130: What Role Should Plants Play In An Animal-Based Lifestyle?

Speaker: What role have plants or can plants have on an animal based diet? That's a topic that recently came up when I talked to my editor about a business idea my daughter had that relied wholly on plants. And that's obviously odd considering that we are very much an animal based, meat centric family. And you know, I do eat plants.

You know, I have eaten plants for a very long time. I still haven't changed my mind on the fact that all plants are toxic to varying degrees. But that doesn't necessarily mean you cannot or should not have any plans as part of your diet, even if you follow an animal based dietary framework like we do here in the, at the ER household.

And the question then becomes, you know, if animal foods are the backbone, what. Role do plants have, if any? And in this episode I wanna talk about three specific categories that I think are very well filled out by plants. One is medicinal purposes. Number two is flavor, um, and also the cultural aspect, and then preparation methods.

So I guess those would be then four-ish in total. Um, but the culture really spans, you know, a, a lot of those. So let, let's, let's call it three. Welcome to the Primal Shift podcast. Quick question before you skip this. How many times did you wake up last night? Once, twice, four times to check your phone.

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And just to reiterate, you know, the foundation of of our diet, of my diet hasn't really changed. Meat, organs, eggs, you know, dairy, bone broth, those kind of things are the foundation of everything. You know, most of the calories that we consume come from animal based.

Products, and we don't include plants in our diet because they're so rich in nutrients. I mean, we don't have to talk about or compare you a beef liver versus kale. I mean that that's not been a close fight. That argument has been settled as far as I'm concerned. But animal based doesn't mean plants are the enemy in every single aspect, you know?

And so. Let's talk about a couple of those use cases as they apply to our way of eating and living at the end of the day. And then you can maybe, you know, use that framework to figure out what roles plants can play in your dietary framework. And let's talk about the oldest use case first, and that is medicinal purposes, you know.

Herbs, root bark leaves, you know, those have been used for a very, very long time for medicinal purposes to cure things, to treat things, to treat conditions, et cetera. And this is not just some, some, some voodoo kind of new age, you know, signs, you know, aspirin comes from willow bark, Metformin comes from the French lilac, and morphine comes from poppies, you know, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I'm gonna eat willow bark for lunch.

But it can be used if I have a headache. You know, in that case it makes perfect sense instead of popping an aspirin. And there are certain herbs in particular with documented benefits, you know, turmeric. Targets, inflammatory pathways, joint support. Ginger is great for if you're nauseous for the digestive issues.

It's ultra anti-inflammatory and those are the things you can, you can try out yourself. You know, if you feel nauseous and you consume ginger, chances are you're gonna feel better. Oregano oil, you know, antimicrobial for gut infections. We've been using this for, well, my wife really. Introduced us to that.

You know, anytime there is a, a viral infection, a respiratory tract infection, anything like that, oregano oil is one of the go-to plants that we use. Chamomile in a Valerian passion flower. Those all are used to. Help with in your nervous system with sleep. There are a lot of sleep supplements. These these days that use exactly, those extracts because they work.

They've been proven to work and I alluded to it initially. Um, our oldest one actually came up with a business idea. To sell, to first produce and then sell, uh, salts with plant-based ingredients. And if you think about it, you know, it's kind of, you know, we sell, you know, beef, organ supplements, bison or animal-based supplements, you know, it's all about animal, animal, animal because they're so useful.

And then we have, uh, someone in the, in the Kummer household who, uh, wants to start a plant-based business. Sounds kind of odd, but if you think about it, it makes a whole lot of sense. You know, for example, you know, she came up with a, with a salt that uses plantain leaves, you know, the broad, uh, wheat, uh, leaf, not the, the fruit, not the banana.

And, uh, infuse beeswax. And organic olive oil with those plantain leaves because they have antimicrobial and antibacterial properties. So if you have a scratch and you don't want it to get infected, you can use it and, and we've used it and it works, you know, and that's definitely something that I would use any time of the day instead of going to the pharmacy and getting a synthetic.

Microbial cream or antimicrobial cream or you know, anti-inflammatory cream. So in those cases it does make a whole lot of sense. You know, it's not being, we not use it for calories, we don't use it for micronutrients. We get all of those from animals. But for those particular use cases, and especially in the medicinal realm, plants do make a whole lot of sense and have, and should have a place in on an animal based.

Framework. The next one is flavor. You know, and flavor is really a legitimate reason. I think. I mean, if you just think about, you know, having rosemary and lamb, all the roast that we make, you know, to for certain holidays, uh, thy in broth, uh, the oregano on, on, in, in, in, on, on a pizza, while pizza is not an animal based product.

But you know, we occasionally enjoy sourdough pizza. We have, you know, fresh basil leaves on there, oreg, or, you know, on, on anything. It arguably makes the food taste better. It smells good. I mean, I love, even though I'm, I'm, I'm, you know, I can't have too much of it, but just a smell of roasting garlic or onions in a pan is divine.

I mean, that's absolutely smells good and it makes you trust. Want to eat, you know, so flavoring is, is something that we do use plants for, especially herbs. But there's also the cultural aspect, you know, of, of cooking, of, of food is, is, is family connection. It's tradition, it's cultural identity in many cases.

You know, I'm my wife's Costa Rican, I'm from Europe. We grew up with certain things that, that just make us feel good and connected. If we eat them together, if we share a meal that contains certain things that might not all be animal based, but there is value in doing that, of course, I'm not talking about, you know, let's go and, and grab, you know, McDonald's and we all share it.

Share a McDonald's meal. No, but having a home cooked meal that might contain plant-based ingredients that. Make you enjoy the food more that make you enjoy your company, that make you, you know, connect with your family. That's a beautiful thing, and that has absolute benefits that I think override any potential downsides of plans.

Now, there are some nuances there, of course. I mean, if there are certain plans that absolutely trigger you, even though. Your family enjoys them, then by all means, don't have them. You know, I know that there are certain things that I cannot have, you know, Artis shocks, anything with inland in it, you know, which is a fiber makes me just blow up.

Like it get bloated. Like, like nothing else. I don't have those things, you know? But there are other things that if you pay attention, if you know your body, if you prepare them, and we'll get to that in a little bit, that can make plans very much. Compatible with an animal based lifestyle. And I always look at it, or often look at it from, even though I'm a very strict person, but from an 80, 20, 90 10 type of perspective, you know, 80, 90% quality animal foods, 10, 20% well chosen, well prepared plants, that can be perfectly fine.

I don't think you have to be perfect. You know, don't let good be the enemy of perfection and. Especially if you listen to your body and, and your body will tell you if you can't do or cannot do something and you just have to listen. There are certain animal-based products that I cannot do, even though I would absolutely love to.

I know that dairy I can only have in, in, in smaller amounts. If I consume too much milk. It doesn't matter if it's raw. A two, A two regeneratively raised the whole nine yards that some people swear by. If I drink that. I can see it in my skin. My skin breaks out. I get bloated and I smell terribly. So it's an animal-based product.

If I have, you know, some garlic, some onions, some I don't know, squashes, uh, olives, et cetera, is part of my diet, I do fine. I do much better than with Rod, with greater amount of raw dairy. The other nuance to all of that is fermentation. I've mentioned this in the past several times. You know, if you follow Dr.

Bill Shandler, you know exactly what I'm talking about. You know, eating like a human means or involves knowing how to prepare plants to make them significantly in some cases, or significantly less problematic or mildly less problematic. And then it really depends on your personal, maybe a genetic makeup, maybe your gut microbiome, maybe your sensitivities, and many other things.

That determine whether or not, and in what amounts you can have plans that are properly, have been properly prepared, and some of the preparation methods that you might be familiar with, you know, include fermenting, sprouting, soaking, peeling, cooking. And just to give you a couple of examples, you know, because those fermentation methods can significantly, in some cases, reduce the antinutrients.

And some of those toxins in those plants and of, and especially if you grow those plants yourself, or at least if you source them, if you source organic version steroid. I'm not saying that soaking or sprouting your glyphosate larden, conventionally grown wheat. Is gonna be good and you can have that part of your diet.

I'm not saying that, but assuming that you source, uh, something that's been grown organically or best case yet has been grown by you in your own backyard and you know exactly what went on it and into it. Then you can use those preparation methods as processing methods to break down lectins and phytic acid, uh, via the microbial action fermentation.

For example, you can increase the mineral bioavailability and add organic acids as part of the fermentation. And just to give you one specific example, we peel, slice, cut, and then ferment potatoes in a saline solution. It's super simple. You just take the weight of the water that you put into the vessel, the weight of the potatoes, combine that, and then multiply it by 2.5%, and that's the amount of salt you add in.

You mix all of that. You let it stand for three days or so. And that breaks down a lot of the bad stuff, makes other things other the nutrients more bioavailable and reduces the glycemic index of the sweet potatoes. So they are more compatible. They are not perfect food. They're not a great source of any nutrients by any stretch of the imagination.

But they're good enough in many cases, unless you're very sensitive to them, that you can enjoy them as part of your diet. You know, as part of those 10 to 20% where 80 to 90% make up the animal food, you know, and sauerkraut, kimchi, I. All of those things are perfect examples of fermentation to make those plants more compatible.

Sprouting, and soaking is another great example that can, um, you know, reduce fighting acid that binds iron, sink, calcium, and magnesium, basically blocking the absorption. By reducing that, you can make that food significantly less detrimental. You know, and just soaking or it for 10 to 24 hours reduces phytic acid substantially.

Whenever we cook rice, we soak it overnight, then pour out the water, and then cook the rice in fresh water. That's significantly healthier. It's not perfect. Rice is not healthy by any stretch of the imagination. Not compared to animal foods, but healthier. And the same goes with, you know, peeling A lot of the antinutrients sit off in the peel, especially with potatoes, especially anything that's in ground contact, because the peel is really the separation, uh, from the environment and the plant, right?

So it needs to be, that's the defensive layer that has a lot of those antinutrients, you know, cooking something is always better than eating raw. Many plants eaten raw. They're not meant to be eaten raw unless you're a cow. You know, humans don't do well with raw plants, generally speaking, so by cooking them, peeling, fermenting, et cetera, you make them more compatible.

And we do grow quite, quite a few plants in our own garden. That includes fruits, but that also includes vegetables. It includes, you know, tubers, some of the things that are not necessarily high on the list on an animal based diet. But again, with everything I've, I've said, with everything taken into account.

They do. Work in many cases, in, in, in certain amounts, at least. Now there are of course a number of things that we do not, we categorically exclude from our diet. Um, those are seed oils or no? Yes, they are pressed from, from plants or from seeds rather. We don't eat seed oils unless we can absolutely not avoid it if we are somewhere and, you know, there is no way around it.

Um, saw. Typically something we do not, uh, have part of our diet and, you know, raw, cruciferous, you know, vegetables in larger amounts or, and of course also ultra process stuff. We don't buy fake meat or, you know, pea protein bars and those kind of, you know, crap products. Those are obviously off limits, but everything else from a practical framework, you know, you could almost look at it like a tier, what is the least problematic?

A little bit more, a little bit more. And then kind of figure out what you can do. Tier one that I think are relatively non-problematic at all are fresh herbs, especially if you grow them yourself or they're organic grown. You know there are even in the amounts that you use them, there are, even if there are toxins in there, if they're antinutrients and they're in those small amounts, they're likely not incredibly problematic.

Now next tier is, you know, you can have them in moderation with proper preparation, like, you know, fermented peels, you know, root vegetable, like sweet potatoes, et cetera. Well cooked squash, you know, seasonal fruit, you know, et cetera, et cetera. And then there is tier three and, and which falls into what tier is, there are general guidelines.

I have a, you know, dietary framework guide that you can, that I'm gonna link down below that you can download that kind of lays it out a little bit. But it also depends on your individual makeup, your sensitivities, your health status that determines what you can and cannot get away with. But for us, it's pretty simple, animal based diet.

Majority of calories come from animal based sources, and plants have their spot in the medic medicinal realm in, uh, the flavor realm, in the cultural realm. And just to make. The animal food that we eat may be more exciting. You know, you can mix the sides. It's, you know, just because you always have the steak or the eggs for breakfast, if you have some, you know, maybe some peppers on the side, some tomatoes, what have you, makes everything a little bit, you know, more exciting.

And so, you know, if you're eating those to tail already, if you're prioritizing organs and high quality muscle meat, you know, building, you know, around nutrient density. You already, you already won the big battle. You know, the planned question is just fine tuning at the end of the day, so do what works for you and don't be afraid of.

Of having plans as part of your diet. Just do it smartly and know which ones and how to prepare and process the the ones that you make part of your diet. With that, we're gonna wrap it up. If you enjoyed this episode, give it a thumbs up. Share with someone who might be on the fence or who might not be super sure what role plans can have on an analyzed framework.

Until next time.