next to motorways.
An expert friend of mine pointed that out and said, "You see all those cars going up
and down that highway, all them rubber flying up in the air?
Guess where it's all going?
It's landing on them crops.
And they're uptaking all the crap out of the," so be careful.
All right, next one is onions.
Of course, onions and garlic are similar.
Onions contain quercetin, so one of my favorite flavanoids, which will really help to strengthen
many different parts of the body up.
Quercetin also acts as an anti-inflam.
Onions also contain a lot of prebiotic sugars in them.
So they're very good for the bowel function.
Try and eat onions every single day, either red or brown.
Now I know people from India watching this video will laugh at me and say, "Man, we eat
onions all the time."
And they do.
Onions are a staple in India, and they should be a staple in all countries because they're
so healthy.
Pineapple, the next one.
Really good food.
Not a great food if you've got a rampant candida or CBO infection, but excellent, excellent
food for many people in terms of improving their digestion, stimulating digestion.
It's got bromeliad in it, which facilitates protein breakdown.
There's a lot of different minerals and also a lot of vitamin C in pineapple.
Cut a slice, cut it in half, have a half a slice per day.
You see what happens.
It's amazing.
Great food for constipation as well.
Also good food for building up bifidobacteria.
So great for children.
Asparagus, the next one, contains also [inaudible] lots and lots of vitamins in asparagus, various
amino acids, but a great bowel building food.
And of course, top of the tree is sauerkraut, one of my favorites.
I'm just about ready to pick about half a dozen cabbages out of the yard and make a
mega sauerkraut.
So yeah, it's easy to make it.
Make sure you use plenty of salt when you're making sauerkraut.
Look up some traditional recipes.
So if you try and understand the process of the lacto fermentation, when you crush the
cabbage up and expel all that juice out of it, and you mix that with salt, the salt increases
the amount of fluid drawn out of the cabbage.
And of course there's always bacteria around, but the lactobacillus are the ones in particular
that really feed.
And so that whole juicy mix becomes very rich in lactic acid.
And it's a fantastic food for digestive health is sauerkraut.
So try and make some up yourself.
Look up some recipes online.
It's simple to make.
Otherwise you'd be paying 10 bucks for a small jar like that at the supermarket.
So that's my take on 10 foods which I feel are excellent to add to your diet because
they help to build good levels of gut flora.
Thanks for tuning in.