The Habit Healers

Chef Martin Oswald and I filmed this live from two different continents (he was in Austria, I was in the U.S.) and we spent over an hour fighting technical issues before we actually got the thing to work. So if you watched live and stuck around through all of that, thank you. Genuinely.

Once we got going, we covered three things. The dirty dozen. The clean 15. And then a conversation Martin wanted to have about what he calls “beyond organic,” which turned out to be the part I found most interesting. The video is above if you want to watch us actually cook. What is below is everything we talked about, organized so it is easier to use.

The Dirty Dozen

The Environmental Working Group publishes an annual dirty dozen list, which identifies the twelve produce items most contaminated with pesticide residues. Research consistently shows that pesticide exposure, even at low chronic levels, is associated with hormonal disruption, metabolic dysfunction, and increased inflammation. For anyone focused on metabolic health, this is not a footnote.

The current U.S. dirty dozen includes strawberries, spinach, kale, grapes, peaches, pears, nectarines, bell peppers, cherries, blueberries, green beans, and apples. These are the items where buying organic makes the biggest practical difference, and where Martin and I both agree you should not compromise if budget allows.

One thing worth knowing is that the dirty dozen varies by region. What is highly contaminated in Colorado may not match what is sprayed heaviest in California, and international listeners will have their own regional variation to consider. The EWG list at ewg.org is updated each year and is a reliable starting point, but it reflects primarily U.S. data.

Potatoes deserve a special mention because people often assume that anything growing underground is somehow protected. Martin explained pesticides applied at the soil surface do penetrate down, and the bugs that target root vegetables are prolific. Conventional potatoes are consistently among the more contaminated options, so organic matters there too.

During the live, Martin put together what he called a Dirty Dozen Salad. It is a spring arugula base with blueberries, raspberries, and roasted pistachios and almonds, topped with quinoa he had seasoned during cooking with clove, cinnamon, black pepper, and a little chili. The dressing was something I want to make every week. Strawberries, garlic, yogurt (plant-based works fine), a splash of vinegar, lemon zest, lemon juice, and optional mustard and basil, all pureed into a vivid pink dressing. I know garlic and strawberry sounds counterintuitive. I had the same reaction. Martin’s point is that garlic works beautifully with greens in a Caesar, so when you think of it as dressing the greens rather than pairing with the strawberries, it clicks. His one technique rule is to dress only about two-thirds of your greens, never the full amount. Over-dressing weighs the salad down and makes it go soggy fast.

Click here for the recipe.

The Clean 15

On the other end of the spectrum, the clean 15 are the items least contaminated with pesticide residues. These are produce with thick skins, natural pest resistance, or growing conditions that make heavy spraying unnecessary. Buying conventional versions of these is a reasonable, evidence-informed way to save money and redirect it toward the dirty dozen.

The current clean 15 includes avocados, sweet corn, pineapple, onions, papaya, sweet peas, asparagus, honeydew melon, kiwi, cabbage, mushrooms, mango, sweet potatoes, watermelon, and carrots.

Martin added some nuance here that I found useful. Radicchio and bitter greens generally have some of the lowest contamination levels of any produce you will find, not because they are grown organically but because insects do not want them. Bitter compounds are a natural defense mechanism. Martin said it simply during the session: “Bitter is better.” These are also some of the most potent liver-supportive foods available, and in his view, underused by people who could benefit most from them.

White asparagus is worth a specific note. In Austria, it is grown completely covered by mounded soil to protect it from light, which also means it is naturally shielded during growing. As a result, it tends to have very low contamination even in conventional form. Green asparagus is equally good. Both are clean 15 options that are also nutritionally strong.

For the Clean 15 Salad, Martin demonstrated a technique I am now going to use regularly. He cut cabbage, carrots, asparagus, and English peas into small, even pieces, then steamed them in a covered pot with just a splash of water for three to four minutes. After steaming, he immediately transferred them to cold water to stop the cooking and preserve the color. He then dressed them with whole grain mustard, flat-leaf parsley, and an avocado-based dressing he had prepared with sesame, ginger, soy, miso, rice vinegar, and lime juice. In lieu of salt, he added a small balsamic drizzle for acidity. His philosophy is to cook very low on sodium and use acids to compensate, whether lemon, lime, balsamic, or vinegar. It is a habit that makes food taste more complex, not less satisfying.

For anyone with a sensitive digestive system, there is no need to eat these vegetables crunchy. Steaming them soft, what Martin called “shankos” (a culinary term from therapeutic kitchen work developed for elderly patients decades ago), retains meaningful nutrition while making the food far easier to digest. If raw and crunchy cruciferous vegetables cause gas or discomfort, softer steaming is the right call. You still get the benefit.

Click here for the recipe.

Beyond Organic

This is where the conversation went in a direction I did not anticipate, and it is the part I keep thinking about.

Martin recently sat down with Professor Harald Mange, a researcher based in Graz, Austria, who studies childhood obesity and unadulterated food systems. Their conversation led Martin to describe a third tier of food quality, something that sits above organic certification in terms of nutritional density.

The concept centers on the alpine farming and foraging tradition. Martin pointed out that Switzerland consistently produces some of the longest-lived populations in the world, with average lifespans comparable to Japan and higher than Italy. When he and Professor Mange pulled on that thread, what kept coming up was not a single food or supplement but the food environment itself. Foraged wild berries from forests. Bitter greens growing in rocky soil. Cattle grazing on pristine alpine grasses with no commercial feed in sight. People physically exposed to cold and heat as a byproduct of living and working outdoors rather than as a wellness intervention.

The nutritional argument is compelling. Plants that grow in harsh conditions (cold temperatures, poor soil, exposure to pests without chemical protection) respond by producing significantly higher concentrations of protective phytocompounds. These are the antioxidants and secondary metabolites that research increasingly connects to cancer protection, cardiovascular health, and metabolic function. A blueberry harvested from a forest hillside in Austria and a conventionally grown blueberry in a covered greenhouse may look identical. They are not the same food.

The practical takeaway for most of us is the farmer’s market, and Martin was clear about how to approach it. Not every farmer’s market vendor is organic, and not every label that says organic is fully what it claims. His parents are farmers, and they were honest with him that growing everything organic at scale is genuinely difficult. What the farmer’s market does offer, particularly from smaller operations with a limited number of crops, is a higher likelihood of fresher, less-processed, more nutritionally intact food. Talk to the vendors. Ask what they grow and how. Look for the unusual items, the strange roots, the foraged greens, the heirloom varieties. That is where the density is.

Martin’s example from his own kitchen in Austria made this concrete. A neighbor grows Jerusalem artichokes (sunchokes) that come back year after year with no spraying needed because the plant is essentially a weed. They are harvested locally, handled minimally, and eaten seasonally. Sunchokes contain inulin, a prebiotic fiber that feeds beneficial gut bacteria and produces short-chain fatty acids that support blood sugar regulation and reduce inflammation. Martin also freezes porcini mushrooms and wild huckleberries at peak season rather than preserving them in sugar. His freezer is his pantry for winter. The goal is produce harvested at its nutritional peak and stored without adulteration, not produce engineered to last three weeks in a refrigerated shipping container.

A Note on Washing

Wash everything, every time, regardless of whether it is organic. Martin’s method of choice is plain water, which he has used consistently for years. If you want to go further, a dilute baking soda solution is the most evidence-informed option for reducing pesticide residues on surface-washed produce. Vinegar and water will help reduce mold and surface bacteria, particularly on items like blueberries that develop mold quickly. Both work. Neither is a substitute for buying organic on the dirty dozen in the first place.

One practical tip Martin shared is to only wash what you are about to use. Storing produce wet accelerates breakdown and mold. Wash as needed, not in bulk ahead of time.

His chef trick for tired greens is worth keeping. Arugula or spinach that has dried out over a few days can be revived by soaking in warm water (around 100 degrees Fahrenheit) for about three minutes. It comes back crisp. Cold water will not have the same effect.

Quick Reference

Always buy organic (Dirty Dozen) -- strawberries, spinach, kale, grapes, peaches, pears, nectarines, bell peppers, cherries, blueberries, green beans, apples. Add potatoes to your personal list.

Safe to buy conventional (Clean 15) -- avocados, sweet corn, pineapple, onions, papaya, sweet peas, asparagus, honeydew melon, kiwi, cabbage, mushrooms, mango, sweet potatoes, watermelon, carrots. Bitter greens like radicchio are also low-risk.

Washing -- plain cold water works for most situations. Baking soda diluted in water is the best option for reducing pesticide residue on produce you could not buy organic. Vinegar and water extends the shelf life of mold-prone berries.

Reviving tired greens -- soak in warm water (around 100 degrees Fahrenheit) for three minutes.

Freezer as pantry -- buy organic or foraged produce at peak season and freeze it. Frozen at peak is nutritionally superior to fresh produce that has been shipped and stored for weeks.

For sensitive digestion -- steam vegetables soft rather than eating them raw or crunchy. You preserve meaningful nutrition and make it far more digestible.

Quinoa technique -- dry-toast the quinoa in a pot for three to five minutes before adding spices and water. It brings out a nuttiness and gives you more control over the texture. Season during cooking rather than after.

Dressing rule -- dress no more than two-thirds of the greens in a salad. Over-dressed salad becomes soggy and heavy within minutes.

Acidity instead of sodium -- balsamic drizzle, lemon juice, lime juice, and good vinegar can replace most of the salt in a dish while adding complexity.

Farmer’s market strategy -- go to smaller vendors with fewer crops. Talk to them. Look for the unusual roots, foraged items, and seasonal specialties. These are most likely to approximate the nutritional density of truly unadulterated food.

Check your region’s list -- ewg.org publishes an updated dirty dozen and clean 15 each year. The U.S. list is the most widely referenced, but regional contamination data varies. Use it as a baseline and adjust for where your food is grown.

Join the Habit Healers Community

If you want to cook this way every week alongside Chef Martin and me, this is exactly the kind of work we do inside the Habit Healers Community on Skool. Martin brings his professional kitchen into our sessions with recipes, techniques, and walkthroughs built specifically around the science of metabolic health. I bring the clinical framework. Every week, we take what we know and turn it into something you can actually do at dinner tonight.

We cook, we talk, we troubleshoot the real obstacles (time, budget, picky families, and all of it). If you are ready to build a kitchen practice that works for your metabolic health long-term, come join us.

Join the Habit Healers Community.

References

Environmental Working Group. Dirty Dozen and Clean Fifteen. ewg.org. Updated annually.

Why can a 150-pound man develop Type 2 diabetes… while a 300-pound man does not?

For decades, we were told a simple story: gain weight, get sick. Stay thin, stay safe. But that story falls apart the moment you look at real patients.

In this episode, I walk you through the concept that changed how we understand diabetes: the Personal Fat Threshold.

I explain why the issue isn’t how much fat you carry — it’s where your body can safely store it. Some people are born with a metabolic “bathtub” the size of a swimming pool. Others have a kitchen sink. When your personal storage limit is exceeded, fat spills into places it doesn’t belong — your liver, your pancreas, your muscles — and that’s when the real trouble begins.

We unpack:

* Why BMI is a blunt and often misleading tool

* What “ectopic fat” is and why it drives insulin resistance

* The Twin Cycle hypothesis and how liver fat and pancreatic fat feed each other

* Why beta cells in Type 2 diabetes may be stunned — not dead

* And why early diabetes can often be reversed

Then I explain something hopeful.

When you “drain the tub” — often by losing 10–15 kilograms — liver fat drops within days. Blood sugar can normalize within a week. Over weeks, the pancreas begins to recover. In many cases, diabetes goes into remission.

This isn’t about perfection. It’s about crossing back below your personal threshold.

Finally, I share how we translated this science into the 30-Day Blood Sugar Reset — a simple, daily micro-habit approach designed to lower the pressure on your liver and pancreas without turning your life upside down.

Because diabetes isn’t a moral failure.It isn’t a willpower problem.And it isn’t always about how you look.

It’s about overflow.

And overflow can be drained.Dr. Marbas Substack: https://drlauriemarbas.substack.com/

A Big Thank You To Our Sponsors:

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Chris Miller MD and I went deep on this one. We sat down for a Friday live and covered something that gets overlooked in the constant noise about macronutrients, protein targets, and which diet trend deserves your attention this week. We talked about the micronutrients that actually keep your brain and body running, the ones most people never test for, and what happens when they quietly fall short.

If you watched the replay, this is your reference guide. If you haven’t watched yet, start with the video above and come back here for the details.

Your Brain Has a Bouncer

Before we got into specific nutrients, Dr. Miller explained something worth understanding: the blood-brain barrier. Your brain is picky about what it lets in. Unlike your gut lining, which is one cell layer thick and held together by tight junctions, the blood-brain barrier is roughly 400 times tighter. It has to be. Your bloodstream carries immune cells, toxins, and pathogens that would cause serious damage if they reached your brain tissue.

Specialized cells called astrocytes, pericytes, and microglia wrap themselves around the blood vessels that supply the brain, creating a filtration system that only allows through what the brain actually needs: glucose via dedicated transporters, oxygen, carbon dioxide, and select nutrients. Everything else gets turned away.

When this barrier is working well, the brain stays protected while the glial cells on the inside handle cleanup and maintenance. That is a healthy brain. And the nutrients that make it through that barrier are exactly the ones we spent the rest of the session talking about.

Vitamin D

Dr. Miller started here because it is one of the most common deficiencies she sees, regardless of diet. You may not feel it right away, but signs can include slower wound healing, getting sick more often, autoimmune flares, and declining bone density.

The test to ask for is a 25-hydroxy vitamin D level. I aim to get my patients into the 40 to 60 range. Below 20 is clearly deficient, and most physicians will agree with that. Research during the pandemic showed that individuals with levels closer to 46 to 50 had less severe infections, which tracks with what we know about vitamin D’s role in immune and cardiovascular protection. It functions more like a hormone than a simple vitamin, and your whole body depends on it.

Here is the thing that surprised me about my own levels. I have lived in sunny places for most of my life. I run outside regularly without sun protection (yes, I know). And I have never been able to get my vitamin D above 30 without supplementation. There are genetic variations that affect your ability to convert sunlight into usable vitamin D, which is why testing matters more than assumptions.

Most of my patients do well on around 2,000 IU daily, but this is individual. I would not take over 4,000 IU without a physician monitoring your levels, because toxicity is real. NatureMade is a reliable, affordable brand you can find at any pharmacy or Walmart.

Magnesium

This one comes up constantly. Even people eating a solid plant-based diet can fall short. The challenge with magnesium is that blood tests are unreliable. Only about 1% of your total magnesium circulates in your blood, so a serum level can look normal while your tissues are depleted. An RBC (red blood cell) magnesium test is somewhat better, but still imperfect.

Pay attention to symptoms: muscle cramps, especially if you are on a diuretic like hydrochlorothiazide. Difficulty sleeping. Muscle twitching. Anxiety. Heart palpitations. Migraines. Headaches. Constipation. As we get older, the cramping and sleep disruption tend to be the most common complaints.

For food sources, pumpkin seeds are a powerhouse. I eat them every single day. Dark chocolate (you are welcome), avocado, almonds, and leafy greens are all solid sources. But if you have gut issues, if you are gassy or bloated or dealing with loose stools or constipation, there is a good chance you are not absorbing well. Aging also reduces stomach acid, which compounds the problem.

Someone asked during the live what the best form of supplemental magnesium is for muscle twitching. Dr. Miller and I both recommend magnesium glycinate (or bisglycinate), 200 to 400 milligrams. It absorbs well and is less likely to cause the GI side effects you might get from other forms.

Omega-3 Fatty Acids

Dr. Miller brought this one up because of her focus on inflammation and healthy aging. What your body really needs are EPA and DHA, the two omega-3 fatty acids that do the heavy lifting for joint health, cardiovascular protection, and brain function. DHA in particular is critical for the brain, and people who carry the APOE4 gene may need even more of it to get adequate amounts across the blood-brain barrier.

If you eat fatty fish like salmon, mackerel, anchovies, sardines, or herring, you are getting pre-made EPA and DHA. If you eat plant-based, you can get ALA from flax seeds, chia seeds, walnuts, hemp seeds, and leafy greens, and your body can convert that ALA into EPA and DHA through a series of enzymatic steps.

But not everyone converts efficiently. Research suggests that a meaningful percentage of the population has genetic variations that reduce this conversion. If your levels are low despite eating ALA-rich foods, you may need a direct source of EPA and DHA. Both Dr. Miller and I recommend algae-based omega-3 supplements for this reason. The fish get their omega-3s from algae anyway, so you are just cutting out the middleman.

I check an omega-3 index and aim for at least 5.5, though above 8 is probably ideal for cardiovascular health. Vitamin D, B12, and algae-based omega-3s are the three supplements I recommend nearly everyone consider. I like Nordic Naturals for the algae omega-3.

Vitamin B12

This is the non-negotiable one. If you eat a plant-based diet and you are not supplementing B12, stop what you are doing and start. B12 only comes from bacteria. Animals accumulate it because they consume bacteria through their food, and it gets stored in muscle tissue. Humans have bacteria that produce B12 in the gut, but it is made beyond the point of absorption. So you cannot rely on internal production.

The majority of my patients need 500 to 1,000 micrograms daily. And this is not only a plant-based issue. People taking metformin, proton pump inhibitors, or anyone getting older can have reduced B12 absorption regardless of diet.

Symptoms can be insidious. Numbness. Fatigue. Brain fog. Balance issues. I had a patient who had been vegetarian for most of her life and came to me in her mid-30s with severe nerve weakness, fatigue, and an inability to grip a cup without dropping it. Multiple doctors had missed it. Her B12 was below the low end of normal. We started injections, and within weeks, her grip strength returned. She was fortunate that she did not have permanent nerve damage, but that outcome is possible when deficiency goes unaddressed for too long.

I check three things: serum B12, homocysteine, and methylmalonic acid. I aim for a serum B12 above 500, and I want homocysteine below 10. I have seen homocysteine drop beautifully with B12 supplementation, even when the B12 level was technically in the normal range. Do not wait for a number to fall below the reference range before you act. That reference range represents 95% of the population, not necessarily what is optimal for you.

Iron

Iron deficiency deserves careful attention, especially for women. You can have normal circulating iron and normal iron saturation and still have low ferritin, which is your iron storage protein. That low ferritin can cause restless legs, sleep disruption, fatigue, brittle hair and nails, and hair loss. Research shows that people who replenish ferritin to at least 50 notice improvements in energy and focus. Sleep specialists prefer levels closer to 70.

Women who menstruate, endurance athletes, and runners are at higher risk. I know from experience. As I entered perimenopause, my periods got heavier and lasted longer. I was running longer distances. I was compounding the problem. And if you drink a lot of tea with meals, the tannins can reduce iron absorption, so separating tea from meals can help.

Pumpkin seeds are a great plant-based source, along with dark green leafy vegetables and beans. If you eat animal products, you are likely getting enough. But if you are supplementing iron, please do so under physician guidance. Too much iron causes its own set of problems. And if you are a man with low iron, that is unusual enough to warrant investigation. In my practice, low iron in men is rare, and when it does occur, we need to look for a source of loss, particularly GI bleeding.

Zinc

Zinc is a cofactor for nearly every cellular function in the body. Immune support, wound healing, thyroid function, and hair health all depend on it. Research shows that supplementing zinc within the first 24 to 48 hours of a cold can reduce the duration by a day or two.

You can test serum zinc, ideally in the morning since levels fluctuate throughout the day. Pumpkin seeds and cashews are excellent plant-based sources. Dr. Miller and I both see patients whose zinc remains low even after dietary changes, and those individuals need supplementation.

One important caution: high-dose zinc can interfere with copper absorption. If you stay under 10 to 15 milligrams of supplemental zinc, copper is generally not a concern. Above that, you want to be mindful.

Iodine

This is the one that sneaks up on people who are trying to eat healthier. Iodine comes primarily from seafood and iodized salt. When people clean up their diet, cut back on processed foods, switch to sea salt or eliminate salt entirely, and stop eating fish, they quietly remove their main iodine sources.

I learned this the hard way early in my career. I was counseling patients to reduce sodium, and they were cutting out iodized salt without replacing the iodine. Their TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) started creeping up. Once we identified the iodine deficiency and replaced it, their thyroid function normalized.

T3 (your active thyroid hormone) is literally three iodine molecules. T4 is four. You need iodine to make thyroid hormone. If it is too low, hypothyroidism follows. But too much can also cause thyroid problems, which is why I have seen patients walk in on 1,000 micrograms of supplemental iodine and run into trouble.

You need around 150 micrograms per day, roughly a quarter to half teaspoon of iodized salt. Seaweed and nori are good sources. The gold standard test is a 24-hour urine iodine collection, which yes, means collecting your urine for an entire day and keeping it in the fridge. A serum level is less reliable unless you are significantly depleted.

One more thing: the worry about soy and cruciferous vegetables damaging your thyroid is only relevant if your iodine is low. I have Hashimoto’s thyroiditis. I have been eating soy, broccoli, kale, and cauliflower for 14 years on a whole food plant-based diet, and my thyroid medication dose actually decreased when I went plant-based because the inflammation in my body went down. So eat those foods. Just make sure your iodine is sufficient.

Potassium

Potassium-rich foods help buffer sodium intake and support healthy blood pressure. Symptoms of low potassium include muscle cramps, fatigue, palpitations, and elevated blood pressure. It shows up reliably on a basic or comprehensive metabolic panel, which your doctor is likely already checking.

Most adults probably get about half of what they need. Potatoes, bananas, avocados, and dark leafy greens are all excellent sources. If you are on a diuretic, pay extra attention. People with kidney disease (stage 3 and beyond) need to work with their nephrologist to monitor potassium closely.

I want to share a story from a patient in Canada. She had reversed her type 2 diabetes on a whole food plant-based diet, lost close to 100 pounds, and come off her blood pressure medications. Then her doctor told her that her elevated potassium was caused by her plant-based diet. Her kidney function was perfect. I told her this was almost certainly a lab artifact. When blood sits too long before being processed, or when the blood draw is traumatic (the needle jostles, cells rupture, potassium spills out), you get a falsely elevated reading. We had her redraw from both arms, well-hydrated, no fist clenching, and her potassium came back completely normal. Lab error is the number one cause of falsely elevated potassium when kidney function is intact. Stay hydrated before your draw and do not let one result panic you.

B Vitamins (Beyond B12)

Dr. Miller took us through the broader B vitamin family. These are found in leafy greens, nuts, seeds, legumes, whole grains, lentils, and avocados. When levels are low, you might notice decreased energy, altered mood, brain fog, or poor sleep.

An important piece of this puzzle is methylation. Some B vitamins need to be methylated (activated) before your body can use them, and genetic variations in the MTHFR pathway can impair that process. Dr. Miller shared a case of a patient eating a comprehensive diet with plenty of plants who could not sleep and had persistent low energy. Genetic testing revealed a methylation issue. Targeted supplementation with B2, B3, B6, and B9 (folate) significantly improved her sleep, mood, and focus.

A few warnings here. Taking high doses of B vitamins without a clear reason can backfire. Certain people cannot metabolize large amounts and will feel worse, not better. B6 toxicity specifically can cause nerve tingling and numbness. And if you get cracking at the corners of your mouth, unexplained rashes, or slow wound healing, consider whether B vitamin status might be a factor.

Choline

This is one I do not think gets enough attention. When I audit my own diet on Cronometer, I was hitting my targets for calcium, iron, and everything else, but I was only getting about half the choline I needed as a pre-menopausal woman. After menopause, the situation gets more complicated because estrogen supports some internal choline production, and when that drops, dietary needs increase.

Low choline can contribute to fatty liver. I have had two patients with unexplained fatty liver, one in her early 40s and one in her early 50s, who had been through GI workups and liver biopsies with no answers. When we started replacing choline with phosphatidylcholine, their liver markers improved.

The richest dietary source is eggs. On a plant-based diet, soy products and cruciferous vegetables are your best options, which is another reason to not cut those food groups based on internet fear-mongering. If you have genetics that impair choline absorption, or if your diet has become too restrictive, supplementation may be warranted.

Fiber

The United States is a fiber-deficient country. The FDA recommends 25 grams per day for women and 35 grams for men, though ancestral populations likely consumed 50 to 100 grams daily. Most Americans fall well short.

Research shows that eating more than 30 different types of plants per week supports a diverse microbiome. Fiber only comes from plants, specifically fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, and legumes. It is absent from animal products entirely.

If you are not used to eating much fiber and you suddenly increase your intake dramatically, your microbiome will protest. The bacteria that break down fiber need to be cultivated gradually. Start slow, increase steadily, and if you are struggling with tolerance, try blending or cooking high-fiber foods to pre-digest them somewhat. Start with lentils if beans give you trouble. They tend to be easier to tolerate.

I get 75 to 80 grams of fiber daily without trying at this point. But I grew up eating beans, vegetables, and potatoes because they were cheap, so my gut was accustomed to it long before I went fully plant-based.

Sodium

Most Americans consume too much sodium from processed foods and restaurant meals. But there is another side. People on very clean diets, particularly those who eliminate salt entirely, can develop dangerously low sodium levels.

Dr. Miller shared her own experience with hyponatremia (low sodium). She was not eating salt because she thought she was not supposed to, and it got her into real trouble. We both see this pattern: health-conscious people drinking large amounts of water, avoiding salt completely, and ending up with sodium levels around 125 (normal is 135 to 145), which is clinically significant.

Sodium is essential for nerve conduction. Every nerve signal in your body depends on sodium transport. The sweet spot for daily intake appears to be around 1,500 to 2,300 milligrams. Both too low and too high are problematic, and the relationship follows a U-shaped curve.

If your sodium runs low, step one is to check whether you are drinking too much water and eating too little salt. A pinch of iodized salt added to whole food cooking is a long way from the excessive sodium in processed food. If the simple fixes do not resolve it, a workup for kidney issues, adrenal dysfunction, SIADH, heart failure, or medication effects is appropriate.

And for the record, if anyone on the internet tells you to drink massive amounts of salt water, do not.

Protein

You can absolutely get sufficient protein on a plant-based diet. I want that to be clear. Beans, legumes, soy, whole grains, nuts, and seeds all contribute. But I do see trouble when people become overly restrictive, skip protein-rich foods because of bloating fears, or eat only fruit for entire meals.

A rough starting point for protein needs: estimate your ideal body weight (start with 100 pounds at 5 feet tall, add 5 pounds per inch, then divide by 2.2 to get kilograms). Aim for at least 1 gram of protein per kilogram, preferably 1.2, and up to 1.6 grams for people doing regular exercise. Less than 1 gram per kilogram is where I start seeing problems, especially in older adults who are already losing muscle mass.

On labs, a low creatinine can sometimes signal inadequate protein intake. And if you feel fatigued, struggle with satiety, or are not building muscle despite resistance training, protein is worth auditing. I ask patients to walk me through breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If there is no protein source at two of those meals, we have found a gap.

One of my favorite tricks: lupini bean flakes. The brand Aviate (A-V-I-A-T-E) on Amazon is excellent. A quarter cup gives you 12 grams of protein for only 80 calories. I add them to oatmeal, smoothies, soups, and chili.

Pair your protein with resistance training. You need to give your muscles a reason to hold on to the protein you are feeding them. Eating enough protein without lifting anything heavy is only half the equation.

How to Audit Your Own Nutrition

If this felt like a lot, here is where to start.

Download the app Cronometer (C-R-O-N-O-M-E-T-E-R). Log your normal eating for one week without changing anything. At the end of the week, look at where you fall short. Then decide whether you need to adjust your food choices or talk to your doctor about targeted supplementation.

For lab work, ask your physician about the following: 25-hydroxy vitamin D, serum B12 with homocysteine and methylmalonic acid, a complete metabolic panel (which includes potassium and sodium), an iron panel with ferritin, serum zinc, and an omega-3 index. For iodine, the 24-hour urine collection is the most accurate test.

Our motto for this conversation: test, do not guess. Whatever your dietary pattern, make sure it is actually working for you by checking the data. What works for one person may not work for the next. We have the same basic plumbing, but our genetics, microbiomes, absorption capacity, medications, and life circumstances make each of us a unique case.

If something does not feel right and your doctor says your labs look fine, do not stop asking questions. Sometimes the answer is in the nutrients nobody thought to check.

In this week’s live session, Chef Martin Oswald pulled back the curtain on something most people never think about: calorie stacking. It’s the way traditional cooking piles fat on top of fat, layer by layer, from the oil you sauté in to the cream in the sauce to the cheese on the finish. By the time a plate of pasta or a restaurant entrée reaches your table, those invisible layers can easily add up to over 1,000 calories, and the food doesn’t look any different than if it had half that number.

Martin spent years cooking in high-end kitchens where butter sauces and cream reductions were the standard. When he transitioned to cooking for physicians and cardiovascular health programs, he had to solve a real problem: how do you keep the flavor and the mouthfeel of those sauces without the caloric weight behind them?

His answer came down to three techniques. Each one recreates what Martin calls viscosity, the way a good sauce coats your tongue and carries flavor across your palate, without cream, butter, or excessive oil. Here’s the breakdown.

Method One: Vegetable Puree (Martin’s Go-To)

Simmer cauliflower in vegetable stock for 7-10 minutes. Blend it smooth. Done.

What you get is a base with the consistency of heavy cream and roughly 40 calories per 100 grams. (A traditional cream sauce runs about 240. A butter sauce can top 500.) The natural pectin in cauliflower is what gives it that coating texture.

From here, you can take it anywhere. Alfredo, lasagna, risotto, or Martin’s move from the session: cook it with Thai curry paste and kaffir lime leaves, and you have an instant curry sauce where the cauliflower completely disappears behind the spices.

Cauliflower not your thing? Martin says butternut squash, onions, or virtually any vegetable that softens and blends will work the same way.

Batch cooking tip: Make a cauliflower soup on day one. Use the leftover puree as a sauce base for the next two or three days.

Method Two: The Roux

A roux is one of the oldest thickening techniques in cooking, common across French, Austrian, and Southern American kitchens. Martin’s low-calorie version:

* Sauté onions dry in a pan (no oil).

* Add mushrooms. Splash vinegar over them as they cook. (Martin’s trick: the acidity builds deep flavor and steams off as the mushrooms release water.)

* Add one measured teaspoon of olive oil (~40 calories), then one tablespoon of whole grain flour directly on top.

* Toast the flour for about three minutes, stirring constantly. (Skip this step and your sauce will taste like raw paste.)

* Add liquid (stock, water), bring to a boil, whisk well, and simmer 7-10 minutes.

This method is especially good for soups and stews that feel too thin. Martin made the point that a watery soup might be perfectly nutritious, but your palate registers it as unsatisfying. Just a small amount of roux changes the entire eating experience without meaningful caloric cost.

Method Three: The Tapioca Slurry (Martin’s Secret Weapon)

Martin told us he ran a blind tasting of five different starches and tapioca flour won easily. It produces a sauce that coats your mouth just enough, then releases cleanly. It holds up in the refrigerator for days without separating (arrowroot breaks down overnight), and it gives you a clear, glossy finish rather than the cloudy look from wheat flour. It’s also completely flavor-neutral, unlike agar agar, which can carry a faint seaweed taste and mute other flavors in the dish.

The method:

* Mix 1 tablespoon tapioca flour with 3-4 tablespoons cold water.

* Stir constantly. (If you let it sit, the starch sinks and clumps.)

* Drop it into your already simmering sauce.

* Bring back to a quick boil, then reduce to a simmer. One minute and you’re done.

Martin demonstrated this by building a lemongrass kaffir lime teriyaki sauce: pounded lemongrass (crushing the stalk releases the aromatic oils), torn kaffir lime leaves, soy sauce, a touch of date syrup for sweetness, thickened with the tapioca slurry.

One thing to know: Because this sauce coats food as a glaze rather than pooling on the plate, you use less per serving. That means the sauce itself needs to be more concentrated in flavor. Season it a touch stronger than you think you need.

Why This Matters

Research consistently shows that reducing the energy density of your meals, eating the same satisfying volume but with fewer calories per bite, is one of the most effective strategies for sustainable weight management. The mistake most people make is trying to eat less. The opportunity is to eat differently. Swapping a cream sauce for a cauliflower puree doesn’t shrink your plate or leave you hungry. It changes what your food is made of while keeping the experience of eating it intact.

As Martin put it: you’re removing the calories, improving the nutrient profile, and the sauce still does everything the heavy cream and butter versions would do.

Want more techniques like these from Chef Martin, plus weekly live coaching on the habits that actually move the needle with me? The Habit Healers community is now open. Learn more here.

What happens if you stretch for just three minutes every morning for two weeks?

Not an hour.Not a hot yoga class.Not a heroic “new year, new me” overhaul.

Three minutes.

In this week’s Habit Healers Live Lab, I share what actually changed in my own hip after seven days of micro-dosing mobility — and why biology responds to consistency far more than intensity.

We treat stiffness like a project that needs a dramatic fix. But your nervous system doesn’t care about your weekend warrior session. It adapts to what you do daily. In this episode, I explain why you can’t “cram” mobility any more than you can cram brushing your teeth — and how small, repeatable inputs begin to recalibrate the body’s built-in safety brakes.

I walk you through:

* Why more stretching doesn’t automatically mean more gains

* What PNF (contract–relax) actually does in the nervous system

* The difference between forcing length and updating tolerance

* Why dynamic mobility is more like practice than stretching

* And how strengthening your glute med might be the missing piece

I also give you the full Week 2 protocol — under five minutes total — designed to shift your system from guarding to allowing.

This isn’t about forcing tissue to surrender.It’s about teaching your brain that new range is safe.

If you’ve ever felt “rusty,” blamed your birthday, or assumed fixing a 20-year stiffness problem required a 60-minute workout… this episode will challenge that story.

We’re not chasing intensity.

We’re rewiring defaults.

Dr. Marbas Substack: https://drlauriemarbas.substack.com/

A Big Thank You To Our Sponsors:

If you want the best supplement to help you on your plant-based journey, you have to try Complement: https://lovecomplement.com/?aff=62

In this episode of "Learn My Lesson," I had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Jake Goodman, a psychiatrist and the writer behind the "Mental Health Movement" Substack. Dr. Goodman shared his inspiring journey into medicine, detailing his early aspirations, the challenges he faced getting into medical school, and his eventual specialization in psychiatry. He also discussed his personal experience with depression during his residency, which has significantly enhanced his empathy and understanding as a psychiatrist.We delved into the topic of dementia, a growing concern among our aging population. Dr. Goodman explained the basics of dementia, including its different types such as Alzheimer's, Lewy body dementia, and frontal temporal dementia. He emphasized the importance of recognizing mild cognitive impairment (MCI) as a precursor to dementia and discussed various ways to prevent and manage these conditions.Key preventive measures highlighted include regular exercise, quality sleep, socialization, and proper nutrition. Dr. Goodman also stressed the importance of getting hearing and vision checked, managing blood pressure and blood sugar levels, and addressing any micronutrient deficiencies. He mentioned the potential benefits of certain medications and supplements, while also cautioning against unnecessary polypharmacy.We also touched on the ethical considerations of genetic testing for dementia risk, with both of us agreeing that it's a nuanced decision that requires careful thought.Dr. Goodman practices at the Goodman Memory Clinic, offering virtual consultations in California, Florida, and New York. He is active on social media and Substack, where he shares valuable insights on brain health and mental well-being.This episode is packed with practical advice and thoughtful discussions on dementia prevention and mental health, making it a must-listen for anyone interested in these topics. Thank you, Dr. Goodman, for sharing your expertise and experiences with us!Links to connect with Dr. Goodman:Virtual Practice (Goodman Memory Clinic): https://forms.gle/BDWhyrsw65V5YYia8Newsletter: https://jakegoodmanmd.substack.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jakegoodmanmdDr. Marbas Substack: https://drlauriemarbas.substack.com/

A Big Thank You To Our Sponsors:

If you want the best supplement to help you on your plant-based journey, you have to try Complement: https://lovecomplement.com/?aff=62

I get referred patients regularly because I practice what people call “holistic medicine.” And the story is almost always the same: they’ve been through conventional medicine, they keep getting more prescriptions, their numbers may look fine on paper, but they don’t feel any better. Sometimes they feel worse. There’s a lack of vitality that nobody seems to be addressing, and nobody is asking why.

That conversation stuck with me, because it’s exactly the kind of gap Chris Miller MD and I discussed in our latest live. Chris is a physician I trust, someone I go to when I have clinical questions that sit outside my own lane. She’s board-certified in lifestyle medicine like I am, and she’s gone further into integrative and functional medicine training. She practices in 23 states via telemedicine, and she brings a perspective shaped by her own health challenges, including managing lupus.

What follows is a summary of our conversation, along with some practical guidance if you’re trying to find a physician who actually sees you, not just your lab results.

The Habit Healers is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

The Problem With “Holistic”

I deliberately chose the phrase “whole person medicine” for this conversation instead of “holistic.” Not because holistic is a bad word, but because it carries so much baggage that it can mean almost anything. For some people, holistic means walking away from conventional medicine entirely. That’s not what Chris and I practice, and it’s not what we’d recommend for anyone.

Whole person medicine, the way we define it, means something specific. It means your physician doesn’t just treat the complaint that brought you through the door. If you come in with high blood pressure, a whole person approach doesn’t stop at a prescription. It looks at your blood sugar. It checks inflammatory markers. It asks about your sleep, your stress, your diet, how connected you feel to the people around you. It recognizes that inflammation in one system doesn’t stay in one system. Your cardiovascular health, your brain, your gut, your immune function are all talking to each other.

And the treatment plan reflects that. Diet and lifestyle come first. Integrative tools like yoga, acupuncture, or mind-body practices can support recovery. Supplements fill actual documented gaps (not guesswork). And medications are used when they’re indicated, because keeping someone safe is always the priority. As Chris put it during our conversation, her first job with every patient is to keep them safe. If something is dangerously abnormal, you address it with whatever tools you have, including pharmaceuticals. Then you build the lifestyle foundation underneath.

Evidence-Based Shared Decision-Making

One of the things I talked about in the live was an article by Greg Katz, MD, a cardiologist on Substack, about a patient who came in with exertional chest pain during exercise. His primary care doctor hadn’t been too alarmed. That would have set off alarm bells for me. The patient eventually ended up seeing Dr. Katz, had imaging that showed significant blockage in the LAD (sometimes called the “widowmaker”), and then faced a decision: stent, or medical management?

What made Dr. Katz’s approach stand out was the shared decision-making process. He looked at the data, including the ISCHEMIA trial, which shows that for stable patients, stenting and medical management produce comparable long-term outcomes. He discussed it with colleagues. He presented the evidence to the patient. And together, they decided.

That model is what whole person medicine looks like in action. It doesn’t mean your doctor avoids modern interventions. It means your doctor uses evidence to guide the conversation and treats you as a partner in the decision, not a passive recipient.

Where Lifestyle Medicine Fits (and Where It Stops)

Chris and I are both board-certified in lifestyle medicine through the American College of Lifestyle Medicine (lifestylemedicine.org). That certification means a physician has foundational training in nutrition, physical activity, sleep, stress management, and behavior change as therapeutic tools.

For a lot of people, that foundation is enough. Shift to a more plant-forward diet, improve sleep quality, add consistent movement, manage stress, and many chronic conditions start to improve.

But Chris’s own story is a good example of when it’s not enough. She changed her diet. She optimized sleep and stress management. Her lupus didn’t budge. So she went deeper. She trained in integrative medicine with Dr. Andrew Weil, studying mind-body techniques, vagal nerve activation, and the role of the parasympathetic nervous system in healing. Then she trained in functional medicine, which uses more advanced testing (microbiome analysis, heavy metals, mold exposure) when standard approaches haven’t uncovered the root problem.

What she found was that she had genetic variants affecting methylation and B vitamin activation. No amount of dietary change alone was going to correct those abnormalities. She needed targeted supplementation and a more precise approach.

The lesson isn’t that diet and lifestyle don’t matter. They remain the foundation for the vast majority of people. The lesson is that autoimmune disease, and really any chronic condition, is not one-size-fits-all. If you’ve made meaningful lifestyle changes and you’re still not getting better, that doesn’t mean you’re doing something wrong. It may mean there’s a layer underneath that hasn’t been addressed yet.

Inflammation: What to Know, What to Ask For

Chris and I spent a good chunk of our conversation on inflammation, because it sits at the crossroads of so many conditions. Joint stiffness, brain fog, depression, difficulty sleeping, waking up sore. These can all be signs of chronic low-grade inflammation. And at its worst, acute inflammation is what triggers heart attacks and strokes.

There are a few basic markers your doctor can check. A CBC (complete blood count) is drawn at most annual visits, and shifts in your white blood cell count from your personal baseline can signal something brewing, even if the number still falls in the “normal” range. If you usually run around 3.5 and now you’re at 6 or 7, that’s worth investigating.

Beyond the CBC, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) is one of the most useful inflammatory markers. It’s produced by the liver in response to inflammatory signals anywhere in the body, and research has linked elevated hs-CRP to increased risk for cardiovascular events, neurodegenerative disease, and autoimmune flares. A target of less than 1.0 mg/L is generally considered protective.

One caveat Chris raised that I think is important: hs-CRP can spike temporarily after an intense workout or during an acute viral infection. If you just ran 20 miles or you’re fighting a cold, recheck it a week later before drawing conclusions.

ESR (erythrocyte sedimentation rate) is another inflammatory marker, and it can sometimes catch what CRP misses, particularly in certain autoimmune conditions. The two tests use different mechanisms and respond to different inflammatory signals, so it’s not uncommon to see one elevated while the other is normal.

The point is this: if you’re feeling off and your doctor isn’t checking inflammatory markers, it’s worth asking.

The Bigger Metabolic Picture

I’ve been spending more time writing and thinking about metabolic health, and one statistic has stuck with me. Research looking at cardiometabolic health criteria in American adults found that only a small fraction, roughly one in fourteen, met all five markers of optimal metabolic health. That data only goes through 2018, so the real number now is likely worse.

Metabolic health is, at its simplest, how well your body processes and uses energy. Insulin resistance is part of it. Blood sugar regulation is part of it. And poor metabolic health doesn’t just show up as diabetes. It accelerates heart disease, contributes to cognitive decline, worsens GI issues, and fuels chronic inflammation.

This is where every conversation about whole person medicine eventually leads. The daily habits, what you eat, how you move, whether you sleep well, how you manage stress, whether you have meaningful social connection, build or erode your metabolic health over time. No single doctor’s visit can undo years of accumulated damage. But the right physician can help you understand where you stand and build a plan that actually addresses the full picture.

A Word on GLP-1 Medications

Chris and I both shared that our thinking on GLP-1 medications has evolved. Neither of us is a pill-first physician. But the data on these drugs keeps expanding in directions that are hard to ignore.

The most obvious use is for food noise, that constant mental chatter about the next meal that some people experience no matter how carefully they eat. For patients who have solid lifestyle habits and are still battling that relentless drive, GLP-1 medications can lower the volume enough to let everything else work.

Beyond weight management, emerging research suggests GLP-1 medications may lower systemic inflammation, reduce cardiovascular events in high-risk individuals, and show protective effects for brain health and cognitive decline. There’s also growing interest in their role for autoimmune conditions, where they may help quiet an overactive immune response that persists even after lifestyle optimization.

None of this means GLP-1s are for everyone. But they’re a tool, and a whole person physician uses every appropriate tool available while keeping lifestyle as the foundation.

Menopause Hormone Therapy: Evolving With the Data

I also brought up menopausal hormone therapy in our conversation, because roughly 90% of my patients are women in this age group, and it’s one of the first things I discuss. My own experience going through perimenopause at 53, despite being extremely active and metabolically healthy, shook me. The hormonal fluctuations hit hard even when everything else was dialed in.

Chris and I have both evolved our thinking here as the data has matured. FDA-approved (not compounded) menopausal hormone therapy, picked up at your local pharmacy, has compelling evidence for bone health, brain health, and cardiovascular protection when used in the right window for the right patient. Hot flashes are not just an inconvenience; they’re driven by cytokine release, and severe vasomotor symptoms carry their own health risks.

This is highly individualized. But a physician who dismisses hormone therapy without looking at the current evidence isn’t practicing whole person medicine. They’re practicing 2002 medicine.

Supplements: Less Is More (With Four Exceptions)

Patients come to me on 20 or 30 supplements sometimes, stacked up from different practitioners, internet recommendations, and well-meaning friends. My approach is to strip it back and focus on what the evidence actually supports.

For most of my patients, four supplements cover the bases:

Vitamin B12 is non-negotiable for plant-based eaters, and it’s also commonly depleted in people over 65, anyone on metformin, or anyone taking proton pump inhibitors like omeprazole. I recommend 500 to 1,000 micrograms daily and want to see blood levels between 500 and 1,100.

Vitamin D is one I check routinely. Even people with significant sun exposure can run low due to genetic differences in conversion. I couldn’t get my levels above 27 or 28 despite training for marathons in Florida without supplementation. For most people, around 2,000 IU daily is a reasonable starting dose, adjusted based on labs. Insurance doesn’t always cover vitamin D testing, but services like Jason Health or similar direct-to-consumer lab companies can make it affordable. [Link to direct-to-consumer lab options]

Algae-based omega-3s matter especially for people who aren’t eating much fish or who are limiting nuts and seeds. You can check your omega index to see where you stand.

Creatine isn’t technically a vitamin, but I’m a fan. The research on brain health and muscle performance, particularly for women over 40, is growing. It’s one I take daily.

Chris added a few others she watches closely in her patients. Zinc can be difficult to absorb, especially without seafood in the diet, and it’s a cofactor for immune function and gut repair. She checks levels before supplementing. Magnesiumtends to run low even in people eating plant-rich diets, possibly due to declining soil quality, and she optimizes based on labs. And B vitamins beyond B12 can matter for people with methylation variants like hers.

One important note Chris raised: if you’re supplementing zinc at higher doses (above 30 mg), you need to add copper, because zinc competes with copper for absorption.

The principle here is straightforward. Don’t guess. Test. Supplement what’s actually low. And reassess annually, because your needs change over time.

How to Actually Find a Whole Person Physician

So what do you do with all of this? Here are concrete steps you can take.

Start at lifestylemedicine.org. The American College of Lifestyle Medicine has a provider directory. Any physician listed there has, at minimum, foundational training in using diet and lifestyle as therapeutic tools. It’s not a guarantee of a perfect fit, but it’s a much better starting point than a random internet search.

Ask about visit length. Fifteen-minute appointments are a red flag for the kind of care we’re describing. Chris’s minimum appointment is 30 minutes, and most of her patients see her for an hour. That time matters. It’s what allows a physician to actually listen, investigate, and explain.

Pay attention to how they handle your questions. A good physician will tell you when they don’t know something, and then go find the answer or refer you to someone who has it. If a doctor dismisses your concerns because your numbers are “technically normal” or because you’re “healthier than most of their patients,” that’s information about whether they’re the right fit.

Be cautious of practitioners who order expensive, unvalidated tests or stack you on dozens of supplements without clear clinical reasoning. Every test should have a purpose. Every supplement should have a documented deficiency or clear clinical indication behind it.

Look at their willingness to evolve. Medicine changes. The data on GLP-1s, menopausal hormone therapy, protein needs, and nutrient testing has shifted meaningfully in the past five years. A physician who hasn’t updated their approach in a decade is not practicing whole person medicine. They’re practicing old medicine.

Consider telemedicine. Chris is licensed in 23 states and is accepting new patients at chrismillermd.com. If you don’t have access to this kind of care locally, telemedicine can bridge the gap.

Your Next Steps

If this conversation sparked something for you, here are three things you can do this week:

Check your most recent labs. Pull up your last blood work and look at your white blood cell count, your fasting glucose, and whether hs-CRP was included. If it wasn’t, ask for it at your next visit.

Write down your top three health concerns. Not diagnoses. Concerns. How you feel. Fatigue, stiffness, brain fog, poor sleep, whatever it is. Bring that list to your next appointment and see how your physician responds to it. Their response will tell you a lot.

Search the ACLM provider directory. Even if you’re happy with your current doctor, it’s worth knowing who’s in your area or available via telemedicine who practices with this lens. You can find the directory at lifestylemedicine.org. [Link to ACLM directory]

Chris Miller MD is a board-certified lifestyle and integrative medicine physician licensed in 23 states and accepting new patients. You can learn more at chrismillermd.com.

If you want to go deeper on these topics with weekly coaching, recipes from Chef Martin Oswald, and a community of people working on the same habits, join us inside the Habit Healers community on Skool.

Watch the full live cooking session with Chef Martin Oswald in the video above. Recipes for the creamy tofu scramble, tofu medallion with lupini bean cake, and peanut butter chocolate mousse can be found here.

Join us in the Habit Healers Skool community where Chef Martin and I work together to bring culinary medicine and healing habits to you live every week in our exclusive community.

Most people think about protein the way they think about a car battery. One source doing one job in one spot. You open the hood, point to it, and say, “There it is. That’s my protein.”

A block of tofu on the plate, a scoop of beans in the bowl, and you call it handled.

But what if you’ve been thinking about plant protein all wrong? Not because the sources are bad, but because the strategy is.

That’s the idea Chef Martin Oswald brought to our live cooking session this week, and it changed how I think about building a plate. He calls it protein stacking, and the concept is so simple it’s almost annoying: instead of relying on a single protein anchor in a meal, you layer protein into every component, from the dressing to the sauce to the side dish and even dessert.

The Strategy No One Talks About

When Martin and I sat down to talk about protein and fiber (because pairing the two matters for blood sugar, satiety, and gut health), I expected him to walk through a list of high-protein plant foods. He did that. But then he did something more interesting. He cooked a full three-course meal where every single element carried protein, and none of them felt like they were trying.

The walnut dressing on your salad? That’s not just fat and acid. That’s protein and alpha-linolenic acid. The hemp seeds blended into your chocolate mousse? Thirty-three grams of protein per hundred grams. The soy milk you splash into your tofu scramble instead of water? More protein than almond or oat milk, working in the background of every dish.

Martin’s point is that most people who move toward plant-based eating make a common mistake. They identify one protein source per meal and stop there. They don’t think about the dressing, the binder, the dessert, or the cooking liquid as opportunities. But when you start stacking, those five or eight grams here and there add up fast. By the end of a three-course meal built this way, you’re easily looking at forty grams or more without ever feeling like you ate a “high-protein” diet.

The Lineup

Before Martin started cooking, he walked through his go-to plant protein sources and made a case for each one. A few stood out.

Sunflower seeds are one of the most underrated options in the plant protein world. They pack serious protein per serving, they contain vitamin E, and they cost a fraction of what you’d spend on nuts like cashews or almonds. Martin calls them the best value protein next to peanuts, and he’s not wrong. You can fold them into a dressing at lunch, sprinkle them on breakfast, and blend them into a dessert at dinner.

Pumpkin seeds carry even more protein per hundred grams and work as a topping, a snack, or a blended sauce base. Hemp seeds sit at the very top of Martin’s list. He treats them like a rescue ingredient, something you can drop into virtually anything (sauces, smoothies, baked goods, oatmeal) to boost the protein content without changing the flavor profile in any dramatic way.

And then there are lupini beans. I’ve been telling people about lupini bean flakes for a while now, and Martin confirmed what I already suspected. They’re the king of the bean protein world. The flakes dissolve into oatmeal, stir into soups, and blend into patty mixtures with almost no resistance. If you only add one new ingredient to your pantry after reading this, make it lupini bean flakes. (These are my favorite.)

Three Dishes, One Principle

Martin cooked three things during our session, and each one demonstrated protein stacking in a different context.

The Creamy Tofu Scramble

This is Martin’s riff on the scrambled eggs he grew up eating in Austria, and he’s particular about texture. He crumbles the tofu by hand rather than cutting it into cubes, which gives you a softer, more egg-like mouthfeel. The trick that separates a mediocre scramble from a great one? Two things. First, a teaspoon of cashew powder stirred in with soy milk (not water, not oat milk) to build creaminess and add protein simultaneously. Second, a squeeze of lemon juice. Martin says acidity transforms tofu scramble into a completely different product, and based on how it looked on camera, I believe him.

He served it over quinoa, stacking another protein layer underneath. Add avocado on top and you’ve got a breakfast (or dinner, honestly) that will keep you full for hours.

The Tofu Medallion with Lupini Bean Cake

This is the weekend dish, the one you make when you want to impress someone or just treat yourself. Martin sliced firm tofu through the center, cut medallion shapes with a round cutter, and then carved the edges smooth. That might sound fussy, but he explained that the rounded edges change the way the tofu feels in your mouth. Smoother, less rough on the palate.

He marinated the medallions in what he calls the “umami bomb,” a sauce built on fermented black beans that carries enormous flavor. The leftover tofu trimmings? Those became the scramble. Nothing wasted.

For the base, he made a cake (his word for it; I kept calling it a patty) from pureed chickpeas and cooked lupini bean flakes, bound with a flax egg and seasoned with the same umami sauce. The chickpea puree acts as the glue that holds everything together, and if you’re nervous about it falling apart, Martin’s advice is simple: use more chickpea puree and a little less lupini until you find the ratio that works for your hands and your pan. You can also add a tablespoon of arrowroot flour or tapioca starch to help it bind as it heats.

He layered it all on a bed of steamed spinach, topped it with the roasted tofu medallion, added a spoonful of kimchi for fermented tang, and finished it with a pureed carrot sauce. (Pro tip from Martin: if you make carrot soup one day, that same soup becomes the sauce the next day. Restaurant logic applied at home.)

Between the lupini beans, chickpeas, tofu, and spinach, this single plate carried roughly thirty plus grams of protein before you even count the walnut dressing on the salad course.

The Peanut Butter Chocolate Mousse

This is dessert where the protein isn’t an afterthought but the structural foundation of the whole thing.

Martin made this two ways in one cup. The outside layer is a peanut butter cream: just peanut butter thinned with soy milk (or vanilla soy milk, which he says works beautifully) and stirred until smooth. If your peanut butter is stiff from the fridge, warm it gently in a water bath or microwave for a few seconds.

The inside is a chocolate mousse made from hemp seeds blended with cocoa powder, soy milk, and a touch of vanilla. He sweetened his with maple syrup, though he usually reaches for date syrup. The key to getting it silky is either soaking the hemp seeds overnight or using a high-powered blender. If you try to shortcut this with a regular blender and dry seeds, you’ll end up with grit instead of mousse.

Between the peanut butter, hemp seeds, and soy milk, this dessert carried around eight to ten grams of protein. That’s a protein bar disguised as something you actually want to eat.

Martin also dropped an idea I can’t stop thinking about: swap the chocolate mousse for an espresso version. Blend hemp seeds with espresso, dates, and a little soy milk. Use that as the center, keep the peanut butter cream on the outside, and you’ve got something that belongs on a restaurant menu.

A Quick Note on Fiber

Before Martin started cooking, I brought up something I’ve been thinking about. When you puree nuts, seeds, or vegetables, a lot of people worry that you’re destroying the fiber. You’re not. Blending does what your teeth do. It breaks food into smaller pieces, but the fiber stays intact. You only lose fiber when you strain it out, like when you juice something and discard the pulp.

This matters for anyone who struggles with digestion, especially as we get older. Martin mentioned a concept from Austrian health resorts called Schonkost, a gentle cooking approach that favors steaming and pureeing over raw preparations. For people in their seventies and eighties, raw vegetables at dinner can be genuinely hard to process. Blended soups and purees deliver the same fiber and nutrients in a form the body can handle more easily.

So if you’ve been avoiding smoothies or pureed soups because you thought blending destroyed the good stuff, you can let that one go.

The Habit

If protein stacking sounds complicated, it isn’t. Start with one change. Next time you make a salad dressing, use a nut or seed base instead of plain oil and vinegar. That’s it. You’ve just added protein to a part of your meal that normally has none. From there, you can start thinking about your cooking liquids (soy milk over water), your toppings (hemp seeds, pumpkin seeds), and your desserts (blended nut or seed creams).

You’re not aiming for perfection here. You’re just recognizing that protein doesn’t have to live in one place on your plate. It can show up everywhere, doing its work in the background of every bite.

Don’t forget to get Martin’s recipes here.

You’ve seen the headlines: “Drug cuts heart attack risk by 50%.” It sounds dramatic. Reassuring. Urgent. But in this episode, I show you exactly how that single percentage is designed to mislead you.

I break down the difference between Relative Risk and Absolute Risk — and why one makes for great marketing while the other tells you what actually matters to your life. We walk through real numbers together, translate medical jargon into plain English, and expose how a “50% reduction” can quietly mean a 1% benefit.

Then we go deeper.

I explain why a result can be “statistically significant” and still clinically useless. We unpack the famous p-value (and why it doesn’t mean what most people think it means). I teach you how to read a Confidence Interval like a pro — including the crucial “Line of No Effect” that determines whether a study actually worked or quietly failed.

And finally, I give you the most practical tool of all: the Number Needed to Treat. This is the number that answers the only question that really matters:

How many people have to take this drug for one person to benefit?

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by medical research, confused by health news, or skeptical of miracle claims but unsure why — this episode is your toolkit.

By the end, you won’t just read headlines.

You’ll decode them.

Dr. Marbas Substack: https://drlauriemarbas.substack.com/

A Big Thank You To Our Sponsors:

If you want the best supplement to help you on your plant-based journey, you have to try Complement: https://lovecomplement.com/?aff=62

This article is based on my conversation with Chef Martin Oswald, author of the Chef Martin’s Healing Kitchen Substack, this is day 6 and the finale of the first-ever Brain Health Substack Summit, hosted by The Habit Healers.

If you missed Day 1 of our Brain Health Summit with Julie Fratantoni, PhD you can watch it here. We discussed how to exercise your brain day to day.

If you missed Day 2 of our Brain Health Summit with Annie Fenn, MD you can watch it here. We discussed foods to decrease dementia risks.

If you missed Day 3 of our Brain Health Summit with Jud Brewer MD PhD you can watch it here. We discussed how to unwind your anxiety.

If you missed Day 4 of our Brain Health Summit with Dr. Dominic Ng, you can watch it here. We discussed microplastics in your brain.

If you missed Day 5 of our Brain Health with Chris Miller MD, you can watch it here. We discussed brain inflammation.

Click here for the 25 recipes, Chef Martin, created for the Brain Health Summit!

Months before the first Brain Health Substack Summit interviews aired, Chef Martin Oswald and I did something a little unusual. We reached out to each of our experts and asked them a simple question: What are your favorite brain-supporting ingredients? They each sent back a list. They had no idea what would happen next.

What happened next was Chef Martin Oswald. From his kitchen in Vienna, Martin took those ingredient lists and built original recipes around every single one. The experts never saw it coming. Dr. Annie Fenn didn’t know her ingredient picks would become a Northern Moroccan Charmoula. Dr. Dominic Ng had no clue his favorites would land on a plate with Pumpkin Seed–Crusted Salmon with Sauce Gribiche, Roasted Beets & Leeks. Each recipe was a surprise, designed to show that the science these experts study can actually end up as something you’d want to eat on a Tuesday night.

This final session of the summit brought it all together. Martin walked through the dishes he created for each expert, and in doing so, he connected the dots between five days of interviews spanning inflammation, microplastics, the gut-brain axis, habit change, and blood sugar regulation. What became clear, sitting there watching him plate dish after dish, was that the same core ingredients kept showing up across every expert’s list. The overlap was the point.

The Sodium Problem (and the Flavor Fix)

One of the first things Martin addressed was sodium. High blood pressure damages the brain over time, and most people eat far more sodium than they realize. This came up in our conversations with Dr. Chris Miller about neuroinflammation and again in our discussions about cardiovascular health and its direct link to cognitive decline.

Martin’s approach to cutting sodium is not about deprivation. He builds flavor in layers. First, increase potassium-rich foods like sweet potatoes, beans, and greens. Then lean on acidity: balsamic drizzle, pomegranate reduction, lemon juice. These cover the flavor gap that opens when you pull back on salt. Next, fermented foods like miso, sauerkraut, and kimchi add a tangy, funky depth that salt alone can’t replicate. And miso in particular carries enough potassium to offset its own sodium content, making it close to neutral for blood pressure.

He also pointed to something practical: reduced-sodium salt is easy to find and an immediate swap anyone can make today. Combined with generous use of fresh herbs and ground spices, you’re not mourning the loss of salt. You’re replacing it with something more interesting.

The Blood Sugar Thread

If there was a single theme connecting every expert on this summit, it was blood sugar. Martin noticed it too. Across the original recipes he developed for the summit, almost none contain high-glycemic foods. The experts didn’t coordinate on that. They arrived at the same place independently, which tells you something about how central glucose regulation is to brain health.

Martin’s dishes rely on low glycemic load ingredients: beans, leafy greens, whole grains like barley, and plenty of non-starchy vegetables. He also explained the practical difference between glycemic index and glycemic load. Beets, for example, have a higher glycemic index when compared to sugar as a reference point. But the glycemic load of a real serving of beets is relatively small because of the fiber content. The fiber slows the glucose spike. This distinction matters because it keeps people from avoiding perfectly good foods based on a misleading number.

He also mentioned a useful eating strategy that came up in our conversation, eat the non-starchy vegetables first, then the beans or grains. That sequence alone can blunt the glucose rise from a meal. It costs nothing and requires no special equipment.

Brain Health in a Bowl: Feeding the Gut-Brain Axis

The gut-brain connection came up with nearly every expert. Annie Fenn, MD discussed it. Dr. Chris Miller went deep on neuroinflammation. Dominic Ng talked about it from a microplastics angle. Martin took all of that and built dishes that combine prebiotics and probiotics in a single meal.

One of his standout techniques is adding miso to cashew butter and letting it sit for two days. The probiotics from the miso colonize the entire batch. Add a splash of sourdough liquid, and you’ve boosted the fermentation further. That cashew butter then becomes a topping for a sauerkraut soup. When you cook sauerkraut, you kill the beneficial bacteria, but the cooked kraut still functions as a prebiotic, feeding the good bacteria you’re scooping on top. The result is a single bowl delivering both the prebiotic and the probiotic. That kind of layering is exactly what the science supports, and Martin builds it into dishes that make sense for a weeknight.

The Anti-Inflammatory Superbowl and the Color Rule

For Chris Miller MD ’s recipes, Martin created an antioxidant board packed with about nine different plant foods in a single dish. The principle is visible before you even taste it: every color on the plate represents a different phytonutrient. Red onions, dark greens, golden turmeric, deep purple blueberries. Both Chris Miller and Dr. Jud Brewer independently flagged blueberries as a priority ingredient, which gives you a sense of how strong the evidence is behind them.

Martin’s practical advice here was refreshingly low-pressure. The healthiest food, he said, is the one you actually have in your kitchen. You don’t need to replicate every recipe exactly. The goal is to get more color and more variety onto the plate, using whatever you have on hand.

He also built potassium into this dish deliberately, bringing the sodium-balance strategy full circle. And the turmeric was there because Dr. Miller specifically requested it for its anti-inflammatory properties. Every ingredient was pulling double or triple duty.

Microplastics, Salmon, and What You Can Actually Do

Our conversation with Dr. Dominic Ng about microplastics was one of the more startling interviews of the summit. He shared research showing that human brains contain roughly seven grams of microplastics, the equivalent weight of a plastic spoon. He brought an actual plastic spoon as a prop during the interview, which drove the point home in a way numbers alone can’t.

But the research also contained something reassuring. Studies comparing younger and older adults found similar levels of microplastic accumulation, suggesting the brain reaches an equilibrium. We appear to be filtering microplastics out, likely through the glymphatic system, which was only discovered in 2012. That system acts like a nighttime cleaning crew for the brain, clearing waste during deep sleep.

For Martin’s dish honoring Dominic’s ingredient list, he built a plate of spinach, beets for nitrates, and salmon crusted with pumpkin seeds for magnesium. The salmon delivers EPA and DHA, the omega-3 fatty acids that came up repeatedly throughout the summit. For people who don’t eat fish, Martin noted that beans and tofu can stand in for the salmon, though a reliable source of omega-3s remains important regardless.

The practical takeaways from the microplastics conversation were grounded and doable: use a HEPA filter, vacuum regularly, mop with a wet mop to capture particles instead of pushing them airborne, and protect your sleep so the glymphatic system can do its job. Sleep is not a luxury. It is maintenance.

Julie Fratantoni’s Matcha Dishes and the Power of Fennel

Julie Fratantoni, PhD brought brain exercises to the summit, and her ingredient picks led Martin to create two matcha-based dishes. One featured a matcha and hemp seed sauce thick enough to cling to roasted vegetables and fennel. The other was a konjac noodle dish with salmon and matcha. Martin shared that he’d eaten enormous amounts of fennel while losing 30 pounds in two months. Fennel has a structural bite to it that most vegetables lack. You have to chew it slowly, and that mechanical process keeps you feeling full in a way that watery vegetables like cucumber simply don’t. If you’re working on weight and find yourself unsatisfied after meals, fennel is worth trying for that reason alone.

Both of Julie’s dishes were, predictably, low glycemic load. The yogurt, the blueberries, the fiber-rich components all kept blood sugar stable. Martin pointed this out, and it reinforced the theme: when you cook with the ingredients these experts recommend for brain health, you end up with meals that are also good for metabolic health. The two are not separate problems.

The Blueberry Dessert That Made a Community Member’s Day

For Jud Brewer MD PhD ’s recipes, Martin created a blueberry bake that one of our Habit Healers community members, made the very next day. She reported back that it was so good the pan was already empty before she could take a photo. The recipe is remarkably simple: plant-based yogurt mixed with a tablespoon of tapioca flour per cup of liquid, poured over blueberries in a baking dish, then into the oven for 30 to 40 minutes. The texture comes out like creme brulee without the cream, the eggs, or the sugar. You can use any mixed berry you like, and vanilla plant milk adds enough sweetness that additional sugar becomes unnecessary.

Martin said something during this part that stuck with me. He said he always feels a little bad putting out recipes because he can’t fully convey texture and thickness through a written page. You just have to look at it, try it, and adjust. That honesty is part of what makes cooking with Martin’s recipes different from following a sterile set of instructions. There’s room to experiment.

Annie Fenn’s Recipes and the Barley Bread

Annie Fenn, MD, who has written an entire brain health cookbook, provided ingredients that led Martin to create a tomato-anchovy sauce served over toasted barley bread with greens. The anchovies deliver omega-3 fatty acids in a concentrated form. The barley bread, made from a European-style seed bread recipe, provides beta-glucan fiber that supports both cholesterol management and blood sugar stability. Martin emphasized that you should toast the bread until it’s dry and firm so it can soak up the tomato juices without turning to mush. White bread, he said, would just collapse. The toasted whole grain holds up, and the contrast between crispy bread and warm, garlicky tomato sauce is the whole point.

Martin built a cross-over dish connecting Annie’s ingredients with Julie Fratantoni’s matcha theme, showing how the same core nutrients keep appearing across different experts’ recommendations.

What Martin Got Right: The Biggest Lesson

Near the end of the session, Martin stepped back from the individual recipes and offered what he called the biggest lesson from the entire summit. Control your weight. Control your blood sugar. And make sure you have a reliable source of omega-3 fatty acids. That’s it. Three concrete things. Not a complicated protocol. Not a list of 47 supplements. Three priorities backed by every expert who appeared on the summit.

Martin has been working in metabolic health cooking for years, and he said this summit brought it all together for him in a new way. The connection between brain health and metabolic health is not theoretical. It shows up on the plate. It shows up in the ingredients. When five different experts from different specialties all land on the same foods, that convergence is telling you something.

Summit Recipes

Chef Martin Oswald created original recipes for each expert. Find them all here.

Key Takeaways from the Brain Health Substack Summit

Blood sugar regulation is the common thread. Every expert on this summit, across different specialties, flagged blood sugar as central to brain health. Martin’s recipes reflect that: nearly all of them are low glycemic load without anyone having to think about it.

Sodium reduction is a flavor problem, not a willpower problem. Use acidity, fermented foods, herbs, spices, and potassium-rich ingredients to replace what salt was doing. Miso is especially useful because its potassium content offsets its sodium.

Feed the gut-brain axis with real food. Combine prebiotics (cooked sauerkraut, fiber-rich vegetables) with probiotics (miso, fermented cashew butter, kimchi) in the same meal. The gut communicates directly with the brain through the vagus nerve, and inflammation can travel that route.

Eat the rainbow, but don’t stress about perfection. Each color on your plate represents a different protective phytonutrient. Blueberries showed up on nearly every expert’s list. But the best food is whatever you actually have and will actually eat.

Protect your sleep to protect your brain. The glymphatic system clears waste, including microplastics, during deep sleep. Go to bed at the same time. Wake up at the same time. This is not optional.

Omega-3 fatty acids appeared across every expert’s recommendations. Salmon, sardines, anchovies, or plant-based alternatives like walnuts and flaxseed. Make sure you have a consistent source.

The three biggest priorities from the summit: Control your weight. Control your blood sugar. Get your omega-3s. Start there.

This article is part of the first-ever Brain Health Substack Summit hosted by The Habit Healers. If you found this valuable, share it with someone who could benefit. And if you want to put these ideas into practice with a community behind you, join us in The Habit Healers community on Skool, where Chef Martin Oswald and I work together to help you build the habits that protect your brain and your metabolic health.