I’m a nutritionist with a BSc in Public Nutrition and a MSc in Clinical Nutrition. Throughout my formal nutrition education, I learned nothing about evolution. I learned a lot about the nutrients that make up the food we eat, chemistry, appetite regulation, statistics, and human physiology, among other things, but nothing about evolutionary biology. I […]
Nutrition
Ask Eirik: Did Our Hunter-Gatherer Forebears Eat Fermented Foods?
In several of my articles on fermented foods, I’ve stated that our preagricultural ancestors consumed primarily fresh foods, as opposed to fermented ones, and that I think we would be wise to follow in their footsteps. I strongly believe that people who harbor a dysbiotic gut microbiota can benefit from consuming small-moderate quantities of certain […]
The First Ever Clinical Study on Fermented Vegetables and Irritable Bowel Syndrome
I came up with the idea for, and was in charge of planning and conducting, what is to my knowledge the first ever clinical research study that has looked into the efficacy of fermented vegetables in the treatment of Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS). The study, which was recently published in the journal Food & Function, […]
Why I Eschew Salt
Salt is a ubiquitous part of our current nutritional environment. It’s found in almost all convenience foods and in several of the food products that make up the foundation of the diet the average Joe and Jane eat, including in “the staff of life”, AKA bread, which typically contains as much as 1-1,5 grams of […]
Paleolithic Nutrition: A Powerful Concept That Should Be Protected and Preserved
Not so long ago, it started becoming trendy to eat like a hunter-gatherer. A lot of people ditched grains, dairy products, and processed foods and stocked up on grass-fed meats, eggs and fresh fruits and vegetables. As I see it, that’s a good thing. In the time that has passed since the public was first […]
Root Vegetables: A Viable & Healthy Alternative to Grains
In the time that has passed since the Agricultural Revolution first took hold in the Fertile Crescent some 12.000 years ago, the part of the human diet that consists of cereal grains has swelled dramatically. Today, most humans consume significant quantities of wheat, barley, rice, and/or other grains on a daily basis. Over the same […]
Ask Eirik: Should I Consume Fermented Vegetables?
Fermented vegetables are high on the list of things I’ve received the most questions about from readers of Darwinian-Medicine.com. That’s not particularly surprising, seeing as I have talked a lot about fermented vegetables in relation to gut health and microbiome restoration here on the site; was in charge of planning and conducting the first ever […]
The Unique Fatty Acid Profile of Coconuts
The nutritionists and professors who are responsible for designing dietary guidelines for the public are not fond of saturated fat. They have long argued that we would all be wise to limit our consumption of cheese, butter, ghee, bacon, sausages, and other foods that are very high in saturated fatty acids. I stand behind this […]
Fix Your Diet. Fix Your Microbiome.
Your health is intertwined with the health of your microbiota. If your microbiota is diverse, resilient, and dominated by bacteria that agree with your biology, then that means that you possess a natural defense against diabetes, colon cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, and a plethora of other diseases and health problems. Unless you’ve […]
How Bread Messes With the Head
Yesterday, as I was rushing through a local grocery store that was one the verge of closing up for the day in pursuit of something to eat the remaining days of Easter, I was taken off guard by a craving for bread that came out of nowhere. I could feel that my body wanted some […]