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What started as a journey to regain health, led to Jessie Inchauspe becoming The Glucose Goddess. Through her popular Instagram, @GlucoseGoddess, Jessie translates the newest and often difficult to understand research into actionable and accessible advice to help people improve their physical and mental health.

We know that science suffers from a communication problem. It may take years for the latest research to reach the general public, if at all. Plus, the technical jargon and headline-driven media make it challenging to know how to effectively use new findings. 

It’s @GlucoseGoddess to the rescue. I love Jessie’s ability to make science fun, break down complicated concepts, and always maintain positive messaging when it comes to nutrition and health.

In Jessie’s new book, The Glucose Revolution, she shares some of the most effective strategies to reverse symptoms of glucose overload. Listen in as we break it all down and learn:

• The three discoveries Jessie made about blood sugar through research and self-testing
• The communication problem with science
• How Jessie grew her Instagram following
• The research that links glucose levels to neurodegenerative diseases
• Why you should put ‘clothes on your carbs’ and other ways to manage your glucose 
• Why vinegar is the magic bullet for blood sugar
• And even more science about glucose regulation and health

Resources:

Kelly LeVeque

Wired to Eat by Robb Wolf

Optimum Foraging Strategy

Found My Fitness

Promethease

Levels

Connect with Jessie:

Website: Glucose Revolution

Instagram: @GlucoseGoddess

Episode Credits:

Thank you to all who’ve made this show possible. Our hosts are Diana Rodgers and James Connelly. Our producer is Emily Soape. And of course, we are grateful for our sponsors, Patreon supporters, and listeners.

Thank you to Dry Farm Wines for their continued support of my work. Their wines are all-natural and low in alcohol which means less of a foggy feeling the next day. Plus, the non-irrigated vineyards force the roots to dig deep in search of water allowing the grapes to absorb extra minerals. Give Dry Farm Wines a try if you’ve given up on wine because of how you feel the next day or if you are simply looking for high-quality, all-natural wine.  They have a great selection of sparkling, whites, rosés, and reds. And when you visit sustainabledish.com/wine you can check out their latest special offer exclusively for listeners of the Sustainable Dish podcast.

Quotes:

“At that young age, I discovered that nothing is more important than health. And if I don’t have my physical and my mental health, I have nothing. And this is my number one priority in life.”   – Jessie Inchauspe

“80% of us have deregulated glucose levels and glucose spikes every day.” – Jessie Inchauspe 

“There’s compelling evidence showing that even small glucose crashes of 20 milligrams per deciliter or less, activate the craving center in your brain.” – Jessie Inchauspe

“I love how positive you are with all of this. And what I think is the big missing link here is that people just aren’t understanding that how they feel is related to what they ate.” – Diana Rodgers, RD

“We know from the science that the shape of your breakfast glucose curve dictates how hungry you’re going to feel for the rest of the day, even if you’re eating the same number of calories. Your breakfast really controls how you feel.” – Jessie Inchauspe

Transcript:

(Intro) Diana Rodgers, RD 

Welcome to the Sustainable Dish Podcast. I’m Diana Rodgers, a real food registered dietitian, author, and sustainability advocate. I co-host this podcast with James Connelly who was a producer on my film Sacred Cow. I also founded the Global Food Justice Alliance and initiative, advocating for the inclusion of animal source foods like meat, dairy, and eggs for a more nutritious, sustainable, and equitable worldwide food system. You can check it out and join me at global food justice.org. Thanks again for listening. And now onto our show. 

(Ad for Dry Farm Wines) Diana Rodgers, RD

I wanted to thank Dry Farm Wines for their continued support of my work. All of their wines are all-natural and low in alcohol which means less of a foggy feeling the next day. Their wines are non-irrigated so the roots have to dig deep in search of water, which means the grapes absorb extra minerals – that’s something missing from more modern vineyards. So if you are someone who has given up on wine because of how you feel the next day, but you’d still like to enjoy it on occasion, give Dry Farm Wines a try. They have a great selection of sparkling, whites, roses, and reds. And when you visit sustainabledish.com/wine you can check out their latest special offer exclusively for listeners of the Sustainable Dish podcast. That’s sustainabledish.com/wine to check out Dry Farm Wines.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Welcome back to the Sustainable Dish Podcast. I am so excited to have with me the Glucose Goddess, Jessie Inchauspe. Did I get that right? Okay. So your book, we’re publishing this on your book release day, so congratulations. I’m so excited to be chatting with you. Your Instagram is so fun. I was so excited when someone pointed it out to me, one of my followers pointed it out to me. You make science fun. You make understanding your body and how it responds to food really fascinating and really fun and really approachable. And of course, that’s what I try to do is break down complicated things for people in ways that are easy. And so I just admire your work so much. Thank you for being here.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Thank you, Diana. And you know, the more the merrier. The more people break down science in an easy, understandable way, the more impact we can have. So it’s lovely to be part of the team.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah, so you have a really interesting backstory. And I always love hearing about that. But why don’t you share how you became the Glucose Goddess?

Jessie Inchauspe    

I love that question. It’s so funny. Once in a while, people asked me how I became the Glucose Goddess. So I didn’t set out to become the Glucose Goddess, just to be clear, it kind of happened. So should I go back to you know, the first events that led me to the health world when I was a teenager?

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yes, please, that and your degrees and yeah, all of it, please.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Okay. So born in France, after high school didn’t really know what to study. So my stepdad told me, If you don’t know what to do, do the hardest thing you can. So I went to study mathematics, which turned out to be a really, really good idea. And while I was in my final year of my undergrad degree, I had an accident, freak accident, broke my back jumping off a waterfall, intense surgery, lots of physical pain, but then a lot of mental pain as well. I started developing this mental health condition called depersonalization, which is kind of just feeling like you leave your body. It’s very scary, you’re very ungrounded. And to stand now that had to do with the stress response of the whole surgery. But back then I was very lost and confused and very scared. And I felt awful all the time. So at that young age, I discovered, Diana, that nothing is more important than health. And if I don’t have my physical and my mental health, I have nothing. And this is my number one priority in life. So I set out to try to figure out how the heck my body worked so I could heal and feel better. So I went to grad school to study biochemistry to understand how my cells worked, which was incredibly interesting. And then I went on to move to San Francisco to work in a startup that was focused on genetic testing – 23andme. And I was there for five years, and I tried to use the knowledge I was getting there about DNA and your genetics to understand how to heal, but it didn’t really help me. Turns out your DNA doesn’t really tell you what to do to wake up to feel good in the morning. But while I was there, something incredible happened that changed my life, I put on a continuous glucose monitor for the first time. And this was you know, by chance, we were doing a pilot study internally at the company. And I put on the glucose monitor. And for the first time I turned on my iPhone, and then I opened the app, and I could see my glucose levels, I could see the inside of my body I could see underneath my skin. And something clicked in that moment I felt finally reconnected with my biology with my body after all these years of being just not in that state, but like severely disconnected. And so this started a wonderful relationship between me and my biology and I started noticing really interesting patterns. I saw that some things that I ate or did created glucose spikes in my body, so rapid increases in the concentration of glucose in the blood. And I noticed that these spikes actually corresponded to moods and to feeling either anxious or having a lot of cravings. And then one day I discovered that these glucose spikes could actually trigger these episodes of depersonalization. And that was the nail in the coffin, I was like, Okay, this is… I have to understand exactly what’s going on here. So I dove into the research, I looked at all the scientific papers on glucose, you know, my computer had chrome open and like 1000 tabs at the top with all the scientific studies that I was reading. And a couple things became very clear to me. One, that we now have enough evidence to show that not only diabetics should care about their glucose levels. 80% of us have deregulated glucose levels and glucose spikes every day. Two, these spikes caused many many consequences and side effects that most of us are very familiar with – cravings, fatigue, worse menopause symptoms, acne, wrinkles, infertility, weight gain, hunger, chronic illnesses, mental health problems, I mean, the list goes on and on. And then three, it became clear that to feel good, I needed to learn to avoid these glucose spikes and steady my glucose levels. And so I learned how to do that. I summarized all the latest science into these very easy tips that allowed me to study my glucose levels, avoid the spikes without giving up the chocolate cake and the pasta that I loved. And so I created this new world for myself, this new world of how to eat and I healed and I felt amazing. And so then, Diana, I was like, everybody needs to know about this, this is so big. So I started showing my friends the scientific papers, nobody cared.

Jessie Inchauspe    

It’s not very, you know, it’s not very compelling when you print out a scientific article, and you just show your friends. So I realized I had a communication problem on my… it was like a marketing problem on my hands. And so I thought, hey, why don’t I use the data from my own continuous glucose monitor to illustrate the scientific papers that I’m finding. So I built this piece of software that would extract the data from my glucose monitor and create these cool graphs that are now on my Instagram. And so these graphs were very compelling to people. And when they saw them, when I was able to show them, here’s the spike of an orange, here’s a spike of an orange juice. People got it, and they started changing their habits. And then they asked me to test more and more things, make more and more graphs and to put the graphs online somewhere so they could share them with their family and friends. And so I started the Instagram page. And it was not called glucose goddess at the time, it was my name, Jessie Inchauspe, which is not very easy to say, right, or type for share. So a year in I changed it to Glucose Goddess, and I learned lots about how to communicate science and what people were most interested in, and it changed many lives. And it’s still going today very strong. And now Glucose Revolution, the book that is coming out today, is you know, the movie, if the Instagram is a trailer, it’s like everything I’ve learned and more. And it’s very exciting. And I hope it will change many lives.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

So how long? When did you first start charting it? And then when did you start your Instagram because you’re at a very impressive, almost 350,000 followers now. That’s pretty great.

Jessie Inchauspe   

So I started charting in 2019. And it was in April 2019, that I put on a glucose monitor, and I started figuring out what was happening in my body. I think within three months, I had, you know, built a little piece of software that was making the graphs, and probably by July 2019, I started the Instagram in the first year, you know, as all new Instagrams go, the growth was slow. But I was really convinced there was something here that the world really needed. So I made a pact with myself. I told myself that every day for the next six months, I was going to work on the Instagram one hour a day, regardless of what I saw in terms of you know, quote, unquote, growth. I just gave an… and I was working at 23andme still. And so in the evenings, I would come home and spend an hour making graphs, interacting with people reaching out to many big names who never answered, telling them, Hey, I’m doing this. It’s cool. Reaching out to scientists trying to you know, get the word out. And after six months, I had I think, 5000 followers, and I was really happy. And so I just kept going. And it’s been three, almost three years now. Yeah. 

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Wow. That’s fantastic. And you’re so right about just sharing a scientific paper and nobody caring at all. But even just putting an image to a paper and summarizing it makes such a big difference in the accessibility of that information to everyday people

Jessie Inchauspe    

Completely. And I think there’s such a missing link because there’s so many incredible scientific papers out there that teams around the world are you know, publishing and the information is incredible. However, it’s not really getting to the general public, and we need more people like you. And like me who are taking the science and translating it in a way that is accurate, unbiased, and interesting, and fun as well, I really believe that this layer of science communicators is going to grow tremendously in the next year is because it’s so needed. And it’s a wonderful thing to be able to do.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Yeah, I mean, we just saw such a big shift, even with the infographics that I’ve done for all the meat and everything. But getting back to your glucose, because I’ve always been fascinated. So my background when I was an undiagnosed celiac, until 26, I ate all the time, all day long, put a full Thanksgiving dinner in front of me at any moment, and I would devour it because I was starving. And everything went straight through me. And so or I would throw it up. And so I just ate and ate and ate and ate and ate like crazy. And I was constantly passing out. Yeah, like they were doing Tilt Table tests on me. I was convinced that I was diabetic. But every time I went in, and you know, they said, No, you’re fine. But I knew something was really wrong with me. And so I got the celiac diagnosis at age 26, which solved at least the food going through me his situation, but it did not solve these glucose spikes that I was having all the time. And, you know, I wonder if it’s because of you know, those 26 years of just constantly eating and all I really had access to was easy carbs, because that’s sort of like what American is, right. It’s granola bars and all that. And so I just switched my diet to a gluten-free version of the diet I had been eating right. So it was like, toast in the morning, usually with no butter, right? Because that’s bad. fat is bad. 

Jessie Inchauspe 

It’s not. It’s not

Diana Rodgers 

And then I would have a sandwich for lunch. What’s that?

Jessie Inchauspe   

It’s not, Actually. Ironically bad. 

Diana Rodgers 

Right. Right. Right. No, my listeners know that. A sandwich, maybe a bag of chips, and for lunch, and then have that afternoon crash. And then dinner might be gluten-free pasta with a gluten-free cookie and maybe a gluten-free beer. And I thought I was doing it right because I met with like the chief gluten-free dietitian in my city who told me as long as you just stick to gluten-free, you’re going to be fine. And I knew I wasn’t fine. But I was following all the advice. And I was still having these episodes of like, one time I was in a bathroom at a restaurant and I… the door was locked and I passed out. And it was they thought I was doing drugs. And it was like literally from a glucose spike. It was crazy for a glucose crash. Yeah. And so I didn’t really start even understanding what a carb was until I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes with my first child when I was 30. And to me at the time, eating 30 grams of carbs per meal was like, on top of being gluten-free seemed oh my gosh, the worst torture anyone could ever endure in the world. But I was gonna do anything to not have an overweight or unhealthy baby, right. And it really wasn’t until then I learned about Robb Wolf’s book and started eating more whole foods that I was able to go more than two hours without eating. I mean, it was so… controlling my glucose was so revolutionary for me. And I was I mean, other than the gestational diabetes, I was still like testing within the normal range. I wasn’t obese, everything else was fine. And so recently when I was posting about Levels, I had a dietician. So how, why are you doing that? Because what how can you do that? You don’t have diabetes? How could you be advising patients on this without diabetes? But my opinion is, we have to advocate for ourselves and learn what we can.

Jessie Inchauspe   

But it’s not even an opinion anymore. Diana, like the science shows us that 80% of people without diabetes, have massive glucose spikes every day that are harming them. And you will have glucose spikes for decades before you develop a diabetes diagnosis. And these spikes affect every single one of us. And so what you are talking about your experience. I mean, that sounds like you were just on a glucose roller coaster all day, probably having reactive hypoglycemia, which is when your glucose crashes below baseline after a spike and you were suffering the consequences and so you know, the conversation is shifting. It’s not just a diabetics problem. Now, you know, it’s really everybody benefits from controlling their glucose curves. There’s a study that was done at Stanford in 2018. When because monitors first became sort of, you know, a bit more mainstream and for non-diabetics They got a set of people who were not diabetic, didn’t have diabetes, their fasting glucose levels were completely in the normal range. They put some glucose monitors on them, and they gave them for breakfast, a bowl of cornflakes, okay. And then they looked at the glucose response of the bowl of cornflakes. Most of them had a glucose spike in the pre-diabetic range. 20% of them had a glucose spike up into the diabetic range. These people were not diagnosed diabetics. And this was the first time that we saw that, hey, whoa, something’s happening here. people without diabetes are experiencing these massive fluctuations with foods that we… most of us eat all the time, cereal and cornflakes aren’t even that sweet of a cereal run, you know. And so that changed the perspective. But we still have to educate the world. People don’t know this yet. And so this is a feedback, you know, that I’ve gotten a lot at the beginning. Well, why are you doing this? You don’t have diabetes? It’s like, well, actually, everybody needs to care. And your story, I mean, is a perfect proof of that. My gosh, I’m so sorry. That you went through that sounds absolutely horrible. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah and I want to talk about the other issues that come from glucose spikes, like Alzheimer’s, and then, you know, are there any other mental health conditions? I mean, I know I feel terrible, like, well, high, high glucose doesn’t really feel like much, right? You feel a little sleepy, but low glucose feels absolutely terrible, those crashes I, I try to avoid them at all costs.

Jessie Inchauspe   

Yeah, I mean, there’s compelling evidence showing that even small glucose crashes of 20 milligrams per deciliter or less, activate the craving center in your brain. And this is a study that was done at Yale. So it’s very clear that even very small dips just affect our hunger and our cravings, right there. And then you know, that particular hour, you feel it right away, then longer-term studies show us that people who have more glucose spikes have more depressive episodes, you know, rates anxiety higher. And then we also know that very long term, I mean, neurodegenerative diseases, like Alzheimer’s, are incredibly closely tied to glucose levels. Alzheimer’s is now called Type 3 diabetes, and all the stuff that we know glucose spikes do in the body: so inflammation, aging, shutting off the cells from actually being able to fuel properly, when that happens in the brain that causes massive side effects. And one of the most common ones being Alzheimer’s. There’s many other things that glucose impacts from female hormones to skin, you know, gut issues. I mean, it’s really, to me, the number one thing that everybody needs to get in a good place for their health to blossom. I have this image of if your body is a plane, and you’re in the cockpit, and you’re like trying to keeping the plane in the air cruising so that you feel okay. And bear in mind, you’re not a pilot, so you have no clue how to fly this plane. There’s one lever in the cockpit, that if you learn how to use it, and how to make sure that it stays in the right range, you’ll solve most of the issues and the plane will stay in the air. It’s your glucose levels. This is the lever in the cockpit with the biggest bang for its buck. If you understand it, and you apply easy tips that I’ve shared, you know, on Instagram, and now in Glucose Revolution, if you apply these tips to keep it in the right place, you will solve so many things, so many things will fall into place. And you’ll finally have a proper base for your health to then flourish and for you to feel good in the morning.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Yeah, and I know that Alzheimer’s is like the number one thing most people are worried about for when it comes to aging, but it seems so far off. And we live, you know, just too long for it to really, for us to really, really worry for most of our lives about what the end of life might be like. But when I look at what schools are feeding kids for breakfast, that really really concerns me. Has there been anything? I’m sure there has been but I haven’t seen much with the science, but not that this is my area with kids fed a typical school breakfast, which is you know, cereal, low-fat milk, so nothing to blunt that spike versus, you know, something more like eggs and you know, higher protein, higher fat breakfast.

Jessie Inchauspe    

The best evidence I have is the number of moms in my Instagram community who sent me messages being like, now that I got my kids on the hacks, they are different kids there. They don’t have temper tantrums anymore. They don’t get upset. They’re not addicted to their screens. They actually sleep better. I mean, I think that’s the best. Those are the best testimonials to get because I’m not a child expert either. And I… it makes sense that if all these things are happening in adults, they’re happening in kids as well, but there hasn’t been very good studies showing this kind of stuff. And I think it’s definitely a topic in which much more should be invested to actually look at the impact of food on kids. I really like Kelly LeVeque. She talks about Yeah, kids a lot and the diets of kids and how it affects them. But yes, definitely, if you look at it from a glucose perspective, for sure, fruit juice and cereal for breakfast is the worst thing. When I was a kid, Diana, I was… every morning before school, I had a big Nutella crepe. Every single day until I was I don’t know, 15. I mean, I’ve come a long way. But, and then I was at school and at 10:45 every morning, I was starving, absolutely famished. And I thought this was normal. And I never even knew there was another world out there where my breakfast didn’t make a massive glucose spike. And I actually felt full until lunch. Completely incredible to think back on it. And then when I tested my fasting glucose levels, when I was 22, there were at 93. And then when tested again, when I was 26, there were 96, which is high because 100 is when you hit the prediabetes range. But yet, you know, I have a small body size, I’m tall, nothing from the outside looked wrong. And finally, when I tested it in 96 and I was 27. This is when I was starting to discover glucose. I was like, Huh, I wonder if those Nutella crepes had anything to do with this. But the good news is, in three years, I’ve been able to completely reverse my progression towards pre-diabetes. My fasting glucose is now 79, which is super good. And I’m very happy about it. So yes, there can be damaged in the early years of your life. But the cool news is, you know, you can reverse them later on once you get the information.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah, and I love how positive you are with all of this. And what I think is the big missing link here is that people just aren’t understanding that how they feel is related to what they ate. I think that’s the number one thing. And so with my kids who are now 16 and 18, when they were younger, and they wanted some ice cream or something like that, I’m like, okay, but not, you have to have it after dinner, we can’t have it in the middle of the afternoon before sports. And I would ask them how they felt after they ate it. And now they know that eggs for breakfast is the way to go. Or, you know, when we would go to birthday parties, in the middle of the afternoon, I would make them scrambled eggs before we would go just so that they didn’t feel like such a rush from all the cake that I knew they were going to have. So it’s not so much holding back the cake, it’s just managing how that cake is going to impact them. That is the trick.

Jessie Inchauspe    

You were doing one of the hacks that I talked about, which is putting clothes on your carbs, right. So if you’re going to have any carbs and sugars or starches, make sure that you have protein, fats, or fiber either with the carbs or before the carbs, which is even better. So you were applying the Glucose Goddess hacks like way before I even was around. So you were the pioneer, thank you.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

But you put the wrapper on it, which was just so great. And before we get into the hacks, I do want to bring up the reason why… one of the reasons why we just don’t know so much is that I might spike with cornflakes and you might spike with a banana. And everybody’s really different with what foods. Not so much?

Jessie Inchauspe 

I would caveat that a little bit. So if you and I both eat a bowl of cornflakes, you might see that your spike is smaller than mine, for example. And that might say a lot about for example, what phase of your menstrual cycle you’re in, how hydrated you are, how stressed you are, how well you slept the night before, what you just ate two hours ago, etc. However, if both of us applied one of my hacks, let’s say I don’t know, having some vinegar in water before the bowl of cornflakes or having the scrambled eggs that you make before the bowl of cornflakes, both of our spikes are going to be smaller. So the hacks work in everybody. Then the actual heights might differ for sure. But the most important thing is actually to just personally to do the hacks because that’ll get you in a good place. And then if you have the ability to use a glucose monitor to kind of see maybe there’s in a certain category of food maybe if you look at like all the different cereal on the market, you’ll find that one agrees with your microbiome better than another. So you’ll be able to make a better choice within a category of food. And but this is additive to the sort of base of hacks that everybody can use in and that work in everybody.

Diana Rodgers, RD  

Right, right, right. Yeah, you know, it’s just interesting when Robb came out with Wired to Eat – he and I have very similar you know, gluten sensitivities and biome issues and everything and we just compared notes and found it was really interesting that he showed bigger spikes with potatoes where I was bigger with the corn and the lentils and potatoes were more okay for me, but totally could have been the day as well. I mean, there’s so many variables, and he’s a dude, you know. So yeah, there’s that.

Jessie Inchauspe   

It’s tough to compare two people. I think it’s, it’s interesting, but you can’t really draw any conclusions of like, who was healthier or not? Because you’d have to look at insulin levels, because you know, he might have a smaller spike, because he has way more insulin in his body, which is not good. So it’s a fun comparison, but you can’t really draw definitive conclusions.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah. All right. So let’s get into some of the… I don’t need you to like give away your whole book. Obviously, we want people to buy it and to follow your Instagram. But let’s talk number one about food order. 

Jessie Inchauspe    

Yes. Yes, yes, yes, let’s talk about food order. The science shows something incredible, which is that if you eat the constituents of a meal in a specific order, you can reduce the glucose spike of that meal by 75%, which means less inflammation, less aging, less risk of developing cravings an hour later, and just you know, less damage to your overall health. So this specific order is the following: Everybody listen up. Vegetables, first, proteins and fats, second, starches and sugars last. So let’s take an example. Let’s take a meal of scrambled eggs, as you mentioned, broccoli, quinoa, and an orange. So in that case, to get your glucose levels in the best place possible, you would start with the broccoli, the vegetables, then you would eat the scrambled eggs, then the quinoa, and then the orange. So that’s the order. And this is incredibly powerful. And the reason it works is because if you eat the vegetables first, during a meal, the fiber in the vegetables is going to land in your stomach first, then it will make its way to your intestines first. And there, the fiber will create this mesh on the walls of your intestine, this viscous mesh, and this mesh will protect you against the onslaught of glucose arriving later on in the sugars and starches. So you will actually absorb less of the glucose molecules into your bloodstream, which is why there’ll be a smaller glucose spike. Second, if you have the protein and the fat before the carbs, the protein and the fat have an effect on the speed of what’s called gastric emptying, which is the speed at which food moves from stomach to intestine, they will slow down gastric emptying a little bit. So not only will the starches trickle into your intestine slower as they arrive, but also they will be absorbed at a lesser rate. So overall, you ate the exact same thing, but your body was protected and the glucose back was much, much smaller. And this hack is so powerful that many people in the community tell me that they’ve done it for you know, five days. And now I don’t know their psoriasis has gone away or they feel amazing. Their period came back. I mean, it’s really incredible. And this is the core of my philosophy, which is we can eat everything we just have to use the latest science to understand how to eat it.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah, it’s interesting you know when I think of an Italian a typical Italian meal, right but the pasta well I guess it’s first aunty pasta and pasta, then the meat and then you know so I guess…

Jessie Inchauspe   

They got it right with the antipasti which is the starter with the vegetables.

Diana Rodgers, RD  28:37  

Which it’s often vinegary, right, which we’ll talk about next. So the Italians need to consult with the Glucose Goddess.

Jessie Inchauspe    

They need to switch. We need to have an intervention. So yeah, say hey guys, switch. You know how you have the antipasti, the vegetables, and then the pasta and the meat. Let’s just move the pasta after the meats and everybody will be healthier.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

But a lot of other cultures that have a vinegary salad before their meals and I know a lot of Europe has the salad maybe after but in America we do usually salad first. And we got that one right so explains the vinegar situation.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Mm hmm. So vinegar is the closest thing to magic silver magic bullet when it comes to glucose levels and I thought it was a fad or it was like a thing that you know, you hear on the internet that vinegar is gonna cure whatever, whatever. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

I did too until I started watching your Instagram and I was like, okay, maybe I should pay attention to this.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Yeah, it’s actually remarkable. So there is a lot of scientific evidence, a lot of really good clinical trials that show that if you add vinegar to your diet in a specific way, you’re able to reduce your glucose spikes. And as a result, you know, people who have, for example, Type 2 diabetes reverse it, people who have hormonal issues like PCOS are able to reverse it as a consequence of glucose levels, you know, getting into a better zone, people can lose weight, etc. So the best way to incorporate vinegar in your diet, I’m actually drinking a vinegar drink right now, as we’re doing the podcast, is to take a tall glass of water and into it pour a tablespoon of vinegar, it can be any type of vinegar. My favorite is apple cider vinegar, because, I think it tastes the best. Some people like white wine vinegar. I would recommend not using balsamic vinegar because it has some sugar left in it. So that might negate the effects and to drink it before a meal. And doing this can reduce the glucose spike of the meal by up to 30%. Now you don’t actually have to drink it, you can also pour it on as a dressing onto your vegetable starter during your meal that also works. And the reason it works is because there’s this molecule in vinegar called acetic acid, and acetic acid, does two things. One, it goes into your muscles, and it says ‘Hello Diana’s muscles. Please, as soon as glucose arrives from digestion, soak it up real good.’ So your muscles are gonna have this instruction to soak up glucose from your bloodstream as it arrives after a meal and to turn it into the storage form called glycogen. So glucose won’t be floating around as much in your blood and creating a glucose spike. The second thing that acetic acid does is in the same way as protein and fats slowed down the trickling of food from stomach to intestine. Acetic acid actually acts on this enzyme in your stomach called alpha-amylase. And alpha-amylase’s role is to break down starch into glucose. So the vinegar slows that enzyme down. So the breakdown of starch into glucose is slowed down. So it trickles into your intestine at a slower pace. And then once it does, and it gets to your blood, your muscles soak it up. So in total, this long explanation, when you have vinegar before a meal, either drink it or as a dressing on vegetables, you reduce the glucose spike of the meal.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Amazing. That was really cool. I’ve never heard that before.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Yeah, and I love explaining the science and in Glucose Revolution, this is one of the things I’ve done is I’ve broken down all the science of all the 10 hacks that are in there into really easy stories, and easy images for people to really understand what’s going on. Because I want people to understand the science so that they can use the tools in the best way possible so that they’re empowered with the information and they feel like they know what’s happening. Actually, when I first handed in the first draft of the manuscript to my editors of the book, there were so many images and so many jokes. And I was like glucose is like dolphins in your bloodstream. They told me, Jessie, we got to turn it down on the images and the things. But thankfully, there’s still many, many I talk about trains, I talk about toasts, I talk about Tetris, I talk about Jerry, he’s the first plants ever to arrive in the world. So lots of images, but fewer than in the first draft.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

I do that too, though. And I talked about like insulin being like sandpaper in your arteries.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Oh interesting. Explain that to me.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

It’s just the inflammation that it can cause when you have too much insulin in your body. And that is the problem with artery breakdown. It’s not it because we don’t see it in the veins. So it’s not… it’s the velocity that the blood is going through in the velocity that the sandpaper or the I guess the grains of sand are going through the arteries.

Jessie Inchauspe    

I can feel that it’s such a good image because it’s I feel like sandpaper in my arteries. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

I know. I know. Well as you were describing all the different processes, I just kept thinking I gotta connect you with my animator. Because I think these would be really fun. 

Jessie Inchauspe 

Please do. I would love that. Let’s do it.

Diana Rodgers, RD 

They would be easy to animate. Because I think any time we can have a window into how our bodies are operating, it’s only a good thing, right? Because, and especially again, with glucose, having high glucose, you might not really feel much different. I know now, when something like I’ll just feel more sluggish. But most people… I mean our bodies out in the wild before we had grocery stores, we seek glucose because it was harder to find. So we talk a little bit about that, like that sort of disconnect between our modern food environment, because I know you talk about that in the book and how our bodies are sort of wired to seek the glucose taste.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Yes. So first of all, in nature, anywhere you find glucose, there’s also fiber. So if you look at root vegetables, there’s fiber in them. If you look at any piece of fruit, there’s fiber in them. That’s an important piece of information. Second, our brains are wired to make us crave sweet foods, because back in the day, there was no food that was both sweet and poisonous. And also sweetness signaled energy, dense energy. So every time we taste something sweet, we get a hit of dopamine in our brain, we get a hit of pleasure. And so when humans discovered the fact that Ooh, sweet stuff is pleasurable, and now we have all these tools to make these kind of food invention things, they thought, hey, let’s just concentrate the sweetness like it’s good, it feels nice, we dig it, let’s just make everything extra sweet. So they first started by breeding naturally occurring plants into versions of themselves that were extra juicy, extra sweet, extra full of glucose, and fructose, which goes hand in hand with glucose in sweet foods. And so if you look at an ancestral banana, versus a banana now, not the same thing, ancestral bananas are tiny, they’re full of seeds full of fiber, not that sweet. If you look at an ancestral peach, it looks like a cherry and it’s tart. We’ve designed these plant products to be candy. Not only have we done that, we then thought, hey, so an apple is cool, but like it takes a while to eat it, so what if we just juice it, and we remove all the fiber, because who cares about that, we just concentrated into this really sweet thing that you can drink really quickly into apple juice. And so by doing so, we remove the protective effect of fiber because as I explained a minute ago, fiber coats your intestines and prevents your body from absorbing too much glucose and fructose too quickly, it’s really important for our bodies to have this protection mechanism. Thanks for the fiber. So now we’re left with all these food products that are highly addictive. Because we want sweetness, and two, that are harming our body, because they’re very far from the ancestral apple that nature made all those millions of years ago. And you might think, Okay, well, you know, if we need glucose for energy, and glucose tastes good, what’s the big problem if we eat so much? Well, we now know that in the same way as if you give a plant too much water, and it drowns, when you give a human too much oxygen, and it passes out, too much glucose harms us, it harms our mitochondria. They get overwhelmed by this influx of glucose, that they’re supposed to turn it into energy, but they’re overwhelmed by this huge glucose spikes, they shut down. It creates this thing in our body called glycation every time we have a glucose spike, which is aging. And finally, it makes us release insulin, which as you mentioned, is sandpaper in arteries, but also leads to the development of many chronic conditions. So in conclusion, we’re kind of in this trap. But there’s a way that we can eat these processed foods, just like you made scrambled eggs for your kids before the birthday party, we can learn these hacks that I talked about in Glucose Revolution that allow you to eat these things that taste very good and give us pleasure in a way that’s less harmful to our body. And I think this is the crux really of the solution. Because it’s really hard to just say, no more processed foods ever again, like we’re all… I want cake for my birthday, I don’t want to eat brussel sprouts for my birthday. So it’s about learning how to eat them while encouraging our body to be healthy. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yean and I think also, if you’re having the cake after a meal, you’re less likely to over-consume the cake, because you’re already full, except for we also have this awesome mechanism that allows us to still have room for cake at all time if we want it.

Jessie Inchauspe    

How does that work? What is that? Somebody has to study that.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

I’ll send you the paper. It’s the optimum foraging strategy. So basically, it’s this idea that we need so many micronutrients for optimal health, that when we are… we seek novelty. So we’re like done with, you know, the berries on this bush, but we see, you know, the darker berries over there, I’m hungry again. So it’s actually a trick that professional eaters will use. And I have… actually this is something that I got from Robb Wolf that I use in my presentations. And it’s the Man vs Food competition. He’s trying to eat five pounds of ice cream, any hits, he hits kind of a threshold where he’s like, I can’t go any further. And then he orders french fries and eats a few French fries. And it stimulates his appetite again, and he’s able to finish the ice cream. 

Jessie Inchauspe   

Wow, I’m speechless. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

It’s amazing. I’ll send you the optimum foraging strategy.  And so it makes sense like out in the wild and you need all these different you know, vitamins and the different colors have different flavonoids, all the different things that we need, and food was scarce. So, you know, eat to your max capacity of whatever you can get your hands on. But that’s why all-you-can-eat buffets are particularly dangerous. And then in my 23andme, when I imported it into a third-party app, I found out that from my genes, I have low food inhibition, high food desire, and low satiation. So basically like the worst combination of all the things. Now, I don’t know if all those genes are on, but I do know that I am very highly motivated to seek new flavors and really excited about cooking and food. And you know, can definitely overeat if something tastes delicious, for sure.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Well, I mean, I feel the same. I wonder if it’s a human thing, and you know, those third-party websites that analyze your DNA, often they just have very small studies, small sample sizes.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Yes, they will show the confidence. Yeah. It’s interesting, though. It’s super interesting. So, Rhonda Patrick has one that’s really interesting – Found My Fitness. I think the one that talked about the different food characteristics was Prometheus. 

Jessie Inchauspe 

Yes, exactly. 

Diana Rodgers, RD 

Yeah. But anyway, the neuro regulation of appetite and how all that works. Yeah, I’m sure there’s going to be so much more coming out. But to me, it’s, it’s just absolutely fascinating.

Jessie Inchauspe   

Totally. And that study, I was mentioning, the one out of Yale, when they discovered the cravings center in the brain, I can tell you a bit about it, because to me, it was so incredibly interesting and powerful. So they put these people in an fMRI scanner, so the big donut machines that look at the inside of your brain. And the people, the subjects were laying there, and they had a screen in front of their eyes that showed them images of different foods. So like broccoli, burger, carrots, cookies, and they had agreed to be hooked up to a machine that was measuring monitoring their glucose levels. And the scientists had asked them every time they saw a photo of a food to rate how much they wanted to eat it. And what they discovered was incredible. When people’s glucose levels were steady, they didn’t rate any of the foods very highly. They were just like 5, 5, 5 out of 10. And then if their glucose levels were dropping, even by as I mentioned earlier, 20 milligrams per deciliter, which is nothing and happens to most of us after a normal, you know, meal. Then they started rating the high-calorie foods really high. So like cookie 10, burger 10 Ice cream 10. And the scientists saw that in their brains, the craving center was activating, was lighting up when their glucose levels were crashing. And that’s also you know, an evolutionary advantage if your glucose levels are getting low, like go eat something. But now in a modern world, this kind of stuff wreaks havoc on our health, because the inputs, is actually creating a response that is no longer necessary, because you have food and you have reserves, but we can’t help it.

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Yeah, and unfortunately, the trends now are towards more snacking. Like we’re seeing less sitting down and eating a complete meal and much more on the go snacking with younger people. So you talk about you know what can happen at different parts in your cycle. You talk about how just a simple walk after a meal can make a massive difference. It doesn’t have to be, you know, a CrossFit workout, it can just be a walk through the neighborhood after dinner.

Jessie Inchauspe 

Or a little dance to your favorite song

Diana Rodgers, RD 

Or a little dance. you talk about drinking margaritas and sitting on the couch versus drinking a margarita and then dancing. It’s just you, you make it really, really fun. You also talk about you know, you don’t have to do them all the time. It doesn’t have to be your religion. This can just be you know when it’s convenient for you. And I think that that’s hugely helpful to people as well.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Thank you, Diana. Yeah, these are tools in your tool, belt, toolbox, tool belt, whichever one you have. What I share in the book, these are principles to get your glucose level steady and start getting the benefits. But as you mentioned, you don’t have to do them all the time. Depending on you know, your goals where your health is at what you feel like doing that day, you do them or not. Like some days I just want to have a pint of ice cream for breakfast and I do it and I don’t have vinegar before and I don’t go for a walk after and that’s fine. But however, if you’re struggling with anything physical or mental, applying the hacks will make a big difference. So definitely, definitely if any of you are suffering and waking up in the morning, not feeling amazing. Try these hacks because they will change a lot of things for you. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah. I mean, the biggest change for me was just not being obsessed with where my next meal was going to come from at all times. Like I used to go I would sit in college class and there’d be like, eggplant parmesan swirling over the professor’s head and it’s all I could think about was like, when am I going to get to go home to make whatever I was craving, and it was such specific cravings. And now, you know, meat and vegetables, like whatever’s in the fridge, if there’s, I don’t know, pork or steak, and then there’s asparagus or broccoli, like, it’s whatever it is. Like food has a lot less control over me than it used to. And it’s really, really liberating to feel that way.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Did you used to walk around with like, a bunch of snacks in your purse all the time?

Diana Rodgers, RD    

All the time. I had snacks. And if I didn’t, I would, and I would start to have a crash, I would start sweating. Like actually, like I would… And I when I do talks about nutrition. And I ask people, How many other people relate to this blood sugar rollercoaster feeling everybody raises their hands. I know that this is something that a lot of people struggle with. And so what you’re doing is, again, I totally agree, I think it’s, you know, having the lever of controlling your glucose is the number one, it’s not the only thing you can still overeat calories. There’s lots of other, you know, aspects to your overall health and you know, getting your sleep on point and, you know…

Jessie Inchauspe    

Stress, quality medical care, connection with other humans. Yeah,

Diana Rodgers, RD   

Exactly. Yeah, all of that stuff is you know, we talk about that on this podcast, too. But I would say that number one biggest thing you can do for people is, you know, get the breakfast on point, you talked about a savory breakfast instead of a sweet one. The number one thing I do for folks is just like, let’s fix your breakfast. It’s something that everyone has on autopilot. And if you just switched that breakfast, you’ve taken care of a third of their food intake. Right. And it’s easy

Jessie Inchauspe    

And we know from the science that the shape of your breakfast glucose curve dictates how hungry you’re going to feel for the rest of the day. Even if you’re eating the same number of calories. Your breakfast really controls how you feel, and have a whole chapter in this in the book. But if you’ve always had a sweet breakfast, you don’t know what it’s like to spend a day without a glucose spike for breakfast. It’s a whole other world. It really is. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Yeah. So if folks are interested in trying Levels, I have a link. It’s sustainable dish.com/levels, and they can give that a shot. And definitely pick up your book, the Glucose Revolution comes out today

Jessie Inchauspe    

The life-changing power of balancing your blood sugar. That’s the subtitle,

Diana Rodgers, RD  

Right. Because there’s another the new glucose revolution, which is actually the old book. You don’t want that. You don’t want the new. You actually want just the regular Glucose Revolution

Jessie Inchauspe    

Glucose Revolution. Yeah. No, but now when you type it on Amazon mine comes up first. So it does. Okay, we yeah, we’ve avoided that confusion. So yes. And actually, for people who have a CGM. Personally, I think it’s cool to get as much context as possible to interpret the data. Because it can be kind of confusing, like, why am I seeing a spike when I exercise? Like, what about this and that, and I hope that you’ll find that my book is a good companion to help you unpack all the data.

Diana Rodgers, RD 

I think so too. Definitely like, like a bad night’s sleep, and you’re going to be wacky the whole next day. Exactly. And stress, as I’ve mentioned to you before, and my followers know, my glucose has been just spiked just from stress. So yeah, there’s a lot of other things that are non-food-related, that can also impact your glucose levels, but you can control food. So working with what you can control.

Jessie Inchauspe   

Exactly. And my intention is that Glucose Revolution is for really, everybody. It’s not… you don’t need to have a glucose monitor to apply the hacks and get all the benefits on the small fraction of my community wears a glucose monitor. Everybody else has seen tremendous results by just applying the hacks. So yeah, it’s for everybody. I hope you like it.

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Alright, well, thank you so much, and folks can find you at glucose goddess on Instagram. I highly recommend it. Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

Jessie Inchauspe    

Thanks, Diana. See you soon.

Diana Rodgers, RD 

All right. 

Diana Rodgers, RD    

Thanks so much for tuning in to the Sustainable Dish Podcast. If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a review on iTunes, and check out my website at sustainbledish.com where you can sign up for my newsletter, catch up on the latest blog posts, and check out my courses and favorite products. See you next time and thanks again for listening.