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Show Notes:
News topic du jour:
1. Fat & Carbs together… [22:32]
Shannon says:
Hi Guys!
My question is in regards to fats & carbs together.
So what’s the scoop with this?
I’ve heard many times that you should not eat fat & carbs together because it leads to instant fat storage and other health problems… is this true, and why?
But I’ve also heard that if you have some fat with carbs, it slows the impact of the carbs and gives less of an insulin spike so it might be helpful to do it that way?
I know that for sure we should not be eating the carb/fat combo of chips, ice cream, pasta with alfredo, grilled cheese sandwich, etc…. but what about butter on a sweet potato? Or butter on air popped organic popcorn? Or nut butter on some apple? Or avocado on sprouted toast? … you get the idea.
This has always had me wondering, so I’m excited to hear your thoughts on this.
Thank you so much!
2. TOO MUCH SALT [26:41]
David says:
HI Robb,
Is it possible to get too much salt. I salt pretty much all my food to taste. I make my own bone broth and find that is real tasty with about 1/4 TSP salt.
I took you up on your starter pack of LMNT. Very tasty .. actually reminds me of the original Gatorade.
I can’t say I’m particularly concerned, but just wondering is it possible to get too much salt and what would be the signs?
ASIDE:
You may be too young but when Gatorade first went commercial and before it was bought by Pepsi (early 70s) it was sweet but very salty in taste, kind of like you had but lime juice and sugar into salt water. It was actually pretty good – especially after a workout but it clearly would probably be spit out by today’s kids who are drinking it more as soda.
3. Figuring Out Macros [30:27]
Lauren says:
I would love to know your perspective about figuring out macros. Is there
a science behind macro percentages? Best for fat loss, exercise
performance, on how you feel? Etc. Do they even matter?
It’s time for The Healthy Rebelion Radio Trivia! [34:31]
Healthy Rebellion Radio sponsor DrinkLMNT is giving a box of LMNT Recharge electrolytes to 3 lucky winners, selected at random, who answer the following question correctly…
thank you the people who heard my SOS from the last episode…and sent in questions for trivia…this is one of them…
Robb, How many miles do we live from the Canadian border?
Did you all hear that?
To play, go to robbwolf.com/trivia and enter your answer. We’ll randomly select three people with the correct answer to win a box of electrolytes from drink LMNT.
The cutoff to answer this week’s trivia and be eligible to win is Thursday May 13th at midnight. Winners will be notified via email and we’ll announce the winners on Instagram as well. This is open to residents of the US only.
4. Cabbage in Different Forms [37:53]
Kimberly says:
Hi Robb and Nikki,
HUGE fan and just adore what you both do, your show, and your awesome relationship. I was laughing out loud the other week when you were telling the story about the girls spelling “horse.” The information and honesty that your show brings is incredible.
But enough about you…
I have a question on cabbage. I did carnivore for a month as an elimination diet for my husband, but in doing so discovered the cabbage family makes my tummy very unhappy (taking sharp stomach pains after I eat them). This made me sad, because I love cabbage in all forms, but I especially love making homemade sauerkraut. I did an experiment to see how I handled fermented cabbage, versus cooked (as I had read that sometimes you can handle that better), and it I didn’t get the stomach pains I got before.
I am curious, what is the science end of things why is fermented sometimes tolerated better? OR could it just be that I ate a smaller amount? OR the good ol’ placebo affect?
Thanks again for all that you do. Please keep doing what you’re doing – you are the BEST.
5. How did you decide on where to live? [41:13]
Joe says:
Hi Robb and Nicki,
I’ve heard you provide resources on how to “strategically relocate” but would you mind sharing how you decided on moving to Montana? Was it for tax optimization, homesteading, or being closer to family? I’m a part of the FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) movement and often think of where I would move my family of 3 young children if I were to live on a modest level of passive income (around 60,000 USD a year) and the above three criteria seem to be the biggest factors for us. Thanks for your thoughts.
Joe from Geneva, Switzerland
P.S. Did you check out the new parenting book “Hunt, Gather, Parent” that studied indigenous ways of child rearing in contrast to the WEIRD (Western Educated Industrialized Rich Democratic) societies and their relatively modern (read: untested in time) parenting practices?
Sponsor:
The Healthy Rebellion Radio is sponsored by our electrolyte company, LMNT.
Proper hydration is more than just drinking water. You need electrolytes too! Check out The Healthy Rebellion Radio sponsor LMNT for grab-and-go electrolyte packets to keep you at your peak! They give you all the electrolytes want, none of the stuff you don’t. Click here to get your LMNT electrolytes
Transcript:
Download a copy of this transcript here (PDF)
Nicki: It’s time to make your health an act of rebellion. We’re tackling personalized nutrition, metabolic flexibility, resilient aging, and answering your diet and lifestyle questions. This is the only show with the bold aim to help one million people liberate themselves from the sick-care system. You’re listening to The Healthy Rebellion Radio. The contents of this show are for entertainment and educational purposes only. Nothing in this podcast should be considered medical advice. Please consult your licensed and credentialed functional medicine practitioner before embarking on any health, dietary, or fitness change. Warning, when Robb gets passionate he’s been known to use the occasional expletive. If foul language is not your thing, if it gets your britches in a bunch, well, there’s always Disney Plus.
Robb: Well, welcome back there, wife.
Nicki: Hubs. Morning.
Robb: Morning.
Nicki: Morning. Good morning.
Robb: Welcome back, rebels.
Nicki: Thank you for tuning in to another episode of The Healthy Rebellion Radio. Where you never know what you’re going to get with us, if it’s early. What is new?
Robb: Well, we had the family in town for-
Nicki: We did. Yeah.
Robb: … for Zoe’s birthday.
Nicki: Zoe turned nine, and my sister and her family came, and my niece and nephew, which the cousins were just ecstatic to see each other. And it was really good-
Robb: Awesome weekend.
Nicki: … to see. It was an awesome weekend, lots of fun. Lots of playing, lots of shenanigans. Dog shenanigans.
Robb: You going to flesh that out?
Nicki: I’m going to tell the dog shenanigans?
Robb: Might as well, real quick.
Nicki: Yeah. We went out to dinner one of the evenings, and we came back and … So, my sister has a little dog that we call a Midgeback, because when they got it from the pound it was … And this was like nine years ago, because she’s like nine. And they said that she was a Ridgeback. And was a Ridgeback puppy. And this dog has proceeded to not grow at all. She’s the size of a pug, but everywhere else she looks like a Ridgeback. She doesn’t have a ridge, but her features, her tail, her coloring, everything. So, she’s the small Ridgeback, Midgeback.
Robb: And.
Nicki: And we came home from dinner, and Robb opened the door, and our entire front entryway room, spread out all over the house were wrappers from jerky sticks, the pork rinds. The sunflower seeds were out, but those didn’t really get devoured. We had a bunch of Paleo Valley turkey sticks that were … The plastic was there-
Robb: Some of the plastic was there.
Nicki: Some of the plastic was there, Dutch comes walking out with a piece of plastic hanging out of his lips. They managed to … Yeah, it was a disaster.
Robb: So, Dutch has never done something like this-
Nicki: Never.
Robb: … Dakota is notorious for pulling shit like this, and-
Nicki: And so, apparently my brother-in-law, Shawn, he was like, “Oh man …” In hindsight, he remembers Zoe going into the pantry to get a treat for the dogs, and Shawn was like, “Okay, I need to remember to make sure we close the pantry door,” because their dog raids the pantry. And the pantry door never got fully closed, and Dakota is a little Houdini, and she got in the pantry. And then it looks like Dutch probably thought that was a pretty good plan. And they had a party. Yeah, so apparently Dakota has raided the pantry before, and got into the Halloween candy, and they came home-
Robb: Nearly died from it.
Nicki: … and nearly died. She was vomiting, diarrhea, they had to call poison control for dogs, and she barely, barely survived that one.
Robb: And that was on milk chocolate. Had it been a dark chocolate neighborhood, she would’ve been donesky. Yeah.
Nicki: And she’s also raided my sister’s garbage in her bathroom, which-
Robb: Oh God.
Nicki: … this is disgusting, but I’m going to share it anyway.
Robb: Oh God.
Nicki: That time of the month, and my brother-in-law was … The dog was outside with him, and he … There was this little string coming out of her-
Robb: Oh God.
Nicki: … rear end. And he was like, “Oh my God, Chrissy, this is all you.” So, my sister had to pull out a tampon out of her dog’s … Yeah.
Robb: Hind quarters?
Nicki: Hind quarters.
Robb: Oh God.
Nicki: So, now we know that when they come to visit in the future we will … When we left again, I closed the pantry door and I also blocked it with something to make sure that … Because she can open doors that have the handle, where the-
Robb: She’ll jump up and-
Nicki: … the handle that’s just like a … What do you call that-
Robb: A lever.
Nicki: A lever, yeah. So, she’ll just jump, she’s a great jumper, she’ll jump and put her paw on that, and it just pops. She can open doors, too. So, that was fun.
Robb: Well, Caesar Milan says that you don’t get the dog you want, you get the dog you need. And I have to say had we ended up with Dakota, we wouldn’t have lasted long with Dakota, because it was a near miss with Dutch. But he is a …
Nicki: He’s a good dog.
Robb: Pristine angel-
Nicki: He is.
Robb: … by comparison.
Nicki: He just got roped in to-
Robb: He was hanging out with a bad crowd.
Nicki: Yeah.
Robb: Made poor decisions. Yeah. But I will say, both dogs clearly were miserable after this. Both of them were just lethargic, laying on their sides-
Nicki: And I was actually kind of concerned, because I saw him have … He clearly ate some plastic, Robb’s like it’s not … Plastic will pass. It’s not-
Robb: Yeah, it wasn’t aluminum foil. Aluminum foil you would be concerned. But the plastic was no big deal.
Nicki: They both appeared to have survived that.
Robb: But they did not feel good for a bit.
Nicki: No. No.
Robb: So, that was our excitement, and we have a nine-year-old, and we got Bandido’d by the dogs.
Nicki: Yeah. That was our weekend. Let’s see, I want to share some things that are going on inside The Healthy Rebellion. We are on our sleep week, week two, coming into the third week here as we round the corner after this episode releases. But there were a couple of great posts inside The Healthy Rebellion community that I wanted to share from last week. So, the first one is from Holly, and she wrote, “Can I just say that on day four I’m seeing huge changes? I’m so incredibly excited. No afternoon energy slump, no heaviness or fogginess. That sugar in my morning coffee, those gluten-free products, it was all fogginess, heaviness, dullness. I just ate a burger, two eggs, olives, and pickles for breakfast, and black coffee. Hey, I can actually drink black coffee now and I feel unstoppable. Thank you The Healthy Rebellion.” So, that was pretty cool.
Nicki: Then we have another post from Jodie, who wrote that she was reflecting on the first week of her first reset. She says, “I am so glad I joined The Healthy Rebellion. This reset is just what I needed, and I’m so happy to have found such a lovely, funny bunch of people. There seems to be such a supportive atmosphere here where people can have differing thoughts and beliefs without a slinging match. I also love how it is all about eating real food, but with a recognition that we are all individuals, a welcome difference from the strict low-carb and keto dogma I’ve seen elsewhere.” And she wrote several posts about … Points, but I’m only going to share the first two. “The sugar and carb cravings, and associated guilt that I have been crushed by for the past few months, have reduced significantly. And I’m so much happier and less stressed as a result.”
Robb: Cool. And we’ve had a fair amount of feedback around that, where people will say, “Oh, I was getting some negative self-talk,” or, “I fell off the wagon, and I felt really bad.” And what’s kind of cool is the messages, hey, you’re one meal away from being back on point, and dust yourself off, shake it … And it really seems to-
Nicki: And I can’t remember who said this, but somebody … I know the post that you’re referring to, and somebody commented, and I wish I knew off the top of my head who it was. But she said, “If you got a flat tire, you’re not just going to go out and slash the other three.”
Robb: Right. That’s a really good analogy.
Nicki: Just fix the tire, get back on track, you’re fine. And keep motoring forward. So, that was-
Robb: I’m stealing that.
Nicki: Yeah. It was a great-
Robb: That’s a really good one.
Nicki: … analogy. Yeah.
Robb: Yeah.
Nicki: Okay. Let’s see. Do you want to jump into your news topic?
Robb: Oh yeah, yeah. So, last week, part of what we talked about, I mentioned that-
Nicki: The Epicurious piece-
Robb: The Epicurious piece, and that … So, as a baseline there is undoubtedly some very anti-meat sentiment floating from government levels, to media levels, to social media levels. That is a non-controversial statement. There was a heavily re-circulated piece that suggested that the Biden administration, as part of their climate change position, had recommended a curtailment in meat consumption, upwards of 90%. This ended up being not true. The Biden administration did make some statements around goals pertaining to climate change parameters that they want to meet, greenhouse gas related largely, and different energy infrastructure, and whatnot. But this thing, the thing that was circulated was actually, and this is from the Austin American-Statesman, and this thing was fact-checked by PolitiFact, and maybe someday we’ll talk about the fact-checking stuff as a separate deal.
Robb: But this one is liar, liar, pants on fire, quality of inaccurate. And this is from the piece, and I’ve got a link to it. The false claims about the Biden restricting access to meat originated with a Daily Mail article that linked Biden’s goals to an unrelated January 2020 study on meat consumption. The article speculated that, “Americans may have to cut their red meat consumption by a whopping 90%, citing a University of Michigan study, that had no link to Biden’s plan.” So, this was a scenario in which two completely unrelated topics kind of got melded together, and stitched together as if they were a contiguous thought pattern. So, it is inaccurate that the Biden administration came out emphatically making the statement that Americans need to reduce their red meat consumption. Clearly that sentiment is kind of baked in the cake of the climate change topic. But here’s an interesting thing.
Robb: So, the claim that the Biden administration suggested that Americans should reduce their red meat consumption is absolutely false. It is false based off of some material that was kind of stitched together. One was a University of Michigan piece, and another one was another … Just basically looking what the Biden administration was talking about. The interesting thing is the University of Michigan piece, which is … It is, itself, false. I feel like one of the dogs that’s trying to bark and chase itself right now, I’m not spitting this out very well. But the University of Michigan piece is … It claims that a reduction of 90% of animal product consumption in the United States would result in a 50% reduction in American greenhouse gas emissions. This is an absolute fucking lie.
Robb: We talk about it in Sacred Cow, even one of the main climate change scientists, I’m blanking on his name right now, I’ll try to dig that up and put it back in here, he came out saying, “Hey, we need to be concerned about our food systems, for sure. But the claims that are being made around animal husbandry and their greenhouse gas emission piece, folks need to pump the brakes on this.” And I will grab this and put it in there. So, one thing. Thank you for fact-checking us. I honestly super, duper appreciate that. The folks that brought this up were very reasonable, very kind. We do the best we can to stay on top of stuff, so thank you for that. At the same time, it’s ironic that we’re in this situation where one piece of the story got fact-checked as false, and then the part of the story that ostensibly is accurate is based off of patently false information. Did I explain that correctly?
Nicki: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Robb: It seems like a mirror facing a mirror unto infinity. And this is just kind of the world that we live in at this point, the layers of inaccurate information really hard to stay on top of, even for myself. I’m not really-
Nicki: And we should dig into the … Not necessarily right now, but the fact-checking thing is also interesting because most all of them are funded by … If you kind of look behind, who is behind these different fact-checking organizations, they’re not independent entities. They are all funded by people with an agenda, people with interests that they’re trying to push forward.
Robb: And you became aware of this reading…
Nicki: When I read that book, Slanted, by Sharyl Attkisson, which I’ve mentioned several times on the show, she has a fabulous podcast, and in … Excuse me. And in many of them she’ll tie in different elements of this. But yeah, I think the main one is this company called Media Matters, and they fund a lot of these fact-checking groups. And when you look at them, and who’s behind them, yeah, it’s definitely not what anybody would call independent. But that might be a Salty Talk-
Robb: Topic for a different day-
Nicki: … or a topic for a different day-
Robb: … or somebody else’s podcast-
Nicki: … or something like that. Yeah.
Robb: … or something. Yeah. And Sharyl Atkinson has-
Nicki: Attkisson. Yeah.
Robb: Attkisson, has dug into it pretty extensively.
Nicki: Yes. And I can’t recommend that book, Slanted, enough. It really, really opened my eyes to a lot of what’s going on with journalism, and the media, and fact-checking, and all of this stuff. So, it’s a good read, well worth your time.
Robb: Cool.
Nicki: Are we done with that topic?
Robb: I think we’re done with that topic.
Nicki: Okay.
Robb: Yeah.
Nicki: Okay. So, then we will move on to our tee shirt review winner for this week. It goes to KSmithBC1. She says, “I’m so appreciative of open, honest, and intelligent content in a time where all media is twisted and skewed. So thankful for Robb and Nicki for providing the straight scoop on many important topics.” And it is a time where all media is twisted and skewed, unfortunately.
Robb: Well, and just to circle back on that, we got a piece of that story wrong, but again, and I just don’t feel like I articulated it well, the story was proven to be wrong about the Biden administration but then the facts that were used to disprove that piece are inaccurate. So, it’s like geesh. Yeah. So, we do the best we can, and when it’s all this convoluted it’s not good for anybody. It’s-
Nicki: Well, and here’s the thing, too. Most places, when they get something wrong, they don’t bother to update it.
Robb: Right, right.
Nicki: Sometimes they do, but only if they can do so in a way where it allows them to further their agenda. I mean, okay … Well, I don’t know if we want to go there.
Robb: Well, you could throw this out there. I mean, just real superficial level-
Nicki: Real superficially, there was an episode in Sharyl Attkisson Full Measure podcast where she talks about the CDC putting out some data about how it’s beneficial for people who have had a prior infection with COVID, to also get the vaccine. And Congressman Thomas Massie, out of Kentucky, who is a graduate of MIT, he has a PhD-
Robb: I think a PhD in engineering, yeah.
Nicki: Engineering or something, called the CDC on multiple occasions, and there’s actually audiotapes of these conversations in this episode. So, it was a very good listen, and where he’s bringing up the fact that the trial data do not show … It wasn’t tested for this, but you can not neither say that the vaccine is beneficial for people with prior infection, and you can also not say that it’s not beneficial. It’s patently false to say that everybody whose had a prior infection also would benefit from getting a vaccine. Well, the CDC materials that they put out effectively said as much-
Robb: They emphatically said as much. Yeah.
Nicki: … emphatically said as much. He got on the phone with somebody, and they’re … They talked to their vaccine taskforce people, and then they’re like, “Oh yeah, you caught this huge error-
Robb: Well, after a huge amount of rigamarole and running around, he … Over like a three phone call sequence, which was edited just for brevity, but he finally painted them into a corner where he’s like, “You guys, this is patently false and you can not ethically make this statement.” And the person finally, after fighting him, was like, “Man, you’re right. We’re going to call you Dr. Eagle Eyes-
Nicki: Can’t believe out of all of the people that … I mean, there were 15 scientists that signed off-
Robb: That signed off on it.
Nicki: … on this thing, and they’re like, “We can’t believe that we didn’t catch it.” And so, he’s like, “Great. Okay, let’s amend it.” Because his big concern was, A, they’re putting out false information, both … And they do these webinars where they speak to MDs, who are then going to be recommending it to patients who have had prior infection.
Robb: And not just patients, the real big deal here was that policy makers, like governors, and other folks in Congress, what was really at stake here, and this was back in January when we weren’t ramped up on vaccine production-
Nicki: And there was a shortage of-
Robb: … and there was a shortage, was that people who had already had COVID were subsequently getting the vaccine. These were oftentimes relatively young, healthy people who also had already had COVID, so ostensibly have some significant amount of …
Nicki: Protection.
Robb: … immunity, and protection against … Were getting the vaccine, and then there were other people that were clearly at higher risk for-
Nicki: More at risk-
Robb: … morbidity-
Nicki: … who were unable to get it.
Robb: … couldn’t get it. So, this was a resource allocation deal, and that was the whole reason why he was going after-
Nicki: He went through these … Yeah.
Robb: … this topic.
Nicki: But then, after speaking to multiple people, instead of them amending their position, they wanted to just wordsmith it and say something like … I can’t remember if the number was 90%, or 95%, but 95% of all people, either with or without prior infection, benefit from it. So, they’re lumping in that … If there’s zero benefit from one group, and 95% in people who haven’t had a prior infection, then you combine them together so that it looks like … It reads like both of them have a 95% …
Robb: Benefit, or-
Nicki: Benefit.
Robb: Yeah.
Nicki: You listen to that, and it’s like, what?
Robb: God, we’re really diverting on this thing, but it’s interesting, and to some degree the ship has sailed. But it’s also, after so much back and forth, and these people just clearly lying and obfuscating this whole thing, they clearly knew what they were up to. They clearly knew what the story was here, even though they kept lying to him, and changing the story. But when he finally painted them into a corner and basically said, “Hey, I’m going to go public with this if you don’t do something,” they said, “Well, the real concern here, the real concern, is that it might confuse people. So, we should just continue lying to people instead of actually being honest-
Nicki: Because we can’t handle the truth.
Robb: Because apparently we can’t … So, I don’t know-
Nicki: I don’t know. I don’t know, that just popped into my head when we read the whole media’s twisted, because once you put something out like that, it’s hard to get the pee out of the pool. It just spreads like wildfire, that’s what media reports on, and then that’s what people believe.
Robb: Here’s the deal, if you don’t have an agenda other than trying to plan a aggregating resource … So, like with us, it’s like okay, we got that thing wrong. And maybe some people be like, “Those guys are assholes. I’m done.” Okay, you’re done. But for the vast majority of people, they’ll be like, “Okay, fine. That’s cool,” and they’ll understand the nuance of kind of the … And the irony of the situation, particularly with this where the thing that was disproven was based off of also disproven information. And so, it’s just so weird. But if you don’t have an alternative agenda …
Nicki: Then you admit your mistakes.
Robb: Then you admit your mistakes and you move forward if the goal is actually helping people. But if the goal isn’t really helping people, if it’s this whitewashing of information, and curation of information for a potentially nefarious purpose, then you’re really hesitant to update your position on stuff. And man, we did half a fucking-
Nicki: All right, KSmithBC1, you got the longest rambling chat around your review-
Robb: Dude.
Nicki: … but thank you for sending in your review. If you shoot us an email over to [email protected] with your tee shirt size and your mailing address, we will send you a Healthy Rebellion Radio tee shirt.
Robb: And we’ll shut-up.
Nicki: And we’ll shut-up. The Healthy Rebellion Radio is sponsored by our Salty AF electrolyte company, LMNT. And last year, LMNT supported over 30,000 frontline workers, and we gave away over 500,000 sticks of electrolytes to help the care professionals and first responders, who were actively helping during the pandemic. And this year we’re continuing our support of the people that work tirelessly to make our lives better. At LMNT, we give a salt. And we’re giving away LMNT to people you nominate who are making a difference in your local community. So, whether they’re healthcare providers, teachers, counselors, coaches, or grocers who show up with a smile every day for work, we want to recognize them. So, we want to give you an opportunity to nominate your local hero, or team of heroes, at drinklmnt.com/giveasalt, and we will send salt to those folks that are making a difference in our local communities.
Nicki: So, again, that URL is drink L-M-N-T dot com, slash give a salt, G-I-V-E-A-S-A-L-T dot com.
Robb: Cool.
Nicki: Cool, cool. You ready for questions, hubs?
Robb: Let’s do it.
Nicki: Okay. Our first one is from Shannon, and she has a question about fat and carbs together. She says, “Hi, guys. My question is in regards to fat and carbs together. What is the scoop with this? I’ve heard many times that you should not eat fat and carbs together because it leads to instant fat storage, and other health problems. Is this true, and why? But I’ve also heard that if you have some fat with carbs, it slows the impact of the carbs, and gives less of an insulin spike, so it might be helpful to do it that way. I know for sure we should not be eating the carb-fat combo of chips, ice cream, pasta with Alfredo, grilled cheese sandwich, et cetera. But what about butter on a sweet potato? Or butter on air-popped organic popcorn? Or nut butter on some apple? Or avocado on sprouted toast? You get the idea. It’s always had me wondering, I’m so excited to hear your thoughts on this.”
Robb: It’s a really good question, and I … The question is probably going to end up being better than my answer, but I think that the more hyper palatable the object is, the more highly processed the combination is. Seems to be more problematic, like when we are talking about toast and avocado I think it clearly does improve the palatability of the thing. Butter and toast. Eating a whack of butter tastes pretty good. Eating some toast by itself, completely just toasted and plain, it’s okay. But man, you put some butter on toast, and maybe even crisp it up additionally, and … Pretty good. So, I think that the main danger here, honestly, is the low-carb jihadis will freak out, because they’re like, “Oh, you know, any amount of carbs, and insulin, and everything.” I really think at the end of the day this does largely boil down to a neuro regulation of appetite story.
Robb: I think that some people, some degree of fat-carb combo minimizes the post-prandial response towards additional appetite. They get some satiety out of the right air-fuel mixture. And for other people, it kind of goops things up. And I don’t really know who does what, and that’s why we do a lot of experimentation around all this. I will say that generally focusing on protein in this context as a primary anchor, making sure that these meals have a significant amount of protein, tends to set all this stuff up for success relative to … We just kind of notice that if people, if their snack is just almond butter and apples, absent significant protein, they just don’t do as well. It doesn’t stick with them the same way, and you have a tendency to just continue eating, and eating, and eating.
Nicki: I mean, it’s easy to do a lot of nut butter on apple.
Robb: Yes.
Nicki: You have an apple, and you-
Robb: And it’s super calorically dense.
Nicki: It’s super calorically dense, and you maybe have five tablespoons of nut butter.
Robb: Right.
Nicki: And what is that? Like 1,000 calories?
Robb: Right, right.
Nicki: I think a tablespoon of peanut butter is like 200 calories.
Robb: I mean, and these are some of the strategies … It’s funny, that parents used to actually help their kids to eat. It’s like, well, you don’t give them just nut butter and just apple. You combine these things, and you do that so that hopefully the kids are fed enough to go long enough to do one batch of dishes before they start generating the next batch of dishes. Yeah, so again though, it’s …
Nicki: So, you’re saying-
Robb: It’s a tidy caloric density-
Nicki: … as long as it’s not triggering … If it’s super processed, it might trigger the overeating because it’s super … The neuro regulation of appetite piece. So, paying attention, like if you’re at your ideal body weight, or your body composition is where you want it to be, having some nut butter on an apple, or some avocado on toast, probably isn’t the worst thing as long as it doesn’t lead you to eat three pieces of toast with half of an avocado on each slide. And so forth.
Robb: You said that far more concisely and much better than I did. Yes.
Nicki: Okay.
Robb: You’re hired, I’m done.
Nicki: Okay.
Robb: I’m retiring.
Nicki: All right. Don’t leave yet.
Robb: Okay.
Nicki: I got question number two. This one is from David, and he’s wondering about if it’s possible to get too much salt. He says, “I salt pretty much all my food to taste. I make my own bone broth, and find that it’s real tasty with about a quarter teaspoon of salt. I took you up on your starter pack of LMNT, very tasty. Actually reminds me of the original Gatorade. I can’t say I’m particularly concerned, but just wondering is it possible to get too much salt? And what would be the signs? As an aside, you may be too young, but when Gatorade first went commercial, and before it was bought by Pepsi in the early ’70s, it was sweet, but very salty in taste. Kind of like you had, but lime juice and sugar into salt water. It was actually pretty good, especially after a workout, but it clearly would probably be spit out by today’s kids who are drinking it more as soda.”
Robb: So yeah, just as an aside, we had … And I think we’ve mentioned this on the podcast somewhere, but we had … Someone on the team went to Florida State University, and went to the Gatorade museum, and there was a couple of packages of the original run of the stuff. And Gatorade used to have a gram of sodium per serving, virtually identical to what LMNT has. And over the course of time, the sodium content has decreased, and the sugar content has increased, ironically. And we would argue the efficacy is gone retrograde in that whole story. So, can you do too much sodium? Yes. For most people, the big problem initially is disaster pants. Like you’re going to reach, and magnesium is probably the worst offender on this story, sodium potassium to a lesser degree, but if you overwhelm the GI tract with electrolytes it will pull fluid out of the body and into the stool, and then you get the woosh effect. That’s probably the main kind of effect there.
Robb: For the vast majority of people, bloating and water retention is actually more of a potassium issue than a sodium issue. That’s not 100% across the board. For most people, their kidneys will sort out the sodium, if you get too much sodium, in pretty quick order. Like 15, 20 minutes. Someone who is insulin resistant, and hypertensive, that is not really the case. You can get a feed forward mechanism, the kidneys are still sorting things, but they’re already working from ma deficit because they’re hypertensive, and they’re retaining more fluid in sodium than what they need already. So, it’s interesting, when we really dig into this stuff the negatives of too little sodium tend to be more pronounced than the negatives of too much sodium, in general. Again, there are-
Nicki: Outliers.
Robb: … caveats and outliers to that. And there’s a non-trivial amount of outliers. A huge percentage of the U.S. in westernized populations are insulin resistant and heading towards hypertensive. So, there are a lot of people that … The funny thing there though, is that restricting sodium … Now, you don’t necessarily want to shotgun sodium in those populations, it’s not really helping them. But funny enough, restricting sodium isn’t really helping them either because they still are just in that hyperinsulinemic state, and any sodium that they have or get, is going to be retained. So, it’s kind of a funny thing there. What they really need is to adjust calorie, and carbohydrate intake such as they are no longer hyperinsulinemic. So, did I answer that?
Nicki: You did. Yeah.
Robb: Okay.
Nicki: David, the main thing is avoid the woosh effect.
Robb: Yeah, avoid the woosh effect. If you want to, get an inexpensive blood pressure cuff and just kind of monitor, do some blood pressure monitoring on that, and then that’s going to tell you definitely where you are in the story.
Nicki: Okay. Next question is from Lauren. She says, “I would love to know your perspective about figuring out macros. Is there a science behind macro percentages? Best for fat loss, exercise, performance, or how you feel, et cetera. Do they even matter?”
Robb: I’m going to sneeze.
Nicki: Okay. Salud
Robb: Yeah.
Nicki: In advance.
Robb: Oh, man.
Nicki: Go ahead. Sneeze.
Robb: I am going to …
Nicki: Salud
Robb: Okay. Holy smokes. Man-
Nicki: At least it wasn’t my sneeze.
Robb: … that was good for me-
Nicki: My sneeze would’ve-
Robb: … hopefully it was good for you.
Nicki: Yeah.
Robb: So, the easiest question on here, do macros even matter? Yeah, they do. They totally do, and they really matter in the context that it seems like a protein-centric approach is kind of where the rubber hits the road for body composition, and effective aging, and all this other stuff. And we really like that range of a gram of protein per pound of lean body mass, up to a gram of protein per pound of body weight seems like a good spread to go with there. From a weight loss perspective, there’s lots of different ways to do this. You could do the keto gains macro calculator, and set it for weight loss, or maintenance, or what have you. John Welborn, ages ago shared this formula with me. It’s a decent starting place for weight loss, somewhere between 10 and 11 calories per pound of body weight is a good place to start for weight loss. 15 to 16 calories per pound of body weight for maintenance, and then 19 to 20 calories per pound of body weight for mass gain.
Robb: And again, those are starting places, so you use that as a beginning place for your calories, or you use something that calculates that stuff for you. You make sure that you get your gram of protein per pound of lean body mass on up to a gram of protein per pound of body weight. And then from there, you figure out whether or not you run better on carbs, fat, or a little combination of carbs and fat. You do better on higher carb, lower carb, or something like a zone mixed ratio. I will say that it seems like if people are getting adequate protein, if they are reasonably metabolically healthy, the high carb versus low carb becomes less of a thing. That seems to become really important, like if someone like me and they have some wacky gut issues, or God knows what, and I just don’t do super well with carbs in general. I have to be really crafty with that. But for, I think, the vast majority of people, so long as they get protein right, and they’re not overeating, then whether they are high carb or low carb isn’t as important.
Nicki: Okay. And then the keto gains, macro nutrient calculator is a really good, easy place-
Robb: It’s a phenomenal resource.
Nicki: … to figure that out.
Robb: Yeah. Yeah.
Nicki: Because, it’s worth saying, that a lot of macro percentages, especially if you’re thinking about keto, a lot of people, what they end up finding online, is the fat heavy side of things. And so, if body composition is your goal, and we’ve said it on here over and over again, but that protein piece is where you want to anchor things, not the fat piece.
Robb: That’s a great point, and the percentages are an outgrowth of getting the gram amounts of the macros. And then there’s just some percentage there. When folks say, “Hey, I’m having problems losing weight,” or, “My body composition sucks,” or whatever. And we’re like, “Okay, give us a breakdown on what you’re eating.” And they give us a percent, “Well, I eat this much fat, this much protein, and this many carbs by percent,” they’re always screwing it up, because you always under-eat protein, and overeat fat typically. And so, this is why we build this from a gram basis of get your protein, and then we’ve got … Four calories per gram of protein, so you look at that caloric load, and then we use either, again, the macro nutrient calculator available online, or we do our own pen and paper deal.
Robb: But you figure out approximately how many calories you want to eat, set a caloric deficit. And then you partition that among your fat and carbs, and really the ratios are meaningless then. It doesn’t even matter. We just want to know the calories, and the gram amounts of those things, and the percentages are kind of whatever they are. If we have a medical condition that we really want to goose, say like ketone levels or something, then that’s maybe a different story where we do pay closer attention to the percents.
Nicki: Okay. It’s time for The Healthy Rebellion Radio trivia, and the feedback we got after last week’s episode is that y’all like the trivia. So, we’re going to keep up with the trivia. Our Healthy Rebellion Radio sponsor, Drink LMNT, is giving a box of LMNT electrolytes to three lucky winners selected at random, who answered the following question correctly. And I will say thank you to the people who heard my little SOS from the last episode, and several of you sent in questions for trivia. So, I’m thankful for you. And this is one of them. Robb, how many miles do we live from the Canadian border?
Robb: As best as I can tell, we live 50.9 miles from the Canadian border. I think if we went as the crow flies, and just bombed overland, it would be a bit closer than that. But as far as being able to walk, bicycle, or drive, about 59.9. Yeah, yeah.
Nicki: Okay. Oh, I’m just remembering too, like this morning … This morning we’re drinking our coffee, and … Before we were getting ready to record this. And Robb goes, “You know what? It’s so weird, the whole time we’ve been living here in Montana, or I can’t remember if it started before, but for sure, since we’ve moved here I wake up and I have this one song playing in my head.”
Robb: And it is?
Nicki: You …
Robb: A Coal Miner’s Daughter.
Nicki: A Coal Miner’s Daughter.
Robb: Don’t know why. We do have that in our mellow listening hit list, so-
Nicki: It’s on your playlist, yes.
Robb: Yeah, one of our playlists, so it pops up occasionally. But …
Nicki: I thought that was really …
Robb: It’s very odd, and it’s-
Nicki: Very strange.
Robb: … it’s like the same the same point in the song every time I wake up, and it has been every single day. And it’s not unpleasant, it’s just really odd.
Nicki: It is.
Robb: I’m like, “What am I channeling here?” I don’t know.
Nicki: I don’t know. I have no idea. Anyway. That was off-topic. Okay, folks. We live 59.9 miles-
Robb: As if the trivia stuff didn’t suck enough-
Nicki: … from the Canadian border.
Robb: … now we need to add second part of trivia. Robb, what song do you listen … Is running in your head when you wake up?
Nicki: To play, go to robbwolf.com/trivia, and enter your answer. And we’ll randomly select three people with the correct answer to win a box of electrolytes from Drink LMNT. The cutoff to answer this week’s trivia, and be eligible to win is Thursday, May 13th, at midnight. And the winners will be announced via email, and also on Instagram, and this is open to residents of the U.S. only. There we go. Question four this week is from Kimberly, on different forms of cabbage. “Hi Robb and Nicki, huge fan, and just adore what you both do, your show and your awesome relationship. I was laughing out loud the other week when you were telling the story about the girls spelling horse. The information and honesty that your show brings is incredible.”
Robb: God, I forgot that already.
Nicki: Very funny.
Robb: That was awesome.
Nicki: “But enough about you, I have a question on cabbage. I did carnivore for a month as an elimination diet for my husband, but in doing so discovered the cabbage family makes my tummy very unhappy. I’m talking sharp stomach pains after I eat them. This made me sad because I love cabbage in all forms, but I especially love making homemade sauerkraut. I did an experiment to see how I handled fermented cabbage versus cooked, as I had read that sometimes you can handle that better, and I didn’t get the stomach pains I got before. So, I’m curious, what is the science end of things for why fermented is sometimes tolerated better? Or could it just be that I ate a smaller amount? Or the good old placebo effect? Thanks again for all you do, please keep doing what you are doing.”
Robb: Yeah, definitely the dose response deal here is a big factor. If you eat a whole bunch of any one thing, particularly plant-y type stuff. Everybody kind of non-controversially accepts that beans may cause humans to be gassy, right?
Nicki: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Robb: If you have a tablespoon of it, it’s probably not going to be that big of a deal. Today is Cinco de Mayo, and so if you go do your Cinco de Mayo plate and you crush a whole plate of …
Nicki: Frito Lays?
Robb: Frito Lays, then that’s going to be a thing. Now, preparation is going to be another piece to this. If we soak, sprout, ferment those beans, and then cook them, then they’re going to have far fewer of the polysaccharides, and even the weird little pinto sugars that can cause flatulence. And GI distress, and all that stuff. And this is where fermentation may sometimes trump standard cooking, because standard cooking can degrade some of these sugars, and kind of starch-based items. But it doesn’t always do that, whereas the fermentation tends to break that stuff down. So, the FODMAP type things and whatnot, can become substrate in the fermentation process. So, I think that that’s probably what’s going on here. I remember when I made my cabbage soup stuff, I would cut up a whole Goddamn head of cabbage, and then cook that with our chicken, or whatever, in a soup. And it was really good, I loved the flavor. And it tends to kind of crush me.
Robb: I can do some of that but not as much, and it’s just something that I’ve noticed that if I moderate the dose … Funny enough though, sauerkraut and kimchi haven’t been working for me lately. I don’t know what’s up with that. There was kind of a period of time where I felt like it was good for me, and I wouldn’t say it’s all that great at this point. So, I don’t know. But definitely amount, and then the fermentation process, degrading these fermentable carbohydrates are probably big factors, yeah. And … Yeah.
Nicki: Okay. Our fifth question for today, fifth and final is from Joe in Geneva, Switzerland. And he wants to know how we decided where to live. He says, “Hi Robb and Nicki, I heard you provide resources on how to “strategically relocate”, but would you mind sharing how you decided on moving to Montana? Was it for tax optimization? Homesteading? Or being closer to family? I’m a part of the FIRE, financial independence retire early movement, and often think of where I would move my family of three young children if I were to live on a modest level of passive income, around $60,000 US a year, and the above three criteria seem to be the biggest factors for us. Thank you for your thoughts.”
Robb: First, Montana sucks, terribly. And nobody else should move here. It’s horrible, the winters are terrible. Our children are probably going to be eaten by bear and mountain lion, that is a possibility. But-
Nicki: Let’s hope not.
Robb: … let’s hope not.
Nicki: Yeah, it wasn’t for tax optimization. I mean, we went from Texas, which had no state income tax, to … Or, sorry. From Nevada that had no state income tax, to Texas, which had no state income tax, to Montana, which has state income tax-
Robb: And that’s going to hurt a little bit.
Nicki: So, it wasn’t for that. For us, out of these here, it was definitely the closer to family piece, and also, as we’ve said before, there are … My sister’s in Idaho, and my dad’s still in Nevada, although I’m really, really hoping that I can get him up her to Montana. Texas was just a bit too far for us, especially given all the craziness of this past year, we definitely wanted to be somewhere where we could drive to family in a day. And then, the Jiu-Jitsu was a huge factor-
Robb: A huge factor for us.
Nicki: … of why we ended up specifically where we are here in Montana. That was Dutch, shaking his head. Straight Blast Gym is the Jiu-Jitsu organization that we’re a part of, that we absolutely love. And there are three locations within 30 minutes from us.
Robb: And there was one in Texas, fortunately. But Texas itself wasn’t a great fit for us, and so … And maybe I’ll talk a little bit about my thoughts around that Hill Country versus here. But so, we really wanted to stay in the organization, and there were not any gyms that I can think of that-
Nicki: All the other gyms are in-
Robb: … were rural.
Nicki: … major metropolitan areas, which wasn’t what we were looking for.
Robb: Yeah. We definitely had some thoughts around family, and also we kind of grew up in more of a mountainous area. So, we wanted to get back to something like that, and I think that for us that was a good call … I’m trying to think of what else. The Jiu-Jitsu scene was huge, the girls are really digging it. You, all three, are going to compete in the Gorilla Cup, which is the once or twice a year intra-SPG …
Nicki: Tournament.
Robb: Tournament. So, that’s really cool, the kids are loving it, you’re loving it, I’m definitely enjoying it. So, that’s all cool. We just generally like Montana. Texas was interesting. We were in the Hill Country of Texas, and again, I don’t know if people don’t care about this. I guess they can just turn the damn thing off. But for a young, getting going family, I think that the Hill Country of Texas could be a really interesting option, because there’s work everywhere. Every possible industry, and industries that you hadn’t even thought of, it’s still, I would say, comparatively inexpensive to get setup there. Although, things are getting more expensive. It absolutely befuddles me why someone would move to Austin, relative to some of the outlying areas. And again, it’s like oh, I live in Austin.
Robb: Okay, good for you. But there’s places like Bastrop, and all these cool places-
Nicki: Boerne.
Robb: Boerne. They’re within a 30 minute drive of getting to Austin proper, and the irony is that if you live in Austin then you’re going to drive 30 fucking minutes to go to your mailbox anyway. And the housing costs are going to be less-
Nicki: Well, different people have different …
Robb: I get it. I get it. But it’s just like-
Nicki: It’s definitely significantly more expensive than-
Robb: It’s way more expensive-
Nicki: … other places in Texas.
Robb: … it’s way more hectic, and that was one part, actually, of just … New Braunfels, although it’s kind of rural, it is halfway between San Antonio and Austin. And so-
Nicki: With one freeway kind of between-
Robb: With a six-lane freeway to … Six lanes both directions, going through the middle of it. It’s a non-trivial amount of traffic going through there. Which can be cool for some people, for some situations. And for us, it just wasn’t really the vibe that we wanted at the end of the day.
Nicki: Remember when we left Chico, I wasn’t in … So, when we had our gym in Chico, California, and I had … I grew up in Red Bluff, which is just north of Chico, Robb grew up in Redding. Both Redding and Red Bluff, you have views of Mount Shasta, and Mount Lassen, and you have a river, the Sacramento River, runs right through it. Even though they’re-
Robb: Pretty scenic.
Nicki: … smaller, Red Bluff in particular, much smaller, beautiful. And in close proximity to national parks, and whatnot. Chico is just a little bit further south, but not as scenic at all.
Robb: It is in the Sacramento Valley-
Nicki: It’s super flat.
Robb: Yeah. Yeah.
Nicki: And I remember when we were making our decision to leave Chico, and I … It was Natalie, I think, one of our coaches, she used this phrase, which has kind of stuck with me. Chico didn’t make my soul sparkle. Texas didn’t make my soul sparkle either, but I frigging love it here.
Robb: Yeah.
Nicki: Montana is a soul-sparkling …
Robb: For us.
Nicki: Place, for us. So, Joe, I don’t know, hopefully that was somewhat helpful-
Robb: But you know, for around here I would say that … So, Reno, and again, this is I guess kind of dragging on, Reno and that Hill Country area are interesting in that there is a lot of industry, there’s a lot of work opportunity. There’s a lot of different things to do there.
Nicki: We loved Reno. We really did. And we actually considered going back to Reno when we were like, “Okay, Texas isn’t really where we want to be.” We considered going back to Reno, but Reno is growing so much, and we definitely like the smaller … population, side of things.
Robb: Yeah, yeah. And you need to bring your own work with you here, for the most part. If you’re a doctor, or nurse, or something like that-
Nicki: But if you’re able to retire early, this-
Robb: All I’m saying is that unlike either Reno or particularly the Hill Country, you could kind of land there. And if you’ve got any type of a resume, ranging from hospitality to science, within a 40 minute drive you could find really good-
Nicki: Good work.
Robb: … there.
Nicki: Yeah.
Robb: You’re highly unlikely do that here. I wouldn’t recommend just showing up in the greater Flathead Valley area with no employment-
Nicki: Unemployment.
Robb: … prospects.
Nicki: But Joe is looking at this, he specifically is-
Robb: I get that, but Joe’s not the only one listening to this Goddamn podcast.
Nicki: I know.
Robb: So, I’m just throwing-
Nicki: But I’m answering his question.
Robb: Yeah, I’m trying to answer everybody else’s question, too. And so-
Nicki: Folks, this is how you know it’s time for us to wrap this up when we start having marital spates about the question.
Robb: Geesh. Ouch. I just think it’s worth mentioning because a decent number of people do listen to the podcast, and folks will wonder about that. Very different places, and maybe more than anything I would just really pay attention to what is the pace of life you’re interested in, what is quality of life that you’re interested in. We’re lucky that we can work remotely, we are incredibly fortunate-
Nicki: What is the climate that you enjoy-
Robb: Yeah, climate.
Nicki: … because that was a big part of Texas too, that was … I really, really love four seasons-
Robb: We have some friends there that no-
Nicki: … and some people love it.
Robb: … no joke, like Maggie, just hates the cold.
Nicki: She hates the snow. And she just loves the climate there, which is great. I love Fall. It’s my favorite season, and there was not really … There is no Fall in Texas.
Robb: There’s really not. Yeah.
Nicki: So, having four seasons was big for us. so, I think just making a list of all the things that are requirements for maximum soul sparklitude, since you have the ability to retire early and move where you want to move, and kind of make that checklist. And then kind of go from there.
Robb: Yeah.
Nicki: Okay. That was the last question for this week’s show. Anything else you want to share, hubby?
Robb: I don’t think so.
Nicki: Okay. Remember to check out our show’s sponsor, LMNT, for all your electrolyte needs. You can do that at drinkLMNT.com/Robb. And remember, you can also nominate your local heroes with the LMNT Give A Salt program, at drinkLMNT.com/giveasalt, G-I-V-E-A-S-A-L-T. And folks, thank you guys for listening, and we’ll see you next week.
Robb: Bye everybody.
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