Chapter 1
Stocking Your Genius Kitchen
Welcome to the Genius Kitchen. My philosophy is simple: food should taste good, and make you feel good before, during, and after eating it. It should also help you to reduce your risk for major health ailmentsânot raise it. For years, Iâve combed the medical literature and have conversed with the top experts in the world, bridging the gap between the nutritional knowns and unknowns to bring you an achievable plan that brings joy and celebration to eating.
In this chapter, Iâm going to lay out all the essential ingredients, from meat, to fish, to dairy, to salt, so that you know what to stock, and what to avoid, along with caveats to cater my recommendations to your unique biology. By the end, youâll have a strong sense of how to leverage food to look, feel, and age your best.
POWERFUL PLANTS
I was one of the lucky ones, born to a mom who knew how to prepare veggies. Whether it was the fresh, sweet Long Island corn sheâd throw on the grill every summer, the savory salads sheâd top with salt, pepper, garlic, and vinegar, or the cauliflower sheâd season and roast in the oven, I never had an issue eating veggies thanks to the way my mother cooked them. In fact, she maintained a vegetable garden during my teenage years, growing tomatoes, zucchini, and various lettuces that weâd enjoy all year long.
Fruits and veggies take up permanent residence in the Genius Kitchen, and incorporating them into your diet promotes health in a number of different ways. For one, theyâre incredibly satiating from their high fiber and water content, but because they have low calorie density, you can fill up on them while ingesting relatively few calories. Plants also provide certain essential nutrients, like vitamin C, which are hard to get from other sources. And they provide a bevy of unique nonessential nutrients that are thought to be beneficial to human health.
Fiber is the perfect example of a nutrient that, while nonessential, seems to make life better. After ingestion, it expands in your stomach, giving you a feeling of fullness. Journeying south, it helps sweep up toxins, keep certain hormones in check (estrogen, for instance), and even helps purge cholesterol-carrying LDL particles that your liver has sent for disposal (see here to discover how). Then, fiber is what feeds the bacteria that live at the latter end of your digestive tract which churn out powerful anti-inflammatory chemicals as a form of thanks.* Perhaps this is why fiber consumption has been consistently associated with healthy aging (lower rates of cardiovascular and neurodegenerative disease, for example) and lower risk of certain cancers (e.g., breast).2
Plants contain other compounds that benefit us in roundabout ways. Plants donât want to be eaten, so they develop chemicals meant to deter predators. In us, many of these compounds are not only safe, they stimulate a protective responseâthink of it as the biological equivalent of the Defense Production Act. Some âbeneficialâ plant toxins include sulphoraphane, produced when you chew raw cruciferous veggies like broccoli, and compounds called polyphenols, which are abundant in fruits, veggies, herbs, spices, and even coffee and tea.
Plants grown under harsh conditions tend to generate more of these defense compounds, and when you eat such plants, their âantifragilityâ gets passed down to youâa powerful example of the symbiosis of all living things. For instance, olives produce oleocanthal, which imparts anti-inflammatory benefits (more on this here), and olive trees grown in harsher climates tend to produce more oleocanthal. Any wild plant will possess more vigor than its farmed counterpart, and organically grown produce tends to possess more than conventional.
These plant defense compounds arenât just good for you; theyâre good for your gut bacteria, too. When you consume fruits and veggies (or drink tea, coffee, or wine) your resident microbes, which thrive on such foods, release chemicals called metabolites. One such metabolite currently under investigation is urolithin-A, which is produced when we consume pomegranate. This nifty compound has been demonstrated to play a powerful role in neuroprotectionâthat is, protecting your brain from aging and decay.3
There are countless other such compounds, and science is just beginning to understand their effects. Generally found in higher amounts in low-sugar fruits and veggies, these compounds usually have strong flavors and pungent aromas; think curcumin in turmeric, the flavanols in dark chocolate, or allicin in freshly chopped garlic. Youâll be happy to know that many of the recipes Iâve crafted for you utilize such ingredients, and that consuming them is consistently related to better health.4
RELYING ON PLANTS FOR ESSENTIAL MINERALS?
When it comes to essential nutrientsânamely minerals like iron, magnesium, calcium, and zincâthere is some concern over their bioavailability in plants. While some plants do contain high levels of essential minerals (calcium in broccoli, for example, or zinc in lentils), they also contain compounds that act as âanti-nutrients.â For instance, grains and legumes contain phytic acid, and dark leafy greens contain oxalic acid, both of which inhibit mineral absorption. Ultimately, in the context of an omnivorous dietâthat is, a diet that also includes foods like beef, chicken, fish, and eggsâthereâs no need to worry, but these compounds can pose real deficiency risks for vegan and vegetarian populations. For added insurance, you can soak your grains and legumes in water, then drain them, before cooking (four hours of soaking reduces almost 80 percent of phytate content and seventeen hours removes phytates almost completely), or simply cook your veggies, which greatly reduces their anti-nutrients.
Finally, plant pigments have been demonstrated to play a powerful role in good health and performance. Of note, we find anthocyanins, which support gut and brain health, in purple foods like blueberries, purple potatoes, blue corn, and red onions. In foods with yellow undertones like kale, spinach, and Swiss chard, we find lutein and zeaxanthin, which help prevent age-related macular degeneration and cognitive aging. And in green foods, thereâs chlorophyll, a magnesium-rich pigment that helps reduce the absorption of food-borne toxins.5
With so much going for them, itâs no wonder the research on fruits and veggies is so positive. We can see studies from animal models all the way up to observational and clinical trial data showing benefit.6 Of course, everyone will be different, and your tolerance to individual plants and overall fiber amounts will vary. But by eating the dishes Iâve created for you, which incorporate a range of colorful, fibrous veggies and whole fruits (along with nutrient-dense animal products like beef, chicken, fish, and eggs), youâll be able to reap the benefits seen so frequently in long-lived people.
THE DOWNSIDE OF PLANTS?
When you peruse your local supermarket, what do you see? Fruits, vegetables, meat, fish, and aisle upon aisle of shelf-stable packaged foods. Whether itâs cookies, cakes, pastas, breads, chips, cereals, meat substitutes, or âvegetableâ oils, the vast majority of food-like products youâll find in your supermarket are plant-based. Government bureaucrats, the food industry, and celebrities alike continue to promote that some versions of these products, which are cheap to make and contain high profit margins, should constitute a significant part of our diets. Unfortunately, these products are highly processed and often nutritionally bereft, made from a convoluted slurry of unhealthful oils and pure starch harvested from the energy-collecting endosperm of plants like wheat, rice, or corn. These types of foods now comprise 60 percent of the calories we ingest every day and encourage a whole host of issues, including weight gain and metabolic dysfunction (see here to understand why). While âwhole foodâ plants like carrots, broccoli, olives, apples, avocados, and dark leafy greens are very good for you, be weary of âplant-basedâ ultra-processed foodsâeven if theyâre marketed as healthful.
When it comes to purchasing, do you opt for organic or conventional? Frozen, canned, or fresh? The answer is: it depends on your accessibility and budget! The research on farming systems is difficult to parse, being mired in the trenches of billions of dollarsâ worth of corporate interest. What we currently know is that while there is little nutritional value of organic over conventional, organic produce may have higher levels of beneficial phytochemicals (plant defense compounds, mentioned earlier), since their defenses against pests havenât been outsourced to man-made chemicals.
If organic falls comfortably within means, I recommend opting for that in certain circumstances. Prioritize organic especially for produce where you eat the skin or peel, such as apples and berries, and dark leafy greens and cruciferous vegetables (broccoli and Brussels sprouts, for instance). This will also reduce your exposure to synthetic, petroleum-based pesticides. There is no need to purchase organic lemons, avocados, bananas, and the like, because you typically remove the exposed skin or rind prior to eating.
When deciding between fresh, frozen, or canned, opt for fresh as much as possible. However, frozen can be a great way to economize and reduce food waste (Iâve provided more tips to save money and curb food waste here). Try to minimize the consumption of canned veggies, because they usually have high levels of sodium added (more on this here) and may leach hazardous, hormone-disrupting chemicals from the cansâ plastic inner linings.
Here is a guide to know which kinds of plants to stock your Genius Kitchen with.
AVOID | GOOD | BEST |
Refined grain flours. Refined sugar (e.g., cane, date sugar) and sugary syrups (i.e., agave). Ultra-processed âplant... |
