August 25, 2022

How do we get vegetable oils out of the food system?

That's the question that my podcast guest on this show – Jeff Nobbs of Zero Acre Farms – is determined to answer, in a very unique fashion.

Now, if your question is, “But why do we need to eliminate vegetable oils? Aren't they, after all, from (healthy) vegetables?”, let me get you quickly up to speed.

The consumption of vegetable oil has skyrocketed in recent years, while healthier fats like coconut oil have been eased out. The reasons behind this shift are many, but economics is a significant factor. Vegetable oils are cheap, and even high-end restaurants are starting to cut their olive oil with vegetable oil to reduce costs. These days, it's hard to find a “healthy” packaged snack, like popcorn, nuts, or vegetable chips, that isn't doused in vegetable oil. What many people still don't realize is that vegetable oils are leading drivers of chronic disease, negatively impacting your metabolism, levels of inflammation, oxidative stress, weight, and cancer risk (for more on the studies behind the facts, you can read this series of articles by my guest Jeff Nobbs). Ruthlessly eliminating inflammatory oils from your diet, particularly vegetable oil, is one of the best nutrition decisions you can make for your overall health.

Then there's the environmental impact of vegetable oils. Canola, sunflower, soybean, and palm oil are among the most environmentally destructive crops in the world. Vegetable oils emit more greenhouse gasses per kilogram than any other major crop, and they're a top cause of global deforestation, taking up more land than all fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, roots, and tubers combined.

So, now are you on board with getting vegetable oils out of your diet and the food system? ;)

Thankfully, health-minded leaders are starting to take notice. Zero Acre Farms is a company that makes oils from fermentation, not cleared rainforests, and they seem to have found an affordable, healthy, environmentally-friendly alternative to what I consider to be one of the scourges of the nutrition world.

I recently tried their new and unique Cultured Oil for a Sunday night feast with my sons. After a wander out in the forest for nettle and wild mushrooms, I put together a delicious meal of wild plant pesto, salmon, and the mushrooms. Normally I would have grabbed extra virgin olive oil or avocado oil, my two cooking staples, but instead, I decided to try this newfangled stuff I'd been sent a few days earlier. The Cultured Oil has higher levels of heart-healthy monounsaturated fats than other oils and still has a ridiculously high smoke point at around 485 degrees Fahrenheit. The oil performed remarkably well, perfectly bringing out the flavors of the food. My family loved it.

Jeff Nobbs, the man behind Zero Acre Farms, is a healthy food innovator on a mission to reverse chronic disease and help fix the many problems in today’s food system. After an early career in technology, Jeff founded the healthy fast-casual restaurant chain Kitava, served as COO of Perfect Keto, and co-founded food security non-profit HelpKitchen. Jeff is now co-founder and CEO of Zero Acre Farms.

During our discussion, you'll discover:

• Zero Acre Farms (use code BEN to get free shipping)
• Kitava
• Perfect Keto (use code BGF to save 20% on Ben's favorites)
• HelpKitchen

-What is the Kitavan Diet?…09:22

• How and why it started
• Impact of food on image and performance
• Jeff Nobbs’s background in the food industry
• How to influence better eating habits
• The Kitava study
• Whole foods-based diets and the Kitavan Diet
• Podcasts discussing the Kitavan Diet:
  • How to Die Young at a Ripe Old Age: The Longevity Paradox & The 7 Deadly Myths Of Aging, with Dr. Steven Gundry.
  • Why You Get Hungry & What To Do About It: How To Defy Overeating, Conquer The Buffet, Stop Cravings In Their Tracks & Much More!, with Stephan Guyenet.
• The Jungle Effect by Daphne Miller

-Pervasiveness of vegetable oils in the food system and the correlation to rising incidence of chronic diseases…17:46

• Pacific islands nations' diets consist mostly of carbohydrates from root vegetables
• Carbohydrates paired with metabolic issues may not be a good idea, but the initial spark may be the overconsumption of seed oils
• There is no population in the world that consumes vegetable oils that have not gotten sick and obese
• A typical meal in a typical restaurant has around 5 tablespoons of oil
  • 5 tablespoons of corn oil is equivalent to eating 98 ears of corn
  • 5 tablespoons of sunflower oil is equivalent to eating 3,000 seeds
  • 5 tablespoons of brown rice oil is equivalent to eating 40 cups of brown rice
• Studies:
  • Omega-6 vegetable oils as a driver of coronary heart disease: the oxidized linoleic acid hypothesis
  • America's most widely consumed oil causes genetic changes in the brain
  • Dietary linoleic acid elevates endogenous 2-AG and anandamide and induces obesity
  • Fatty acids, inflammation, and asthma
  • Dietary fat and risk for advanced age-related macular degeneration
  • The importance of the ratio of omega-6/omega-3 essential fatty acids
• It's not so much the concentration but the damage done to what is being extracted during extraction
• Podcast with Dr. Bill Harris and Dr. Kristina Harris Jackson:
  • The Giant Fish Oil Episode: Everything You’ve Ever Wanted To Know About Omega 3 Fatty Acids, EPA, DHA, Dosing, Sourcing & Much More!
• Podcast with Cate Shanahan:
  • 4 Ways To Eat Yourself Beautiful: Meat On The Bone, Fermented & Sprouted Foods, Organ Meats, Deep Nutrition & More With Dr. Cate Shanahan.
  • How To Use Food As Your Body’s Fat Loss Language, with Dr. Cate Shanahan
• Deep Nutrition by Cate Shanahan
• Fat Burn Fix by Cate Shanahan

-The environmental impact of vegetable oils…28:28

• Vegetable oil crops are now 2 of the top 3 causes of global deforestation (soybean and palm oil)
• Around 30% of global croplands are now dedicated to these crops
• Vegetable oil is now the most consumed food in the world after rice and wheat
• Vegetable oil crop production is the fastest growing sub-sector of agriculture
• 4 of the top 5 greenhouse gas-emitting crops
• Studies:
  • Soybean Oil Is More Obesogenic and Diabetogenic than Coconut Oil and Fructose in Mouse: Potential Role for the Liver
  • The Omega-6/Omega-3 Ratio and Dementia or Cognitive Decline: A Systematic Review on Human Studies and Biological Evidence
  • Omega-6 fatty acid intake tied to breast cancer
• Anandamide (the bliss molecule)

-The story of Zero Acre Farms…32:59

• Ben's first aid kit against the negative effects of vegetable oils:
  • Spirulina
  • Glycine
• BGL article:
  • Eat Yourself Smart: 10 Foods That Can Destroy Your Brain & How To Fuel Your Brain With The Best Cognitive-Boosting Alternatives.
• Kitava
• Zero Acre Farms (use code BEN to get free shipping)
• Oils that are lower in omega-6 fats tend to be more problematic for the environment
• Palm oil, lower in omega-6, only grows 10-15 degrees from the equator and competes for land with the rainforest; the same with coconut oil

-How does the fermentation process work?…44:34

• Method of fermentation to produce healthy oils and fats
• Cultured oil is made from communities of organisms called cultures; these consume the sugars in plants or animal products
• From plants like cabbage (sauerkraut), milk (cheese), barley (beer), grapes (wine)
• Oil cultures transform the carbon source into healthy fats (cultured oil)
• TJ Robinson the Olive Oil Hunter
  • What Olive Oil Should Taste Like, The Scary Truth About Olive Oil, Can You Cook With Extra Virgin Olive Oil & Much More!
• Adulteration is a big problem with avocado and olive oils
• Linoleic acid in cultured oils can be as low as 1, 2, or 3%
• Smoke point of Zero Acre Farms oil has been measured at 485 degrees F

-The future of cultured oils…58:49

• Cultured Oil (use code BEN to get free shipping)
• How do we get corporations to switch over?
• The future of cultured oils is in packaged foods and restaurants
• The World Needs an Oil Change

-How to order cultured oil?…1:02:52

• Zero Acre Farms Cultured Oils (use code BEN to get free shipping)

-And much more…

-Upcoming Events:

• Keep up on Ben's LIVE appearances by following bengreenfieldlife.com/calendar

Click here for the full written transcript of this podcast episode.

Resources from this episode:

– Jeff Nobbs:

• Zero Acre Farms Cultured Oils (use code BEN to get free shipping)
• Kitava
• Perfect Keto (use code BGF to save 20% on Ben's favorites)
• HelpKitchen

– Podcasts and Articles:

• What Olive Oil Should Taste Like, The Scary Truth About Olive Oil, Can You Cook With Extra Virgin Olive Oil & Much More!
• Answers To Your Top 8 Burning Questions About Olive Oil Revealed (& How To Avoid The Most Common, Dangerous Olive Oil Mistakes)
• 4 Ways To Eat Yourself Beautiful: Meat On The Bone, Fermented & Sprouted Foods, Organ Meats, Deep Nutrition & More With Dr. Cate Shanahan.
• How To Use Food As Your Body’s Fat Loss Language, with Dr. Cate Shanahan
• Why A High-Fat, Ketogenic Diet Chock Full Of Saturated Fat, Coconut Oil & Butter Could Be Destroying Your Brain (& What To Do About It).
• The Dark Side Of Coconut Oil: A Cautionary Tale For Coconut Oil Extremists.
• Podcast Episode #41: How To Gain Weight Without Getting Fat, What To Do If Your Spouse Doesn’t Eat Healthy, The Best Cooking Oils & Food Combination Diets
• The Giant Fish Oil Episode: Everything You’ve Ever Wanted To Know About Omega 3 Fatty Acids, EPA, DHA, Dosing, Sourcing & Much More!
• A Deep “Dive” Into The Fascinating World Of Fish Oil, The Right Fat Ratios In Your Diet, Plant Vs. Animal Based Oils & The Exact Fish Oil Ben Greenfield Uses Every Day.

– Books:

• Deep Nutrition by Cate Shanahan
• Fat Burn Fix by Cate Shanahan
• The Jungle Effect by Daphne Miller

– Studies:

• The Importance Of The Ratio Of Omega-6/Omega-3 Essential Fatty Acids
• Dietary Linoleic Acid Elevates Endogenous 2-AG And Anandamide And Induces Obesity
• Soybean Oil Is More Obesogenic and Diabetogenic than Coconut Oil and Fructose in Mouse: Potential Role for the Liver
• Association Of Plasma N-6 And N-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids With Synovitis In The Knee: The Most Study
• The Omega-6/Omega-3 Ratio And Dementia Or Cognitive Decline: A Systematic Review On Human Studies And Biological Evidence
• Omega-6 Fatty Acid Intake Tied To Breast Cancer
• A Host-Microbiome Interaction Mediates The Opposing Effects Of Omega-6 And Omega-3 Fatty Acids On Metabolic Endotoxemia
• America's Most Widely Consumed Oil Causes Genetic Changes In The Brain
• Omega-6 Vegetable Oils As A Driver Of Coronary Heart Disease: The Oxidized Linoleic Acid Hypothesis
• Dietary Fat And Risk For Advanced Age-Related Macular Degeneration
• Fatty Acids, Inflammation, And Asthma
• Dietary Lipids And Risk Of Autoimmune Disease

– Other Resources:

• TJ Robinson
• The Kitavan Diet
• The Kitava Study
• Spirulina
• Glycine
• Method Of Fermentation To Produce Healthy Oils And Fats

Do you have questions, thoughts, or feedback for Jeff Nobbs or me? Leave your comments below and one of us will reply!

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