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MesoAmerica and ChocolateIn our series looking at foods that built civilizations, today we are going to stay in the Americas with chocolate. Chocolate has been used as currency, consumed by kings, incorporated into religious ceremonies, and prescribed as medicine. Today, it is a multibillion-dollar industry that wants you to believe that eating chocolate is an act of preventive cardiology. I mean, why not? They convinced us to give chocolate to people we love, eat it when we are happy, when we are sad, when only the dog understands us. Don’t feed chocolate to your dog. And we have done all this with a bitter seed that most of us would probably spit out if we tasted it straight from the tree. Ancient Harvest and Production of CacaoArchaeological evidence from Ecuador indicates people used cacao about 5,300 years ago. Football-shaped pods were cut from large branches of the Theobroma cacao tree. The pods are sliced open and have 30 to 40 seeds encased in a sweet, sticky white pulp. The seeds and pulp were scooped out and placed into piles or baskets covered in banana leaves to ferment for 3 to 7 days. During fermentation, yeasts broke down the pulp, killed the seed germ, and began developing the chocolate flavor. After fermentation, the beans were spread on mats and left in the sun for about a week. Workers periodically turned them until they were dry and brown. At this point, the beans were shelf-stable, light, and portable. They were bagged and used as currency across Mesoamerica. Imagine growing your currency. To make the cacao drink, the beans were toasted on a griddle over an open fire, which loosened the papery outer husks. They then crushed the shells and blew away the husk, revealing the inner cacao nibs. These were then ground, like maize, by rubbing a stone rolling pin back and forth over the nibs. The friction and a small controlled fire under the stone would melt the natural cacao butter. As a result, the solid nibs transformed into a rich, glossy, flowing chocolate paste. They mixed this pure cacao paste with water, cornmeal (to thicken it), spicy chili peppers, wild vanilla, allspice, and fragrant flowers. To serve it, they would pour the liquid from jars into bowls until a thick froth formed on top. That was considered the most prized part of the sacred drink. The Maya used cacao in ceremonies, the Aztecs collected cacao as tribute, and the beans were used as currency. Just like we used to use the Hershey’s bar as currency on the playground. Imagine using chocolate to pay taxes. That chocolate would be as bitter as taxes are today. Europe Meets ChocolateThe first time Cortez drank cacao, they hated it, describing it as a drink fit for swine. But then they began to experiment with the recipe by removing the chili peppers and cornmeal and adding lots of cane sugar. Do we know what Cortez said exactly? Not really, although I think of him as one of the nastier characters on The Princess Bride. Then they added cinnamon, vanilla, and anise, instead of using the local herbs. And they served it hot, instead of cold. The Spanish court kept this sweetened "hot chocolate" recipe a state secret for nearly 100 years. By the 1600s, the recipe leaked to the royal courts of France, Italy, and England, becoming the ultimate luxury status symbol for the European elite, and Starbucks fans everywhere. It is a good story, and some even think it is true. The difference between cacao and cocoa is sometimes described as the difference between the original cold Aztec drink and the modern Spanish one. But it was probably a misspelling by the English traders on ship manifests. But if you want to sound cool, you use cacao. Mother’s Day, 1990It was Sunday, Mother’s Day, and I was a surgical resident on the vascular service. I was thinking about driving down to Portland to visit my mom when I received a call from Dr. Raker. There was a patient who needed vascular surgery to save his leg. There went my Mother’s Day plans. Over the course of the next six hours, we operated, bypassed the aneurysm, and saved Charlie’s See’s leg. Charlie had tasted more chocolate than probably anyone alive, and he didn’t like most American chocolate. Some Belgian chocolate, maybe. He told me about the Guna people of Panama, who drank six cups of chocolate a day. And they didn’t have heart disease. He had tried, but didn’t like that drink. His expressed regret was that if he had consumed more chocolate, maybe he wouldn’t have needed vascular surgery. That is unlikely, but let's find out why the people in that area of Panama have lower blood pressure. Chocolate FlavonolsThe bioactive ingredient in chocolates is flavanols. These have several effects: they reduce blood pressure directly through nitric oxide, they have a mild anti-clotting effect, and they are anti-inflammatory. Nitric oxide causes the muscles in blood vessel walls to relax. When those muscles relax, your blood pressure goes down. The lower your blood pressure is, the less strain on your heart, the less risk of developing atherosclerosis, and the longer a person lives. Of course, we don’t want it too low. All that from drinking chocolate. But not so fast. We often have mechanisms in biology that do not translate to eating chocolate and decrease your risk of heart attacks and strokes. But what a sweet experiment to try, so they did. Cocoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study, aka COSMOS.COSMOS followed 21,000 Americans for over 3.5 years to see if the cocoa flavonols decreased the risk of heart attacks and strokes. Subjects were fed either a placebo or 500 mg of flavonols daily. They found that the group who took flavonols had a 27% lower risk of death from heart disease, and about a ten percent lower risk of all cardiovascular disease. Perhaps had they had the content of the bean, as in a chocolate bar, or even received the drink that the Kana (Guna) people drank, it might have had a different result. Is it Dessert or a Health FoodOne way to describe nutritional information is that there are those who are splitters - finding the ingredient in the food that causes the reaction and focusing on that. And there are lumpers, who put the food together in a matrix and see what that matrix does that a single ingredient might not. We know that eating blueberries, seeds, nuts, other fruits, and vegetables provides improved health outcomes across all studies that have examined these. That is the backbone of the Mediterranean diet. Building a diet around those healthy foods. Chocolate has not been on the list for the Mediterranean diet. Again, just because chocolate originated in Mesoamerica does not mean it cannot be a part of a Mediterranean diet. However, you can make chocolate an important part of the Mediterranean diet without it being dessert. I will have a few of my favorite recipes below, like adding them to my son’s favorite “taco” soup. When you get a chocolate bar that is 70 percent or more “dark” chocolate, that does not translate into the amount of active flavonols in the chocolate. How the chocolate is processed will determine the amount of flavanols in the chocolate, not the percentage of dark chocolate. So if you enjoy chocolate as a dessert, enjoy it. Don’t fool yourself into thinking it is a health food. But you can add a healthy dose of chocolate to beans, stews, and sauces, and add a richness to a dish that is perfectly healthy. This is much like the mole sauces of Mexico, rich, but with more of an Italian-Sardinian twist. As for our people from Panama, they still drink the bitter cocoa. When they move from their village to the city, they drink less and tend to develop the same diseases as the city folk: high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke. I might add this confounding variable: while in their village, they eat more fish, almost no ultra-processed food, and their diets are filled with other fruits and vegetables (kind of like a good Mediterranean diet - or if you want to rename it to the DASH or MesoAmerican diet, you can).

I’ve been doing a series about foods that built civilizations. In this episode, we are talking about the potato. It is difficult to imagine that thousands of years ago, people constructed large buildings, managed rivers, built monuments, and created art. We have glimpses of these civilizations through stories, archaeology, and the structures they left behind, but much of their history has been lost. Imagine, we don’t even know where Cleopatra or Alexander the Great are buried, yet we know their stories. As European powers conquered Indigenous peoples, their languages, cultures, and oral traditions were suppressed. When a language disappears, so are the stories preserved within it. Our clues come from archaeology when we uncover a monument, a building, or an ancient settlement. In the Andes, the potatoes they cultivated were not the Russets, Yukon Golds, or fingerlings you find in the store today. Different colors, shapes, and textures. Adapted to survive the elevations, temperatures, and growing conditions. Biodiversity protected their food supply against frost, disease, and changing environmental conditions. If one variety failed, another might survive. The ancient wisdom of diversity that Andean farmers developed over thousands of years was lost when the potato eventually reached Ireland. Preserving PotatoesThey even developed a method to freeze-dry the crop. They exposed the potatoes to repeated cycles of freezing and thawing. Then they pressed them and allowed them to dry. The result was called chuño. The freeze-dried potatoes could be stored for years. When rehydrated, they were used in soups and stews. I wonder if they ever thought about freeze-drying the coffee berry. Perhaps there was an ancient people called the Sanka. Tiwanaku: Farming at the top of the worldThe civilization flourished for centuries before it declined around the end of the first millennium CE. Near Lake Titicaca, in what is now Bolivia, the Tiwanaku civilization developed an agricultural system that allowed people to grow food in one of the most challenging environments on Earth. This pre-Inca civilization had monumental stone buildings, elaborate sculpture, and an extensive network of agricultural settlements. Its buildings and agricultural remains are still there. These people had an advanced civilization before the Inca. It is amazing to think the Inca were not the first to build a sophisticated society in the Andes. They developed raised agricultural fields, known today as waru waru. Water-filled channels surround these elevated planting beds. The channels helped moderate temperature fluctuations, reducing the risk of frost damage to crops, while the raised beds improved drainage and growing conditions. The Inca: An empire built on agricultureThe Incas inherited thousands of years of agricultural knowledge The empire depended on the ability of crops to grow at different elevations. Food was collected, stored, and distributed throughout their kingdom. Potatoes were important in the highlands, while maize, quinoa, and other plants supported populations in different environments. Machu Picchu sits high in the Andes. Its buildings, terraces, and water systems demonstrate advanced engineering. It is on most travelers' bucket lists. When the Spanish arrived, they encountered an unfamiliar vegetable, a product of thousands of years of agricultural experimentation. They would carry that vegetable across the Atlantic. The Irish Lumper: The Potato That Fed a NationThe most famous potato is the Irish Lumper. When the Lumper arrived in Ireland, it thrived, even in poor soil, and produced enough food to sustain a family on a small plot of land. The Irish Lumper was a large, knobby, rather homely potato with pale skin and yellowish flesh. It wasn't known for its flavor. Historical accounts describe it as watery, bland, and sometimes soapy. It produced enough yield to feed your family. Add a little milk or buttermilk, and you have a diet that could sustain people doing hard physical labor. Small landowners and sharecroppers throughout Ireland depended on the Lumper for their primary source of food. Then the blight came, crossing from America. It was Phytophthora infestans arriving in 1845, and harvests failed. Ireland's dependence on potatoes, combined with inadequate government relief, turned an agricultural disaster into a human catastrophe. Even while Ireland exported some grains to the UK. Approximately one million people died, and another million emigrated, many to America. As with all waves of immigrants, they encountered discrimination, but ultimately helped shape the country's economy, literature, culture, and political life. Their wave of immigration led to a long, sustained economic boon for America. Today, a group has reconstituted the Lumper, and you can buy one today. It is ok, not my favorite. For that, we have the simple boiled potato from Norway. The French Fry: From Belgium to McDonald'sFor generations, the French and Belgians have argued about who invented the French fry. A popular Belgian story claims that people living along the Meuse River traditionally fried small fish, but when the river froze, they cut potatoes into the shape of fish and fried them instead. Fried potatoes became popular in Belgium and France during the nineteenth century. Belgians perfected the technique of cooking them twice: first at a lower temperature to cook the potato through, then again at a higher temperature to create that wonderful crisp exterior. Belgian fry shops used animal fats, from beef tallow to horse fat from a horse’s kidneys. Yes, some will even tell you that horse fat from the kidney makes the best fries - I wouldn’t know. The French fry eventually crossed the Atlantic and became an American institution. For decades, McDonald’s cooked its fries in a mixture containing beef tallow and vegetable oil. In 1990, the company announced it would switch to vegetable oil, a decision influenced by growing concerns about saturated fat and a persistent Omaha businessman named Phil Sokolof. Many attribute this change to physicians, but it was really from this first food influencer. Taking out full-page advertisements in major newspapers claiming saturated fat from the fries was bad for the heart. Alas, that “debate” continues. But changing the frying fat didn’t change the fundamental technique. Commercial French fries are generally cooked once, frozen, and then cooked again before serving. That is why my favorite tip for making good fries at home is to buy the frozen ones that have already been partially cooked. Finish them in the oven or air fryer, and you can get that crisp exterior and fluffy interior without turning your kitchen into a Belgian fry shop. No horse required Fear Not the Potato. Fear the Person Who Fears the Potato. The potato wars: From carbohydrates to beef tallowToday, the potato is at the heart of several nutritional controversies. From those who say it is one of the evil whites that leads to obesity, to those who think potatoes should be fried in beef tallow. These are the controversies we will address for our paid members. Blood Glucose and the PotatoPotatoes are primarily starch, which your body will break down into glucose. Eating a potato will raise blood glucose, although the magnitude of that response depends on the type of potato, how it is cooked, how much you eat, and how well your pancreas works. It also depends on what other foods you eat with it.

In our series about foods that built civilization, we talked a lot about grains, from wheat to corn to rice. Today, we are taking you to the ocean, with the civilizations that salmon built. From California to the interior of Alaska, salmon, a staple, allowed people to settle into villages, develop complex social networks, art, and trade routes. Those trade routes are as large as the ones in the Mediterranean. Some tribes built communal homes and developed complex art and language. Some were Seafaring tribes with canoes up to 60 feet long that traveled across oceans. All because there was a fish that would return in large numbers to streams and rivers, reliably, predictably. So predictable, the people could build their lives around salmon runs. So much so that some built a calendar not only with lunar cycles, but also with the return of the salmon. Civilizations have always gathered around food and water. The Mediterranean connected people who grew wheat and olives, giving people time to make wine, mine copper, build ships, trade with their neighbors, and occasionally go to war with them. Asia had rice and grain near the great river systems. The reliable calories from rice and grains allowed villages to become cities and to travel by water to trade. Today we are going to my home, from the Ventura River in California to my home state of Alaska. The Crop That Swam HomeDifferent than the other civilizations, no one had to plant this crop. They didn’t have to tend the crop. It literally swam home every year. Different times for different types of salmon. When the first Europeans saw these fish, the river was so crowded they joked you could walk on their backs, crossing the river and never get wet. Ketchikan, The Salmon Capital of the WorldI grew up in Ketchikan, Alaska. A city founded upon salmon. Some say Ketchikan stands for smelly fish, apparently after the large spawn, as the fish died, it left quite an odor - you can only imagine thousands of dead salmon. Everyone has their favorite type of salmon. The large ones, the King Salmon, also called Chinook, typically start their run to the creeks and rivers in April. You could catch them reliably in late May and June, or even later. We had a King Salmon derby, usually in late May to early June. The record salmon was 79 pounds for that derby. The largest King I ever caught was 26 pounds, and I cannot imagine catching one larger. For a fish that was the livelihood of many of my neighbors, the stocks have become so low that the derby I grew up with was cancelled. Global warming has devastated salmon runs. The above totem is either an eagle or a man, depending on who you ask. The clam has caught it, and the tides roll in, and the man, or eagle, sings a song. Note the amazing carving, and a story as old as time itself. These are Chilkat blankets, or dancing blankets. They take up to five years to create. Made from a combination of inner cedar bark and mountain wool to make the foundation. The colors are mostly dyes of four natural pigments: black (hemlock bark/copper oxide), yellow (wolf moss), blue-green (copper soaked in urine), and the creamy white of natural undyed goat wool. Non-Nomadic PeopleBecause of the abundance, both in terms of the salmon runs, other marine mammals, and berries, they didn’t have to forage. So they were able to build villages with communal living - they were SF before SF was. An intense harvest in the late spring and summer led to a winter of art, ceremonies, and the potlatch. The potlatch is a giant party where the hosts not only display their wealth, but give it away. The richer you are, the more you would give, and that would be the nudge for the neighbor to do the same. Large villages and communal houses, when encountered by the first Europeans, weren’t something they were expecting. There was an entire civilization, clans, tribes, and alliances. People who made treaties, made war, and played games. In Ketchikan, these were rebuilt during the Depression. Here you can see my brother and I being kids - but it also gives you an idea of the large size of these communal homes and totems. They did travel through large canoes.

Corn, beans, and squash, the three sisters, were the Native Americans’ crop, providing a stable source of calories, protein, and farming from Canada through South America. They allowed civilization to go from a hunting people to those who built cities that rivaled Europe and pyramids equal to the marvels seen in Egypt. The rise of civilizations has a pattern: grow a stable crop that allows people to survive, and go from nomads to develop complex societies. In our series of foods that built civilizations, we turn to the Americas before Europeans arrived. Long before Europeans arrived, civilizations in the Americas had developed writing, calendars, monumental architecture, cities, trade networks, irrigation systems, pottery, and sophisticated agriculture. Corn, or maize, fed the Maya, Inca, and Aztec worlds. In what is now the American Southwest, Pueblo peoples built multi-story communities in the desert, while Mississippian societies built towns and enormous earthworks along the great river valleys. It began with Corn, or MazeIt all began with a grass called Teosinte (pronounced “tA-O-‘sin-tE”). Teosinte does not look like corn today, but the DNA shows they are alike, and it was this grass that Native Americans 10,000 years ago began to engineer. In fact it wasn’t until a few years, 2005, ago that modern molecular geneticists discovered that this grass, Teosinte, was the father of corn. For years, people who study plants, botanists, assumed the evolutionary predecessor had long since become extinct. And while Teosinte is widely spread throughout Central America, it was not even considered in the same family as corn. The original ear of Teosinte is 2-3 inches long with 5-12 kernels. The kernels were hard, and most human teeth would break trying to eat them. Teosinte is inedible for many people. Contrast Teosinte with modern corn with a cob. A cob is 12 inches long, with over 500 kernels. The coating on the kernel was selectively bred from the rock-hard protecting seed to, now, where corn has an easily chewable, paper-thin, but still indigestible membrane. This was breeding at its finest. Ten thousand years ago, there was no plant that anyone would recognize as corn. In fact, there was no corn. By 4500 years ago, corn was throughout all the Americas, with carbon dating of kernels in Arizona from over 3000 years ago, in Canada 700 years ago. Corn allowed the Mayan people to go from a people who foraged to a people who could stay and cultivate. You can see from the photos how, as time went on, corn changed: both Teosinte and corn have the same number of chromosomes, and they have the same genes that code for the same proteins. Teosinte and corn can be bred because they are so close genetically. The difference between the grass, Teosinte, and modern corn is about a few genes. Corn didn’t “evolve”; early Native Americans bred corn. Generation of corn after generation, they bred the crop that tasted better, chewed more easily, and survived well. In what is now El Salvador, some have said the Mayans discovered corn in the mountains of Chalatenango. Recently, a dam revealed a village in the area, which was one of the original four Lake Island villages of the Mayans. On this land, one can see the range of corn from the grass to the modern corn. If you hike there, you can see places where the Mayans would grow special crops, where they would harvest the Teosinte with the kernels they could eat, and over time, they would breed it and cross-breed it until they had an agricultural system based on this plant. So sacred was corn that they called it the “grain of the gods.” To this day, the people in Santa Ana, in western El Salvador, still plant little plots of primitive corn that they call something like “ulupiche”. This is not to eat, but simply to please the ancestors. It is from these Mayans that corn was selectively bred, or genetically engineered for better taste, different colors, and the ability to withstand pests. Corn moved quickly, finding its way to Mexico 7000 years ago, South America 6800 years ago, and to North America nearly 4000 years ago. Once Europeans arrived, corn spread even more rapidly through the rest of the world. The First Tupperware PartyEdible Tupperware, that would bring new life into a product that seems to have gone the way of Department Stores and home parties hosted by your neighbor to get you to buy something. The first squash was probably used to carry water, food, and grain. Vessels such as these were radioactive-dated nearly 11,000 years ago in Honduras. These gourds were hard; the inside was bitter, but they were efficient to carry water, perhaps cook food, and store knick-knacks (the first junk drawer was a squash). But get hungry enough, and even bitter food can be tasty (not Brussels sprouts). The squash family (Cucurbitaceae) was domesticated about the same time. Those squashes were related to zucchini, yellow summer squash, acorn squash, delicata, many pumpkins, pattypan, and crookneck squash. And as much as zucchini feels Italian, these squash were grown and consumed in Mexico thousands of years before Rome existed. Multiple types of edible squash were cultivated in different geographic regions and ultimately traded. The BeanThe last of the sisters was the bean. Indigenous peoples domesticated several species of beans in the Americas. The most familiar is Phaseolus vulgaris, the ancestor to black beans, kidney beans, pinto beans, and navy beans. But there wasn’t just one ancestor to all the beans. Indigenous farmers domesticated at least five species of Phaseolus. Today, we know their descendants. Besides the black and pinto beans. There was a different region that grew lima beans, and yet others were the scarlet runners and tepary beans. Europeans had been eating beans for thousands of years before Columbus. Original old-world beans included fava beans, peas, lentils, and chickpeas. From America, Europe obtained kidney beans, black beans, pinto beans, and cannellini beans. Yup, those favorite beans I put on Paella originally were groomed in America. The Three SistersWhen the first European settlers arrived, they noted the agricultural habits of the Iroquois with the three sisters. The corn provided the pole, the beans fixed nitrogen into the soil, and the squash provided a ground cover that kept away pests. This works not only from the perspective of good land use, but also provides a complete protein. You do not have to eat corn and beans in the same bite to create a “complete protein.” But across a diet, their amino-acid profiles complement each other beautifully. Corn gives abundant energy and some protein. Beans add protein, particularly lysine. And, squash adds micronutrients through the seeds, fat, and additional protein. The agricultural system worked, and because it worked, it was copied throughout the Americas. The nutrition also worked, without a Registered Dietitian telling them. CivilizationsWe have historic records of what happened to some civilizations, which gave us written languages, weights, measures, amazing architecture, and Mayan calendars. The tragedy of the indigenous peoples of what is now North and South America has been well documented. We have no idea what we have lost. Yet what remains is the food. What always seems to remain is the food, and now, when you eat your tomato on the pizza, or have cannelloni beans on Paella, you are eating history from the major continents that all had their own civilizations whose contribution was great pizza, paella, and food. Every one of the ancient civilizations has disappeared. Their food remains. We read about the Greeks eating whole grains and pulses. We tour Machu Picchu. We marvel at the Code of Hammurabi. We look at the terracotta soldiers guarding the tomb near Xi’an. All while enjoying the food that allowed them to settle and make a civilization. Some monuments survived, but the food is still here. I still don’t know why we kept Brussels sprouts.

If you spent time in the low-carb world, rice is about as welcome as a toxic waste dump. It is part of those dreaded whites: white flour, white sugar, and white rice. All a part of the reason we are fat, diabetic, and have every disease one can think of. But then, if you get out and see the world, you will realize that people eat rice daily, are thin as a rail, relatively healthy, and have some of the longest lives on the planet. Today, we will make sense of the madness of rice. While people in the Mediterranean were mostly illiterate, in Asia, they had developed writing, laws, philosophy, governments with elaborate testing for civil servants, and gunpowder. In addition, the evidence shows they circumnavigated the oceans, found a larva that could make silk cloth, and developed fine porcelain. They did this while we were drawing crude paintings in caves. Some of our ancestors looked east and even wrote about this “strange” but highly advanced civilization. This was all possible with grass, we call rice. Yangtze River BasinAlong the basin of the Yangtze River, and elsewhere, was an edible grass that ultimately became rice. You can imagine it was simply gathered until someone learned how to plant it. Wild rice, then, would drop the edible seed as it matured. Replanting those that kept their seed on the plant longer meant the rice was easier to gather. Planting and gathering meant staying in one area, then, with abundance, one had to build storage, and eventually a civilization around rice. Weights, measures, laws, buildings. Once people can exchange for rice, you develop professions, art, philosophy. River basins have great soil, but the unpredictability of floods, so management of the river, canals, and all because of a simple grain. I realize carnivores like to hunt large game as their primal food, but chasing mammals doesn’t lead to a civilization or a brain beyond hunting. Also true today, although the hunting is reserved for determining which type of beef is better, and which store has better prices. Modern carnivore hunters prefer Costco beef, gyms, testosterone, and making fun of people who take statins. One needs a granary to build a civilization. Rice RoadsThe ability to grow rice led to the first trade routes, as rice and the dishes that accompany it. From Bryani, to Pilaf and Risotto, to Paella Rice, made its way through trade routes around the world. And with each region, their dishes were accompanied by rice. Spice roads developed on the trails originally made by rice traders, and one might think the spices were there to make the rice even better. Today, we all have our favorite rice dishes. Mine vary between sushi and paella. Every culture accepted rice and made its own dish. Some regions even claim their rice came not from the east, but locally. Rice and MedicineThe first peer-reviewed diet for a chronic disease was the Rice and Fruit Diet, popularized by Walter Kempner out of Duke University. He developed the diet for malignant hypertension, the disease that President Roosevelt died of. This disease was almost uniformly fatal within six months of diagnosis. Kempner developed this low-sodium diet of white rice and fruit. In trials, it not only lowered blood pressure but also improved survival. In the 1960’s, the diet became popular for weight loss, and throughout the United States, “Rice Houses” became a place for weight loss. Many Hollywood celebrities swore by them. Vitamin B1 was arguably the first vitamin Today, we know that thiamine deficiency leads to Beriberi, which was a common and often fatal disease in the Japanese Navy. Kanehiro Takaki noticed sailors who preferred polished white rice, almost exclusively for food, developed beriberi. While officers eating a more varied diet generally did not. Hanehro Takati is credited with saving the Navy by changing its diet. Polished rice removes the husk and endosperm of the rice, which is the main source of fiber and nutrients. Vitamin A is also unavailable in polished white rice. Vitamin A deficiency remains a preventable cause of childhood blindness. The World Health Organization estimates that 250,000 to 500,000 vitamin-A-deficient children become blind every year, and about half die within twelve months of losing their sight. To overcome this, rice was genetically modified to produce a precursor of vitamin A. The rice takes on a deep yellow color, hence the name “golden rice.” Unfortunately, the objection to a genetically modified organism was brought to court and stopped golden rice from being used. While this sits in litigation, these children are still going blind and dying. Why not use brown rice? White rice is shelf-stable for years. Brown rice will quickly become rancid, so it has a limited shelf life. How to Eat Rice without Losing Your Mind - and Should You Buy the $400 Rice Cooker?When writing about rice, there is a lot of heat and not much light. Influencers warn about blood sugar levels, arsenic, while some claim brown rice is perfect and white rice is evil. Others, in an attempt to sound like they know science, refrigerate rice overnight and claim it is now transformed into perfection. Let’s go through those claims, as well as the fancy rice cookers I see on the market.

When we talk about the microbiome, people think about the colon and trillions of microorganisms. Have you ever considered that humans have other interactions with microbiomes that occur with our cooking? On this week’s episode of FORK U, we continue with our series “Food That Made Civilization.” The topic is Fermentation. How Fermentation Built CivilizationWe were selecting a microbiome without knowing it. Bacteria, yeast, and molds. Feed the ones that worked, keep the conditions they liked, and do it again. Your grandmother may have kept the bowl that made better bread. She saved some of yesterday’s dough to start tomorrow’s. Others learned that milk mixed with a bit of salt and kept in a goat’s stomach became yogurt or cheese instead of something that had to be thrown away. In Asia, they salted cabbage, put it into a jar, and buried it, which allowed them to survive the winter. And perhaps in what is modern-day Iran, they learned that when they crushed grapes, stored them in special containers, they made wine. And in Mesopotamia (now Iraq), ancient Sumerians left written recipes of barley brewing dating back over 5,000 years, which was probably beer. There were no microscopes or bacterial cultures. We didn’t know that yeast metabolized sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide, or that lactic-acid bacteria changed the chemistry of cabbage and milk. But what they didn’t see was a colony of bacteria, yeast, and mold, creating environments in which organisms thrived, and transformed foods into something more edible and even stable for preservation. Those microorganisms gave us bread, beer, wine, cheese, kimchi, vinegar, and eventually penicillin. What Did Ancient Beer Taste Like?We are fascinated by what people before us ate and drank. From the Midas Tomb in ancient Phrygia, now Turkey, they discovered that people had made a fermented drink from barley, grapes, and honey. It was probably beer, wine, and mead in the same cup. Based on a chemical analysis of these vessels, Dogfish Head Brewery used modern yeast to make a beer called Midas Touch. But I wished we could have cultured the yeast and bacteria from one of those vessels? As much effort as Dogfish used to reproduce the ingredients on the basis of chemical analysis, the beer is not the same. The barley, grapes, and even the water are different. Some of those grape varieties may not even exist anymore. The temperature and storage conditions we are guessing at best. And the microbes undoubtedly changed over the three thousand years while waiting to resume their shift. Dogfish Head analyzed ingredients from pottery in China. That 9000-year-old pottery once held a fermented beverage made from rice, honey, and fruit. This was being drunk years before the Great Wall was built. Which makes me think, the Great Wall was the velvet rope, seeing if your name was on the list for the rice wine party. But consider it like this: even pizza lovers from New York will tell you that without the NY water, or coal-fired oven, you cannot make a true NY pizza. The yeast we use now are descendants of those used by our ancestors. But the microbiome changes, they reproduce, mutate, mix with other organisms from the flour, the grain, the fruit, the hands, and the environment. Yeast today are more different from their ancestors than we are from ours. But we are never drinking the exact same beer. We are drinking what became of that ancient experiment. Just like you never step in the same river twice. Then We Finally Saw ThemThen came Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, who developed the first microscope. He was not a physician. He was not a professor of microbiology. There was no microbiology. He was a fabric salesman with an obsession for making good lenses. When he put those lenses together, he saw a world no one knew existed. He pointed it at everything: water, tooth scrapings, and eventually beer. He saw tiny living things moving around in a world humans had never seen. Leeuwenhoek called them animalcules, little animals. He even looked under his microscope at wine and beer. France Has a Wine ProblemBy the middle of the nineteenth century, France had been through revolution, empire, monarchy, another revolution, republic, and empire again. The country had plenty of political problems. But there was one problem that could unite almost any Frenchman. They didn’t know why sometimes their wine would spoil. Yes, there is the occasional bottle that is “corked,” and that is an inconvenience. But losing the entire batch is a disaster. Louis Pasteur, a chemist, was commissioned to help solve this problem. Leeuwenhoek could see them. Pasteur wanted to know what the hell they were doing. They were doing chemistry. The yeast was associated with alcoholic fermentation. Other organisms were associated with lactic fermentation. Different microorganisms produced different outcomes. And suddenly, all those odd instructions from your grandmother made sense. Use this bowl. Save some of that dough. Keep a little from the good batch. Don’t use that barrel again. Pasteur found that gently heating wine could prevent some of these microbial problems without boiling or ruining the wine. This gives us one of my favorite historical details: pasteurization was developed for wine before it was used for milk. The raw-milk crowd should put that on the T-shirt. My Great-Great-Uncle Changed SurgeryJames Young Simpson — my grandfather’s uncle — helped transform surgery with chloroform anesthesia. Anesthesia meant surgeons could finally operate without four people holding the patient down. Unfortunately, patients could survive the operation and still die several days later from infection. That is where Joseph Lister enters the story. Lister read Pasteur’s work on fermentation and putrefaction, and wondered if microorganisms could spoil wine; perhaps they could also spoil wounds. Fermenting grapes can be wonderful. Fermenting wounds, not so muchLister began using carbolic acid to treat wounds, instruments, and surgical infection rates fell. That became the start of modern, safe surgical technique. Pasteur was worried about spoiled wine. Lister was worried about dead patients. In your kitchen, you practice microbiology.

Salt: From the Roman Legion to Your Electrolyte Packet You've probably heard that Roman soldiers were paid in salt—and that this is where we get the word salary. It's a great story. It's also almost certainly not true. The Romans had money. We find Roman coins throughout the former empire, including around military forts such as those along Hadrian's Wall, and we have evidence that Roman soldiers were paid in money. What we do have is an ancient linguistic connection between the Latin sal, meaning salt, and salarium, which eventually gives us salary. Somewhere along the way, that became the much better story that a legionary went to the quartermaster and collected his wages at the imperial salt lick. But the fact that the story sounds believable tells us something important: salt really was extraordinarily valuable. Long before Rome, humans sought salt just as other animals do. Animals travel to mineral licks, and humans learned to exploit saline springs, coastal deposits, and eventually salt mines. Nobody needed to measure a serum sodium to discover salt. We had two very good reasons to want it: salt tastes good, and salt preserves food. That second property changed civilization. Meat and fish could be salted and dried. Vegetables could be fermented. Milk could be transformed into cheese, concentrating its nutrition and allowing it to last far longer than fresh milk. Salt helped food survive winter, travel aboard ships, and provision armies. The Egyptians even used natron—a mixture of sodium salts rather than ordinary table salt—to dry and preserve their dead. Hence the mummy. Or occasionally, presumably, the daddy. Once everyone wanted salt, governments discovered the next obvious thing to do: tax it. Salt became a source of state revenue in ancient China, traveled along trade routes in Rome, was burdened by the French gabelle, and eventually became the focus of Gandhi's famous Salt March against British rule in India. Then something changed. We got very good at producing salt, and we invented refrigeration. One of the principal reasons humans had consumed large quantities of salt—preserving food—became much less important. Unfortunately, we didn't stop liking the taste. Modern food manufacturers discovered that salt was cheap, improved flavor and texture, and could be added to almost everything. Today, the problem is rarely finding enough sodium. It's avoiding too much of it. There was, however, one particularly clever moment when public health took advantage of our universal salt habit. Iodine deficiency once produced enormous numbers of goiters and, more importantly, could impair fetal and childhood brain development. In 1924, iodized salt appeared on grocery shelves in Michigan as part of the American effort to combat endemic iodine deficiency. The idea was beautifully simple: everybody eats salt, so put iodine in the salt. Salt iodization became an extraordinarily effective way to prevent iodine-deficiency disorders, and it remains recommended by the World Health Organization. Which makes today's fascination with expensive “mineral” salts particularly amusing. Celtic sea salt, Himalayan pink salt, and other specialty salts contain magnesium, calcium, and other minerals—but in trace amounts. If you like their taste or texture, wonderful. I have fancy salts in my kitchen too. That's cuisine, not cardiology. If you want magnesium, eat some nuts. And then buy Morton's. We have performed a similar trick with hydration. There are people who genuinely need extra sodium: athletes exercising for hours, people working in extreme heat, and people experiencing substantial fluid losses. The development of sports drinks was a reasonable response to athletes losing both water and electrolytes during prolonged exercise. Somehow, that became the idea that everyone needs mango-flavored electrolytes simply because they own a water bottle. Most of us don't. Sodium is essential, but essential doesn't mean unlimited. The WHO currently recommends adults consume less than 2,000 mg of sodium per day—about 5 grams of salt—and notes that average global sodium intake is more than twice that amount. Most dietary sodium isn't necessarily coming from the salt shaker. Processed meats, breads, sauces, prepared foods, restaurant meals, cheese, and other frequently consumed foods can contribute substantial amounts. That doesn't mean your food needs to be bland. Cook vegetables. Eat legumes. Have fish. Use olive oil, herbs, spices, lemon, and vinegar—and use enough salt to make good food taste good. Just don't confuse seasoning your dinner with adding unnecessary sodium to an already sodium-rich diet. Salt helped build civilizations. It preserved food, provisioned armies, generated taxes, helped make cheese possible, and eventually became a vehicle for preventing iodine deficiency. We spent thousands of years figuring out how to get enough of it. Now we've become so good at it that we're paying extra to put more of it in our water. Listen to this episode of FORK U for the story of salt, and head over to drsimpson.com for the deeper dive into sodium, blood pressure, vascular health, salt sensitivity, gastric cancer, electrolytes, and what the science actually says about how much salt we should be eating.

How a tiny seed changed the way we work, think, meet, and start the day Bread gave civilization calories. Beans gave it protein. Olive oil gave it light. Coffee gave civilization somewhere to meet—and a reason to stay awake. Coffee came late to Western civilization. The Greeks didn't have it. The Romans didn't have it. Even Galileo had to stay awake at night looking through his telescope without the help of an espresso machine. Historians no longer like the old idea of the “Dark Ages,” and for good reason. But I have my own definition: the Dark Ages were simply the time before Western civilization discovered coffee. Coffee Started as a FruitFirst, coffee isn't really a bean. What we call the coffee bean is the seed of a fruit, often called a coffee cherry. Coffee plants originated in Africa, especially Ethiopia, where we get the wonderful legend of a goat herder named Kaldi. He supposedly noticed that his goats became unusually energetic after eating the red fruit from a coffee tree. The goats danced, Kaldi tried the fruit, and eventually the local monks discovered it helped them stay awake for evening prayers. It's a great story, although there isn't much evidence that Kaldi actually existed. The history becomes more reliable by the 1400s, when we know people were drinking coffee in Yemen. From there, coffee traveled along trade routes through the Middle East and into the Ottoman Empire. Somewhere along the way, something important happened: coffee stopped being simply a drink and became a reason for people to gather. Coffeehouses Woke People UpBy the 1500s, coffeehouses were appearing in the Ottoman world. People came to drink coffee, but they stayed to talk about business, politics, religion, news, and probably their neighbors. Coffee eventually moved west, and by the 1600s, coffeehouses were spreading across Europe. London's first coffeehouse is generally dated to 1652. Some of these coffeehouses became known as “penny universities.” For the price of a cup of coffee, you could sit, listen, argue, and perhaps learn something. Coffee did not cause the Enlightenment, but it certainly provided a convenient place for people to discuss it. Unlike the tavern, the main drug being served made people more alert instead of less. The Swedes Took Coffee SeriouslyThen there were the Swedes. After losing to Russia in 1709, King Charles XII of Sweden spent several years in Ottoman territory. While there, he and his companions developed quite an affection for coffee. When the Swedes eventually returned home, that affection came with them, and coffee became deeply rooted in Swedish culture. Today, the Swedes have fika, which is much more than a coffee break. You stop what you are doing, sit down, usually have something to eat, and most importantly, talk to another person. In other words, coffee provides an excuse to stop working long enough to remember that there are other human beings around you. That sounds remarkably familiar to me. Coffee in Rainy AlaskaI grew up in Ketchikan, Alaska, one of the wettest cities in America. Some years, the rainfall can approach 200 inches, and this isn't always the lovely rain that gently falls outside while you read a book beside the fireplace. In Ketchikan, the rain sometimes blows sideways. Many women of my mother's generation had moved to Alaska because their husbands brought them there. Their families might be thousands of miles away, winter days were short, and sometimes it seemed as though the rain would never stop. This was before SSRIs, but there was always coffee. My mother and her friends would gather at someone's house, sit around the kitchen table, drink coffee, and talk. Looking back as a physician, I think those gatherings served an important purpose. Not because coffee treats depression—it doesn't—but because friendship, conversation, and human connection matter. When the rain was blowing sideways, and you had had enough of your own house, you could always go to Betty's house for a cup of coffee. Of course, there were standards. In our part of Alaska, coffee meant Hills Bros. If Betty served something else, everyone would still drink it gratefully, but it would certainly be discussed. Coffee could generate more conversation than differences in religion. In a town where you could still hear Norwegian spoken on the streets, coffee sometimes seemed like our national beverage. Admittedly, Ketchikan also had far more bars than churches, but that's another story. We Still Meet Over CoffeeThat social role of coffee never disappeared. In many parts of the world, you don't begin a business meeting with business. First comes coffee. You make introductions, ask about family, talk about where you are from, and get to know one another. Then you conduct business. We Americans have made the process more efficient. We pick up a paper cup from the espresso bar, carry it into a conference room, open the laptop, and get right to work. We've kept the coffee, but perhaps we've lost a little of the ritual. Still, coffee shops are thriving, while alcohol use, particularly among younger adults, has been declining. For generations in America, meeting someone often meant, “Let's get a drink.” Increasingly, that drink might be coffee. From a health standpoint, replacing some alcohol with coffee is probably a pretty good trade: a healthier drink and a brighter mind. Even first dates now happen over coffee. Some people think a proper first date should involve dinner, but I'm not convinced. If I'm going to spend two hours discovering whether I like someone, wouldn't I rather find out after they've occupied a few of their adenosine receptors? Give them an espresso, and let's hear their interpretation of Hume. What Coffee Does to Your BrainWhich brings us to caffeine. Caffeine doesn't actually give you energy. Instead, it blocks receptors for adenosine, a chemical involved in the feeling of sleep pressure. As you've been awake longer, adenosine signaling helps tell your brain that you're tired. Caffeine interferes with that message, which is why you feel more alert. My first scientific encounter with caffeine wasn't coffee at all. In the organic chemistry laboratory at the University of Chicago, we isolated caffeine from tea by brewing what may have been the world's strongest cup. It looked completely undrinkable, which was fine because we weren't making afternoon tea; we were doing chemistry. Years later, my friend Simon Majumdar introduced me to proper British builder's tea. Suddenly, I understood the British a little better. Builder's tea is one step removed from containing enough caffeine to keep you awake through one of my podcasts. Do You Really Have to Wait 90 Minutes?You may have heard the popular claim that you should wait 90 minutes after waking before drinking coffee because of cortisol. There is a little real physiology behind the claim. Caffeine can temporarily increase cortisol, and cortisol normally changes around the time we wake up. However, that doesn't prove the 90-minute rule. People who regularly consume caffeine develop substantial tolerance to some of its cortisol effects, and we don't have clinical trials showing that people who wait exactly 90 minutes have better health, better sleep, or better alertness. This is an important lesson that goes well beyond coffee. A biological mechanism is not automatically a medical rule. If waiting 90 minutes makes you feel better, then wait. If you've been drinking coffee shortly after waking for thirty years, sleep well, and enjoy your morning cup, there isn't good evidence that you need to stand beside the coffee maker holding a stopwatch. Coffee Is More Than CaffeineFor years, medicine tended to think about coffee mainly in terms of caffeine. Caffeine stimulates us and can temporarily increase blood pressure, so it seemed reasonable to worry that coffee might be bad for the heart. Then researchers began looking at what actually happened to people who drank coffee over many years, and the story became much more interesting. Coffee contains hundreds of compounds, including chlorogenic acids, which are polyphenols. It also contains other compounds created or changed during roasting. In other words, coffee isn't simply caffeine dissolved in brown water. Large observational studies have found that moderate coffee consumption is associated with lower rates of several health problems, including type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Some of the most consistent findings involve the liver, where coffee drinking has been associated with lower risks of chronic liver disease, cirrhosis, and liver cancer. Interestingly, some health associations also appear in people who drink decaffeinated coffee. That tells us caffeine cannot be the entire story. Of course, these studies don't prove that coffee prevents disease, and coffee isn't medicine. But they certainly make the old idea that coffee must be bad for us much harder to defend. How You Make Coffee MattersEven the way we brew coffee changes what ends up in the cup. Coffee contains compounds called cafestol and kahweol, and cafestol can raise LDL cholesterol. Boiled and unfiltered coffee retains more of these compounds, while a paper filter removes many of them. That makes a simple invention from 1908 surprisingly important. A German woman named Melitta Bentz wanted a cleaner cup of coffee without grounds and began experimenting with paper filtration. More than a century later, we

For years, beans have suffered from an image problem. They've been called "the poor man's meat," joked about for causing gas, and often relegated to the side of the plate. Yet for thousands of years, beans, lentils, chickpeas, and peas—collectively known as pulses—were among the most important foods on Earth. If bread supplied the calories that built cities, beans supplied much of the protein that sustained them. Long before protein powders and high-protein snack bars, civilizations from Rome to India relied on pulses as an everyday source of nourishment. The Roman laborer's bowl of puls—a hearty porridge often enriched with legumes—was far more representative of daily life than the lavish banquets of emperors. Across the Mediterranean, dishes like pasta e fagioli reflected a simple truth: grains and legumes together formed a remarkably nutritious meal. Modern science has largely caught up with what history already knew. Beans are rich in protein, but they're also packed with dietary fiber, resistant starch, folate, magnesium, potassium, and a remarkable collection of plant compounds that support both heart and metabolic health. Their fiber nourishes the trillions of bacteria living in our colon, producing short-chain fatty acids that help maintain the health of the intestinal lining and may reduce inflammation throughout the body. Perhaps most remarkable is that cultures around the world independently discovered the same dietary pattern. Italy has beans and pasta. India has dal with flatbread. Latin America combines beans with rice or corn. The Middle East gave us hummus. These weren't accidents. They were elegant nutritional solutions developed centuries before anyone knew what an amino acid was. Beans also improve the soil they grow in. Through a partnership with nitrogen-fixing bacteria living on their roots, legumes enrich the earth for future crops. Few foods nourish both the people who eat them and the land that produces them. Today, beans are enjoying a well-deserved renaissance. Heritage producers such as Rancho Gordo have reminded us that beans have flavor, texture, and personality. They're no longer just pantry staples—they're ingredients worthy of the center of the plate. In this week's Fork U podcast, we'll explore how one humble family of plants helped build civilizations, why modern nutrition keeps rediscovering their value, and why the "poor man's meat" may actually be one of the richest foods in human history. Sometimes the greatest superfoods aren't new discoveries. Sometimes they've been quietly simmering in the pot all along.

Olive Oil: The Original Superfood Before electricity lit our homes, olive oil did. For thousands of years, olive oil was far more than something people poured over bread. It fueled lamps, preserved food, moisturized skin, and was used in religious ceremonies. Long before it became a staple of the Mediterranean diet, it helped build civilization. Today, we think of olive oil as healthy. The fascinating part is that people believed it was medicinal long before they understood cholesterol, inflammation, or blood pressure. Sometimes medicine begins with observation. The science simply catches up later. More Than Just FatWhen people hear "olive oil," they often think of fat. That's true, but not all fats behave the same way. Olive oil is rich in monounsaturated fat, the primary fat found in the Mediterranean diet. Rather than worrying about the chemistry, it is more useful to think about what happens inside the body. The real benefit comes from what olive oil replaces. Instead of cooking with butter or shortening, people sauté vegetables with olive oil. Olive oil is better than creamy dressings, and it is part of a delicious vinaigrette. And my favorite is, instead of spreading butter on bread, dipping it in olive oil. Those small substitutions can add up over time. The Science Is ImpressiveOne of the first studies to grab the attention of cardiologists came from Lyon, France. Researchers enrolled people who had already suffered a heart attack and asked one group to adopt a Mediterranean-style diet rich in olive oil. The results surprised almost everyone. Those following the Mediterranean diet had dramatically fewer second heart attacks than those eating their usual diet. It was one of the studies that helped transform olive oil from a traditional food into a modern medical recommendation. Since then, researchers have followed hundreds of thousands of people around the world. Again and again, the same pattern appears. People who regularly consume olive oil tend to have lower rates of heart disease, lower rates of type 2 diabetes, and even lower mortality. Even better, randomized clinical trials such as the PREDIMED study showed that people at high cardiovascular risk reduced their chances of major cardiovascular events by following a Mediterranean diet supplemented with extra-virgin olive oil. Why Does It Work?Scientists think olive oil helps in several ways. When olive oil replaces butter and other saturated fats, LDL cholesterol usually falls. The natural polyphenols found in extra-virgin olive oil also appear to reduce inflammation and help blood vessels relax by improving nitric oxide production. In addition, studies suggest olive oil improves insulin sensitivity and helps protect LDL cholesterol from becoming oxidized, an important step in the formation of artery plaque. No single mechanism explains everything. Instead, several small benefits appear to work together. That is often how nutrition works. Not All Olive Oils Are the SameIf you ask people where the best olive oil comes from, be prepared for a lively discussion. Some prefer the buttery oils from Liguria in Italy. Others enjoy the peppery oils of Lebanon, Greece, or Spain. I have favorites from Arizona, where I lived for years, and from California, where I live now. California also has some of the highest purity standards for olive oil in the world. While olive oil fraud has occurred in some parts of the world, California producers have built a reputation for careful quality control. That gives me confidence in what I'm pouring into my pan. A Small Change Worth MakingNutrition rarely comes down to one magical food. Instead, it comes from making better choices more often. Adding olive oil to your kitchen is one of those simple changes that is easy to enjoy. It makes vegetables taste better, encourages home cooking, and replaces less healthy fats without making meals feel restrictive. Sometimes the healthiest habits are also the most delicious. Olive oil first transformed civilization by lighting the night. Today, it may help illuminate a healthier future—one meal at a time.

Cheese: Humanity's Greatest Delicious AccidentWhat if one of the world's favorite foods happened by accident? That's probably how cheese began. Nobody knows exactly who made the first cheese. Maybe it was a shepherd carrying milk in a bag made from a sheep's stomach. The milk warmed in the sun, natural rennet in the stomach lining began to separate the curds from the whey, and suddenly milk had become something entirely different. Instead of throwing it away, someone tasted it. Transforming CheeseCheese is another example of one of humanity's greatest skills: transforming food. We didn't simply discover food—we learned how to make it safer, preserve it longer, and often make it taste even better. Then, over thousands of years, every culture added its own touch. The English gave us Cheddar. The French perfected Brie and Roquefort. Italy created Parmigiano Reggiano. Greece gave us Feta. Norway even created brown cheese by slowly caramelizing whey into a sweet, nutty delight. Each cheese tells the story of the people who made it. Then there's the science.For years, cheese was criticized because it contains saturated fat. However, modern nutrition research has taught us that cheese is far more complicated than a single nutrient. Cheese contains protein, calcium, beneficial bacteria from fermentation, and a unique food structure that scientists now call the dairy matrix. Interestingly, studies have found that eating cheese is generally neutral—and in many cases modestly protective—when it comes to heart disease. One of my favorite ironies involves Parmesan. People often warn about MSG while happily grating Parmesan over their pasta. Yet Parmesan is naturally rich in free glutamate, the compound responsible for the delicious savory flavor we call umami. Nature discovered that trick long before chemistry gave it a name. Like bread, soup, and cooking itself, cheese reminds us that humans became successful because we learned to transform food instead of wasting it. The next time you enjoy a piece of good cheese, remember you're tasting one of humanity's oldest scientific experiments. This week on FORK U, we'll explore the fascinating history of cheese, how it shaped civilization, why it's healthier than many people think, and why your charcuterie board has a much longer history than Instagram. And on my Substack later this week, we'll dive even deeper into the science behind cheese, fermentation, heart health, the Mediterranean diet, and why nutrition is always more interesting than social media makes it seem.

For years, bread has been the villain of social media. Scroll for a few minutes, and you'll find someone telling you bread causes obesity, diabetes, inflammation, or that humans were never meant to eat it. History tells a different story. Bread didn't weaken civilization. Bread helped build it. From Grass to GreatnessImagine the first person who looked at wild grass and wondered whether those tiny seeds could become food. Nobody knows exactly how bread was invented. Maybe someone mixed crushed grain with water and left it in the sun. Maybe wild yeast landed in the mixture, and it began to bubble. Maybe someone cooked it on a hot rock beside a fire. Whatever happened, one thing is certain. Someone noticed something new and tried it again. That's how science often begins—with curiosity. Bread Changed EverythingOnce people learned how to make bread, life changed. Grain could be stored for months. Families no longer had to search for food every day. Villages grew into towns, and towns became cities. Soon, people could become bakers, builders, teachers, physicians, and merchants because someone else was growing wheat. Bread didn't just feed people. It helped create civilization. Bread Fed EmpiresThe ancient Egyptians depended on bread. Grain storage helped feed the workers who built the pyramids. The Romans knew that keeping bread available helped keep peace in the city. Even today, archaeologists find bakeries and loaves of bread preserved in Pompeii. Later, during the Klondike Gold Rush, my grandfather carried a sourdough starter into Alaska. Thousands of prospectors did the same. That's why experienced miners became known as "Sourdoughs." Bread traveled wherever people went. Then Bread ChangedOver time, bread changed. Factories made bread softer, whiter, and able to last longer on grocery store shelves. It became convenient, but much of what made bread special disappeared. Then, during the 1960s and 1970s, people began baking bread at home again. Books like The Tassajara Bread Book encouraged Americans to rediscover whole grains, sourdough, and fresh bread. Sometimes progress means remembering what we forgot. What Does the Science Say?Not all bread is the same. Whole-grain bread contains fiber, vitamins, minerals, and plant compounds that refined white bread often lacks. Study after study has found that people who eat more whole grains tend to have lower rates of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, obesity, and colorectal cancer. That's one reason whole grains remain an important part of the Mediterranean diet. The question isn't whether bread is healthy. The question is: Which bread? Keep It SimpleOne of the simplest meals is still one of the best. Take a slice of whole-grain bread, add good extra-virgin olive oil, and enjoy it with a bowl of soup or a Mediterranean meal. It doesn't need to be complicated. Some foods have survived for thousands of years for a reason. Bread is one of them. This week in my Substack, I dive much deeper into the history of bread, how it helped build civilization, why whole grains continue to be recommended by nutrition research, and why bread has become one of the most misunderstood foods on social media. You can read the full article on drsimpson.com, and if you're looking for Mediterranean recipes—including homemade bread, soups, and healthy meals—you'll find them at terrysimpson.com.

Soup: The Mediterranean Diet in a BowlOver the past few weeks, many of us have been looking at our refrigerators a little differently. News about Cyclospora, E. coli, and other foodborne outbreaks has made people nervous about fresh vegetables and herbs. At the same time, grocery stores are filled with expensive electrolyte drinks, protein broths, and wellness beverages promising to keep us healthy. However, there is a much simpler solution that has been around for thousands of years. Make soup.It may sound almost too simple, but soup remains one of the healthiest meals we can prepare. In fact, if someone asked me to build the perfect meal using what we know today about nutrition, I'd probably start with a pot of soup. Add onions, garlic, beans, tomatoes, leafy greens, herbs, perhaps a little chicken or fish, a drizzle of olive oil, and serve it with a slice of whole-grain sourdough. You've just created what I like to call the Mediterranean diet in a bowl. And to prove you can do that from any cuisine, my favorite soup is Dahl - and click here for the recipe. The First Food SafetyMore importantly, soup has always been much more than comfort food. Throughout history, people discovered that boiling food made it easier to digest and often safer to eat, even though they had no idea bacteria or parasites existed. Today, we know that proper cooking destroys organisms such as Cyclospora and many harmful bacteria, making soup not only delicious but also one of humanity's oldest food safety techniques. Furthermore, soup is one of the best ways to reduce food waste. We all have that refrigerator drawer that starts out as a crisper and eventually becomes what I call the "future soup drawer." A few carrots, some celery that's lost its crunch, half an onion, spinach that's beginning to wilt, or herbs that are no longer picture-perfect can all become tomorrow's lunch instead of tomorrow's compost. Rather than throwing them away, let them contribute their flavors to a pot of soup. Another reason I love soup is that it naturally brings together many of the foods we should be eating more often. Beans provide fiber and plant protein. Vegetables add vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals. Herbs contribute remarkable flavors without relying on excess salt. A little olive oil adds healthy fats, while broth provides hydration along with naturally occurring electrolytes. Unlike many products marketed as "wellness foods," soup doesn't need fancy packaging or celebrity endorsements. It has been quietly doing its job for thousands of years. Better with Age - like meThen there's one final reason soup deserves a place in every kitchen. It gets better. Few foods improve overnight the way soup does. The flavors continue to develop, the broth becomes richer, and somehow the entire pot tastes more complete the next day. That's one reason soup has always been one of the original meal-prep foods. Long before social media was teaching us how to prepare lunches for the week, families simply made one large pot of soup and enjoyed it for several meals. Of course, every family develops its own favorites. In our house, taco soup is always a winner. It starts with onions, garlic, olive oil, canned beans, tomatoes, cumin, coriander, and chili spices before being finished with fresh lemon juice, avocado, and crushed whole-grain tortilla chips. It's hearty, inexpensive, packed with fiber, and it disappears quickly whenever I make it. Perhaps that's why every civilization eventually invented soup. It stretches ingredients, reduces waste, nourishes families, hydrates naturally, and transforms simple foods into something extraordinary. Sometimes the oldest ideas remain the smartest ones. This week on Fork U, we're diving into the remarkable history and science of soup, including why every civilization created its own version, why soup may be the Mediterranean diet in a bowl, why it often tastes better the next day, and even why a proper French consommé is one of the greatest achievements in culinary science. For the full story, listen to this week's episode of Fork U at drsimpson.com. And if you'd like some of my favorite soup recipes—including taco soup, Mediterranean-inspired soups, and other healthy meals—you'll find them at terrysimpson.com.

Fire didn't just change dinner. It changed us.If I asked you what made us human, you might say language. Or tools. Maybe agriculture. All of those changed our species, but I think one discovery came even earlier—and it may have been the most important of all. Fire. Not because it kept us warm. Not because it frightened predators. But because it cooked dinner. At first glance, that might seem like an odd claim. After all, cooking is something we do every day without much thought. However, when you look at the science and the history together, cooking becomes one of the most remarkable innovations in human evolution. More importantly, it changed far more than the taste of our food. For more in-depth discussion, go to my Substack channel at DrSimpson.com Cooking Changed the Food We AteBefore humans learned to control fire, food was difficult work. Raw meat is tough. Many roots are fibrous. Grains are nearly impossible to eat without processing, and many plants lock away their nutrients behind tough cell walls. Then everything changed. Cooking unfolds proteins, softens connective tissue, gelatinizes starches, and breaks down plant cell walls. As a result, our digestive system has less work to do, and we gain access to more of the calories and nutrients already present in the food. In other words, cooking didn't create nutrition. It unlocked it. Then Cooking Made Food SaferHowever, the story doesn't stop with nutrition. Long before anyone understood bacteria or parasites, early humans discovered something through observation. Food cooked over a fire made people sick less often. Today we know why. Heat destroys many harmful bacteria. It kills many parasites. It reduces the risk of foodborne illness. Consequently, cooking likely became one of humanity's earliest public health tools. Groups that regularly cooked their food would have lost fewer children to severe diarrheal disease, had healthier adults, and retained more of the calories they worked so hard to obtain. That is a tremendous evolutionary advantage. Flavor Matters More Than You ThinkThere is another benefit that often gets overlooked. Cooking made food taste better. That may sound obvious, yet it is incredibly important. Humans don't simply eat because food contains nutrients. We eat because food is enjoyable. Cooking creates hundreds of new flavor compounds through browning reactions that simply don't occur in raw food. Think about the smell of fresh bread. Or grilled steak. Or roasted coffee. Those aromas are products of cooking. Likewise, a cooked potato bears little resemblance to a raw one. The texture changes. The flavor changes. Even the way our bodies digest the starch changes. Fire didn't just feed us. It invited us back for another meal. The Real Lesson from EvolutionUnfortunately, some people oversimplify this fascinating story. They argue that because meat was important during human evolution, the ideal modern diet must consist almost entirely of meat. The science doesn't support that conclusion. Cooking improved meat. It also improved roots. Cooking made tubers tasty. Then cooking softened grains. And finally, it made legumes digestible The evolutionary advantage wasn't eating one perfect food. Instead, it was becoming adaptable enough to thrive on many foods by transforming them with fire. That is a much more interesting story—and one much better supported by the evidence. Why This Still Matters TodayEven in modern kitchens, we continue using the same principles our ancestors discovered thousands of years ago. We cook food to improve digestibility. And we cook food to improve safety. We cook food because it tastes better. Most importantly, we gather around meals because cooking has always been about more than calories. It has always been about family, community, and sharing stories. Perhaps civilization didn't begin with the first city. Perhaps it began around the first campfire.

The Bank of Muscle: Why Your Real Retirement Account Isn't Your 401(k)I used to think retirement planning was all about money. Put enough away, let compound interest do its thing, and someday you'll enjoy the rewards. As I've gotten older, however, I've come to appreciate another form of savings that may be just as important. It's your muscle. Nobody reaches eighty-five and wishes they had less of it. Instead, people wish they could get out of a chair more easily. They wish they could carry groceries, travel, garden, and play with grandchildren. In other words, they wish they had more reserves. That's really what muscle buys us. Dad's First Retirement AccountI was fortunate. My father lived nearly ninety-nine years old, and he didn't simply survive. He lived. At eighty-five, Dad was walking three and a half miles every day. That's remarkable. Many people half his age don't walk that much. He had survived several heart attacks over the years, but he had reserves. Looking back, I realize that making it to eighty-five is one thing. Reaching eighty-five healthy enough to begin the sprint into your nineties is something else entirely. Dad didn't do anything exotic. He wasn't biohacking. He wasn't chasing supplements. He wasn't optimizing every laboratory value. He walked. And my mother cooked. Their meals weren't complicated. They enjoyed meat, potatoes, vegetables, soups, and desserts. They enjoyed life together. In hindsight, Dad was making deposits into his Bank of Muscle every day without ever calling it that. Then Life ChangedAs my mother's dementia slowly progressed, things began to fall apart. Dad stopped walking, not because he wanted to, but because he didn't want to leave Mom alone. He worried she might wander. At the same time, Mom stopped cooking. Breakfast became something out at a diner. Lunch might be a sandwich. Dinner often became cereal. I watched them both lose weight. Then I got the phone call no child wants. "Dad's in the hospital. He fell and couldn't get up." The fall wasn't the problem. Falls happen. What concerned me was that Dad no longer had enough reserve. After a couple of weeks in rehabilitation, I convinced him to move into an assisted living center close to our house. He wasn't thrilled with the idea, but something remarkable happened. Once Mom entered memory care and Dad had regular meals again, he began to thrive. He complained constantly about the food while gaining seventeen pounds. But he made friends and was always talking to someone or another. I would drive by and see him talking to anyone, from former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who lived there, and had a crush on my dad. My dad was making sure his neighbor got the newspaper, and yet he continued to complain about the food. All while gaining 17 pounds the first year. Twice a week, I would take Dad to dinner, and we would split a steak. The waitresses had a standing joke. They would ask him whether he wanted the kale salad. Dad would smile and say, "I grew up in an orphanage in Alaska. We grew kale, but we fed it to the cows. I'll eat the cow." He charmed every waitress in town. Eventually, after Mom died, Dad moved back home to Oregon and lived independently again. Visiting Angels helped with meals and companionship, but he was back in his own house. Looking back, I learned two things. Food matters. Muscle matters. Frailty Is the EnemyWe spend a lot of time talking about heart disease, cancer, cholesterol, and blood pressure. Those are important. However, frailty is another great enemy of aging. Frailty steals independence. One broken hip can change everything. A fall that would have been a nuisance at sixty can become life-changing at eighty-five. Muscle gives us reserve, and reserve allows us to recover. My father didn't avoid every setback. He survived them. That's what reserve does. Protein Helps, But It Isn't MagicThe supplement industry would love us to believe that a powder is all we need. Unfortunately, muscles didn't get the memo. Protein matters, especially as we age. Most experts recommend older adults consume about 1.2 to 1.5 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight each day, spread throughout the day rather than eaten all at once at dinner. For many people, that means aiming for twenty-five to thirty grams of protein at each meal.¹ However, protein alone isn't enough. A large meta-analysis found that protein supplementation without resistance exercise had limited effects on strength and muscle mass. In contrast, combining protein with resistance exercise produced meaningful improvements.² In other words, muscles need both building blocks and a reason to keep existing. Exercise Doesn't Have To Be FancyWhen people hear "resistance exercise," they often picture bodybuilders. That's not what the science requires. Walking hills counts. Gardening counts. Resistance bands count. Swimming counts. Carrying groceries counts. Yoga counts. For me, yoga became the answer. I'm not a gym person. Exercise isn't my hobby. I don't wake up every morning excited to work out. I do yoga because I know future Terry will appreciate it. I'm not training for the Olympics. I'm training for my eighties. Real Food Still WorksWhey protein is probably the most studied supplement because it's rich in leucine, an amino acid that helps stimulate muscle protein synthesis. As we age, muscles become less sensitive to that signal, which is why getting enough leucine becomes increasingly important.¹ Fortunately, you don't need expensive powders. Eggs, fish, dairy products, soy, beans, chicken, and meat all provide excellent protein. Personally, whey protein and I are not close friends. I've had lactose intolerance for years, and the slower gut that comes with GLP-1 therapy has made me even less tolerant of many whey products. Add stevia, sugar alcohols, and various flavorings, and my intestines politely object. Instead, I use egg protein or plant proteins. I avoid stevia because it tastes like electrical tape to me, and I don't need a chemistry experiment in a shaker bottle. Still, I recognize supplements have a role. If you're on a GLP-1 medication and eating less, or if you're simply busy, a protein shake or bar can be a useful tool. They aren't magic. They're convenient. A Father's WisdomAfter Mom died, Dad came to live with me in California. By then, I had discovered yoga. Dad teased me about it at first. Then one day, he looked at me and said something I've never forgotten. "I think you doing yoga is great. You're the right age. Doing this now is important. If yoga is what you like, buy all the spandex you want and keep doing it." Those words stayed with me. You're the right age. Doing this now is important. If you're lucky, your parents give you wisdom throughout your life. When you're young, you roll your eyes. Later, you realize those words become part of who you are. Money gets spent. Wisdom gets carried. Dad wasn't telling me to do yoga. He was telling me to keep moving. Make DepositsEvery age has different priorities. At twenty-five, you may be building a career. At forty-five, you may be raising children. At sixty-five, you may be protecting your muscle. At eighty-five, you may simply want enough reserve to get out of a chair and go to dinner with your family. The body doesn't really care whether those deposits come from yoga, barbells, swimming, pickleball, or walking. It only cares that you keep making deposits. Because someday you'll need to make a withdrawal. Life guarantees that. When that day comes, you'll be grateful for every walk, every stretch, every protein-rich meal, and every little thing you did, not because you loved doing them, but because they built reserve. Healthy aging isn't about dying young as slowly as possible. It's about building enough reserve so that when life knocks you down, you still have enough strength to get back up. And that may be the most important retirement account you'll ever own. ReferencesBauer J, Biolo G, Cederholm T, et al. Evidence-based recommendations for optimal dietary protein intake in older people: a position paper from the PROT-AGE Study Group. J Am Med Dir Assoc. 2013;14(8):542-559.Liao CD, Tsauo JY, Wu YT, et al. Effects of protein supplementation combined with resistance exercise on body composition and physical function in older adults: a meta-analysis. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. 2017;106(4):1078-1091.Cruz-Jentoft AJ, Bahat G, Bauer J, et al. Sarcopenia: revised European consensus on definition and diagnosis. Age and Ageing. 2019;48(1):16-31.