Well, hello ladies and gents, Robert Sykes, Keto, savage.com
and today I've got special guest master chef James Bear on the
line. He is the man behind pluck
seasoning, which is a organ blend seasoning.
I've had him on the podcast before but it's been quite some
time. Wanted to bring him back on and
just pick his brain about food chemistry, flavor profiles, what
he's doing with pluck and some of the new flavors that he's
come out with. We just honestly dive into all
kinds of things, talk about how to parent our kids around
nutrition and kind of how to incentivize them to eat quality
foods, real foods, even when they're outside the home.
We talk about different cooking modalities and techniques,
making sauces, what to watch out for when you're eating at at
restaurants, things of that nature.
So thoroughly enjoy the conversation.
We've got a lot of respect for James.
I love what he's doing with pluck seasoning and I have no
doubt that you will take something from this
conversation. So without further delay, sit
back, relax, enjoy the podcast with James
and we are live James. How are you brother?
I'm doing great, Robert, so good to talk to you again.
Hey man, it's a pleasure to have you back on the show.
You are the brains behind my favorite seasoning company,
Pluck, which I actually recorded a video.
I kind of did like a little product of you.
I've. I've been gone out of town for
so long and I had a whole bunch of pluck sitting on my my desk
and my man, I'm on a plug pluck. So I recorded a video about your
stuff today. Oh, you did?
Oh, we'll make sure to tag us. That's awesome.
I'll do it, man. I'll do it.
Well, give me some back story, man.
We we had you on. I don't remember when it was,
but it was probably a couple years now that you were on the
podcast last. But you've been doing all kinds
of cool things. The brand is growing.
What you're getting involved in is, is growing.
Just kind of bring me up to speed, man.
Catch me up since we talked last.
Yeah, I'm just really grateful to you.
You know you were one of the first podcasters that had me on
to talk about us and and you know that was kind of, I would
say during COVID, you know, even though it was slightly after,
but it was during a period where we couldn't really get our
product to people. You know, there were no
conferences that we could get samples to.
There was there was no grocery stores that were allowing us to
set up tables to give people taste.
And this is a product that really requires, you know,
either someone having tasted it, talking to their audience about
it or or someone getting to taste because it's it's it's
hard to, it's hard to kind of explain because everyone has
such a different association with organ meats.
They think they're disgusting or they have this specific idea of
what they're going to taste like.
And we're like, no, no, no, this.
We made it so that it tastes delicious.
And then that way you're getting all these nutrients, these organ
meats in your diet effortlessly. And I'm always trying to share
with people, you know, in like 20 years of being a professional
chef and just being in the food business, I I really feel like
I've boiled it down to like for someone to take a healthy habit,
really specifically food related, and to make it
something that is a habit like something that they're doing
daily, that that's kind of in. I call it the Netflix of food.
Like where they're it's effortless.
They're not thinking about it. They just pay their monthly fee
and they they watch the movies and it's done.
They just, they go on autopilot with it.
Well I've I've I've really, I've really kind of boiled it down to
that. It's got to hit two things.
It's got to be easy and it's got to be delicious and if you hit
both of those then there's literally no reason why anyone
would not use it right. It's and there were.
It could be COVID 4.58 point O. It doesn't matter if it's easy
and delicious. You're going to keep it in your
life. It's going to become lifestyle.
It's going to, it's going to be something you do because you
feel good doing it and and it tastes good, like 100%.
Vouch for your product being delicious and easy, I put it on
everything. I think I like the the
all-purpose blend the most if I had to pick one.
Yeah. And that's when we, when you and
I first talked that was our only product and now we have four
products. Now one is pure, which has no
salt, no seasoning. So that one's really great for
well, you have you're you're a father now and and it's great to
add to your child's foods, you know, particularly early on, get
them those organ meats without them fussing or whatnot.
And then it's really great for pets as well.
We have a lot of clients that put it on their cat and dog food
to just support their animals and getting organs.
Cause surprisingly a lot of pet food doesn't have organ meats in
it, which is kind of insane to me because if an animal is in
the wild, that's the first thing they're gonna eat.
Yeah, definitely counter to reality.
Remind me and the listeners your back story from a culinary
standpoint, like where have you come from in that regard?
Yeah. So 20 years been a been a chef.
I I went to colonial school in New York and knew that I didn't
want to cook at a kitchen or in a restaurant I should say.
And I wanted to help people and so became a a a personal chef
for and I was in LA at the time so I cooked for a lot of
celebrities and basically it just grew from there.
I was cooking for I'll just name drops and some people love
hearing this. I was cooking for Tom Cruise and
I left him to start a meal delivery service which was crazy
because it was 2007. If people know that date, that's
when we had that recession And so it's crazy for me to leave a
cushy job for my own business but but I did and I grew, grew
that meal delivery service from one person to hundreds and and
learned a lot. It's kind of like my Business
School in a sense because there was so much that I didn't know.
And then I sold that business and I started pluck.
And really pluck comes from the the desire to support my kids
health more mine and my kids health.
But to do it effortlessly, you know, I the one thing I I'm
always kind of supporting parents with is, you know,
there's that a lot of people nowadays, they, they cook, you
know, sometimes two to four meals a night.
And what they what they're doing is that, you know, they're
cooking for their child and they're cooking one meal for
their child and then they're cooking another meal for maybe
some other people in their family.
And then they're cooking another meal for themselves if they're
on a restrictive diet or anything like that.
And I'm always trying to tell people like, you know, there is
no such thing as kids food. It's it's just food and and and
there's no reason why kids can't eat what you're making for the
adults and and that's really what I try to do with pluck is
like look, organ meats are the most nutrient dense food on the
planet. Most people, what they're doing
is they're making pates. Sometimes they're cooking organ
meats on their own and they they make those pates.
They serve them on the table with all the other food and no
one eats them except the person that made it.
And I hear that countlessly. I mean, I'm talking like
homesteaders, people that eat, you know, nose to tail all the
time, they're always telling me they're like, yeah, I'm the one
that eats the Pate and no one else does.
And I'm like, yeah, I don't want to be that parent.
Like I don't want we work hard enough.
You know, Like, I don't. I don't want to be a parent that
gets in the kitchen, spends 30 to 60 minutes of my time making
food and then have someone not eat it.
So that's that's really where pluck comes from.
Because it it it's it's like you're getting that, that organ
meat nutrition and you're literally treating it like salt
and pepper. Like we put it on popcorn.
We put it on my kids put on their toast sometimes on rice,
on potatoes, on eggs, on meats, fish, chicken, you know it's
like you literally could put it on anything.
And most kids, I really haven't met a kid yet who doesn't like
it. But but kids truly flip for it
like they just they there's just I don't know if it's because
their body is just they're so already connected to their what
their body needs. And so the bodies are just
screaming for the nutrients and like so the minute that they get
in their mouth it tastes good. Or it's because the mix does
taste good. I don't know.
But I've been told countlessly from the from parents they're
like when we run out of pluck my kid cries and I'm like Oh my
gosh. That's why, you know, like
that's, I mean, I. I delicious.
I I got to know, man, how how old are your kids?
7:00 and 11:00. 7:00 and 11:00, You'd be proud of this.
We were cooking up some organ miss the other day.
I fried up some liver just like pan seared some liver cutting
the thin slices. And my 1 1/2 year old was eating
and he loves it, you know. So yeah, fortunate to have a son
that's not a picky eater. Yes, and and honestly, like it.
It starts now, right? The way you're doing it, where
you're introducing these foods. This is the time to do it now.
Don't hold your breath though, like, hopefully he stays in
adventurous Eater. But you know, like my, my 11
year old, at one point, I think when she was seven, she started
to get picky like things. She was like, gnawing meat off
the bones, eating tons of fat. And then at one point she was
like, she would see fat and she was like, I don't want that, I
don't, I won't eat that. And then, but yet what's so
ironic is she'll eat ground meat.
Like she'll eat ground lamb, but she then won't eat the fat off
of like, a lamb chop. And I'm like, well, honey, it's
the same thing. They're just they're just
grinding the fat in it. And she's like, I I prefer that
I'm fine. So it's just funny what what
happens as they get a little older and they get to choose.
It's, I think, I think food for most of us becomes that catalyst
for independence. It's like, well, I'm going to
choose what goes in my mouth. They probably, like, go to
school and they hear about what other kids like and don't like,
like they just want to emulate that.
Totally, totally. Yeah, I I think so.
But I, you know, I go back to like that's why it's so
important. Like what you're doing now is
you're introducing these foods because there is a baseline, you
know, there there is like what I like to call home base, you
know, it's like like I almost see my job as a parent really is
just to establish contrast for my daughters, you know, So that
way when they go out in the world because we can't control
the minute they leave our home, they're eating junk.
I mean the the schools the the, the the businesses out there,
even like libraries. Like it's it's crazy to me.
I'm, I'm on the East Coast now and like, it's crazy to me.
My kids will go to like this thing called like Mathnasium
where they're going to or they go to school or even the dentist
and they come out and they're like they have a lollipop or
Jolly Rancher in the mouth and I'm like what?
What? Where did you get that?
They're like, Oh yeah, they just gave it to us at the end and I'm
like why? Why do why do these institutions
or these businesses think that that's OK?
You know what I mean? Like the parents just are OK
with their kids getting this candy.
But but point is, is that we lose control the minute they
leave our home. So.
So my job, at least the way I see it, is like, well, I just
need to establish a baseline and something so that my kids
understand, like when they eat the way they we do at home, they
feel this way and when they eat the way they do out and out and
about, they feel a different way.
This is totally counter to where I had anticipated taking this
conversation, but I'm curious since we're on it.
When they first started going out from home and having more
independence, did you know right at the gates that you were going
to allow them to make their own choices in free will?
Or were you trying to be protective about that and kind
of like guard what they did and did not consume?
Like how did you approach that? I totally tried to guard it for
as long as I could. You know, like we were making
everything from scratch sending them with food from home as much
as we could. But you know what happened.
Robert is like God, man. Like as early as I want to say
first or second grade for my oldest one.
My my youngest one tends to kind of follow instructions a little
bit more. But my oldest one she's she's
just like I'm I'm going to if I see something that looks
interesting I'm going to explore you know and and so early on
when we were this when we were in Portland OR that school that
we were at they had this no thank you table and so my
daughter would be eating the food we we made for her in the
in the cafeteria. But then there was this table
that would have these flavored yogurts and apples and and pears
and sometimes other things like, I don't know, things that maybe
kids like ranch dressing with something or other, like
something that kids didn't want out of their lunch.
That was basically what the no thank you table was, is they
they got their lunch from the cafeteria and then anything they
didn't want they could put on that table and then anyone could
grab it. So we as parents immediately
lost out to this table that just had food on there, just
screaming to these kids, hey, take what you want.
And we were furious. We were totally furious, but we
had really no control over it because there was no one in the
cafeteria telling these kids, oh, your parents said you can't
do this, so please walk away. You know there was no one kind
of securing that area. And then the other thing that
happened which still to this day shocks me is that the school
would was requiring snacks every day at school.
So not only are they pushing these kind of snacks that
snacking habit on kids early on but what they did was they would
have parents supply it and you could tell the school at the
beginning you know like Oh my kids gluten free or or or give
any kind of dietary you know refer like dietary restriction.
But this school, it wasn't like this.
It was almost like the teacher was the one overseeing it.
And we got multiple calls because our daughters are gluten
free. And like we would get they're
not celiacs, but they're still sensitive to it.
And we would get this call like, oh, today Sasha by mistake got
gluten And it's because when you, the parents were just
bringing like Cheez its and and and just, you know basically
stuff from Costco that was in bulk and it was just all crap.
I mean all of it not not like it was like those gummy fruit
snacks that are just candy, you know, repackages something
that's healthy. It was like yeah Cheez, its and
pirate booty. I mean it was just all stuff
that you know if you're at all health conscious, you probably
don't want your kid eating. And we had no control literally
no control of the schools like what we have to provide the
snack. So if you're you're telling your
teacher like hey I don't want my kid eating it, now they're
ostracized because now they're the one kid, the only kid in the
entire class that doesn't get to eat the snack And so that's just
you know. Yeah.
I don't know what you. Just hit all these walls.
Because like Rigel's a year and a half and like, he was like,
I'm super proud of the fact that Crystal and I were keto long
before his inception, all throughout her pregnancy when
she was keto eating quality foods and he was born.
He's been keto since birth and he's like in the 99th percentile
for all growth metrics. So like, I want to maintain that
foundation and we're going to, we're planning on homeschooling
in the beginning initially. So we'll be able to oversee a
lot of that. We'll obviously prepare his own
food and, you know, let him do things with other kids and not
try to ostracize them. But I don't know, man.
Like, I don't know how As a parent, the best way to go about
that is other than just simply really trying to educate him
early on. But I don't know if he'll get
it, you know, I don't know. I don't know.
We'll have to just kind of see. But I want him to know and make
these own decisions out of his own self-interest and
preservation. But I just got to have a
conversation with him, I guess. Yeah, When I think, I think it's
important as parents like at least from my perspective that
it that we we do have to let go sometimes.
You know, like a lot of a lot of our inclination is to protect
our kids from everything. But you know, most of us came
from environments where we weren't protected.
You know, it's like our parents didn't know any better.
So we had to learn. We had to learn by falling off
that bike. You know, we had to learn by
making these mistakes. And I do believe we do have to
give our kids that opportunity as well.
But at the same time, like, to your point, like if you can, if
you're homeschooling and you can control what goes into their
body as long as you can. And I say you take that.
But then when they're on the out in the public and you know
you're not able to watch them. I also think that part of it is
kind of like relinquishing the control over it and kind of just
giving them the dignity of finding their own way because.
And but yet at the same time always when they come home
you're always eating a certain way.
Like they always know that coming home means this is the
way we eat. And the basically they're you're
always creating like that baseline of like this is how you
you'll always be able to explore other things.
But when you come back home, you're going to get to
recalibrate your body back to like that healthy zone and
you'll see how good you feel. And that happened, like my kids
went to this camp last summer and that camp just, you know,
they typical camp food. And my God, my oldest daughter
had all these pimples from it. And just you could tell she, she
wasn't healthy all summer. And she, she came home and she
was like, I didn't feel good eating that food.
And I'm like, yeah, I hear you because because they're using
all these vegetable seed oils, they're using all these fried
foods. They're they're they're using
all these poor ingredients. And I was, and she didn't like
the first week of eating home. She's like, I'm so glad to be
eating this food. Like, like she realized why we
feed her the way we do. And I'm like, OK, well that's
that's all I can do. Yeah.
That's all I can do and. That is all you can do, man.
I mean just and and kids are so much smarter than people give
them credit for. But what I don't understand is
when you have parents that get it like they've gone through
that journey, they've they've got their nutrition dialed in,
yet they'll still be the one out grocery shopping and buying food
specific for the kids because they don't want to have those
hard conversations or they don't want to fight their kids.
When their kid want the wants, the Gushers or the candy, it's
like that's just laziness on their part.
And maybe I'm premature in saying that because Ryze was not
to that point yet where he's verbalizing his thoughts.
But I feel like while they're in your home and you are the one
that's doing the grocery shop and if you've got this stuff
figured, I mean, if you don't know, you don't know.
But if you do know then then do right?
Well, you you are in particularly really good.
Like when I saw you at Kita Khan and you were you were on your
you were on your specific diet you know, eating plan.
You know, 'cause you were cutting.
Like, I remember, like I was like, hey, you want to try this?
You want to try? The heck no.
I you were like, I really want to like, I genuinely want to,
but I can't right now. And you were so good about that.
And I I was like, I was kind of blown away.
I was like, man, that's that's cool.
And I even aspire to be. I'm I'm pretty good.
Like I I would say I'm much better than I was previously.
But like, like I have those days where it's like sometimes I'm
like, you know maybe I didn't eat as soon enough.
And so now instead of me just kind of being mindful about what
I'm I'm eating now I'm eating over hungry and so I'm making
poor decisions or maybe I had bad sleep the night before which
always makes me have poor food decisions.
But but then the other thing, as a father sometimes, so I was
raised where these kind of dessert foods or candies or I
don't know what you want to just kind of junk food was used as a
reward, you know, from ice cream to candy, all of it.
And so it was like that's it's so ingrained in me like oh you
know we we made it through the week.
Let's go get pizza for dinner, you know or or oh, it's your
birthday. Let's let's go get ice cream or
you know the like these rewards that we do around these sugary
foods and and kind of junk foods is is.
Is what we're so socialized to do.
And so I I I feel it sometimes, like, I just find my kind of
knee jerk reaction is like, oh, there's free Dum Dum lollipops.
Let me grab 2 for my kids. Like literally it's a knee jerk
reaction of like, oh, I know they're going to like that, Let
me grab it. And I have to stop myself from
doing it. And then the other thing is that
I see this with a lot of fathers is this is how a lot of fathers.
And I feel this way too, sometimes.
If it's how we connect with our kids, it's like through
experiences and through the like, oh, well, let's go go for
a walk and then while we're out, let's you and I will have this
experience together where we'll get ice cream.
You know it. It's a lot of times how we're
connecting with our kids. Yeah, no, I I agree.
I think I just need to build connections that are, you know,
healthy. Like, rather than going for ice
cream, let's go grill a steak together, you know?
Totally. Or or just for a walk or like
just valuing that the the connection time versus what you
do in that time? Yeah.
And I like, I think food, like food is very important to us as
a society. I mean it's just kind of like we
have like we we get together for family gatherings and the the
center focal point is the food. And I get that, and I'm not
saying that we should ever try to remove that, but we should be
conscious of the fact that that is not the priority and that
should not be the zenith of what the experience entails.
Like at Thanksgiving, like, I talk about this every year for
Thanksgiving. You know, when you go to
Thanksgiving, it should be to be grateful to have thanks, to
spend quality time with your your family.
And if you are just eating copious amounts of junk food and
then you pass out on the couch for three hours because you're
in a food coma, then you're missing out on what the whole
point is. Like.
That should not be the the center point of the focus.
Totally. I yeah, I completely agree.
I was. I was just at this conference
just a few days ago and the guy leading the conference was, was
he, he was kind of a mindset guy, supporting people and
learning how to communicate not only to other people and in
within business and personal life, but also to yourself
differently. And he pointed out how like a
lot of people would say, I like they'll be talking about food
and they'll say I love food. And how when our brains hear
that or unconscious hears that, well, weak then connect.
Well, love is a very specific word.
And so our brains usually file love and, you know, connection
with people, you know, like I love my wife or I love my child,
right. So when you say I love food,
it's putting a deep connection to food.
Where is what we're really meaning to say is food is yummy.
Yeah. Right.
Like this food is delicious. This food is yummy and like it
has a even when I say it, it has a totally different level of
connection. And I, and I think that's one of
the issues, is that we're putting so much emphasis on
food, like so much from not only healthy food but also to stay
away from certain junk food. But that, that that we're
forgetting that, you know, food is to a certain degree is fuel
and and here I am, I'm a chef, right.
So, you know, flavor is so important to me.
But yet I'll also admit that I have put too much too much
emphasis on food at times to the point where I get so caught up
in it and and where I if I don't, let's just say if I'm
hungry and I don't have it in front of me that I start to
panic. Because that connection to it is
so overly strong, you know and I think I think kind of
intermittent fasting or even multiple day fasting helps you
with that, helps you kind of like like it helps to like
create some space between you and your cravings or you and
your attachment to food. And I think that's one of, I
think that's one of the things we've kind of lost a little bit
is we're it's just all these food shows and and food porn and
food foodie, this foodie that. It's like it's all it's fun and
games, but at the end of the day, food is fuel.
It's it's funny you're saying this because like this is
incredibly relevant to me right now.
Like when I'm in a a surplus or a building phase and I'm eating
ample amounts of calories. Like I don't even think about
food. I have, you know, like I'll,
I'll go without eating because I'm distracted or I'm busy.
I don't even think about it and I have to just like, you know,
scarf it down. It's just a thing that I do.
It's 100% fuel based, not even something I really enjoy, look
forward to. It just is what it is.
But when I'm in a deficit or 4% body fat, like I am now, like it
is a mental challenge throughout the day.
And it's an exercise that I do to to really not allow myself to
fixate or become obsessive about the food.
Because when you're this depleted and that is your life
source, you're literally running day-to-day.
So, like, you look forward to the meals, you think about the
meals, you're tracking your macros, you're thinking about
what you're going to eat to hit those macros.
Like you just are constantly inundated with these thoughts of
food, which can most definitely be taken to an unhealthy level.
So I've been pausing and trying to be present in things
unrelated to food prior to allowing myself to eat my meal,
which has been really good for me.
And I know that this will all, you know, stabilize once I'm
back up to a sustainable body fat percentage and eat more food
in general. But going through those phases,
you can like, I I totally see what you're saying.
And that's where a lot of people find them.
That's why people have eating disorders.
That's why a lot of competitors struggle with disordered eating
after a show. But you should never obsess and
fixate on food to the point where it distracts from
everything else in your life. Like food can and should be
enjoyed. It should nourish your body.
You should enjoy as you're consuming it, but it shouldn't
rule your life. I agree.
I think it's I think it's yeah it's negatively affecting so
many people and I think one of the reasons too is because you
know ancestrally flavor used to meet mean that the whatever you
found in nature that had flavor were also meant to had nutrition
and we're kind of all screwy with that now.
You know because things can have flavor but no nutrition because
of artificial and natural flavors, right.
And it's very confusing for our ancestrally designed bodies.
You know that this modern food is very new to us and our bodies
weren't originally designed for it.
So I think we're we're having a lot of, you know for lack of
better word like growing pains with it and I and it's kind of a
funny word since we're such an obese and overweight nation.
So clearly we're literally growing from these pains, but
it's just new, it's it's incredibly new in in most of the
foods, the majority of these ultra processed, well, really
all of the ultra processed foods, but but the majority of
what people are eating your body historically has never eaten
before and never, never sustained itself on.
So it's very confusing. There's a really interesting
quote. So this this professor of
archaeology, Bill Schindler. He wrote a book called I Love
Bill Schindler. He's one of my close friends.
Amazing, yeah. Love him too?
Yes, Doesn't surprise me. You guys are close.
You guys are both such good people.
But Bill Schindler's got a great quote.
He says we are the only species in the world that looks to
someone else to tell us what to eat.
Yeah, that is crazy, man. Right.
I mean it. It literally.
I, I, I repeat this all the time and it floors me every time I
say it. It's like think about how many
species are on this in this world.
I mean just so many and we are the only one that has lost its
way in terms of knowing what we're supposed to eat.
You know, it's like our big brains have brought us a lot of
great things, but they've also brought a lot of problems with
them and and and that's the big one is that we're losing touch
with it. And and one of the ways that
that's playing out is, you know, food in general is not as
nutrient as it used to be. We're inundated with all these
marketing and ultra processed foods.
It's confusing. We're marketed all these
different diets. We.
Just have too many options. We have too many options, man.
Like when you have a very limited number of options to
choose from, it becomes pretty clear the path you should take.
But when you have so much, like it's anxiety inducing, like when
you go to a restaurant and you've got 500 options to choose
from on the menu, that's exhausting.
Whereas if you go to a restaurant with like three
options, OK, let's go with that one and you'll enjoy it more.
Whereas if you get 500 options, you're constantly second
guessing yourself. Like, man, maybe I should have
got that one, that one may have been better.
This was OK, but I wish I would have picked this instead.
Like, we have too many options. Whereas if we just simply ate
real food that is naturally procured and we know where it
comes from, the options are pretty clear and the path
forward is pretty obvious. Absolutely.
And and and the keyword in that to me is eating.
I think we're locked in this idea of like, oh, because our
food is nutrient deficient, we have to supplement, which in
most cases we do. But what's happening in
particularly around organ meats is you're seeing the way most
people are getting them in their diet is they're taking
supplement, you know encapsulated organ meats.
And that's one of the reasons why I made pluck the way it is
where we're we're making it some as something you're adding to
your food because I think this swallowing of our nutrition
versus eating our nutrition is continuing to diss like
disconnect us from our food sources.
We already are disconnected from our food sources but it's it's
propelling it even deeper and further because if you think
about it, I use this as an example if I put salt in your
tongue. So we have a biological system
and it starts with when we see things with our eyes like the
color of the food, you know that that's that already starts a
process. When we bring it closer we can
smell it that also continues the process.
And then of course, once we bite it and start mastication
process, taste buds, the saliva, they all this is all part of a
process of communication that happens to our body.
It's a biological process, right?
But when I so when I put salt on your tongue, your your body
immediately, instantaneously communicates, Do I want more or
less of this? Do I need more or less of this?
Right. And anyone that's done salt on
their tongue, they'll know they can't really go past three dips.
Like it's pretty challenging to go too high because your body
will stop you a little. The salt will literally start to
taste disgusting. But if I were to swallow a salt
tablet, I get, I swallow it. Delayed response.
Nothing. No response, no communication.
And then 1520 minutes later, why am I bloated?
Oh, I just got too much of something.
So one is completely dictated by what your body needs.
The other is it's just guesswork.
And and we're continually staying in that guesswork.
And that's why so many people who take tons of supplements or
capsules, like they're sometimes feel very nauseous and sometimes
they're going overboard. Or some, you know, it's it's
it's just you're working against your body when you do that.
Yeah, totally agree man. I'm all for real.
And same thing like drinking supplements.
Like, I it's probably been three years since I've drank a protein
shake. Like I I don't, I don't drink
protein shakes. I mean, I eat my protein and I
chew the meat that it comes from.
Like that is as simple as that sounds.
What we've all come from as a species, so like there is a
place for supplementation for sure, but to make that the where
you get the majority of your nutrition, there's a disconnect
there. That's amazing.
You don't do That's awesome. Particularly since you
bodybuilder like that's amazing. You don't rely on protein
powders cuz I I've taken some over the years and even I
noticed sometimes I'll do them and I feel nauseous after them
and I'm like oh see this is perfect example like I'm I'm not
eating this I'm just drinking some isolate powder and and I'm
and now my body got got something that maybe it wouldn't
have wanted to had I chewed and eaten it.
You know I don't I don't know. But totally something's off.
We'll use protein powders in the bricks like they we use a a whey
protein concentrate in some of the brick flavors.
It's not and I said it's not, it's as minimally processed as
possible and it's all coming from grass fed sources.
But it's in a brick that I'm chewing.
You know, it's not like a a shake that I'm just shooting
back and drinking and I think that's super important.
I agree. Well, it's the same thing like
with juice, right? It's like, it's like we could
drink a glass of orange juice or we can eat an orange right in in
a glass of a glass of orange Juice is very different from
from eating orange. It's it's way more potent in
terms of like you're getting too much sugar.
It's it's like five oranges versus one.
And when you can probably never eat a whole five whole oranges,
right. It's like your body wouldn't let
you. So it's like, I agree like your
bricks, people are going to easily eat that and they can
stop when they need to and restart.
Versus with a drink you just think, oh, I'm supposed to drink
this whole glass And then and then instinctively we drink the
whole thing whether we want to or not just because we're
ingrained. Like I shouldn't be wasting,
right? Yeah, and I'm all for not
wasting. Like it's like a mortal sin in
my mind to throw food away. Like I I I buy what I need.
I procure what I need, I cook what I need, I eat what I need.
I don't like food waste because there's just so much waste in
this consumerism society we find ourselves anyways in anyways, so
I'm all for not wasting. But I mean just simply being
being mindful before you put it on the plate or in your glass in
the 1st place, We'll cut down on that.
Totally. I I think I always kind of joke
with myself though like that I that I have like you know like
Dust Bowl like my my my mentality around food is like
Dust Bowl era or something because.
Because like I see a plate of cookies and I'm like, oh, I
can't waste those. Oh, that ice cream cart that I
just opened the cart and I open. I have to eat the whole thing in
this one sitting. Because if I don't then it's
wait, you know, I'm I'm, I'm being wasteful.
Like, like I literally, that's the tricks my mind plays.
So now I've just learned why I can't even bring this stuff into
my house. Because the minute I do, I go
into that that kind of like, you know, there's people starving in
Somalia. I have to, you know, eat this
whole thing kind of mentality that I was raised with, so.
I'm a little different with that kind of food.
With that kind of food, I don't even view it as food.
So it's easier for me to throw that away.
Like if it was a piece of steak or something on the plate, I'm
like, Oh my gosh, we can't waste that.
But if it was like a a bag full of Oreos, I'm like, OK, that's
not even food to begin with. So that goes in the trash.
How did soup? But when did you acquire that
discipline or that kind of frame, frame of mind?
Because were you, were you raised with that discipline, or
were you raised on Standard American diet like most of us,
and then you had to learn it? Yeah, I mean, we, I was raised
eating real food. But like, my parents didn't know
any of the stuff that I know about nutrition.
My mom's recently gone keto and I'm super proud of her for that.
But like, I mean, I would eat TV dinners, I would eat candy, I
would eat, I would eat, you know, stuff that everybody ate.
But I was raised in a very disciplined fashion.
But it wasn't necessarily around food.
But you know, we'd also eat real quality food like my dad
haunted. So we would have, you know, wild
venison meat and everything. So I ate a lot of real food in
tandem with the junk food. But now knowing what I know and
learning as much as I have, it's like there's a stark contrast
between the two. So anything that is not real
food, I just have no problem viewing as not even food in the
1st place. Like if it's got an ingredient
list a mile long and it's full of a whole bunch of seed oils
and the carbohydrate count is significantly higher than the
fatter protein. Like, it's just it's not even
worth my consumption or time. Yeah that's that's really great
that you've you're you're able to kind of like maintain that
mindset and actually abide by it because like we were talking
about earlier, I mean a lot of us might have best intentions
but we still bring the junk into our house.
And I I really, I really do feel strongly like that that's where
that's where change really happens.
It's like, you know, sometimes our our desires, our cravings,
you know, that's going to pop up, you know, it just kind of
rears its ugly head sometimes. But where you can truly make
changes is what you bring into your house.
Because if it's if it's not in your house, you're not going to
eat it. Yeah, and also like the more
I've learned about regenerative agriculture.
Like, I've listened to several podcasts with Will Harris.
I've had Will Harris on the my podcast.
He's the one behind White Oak pastures.
Yeah, White Oaks, yeah. Yeah, I mean, the the more I
learn about how this is all intertwined and the more I've
learned about the the, you know, the beef commodity system and
what typical supermarket grocery stores are sourcing their food
from and how those animals are treated and what those animals
are fed. It's like you vote with your
dollar and what you bring into your home is a reflection of
that. So I honestly just don't want to
support those entities that are causing harm to the environment,
causing harm towards people's health and just doing it all for
the sake of making a buck. Like I just don't want to
contribute towards that at all. Yeah you're so right on.
You know I've I've that's the question I have asked for the
last 20 years is is like what what can we do to truly support
change you know and every you know early on that was that was
what was said in smaller circles.
Now it's wider circles. It's like where you vote with
your dollars, right. Like you only spend your money
but a lot of times you don't have like I I've talked to many
people they don't have as many options as other people do.
So, so sometimes you know you're still voting for something
that's not that great, but it's that's what your options are.
And you got to just, I mean you can just do the best you can
with what you got. So like if someone is, you know,
there are certainly cheaper options that are quality.
Like you can buy a bunch of eggs that are quality for a
relatively decent price, even though eggs have certainly
increased in cost. But like you know, if you can't
afford the creme de la creme cut of steak from the properly
sourced place, I'm not suggesting that you starve.
But if you can, then rather than spending the money on the flat
screen TV in your cart and forsaking the quality of your
groceries, like kind of shift that balance a little bit and
focus on the things that matter. I wholeheartedly agree.
I I'm always telling people, 'cause I I.
This is how I tend to think as well like, you know like the for
a long time there was it's still talked about but the mercury in
fish was a big topic and and so some people just stopped eating
fish, 'cause they were so afraid of getting mercury poison
poisoning. I I tend to look at and and a
lot of people don't eat conventional, you know, animal
meat because of these reasons. Sometimes they won't eat organs
because they're they have this misconception that these organs
have toxins in them or whatnot. And and I'm always trying to
spread the word of like, look, is it better to throw the baby
out with the bathwater or to just make sure you're not buying
the junk food, you know what I mean?
So like so like if you're. Restricted in what you can eat
or sorry, what in your income. So that's restricting you on
what you can buy. You still can buy meat, real
food and just keep away from all the ultra processed foods and if
that meets conventional and that's what it is, that's what
you can get. But I don't believe people
should just kind of like be like, well, I can't eat fish so
I'm not going to eat fish or I can't afford meat.
So I'm just not or or you know, like grass fed meat.
So I'm just not going to eat meat.
It's like, no, that's you shouldn't be all or nothing.
Like just get get eat the meat, but just get the best source
that you can afford in that moment.
But just don't go by the Doritos, the Oreos, and the, you
know, all the other crap like. Just don't do that.
Yeah, and plug in locally. Like we we've recently found a
nearby friend that he's raising his own lamb.
So I went over there and slaughtered one of his lamb for
him, helped him butcher it, and now I've got a freezer full of
lamb that have been literally fed nothing but what they've
forged. So as high a quality as you can
get. And I don't have to go through
the commodity system at all. And I'm supporting my local
community. It's cheaper.
It's much higher quality and more nutritious.
It's like take the effort to plug in locally and see what
options you have. I mean, there are so many people
that sell eggs. Once you start looking, I mean,
you can get locally pasture raised chicken eggs for pennies
on the dollar compared to what you're buying it for elsewhere.
It's just like you just take a little bit of effort.
You know, you bring up a good point too.
Like I think we've lost, it's in our economic system.
But you know back in the day people used to barter and
exchange, you know their, their their trades for things, you
know, right. So like like that's still
something people are willing to do and and you're only going to
find that out if you ask. And to your point like if, if
you, if you don't, if you can't, if you are unable to have
chickens let's say in your in your area because of some
ordinance or something. Like you can always see if you
can find the local neighborhood that can and even like go in
with the neighbor that wants to like put it on some chat form or
something like that and find the neighbor that's that can have
chickens that's willing to have them And then you both go in on
it or something you know and then you're you're you're sweet
you know you're you're each sharing in the bounty of the
eggs and eventually the chicken meat and or you're you're giving
them your skill and then they're giving you what their skill is.
So maybe if they have animals on their land that you get a
certain amount of product from them and then you're helping
them with their taxes or whatever it is you do, you know,
it's like I I I don't think we should always just look at it as
like what can I afford financially?
It's like, well, no. Like you just use your skills to
to to get the quality of the food that you want. 100% ma'am
100% I'm curious because you are a culinary genius.
What is your specialty with cooking like?
What do you enjoy and take the most pride in with food
preparation? I love sauces and dressings.
I like. I love them from day one.
I just. It's funny, my wife wrote a book
called Eat Naked and when she was first starting the
manuscript. So we were, we just met, right
when she was writing the manuscript and she was on her
recipe chapter and she was asking me all these questions.
And we ended up talking for two hours.
And one of the first questions I asked her was like, well, what
does eat naked mean, You know? And she's like, well, you know,
at that time she was like, you know, foods that are just whole,
foods that don't have all these sauces and dressings.
I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
I'm like, wait a second. If you don't put a sauce in a
dressing on something, then what distinguishes it from something
else? I'm like, I was like, that's
what to me, that's what brings the flavor.
And so right away I was like, you know, when I was starting
out as a chef, that's the part that I loved.
Like, I loved making dressings and sauces, but I loved using
real food to make them. And what I mean by that is like,
like, and this really only applies if someone who's
listening eats vegetables and whatnot.
But like, I would take things like carrots and I would add
them to dressings. I would like, peel cucumbers and
then deseed them. And I would add those to like,
peanut sauces and stuff like that if I was making like a
noodle dish or something. But I used real food to thicken
and flavor the sauces and dressings, like even onions I
use a lot. I'll take onions and I'll
caramelize them and then I'll blend them when if I'm making a
gravy for example or any sauce that I want to have kind of a
savory but sweet taste. Because when you caramelize
onions you get you bring out their natural sweetness And I I
just, I love that. I love that part of the process.
A lot of people don't know this but when you go to a restaurant
so most most of the sauces and dressings even restaurants are
pre made. So they're these places go to
like a place called restaurant Depot and most of the sauces and
dressings at restaurant Depot are like craft you know craft
sauces and stuff are best best brand and so they're all pre
made. They all have horrible
ingredients and this is it's just that's where most
restaurants and whatnot are getting up from and so.
Even high end restaurants. Yeah, even high end, absolutely.
Because they're saving money on that.
And the reason why they are is because, you know, a chef is
more costly than a cook. So cook is someone who can
perform a task. They don't necessarily
understand the chemistry of the food and that's not their Forte.
Whereas a chef is more more involved with the flavor, the
chemistry of flavor and how to take something that was bitter
and have how to make it, you know, taste better or how to
take something that's overly sweet.
And in trying to transition it so it's not so you know, find
the balance of the food flavor, that's what a chef usually is
trying to do. But a cook doesn't necessarily
know that, particularly someone who's on the line, they don't
always know that. And so when you're on a
restaurant, that's the majority of the people in the restaurant,
they're just following recipes, but they wouldn't necessarily
know how to get out of a corner regarding flavor.
And So what they're trained to do is OK if it's bitter or sour
you add sugar because that's how you get out of that corner and
and so that's what happens is when you when you go to a
restaurant a lot of times if they are making their own stuff
you'll find they're overly sweet and it's and then that's the
that's the reason. So, so either it's either
packaged or it's overly sweet like it's or overly salty.
So you it's kind of like rarely do you find things that are
truly, truly balanced unless you're going to a really high
end restaurant where they understand and focus on those
things. Yeah, no, that's I mean the
sauce is like I I don't even like going to restaurants for
food. I'll go sometimes for the
ambiance or like for interacting with the people.
But when it comes to like the actual food consumption, I
typically prefer my own food over what I get at a restaurant.
Like I cook a better steak than any steak houses I've been to to
a little bit there. But like, I know what the food
is prepared in. Like I know what the, the
quality of the meat is. I don't like.
I mean, even the really high end restaurants like they're not
typically using grass finished butter and the right oils like
they're using soybean oil because most people aren't going
to be able to distinguish that from a flavour profile and
they're going to totally save money.
Well, and exactly, yeah, you just nailed it.
Like there's they all have bottom lines.
They're just saving money. You know that's where like
restaurants and food products don't have I mean you know even
with the products we we have like there's they don't you
don't have a huge margin like usually and and so you have to
you know you either have to be a high end product, you know
because you're using quality ingredients and charge
appropriately or you have to cut costs somewhere and most
businesses are cutting them in the ingredients that you know
And then there's there's really 22 cheap ingredients when you
when you're creating a product for a grocery store.
And This is why you see these ingredients in everything is,
which is basically salt and sugar.
Those are the cheapest ingredients.
And then of course then from there goes to like the vegetable
oils versus you know, like extra virgin olive oil or something
like that or you know animal fats, stuff like that.
So, so they're cutting corners wherever they can.
Absolutely. And I agree with you like like
there's some quote by this famous chef who who says like
85% of cooking is is sourcing your ingredients.
Yeah, totally. Man, you know that that
ultimately if you get really, you know, delicious food, like
if you pick produce or fruit when it's in season, when you
get, when you get meat that has been raised properly and and
humanely treated, you know, and 100% grass fed.
When you get pastured poultry and that's been fed properly,
not just tons of soy and corn. When you when you get these
quality products, you don't have to do much to it.
It's it's all the flavors in it. You just have to like, not
overcook it. 100 percent, 100%. I've got a selfish question for
you. So you know, for Thanksgiving,
my family's always done a deep fried Turkey and it's delicious.
They always use peanut oil and I pretty much have deep fried
Turkey once a year at Thanksgiving.
So in the past, I've not really paid that much mind and really
and truly, I probably shouldn't losing sleep over it.
Once a year, however, I splurged and I got my own Turkey fryer
because I want to be able to cook with that modality.
And I splurged and I spent the money on 5 gallons of grass
finished Wagyu beef tallow to deep fry this Turkey.
And I'm I'm doing this Turkey on Thursday as a Christmas party
for my crew and I'm going to deep fry this Turkey with the
right seasoning and I got like a a properly sourced Turkey.
Like I'm going all out with this.
This is going to be the most expensive Turkey I've ever
eaten. But when it comes to this
tallow, you know when you heat fat, it, like tallow has a
higher smoking point than a lot of other fats.
But am I good to reuse that tallow for multiple cook
sessions or do you know much about that?
Well, you you, you can. But the key is that, yeah, the
key, the key is just you'll kind of know.
I mean, usually you can do it a few times, but eventually the
oil will burn. Eventually you know the fat will
burn so but you'll know it you'll you'll you'll smell it
you'll you'll see you'll see the color starts to change.
But like I'll I'll sometimes I make these gluten free chicken
tenders sometimes and I'll fry them in like lard or coconut oil
or something And it absolutely after a while it's like I I I
have to I change up the oil at one point you know I can do like
a couple rounds and then I think I end up doing about maybe 3
rounds and then I have to change it.
Now I'm not using as much oil as you're going to be using or fat
that you're going to be using for the Turkey.
But it's the same concept. I mean that's one of the reasons
why a lot of times when you go into a restaurant, if you if you
know what rancid oil smells like rancid oil, meaning that it's
been oxidized, overcooked and and just it's now bad, it's
turned, you'll smell it in the air the minute you walk in the
restaurant. So if they have a fryer, my
guess is that it will absolutely have that smell.
Like almost every establishment I've ever walked into has that
kind of it has almost like a bitter smell to it.
Like it just smells. You walk in and it just smells
off. At least it does to me.
And why not? People eat that stuff like,
etcetera. They don't even view it as food.
But like when you look at what people are eating on a daily
basis that you know their if their tendency is to go to a
fast food chain for lunch or something.
And you look at how that food is prepared using the oils that
they're using to fry things in, but then reusing it, who knows
how many times. Like it is literally just a
cesspool of not goodness that you're putting into your body.
Yeah, absolutely. And and I mean like this is
something you said earlier, it's like you only know what you
know. You know what I mean?
Like I I worked with these two, these women.
This is a long time ago, maybe 15 years ago I worked with these
women who were starting a restaurant and I was helping
develop the menu. And the 1st way we started out
in our relationship was they took, they drove me they would
they lived in like Long Beach area but they drove me all over
LA showing me their favorites of everything that they wanted the
restaurant like. So I had benchmarks.
So I knew like if they let's say they wanted roasted potatoes.
I knew that the potatoes that we created for the restaurant had
to either be as good or better than this place they took me to.
And so they took me to this place in Long Beach and it was
some kind of Thai place or something.
And they were like, these are the best fried potatoes around.
And the minute I walked in, I was like, oh, these are going to
be horrible. And they're like, what?
How do you. What are you talking about?
I'm like, can't you smell? Don't you smell that?
Like the way the air smells in here?
That's the oil. And that's the way those fried
potatoes are going to taste. It's going to taste gross, I
promise you. And they're like, what are you
talking about? The thing came.
I had 1/2 of one. I didn't even finish a whole
one. I had.
I had 1/2. And I'm like, Yep, tastes
disgusting. They're like, what do you.
We still don't know what you're talking about.
I'm like, OK, let me cook for you for two weeks, and then
we'll come back here and you tell me if it tastes the same.
And so for the next two weeks, I cooked really, you know, I
cooked the way I did. It was really clean.
We use proper oils. We we cook things properly and
quality product, everything. And then we went back two weeks
later and they couldn't even eat it.
They were, they were so disgusted.
And it was just because their bodies didn't know any
different. They didn't know what it what
properly fried food tastes like, you know, like food that's been
fried in lard or tallow. They didn't know what that
tastes like, that how clean that tastes, and how that how it's
supposed to taste. The palates were all kind of
ruined by all these ultra processed foods, and so of
course they didn't understand the difference until they had a
contrast. Yeah, 100% man people, they
don't know what they don't know what is.
What is your favorite cooking? Not utensil, but like apparatus,
like deep fryer, pan searing. Well, yeah, yeah.
A pan for me, like a pan is, you know, or any any kind of pan for
me is. And a chef's knife and a cutting
board. I could pretty much those three
things. I could do most everything I
need to. Are you a?
Cast iron Guy, are you stainless steel or what do you use for?
AI use stainless steel and cast iron.
But here's the thing with cast iron.
If you if you're high in your iron count, you know you got to
be careful because you do pick up iron in your food from when
you do use cast iron and and you just got to be careful, you know
you can get too much iron. If you're someone now for
someone who's anemic, cast ironers are great to use.
And same thing if you you know, if you the, the lady in your
life is menstruating, you should actually absolutely be cooking
on cast iron during when they're bleeding.
You know it's going to help replenish their iron.
There's like a a trick to cooking with stainless steel
around, like you have to get it blazing hot, tested with like a
drop or two of water, Like how does that whole process work?
Because I don't think a lot. Of people.
Yeah. Yeah.
I don't use the Teflon kind of stuff for all these newfangled
kind of like, you know, things that prevent the food from
sticking. Really.
What I do is I use yeah, you let the pan get hot but not so hot
that the minute you add the fat it's going to you know, it's
going to burn. But you do let you you let the
pan start to warm up. Then you add the fat and then
and I don't add too much just enough to coat the bottom and
and honestly like like a lot of people are like, oh, that's why
I love these Teflon things because I don't need to use fat.
It's like, well, I want the fat. Like I I want butter with my
eggs. I want some kind of fat, you
know, with my, with my steaks or or or animal products.
Like to me the fat is what helps process the protein.
You know what I mean? It's like it's it's necessary
and it adds flavor and and so I so that's why stainless steel
for me is not a problem because you just you heat up the pan a
little bit throw in some fat let that heat up and then just know
it. So every every time you add
something the pan is going to cool down.
So you start it you put it on the the stove top it starts to
heat up. The minute you add the fat, it
then now cools down a little bit and then the fat heats up.
But the minute you add food to that fat, now the fat is going
to cool down and so then you got to let it get back up temp.
That's why when you go to fry foods, you don't want to throw
the food in before the oil is above temperature or it's not
going to fry properly. And so that's definitely
something when you go to do your Turkey, make sure that oil you
know is truly at temp that the frying temperature you want
before you add that Turkey. Yeah, for sure.
Kind of going back to your expertise on sauces, I've had a
hankering for some keto friendly, like Indian style
food. What's a good keto friendly Thai
Curry sauce? Yeah, so how I would do it.
Well, when you say keto though, are you use, So you're clearly
you're still doing nuts, right? Not so much right now I'm not
opposed to doing nuts, but yeah, in general.
OK. Yeah.
So just making sure that I like because because I want to make
sure certainly because these ingredients that I'm going to
suggest are keto. But just, you know, give me,
give me. People without nuts, if you can.
Yeah. So I would use coconut milk.
OK, So that you know you're going to get a lot of fat from
that, but I would use that to thicken the this, the peanut
sauce. You might even experiment not
using peanuts because a lot of people there's a fungus that
grows on peanuts and that's typically what people get
allergic to and sensitive to. And it's hard even when they're
roasted, they still can be contaminated with it.
And so like anyone that kind of has, I don't know, I feel like
the two big things that we're going to see more and more of
like kind of fungal issues and mold issues and people like
these are the N and Lyme disease as well.
I think those three are we're going to see continue to
increase and we have to be mindful particularly of the
fungal stuff that what are the foods that contribute to it you
know and sugar contributes to it, peanuts, the any anything
that kind of supports fungal and bacterial growth.
But so I even like. So when I do, when I do like a
peanut sauce, I sometimes won't even use peanuts.
I'll use something else. I'll use like you could use
tiger nuts, which are legume as well if you don't want to use a
nut. But sometimes I'll use cashews,
sometimes I'll use macadamia nuts, like you can mix it up and
it will still taste nutty, like it doesn't have to be peanuts to
still get that across. And then what I'll do is I'll
I'll use coconut milk. I'll sometimes do instead of
doing caramelized onions. I'll caramelize shallots to get
that savory flavor in the peanuts, and it brings a
sweetness with it. But I'll blend those into it, I
will add. Coconut aminos, which I know
some keto people still will use, so that's good stuff, so I'll do
that to sweeten it instead of any sugar.
I will also add, like I'll said, I'll tend to add like a carrot
to it as well, just because I find it thickens it up.
Another thing you can do too is you can add like canned squash.
You know something, anything, precooked squash or something
like that to it. That will help to thicken it as
well, because that's really all you're doing is you're with a
peanut sauce, you're you're adding flavor, but then they're
making it thick with, you know, they're using peanut oil or some
kind of, you know, vegetable oil too to thicken it.
And so you just want to get around that and use your own
stuff. Because if you use coconut oil
to thicken it, then that means if when you go to put it in your
refrigerator, it's going to harden and olive oil isn't the
right flavor for it. So I tend to sometimes I'll add
a little bit of sesame oil, but I'll use like toasted sesame
oil. And toasted sesame oil is an
interesting one because it has really nice flavor, but it's
already been toasted right so it's already been cooked so you
don't want to cook it more. And a lot of people use it in
their when they're cooking, but I actually use it after I've
cooked the food, so I'll just lightly put it over something.
So I'll sometimes do that for for an oil I will use.
I'll say I I used it like I said, I use like sometimes
vegetables or caramelized onions, like I'll thicken things
like that. I'll use like butternut squash
sometimes to thicken things. So I'll get around that kind of
using peanut oils and things like that if I can that.
Makes sense, man. I'm not to give that a shot.
I'm kind of playing around like with this reverse diet, I'm
having one refeed day a week and I'll I'll allow myself some
increased flexibility on that day.
So about to try out some of these ideas of yours for sure.
Well, you know my you know what my favorite sauce is?
It's my favorite sauce is chimichurri.
Are you familiar with that? Oh yeah.
Yeah, I love that one.
I love that on. Lamb.
I love that on lamb. Oh yeah, but you could.
I mean, you should try it on everything.
I mean, it's so good on steaks too.
Or. How?
How you making them? So basically I take I take
parsley and then I you can use garlic too.
You can even add shallots if you want, but you just basically you
you mince up some herbs and I add some salt.
I'll use sometimes some dried oregano with the fresh parsley
and then you add a little bit of either lemon zest or lemon
juice. You can also use a little bit of
white vinegar. You just need something acidic
basically and you blend it. You can even add a little bit of
chili flakes if you like stuff that's a little spicier.
So Add all that. You blend it in either blender
or food processor. I usually just use a food
processor and then you put it all on a bowl and then you add
the olive oil after the fact and then you just kind of use a
spoon to to to mix it all together.
And so you get this kind of very loose herby dressing or not
dressing sauce, and it's just so good, 'cause it's oily, but at
the same time really flavorful. Manually, it's my favorite.
That's my favorite. Hands down my favorite.
I love it, love it, love it, love it so, and it's it's
Argentinian or South American sauce.
It's used a lot there, but it goes well on everything and it's
just so easy, so, so easy. And it's a great way to use
olive oil too because you know there's kind of controversy of
whether you can cook with it or not.
Now everyone in Italy cooks with it, of course, but some people
say Oh no, you shouldn't. But I've, I've talked to people
that have and I said no, you can.
But I've also used cooked with it myself and sometimes found
that it changes the taste. So I think it just depends on
your desires. But what's beautiful about
chimichurri is you're not cooking it.
It's a sauce you're, you know, drizzling over the food after
it's cooked. So it just, it's just optimized
like all of us, So good that way, you know?
That's why a lot of times when you're in Italy or Spain, like
the olive oil is just on the table.
You just drizzle everything with it because it's the olive oil in
its own right. It's just, it's just so
flavorful if it's done right. And it's virgin, you know?
Yeah, quality. Yeah, I.
Like that you'd be probably made I I made something pretty tasty
the other day. I've got.
I went hunting and I had you know several, you know, venison
roasts from that hunting trip and I got the from the
hindquarters. I punctured it all over with a
knife and I shoved garlic clove in each hole and then I seasoned
it with. I put some olive on their salt,
let it come to room temp, and then I seasoned it with this
like Rosemary spice blend. And then I wrapped the whole
thing with the mesentery or the cow fat from the lamb that I had
slaughtered the week before. So the the fat that holds all
the intestines and organs against the abdominal cavity.
And I wrapped this very lean, you know, Venison's incredibly
lean. So I wrapped it with that and
then roasted it in the grill and that was spectacular.
Have you ever cooked with cow fat?
No, but I well that's not true. Yes, I have there there's a
there's a sausage I used to get in Portland OR that would have
that over it and yes it's so good.
I mean that's the way to do it right When when fats are lean or
sorry protein is lean you you do you you're it's going to dry out
too fast unless you're like sous video you know unless you cook a
sous video or something like that.
But it's going to it's going to dry out if you do it any other
way. That's why a lot of, you know a
lot of times back in the day, I mean a lot of meat was eating,
eating fairly raw. You know, you know cooking,
cooking things particularly overcooking them you know,
contributes to excessive histamines and it it changes the
protein. It's harder to digest.
You know, I I don't I can't remember if I ever told you
this, but I back in the day. So when I was personal chefing a
lot, I used to basic experiment on myself with all these diets
because I would have to cook for people and make sure I
understood the diet so I could do them well.
So I used to do all, I mean you you name the trend, I probably
did it and but at one point I did raw or what it's called, I
guess it's called raw primal, that's what it's called.
And what it is, is you're eating, you're eating meat,
you're eating any animal product you want, but it's got to be
raw. I have not gotten on the raw
trend, but I have eating things that are much more rare than
normal. Like what I've been doing here
lately is I'll get like a pound of lamb or pound of ground beef
or venison and I'll just sear it on both sides, like just very,
very briefly on a hot cast iron skillet.
So I'm eating the middle of It's pretty well raw, but I've really
enjoyed that. Yeah, yeah, that's that's close.
I mean we we were eating it fully raw.
But yes that's that's that's kind of like the the the next
best way to do it and it's far better than cooking it all the
way through. But you'll probably find when
you do that. At least I found when I did
Primal. Raw Primal is that I didn't eat
as much protein because I I was I was basically every bit that I
ate was completely accessible. So I was really I I, you know I
wasn't it wasn't a truly a science experiment but I just
noticed I ate less but felt more full from what I ate and I
noticed like I felt energetically just amazing.
And I also everything about the digestive part from pooping to
everything. Like it just was so clean.
Like everything was perfect. And I did that for an entire
month and I felt better than I ever have.
But the biggest issue is that it wasn't really sustainable
because I had a new I had a one year old.
It would be like me, you doing that right now basically is
that's where I was at in my life.
And, you know, you know, it's kind of, it's hard to eat one
way and have your child eat a different way and you can't
really, like you probably are facing this sometimes with your
bodybuilding, Like when you're at a specific diet, it's hard to
go out to eat with people because you can't eat certain
foods. You can't go to parties because
you just, you know, it doesn't totally fit, you know, societal
norms. And and that's kind of why we
backed off of it because it was like, well, this is great.
I feel great. But I'm not, I'm not fully
getting to enjoy the norms of life.
Yeah, totally. Yeah, yeah.
I mean, if you're eating raw food, I would think that it's
pretty imperative that you know where it's coming from too.
Like like you don't know if you don't know how it's processed,
like you, you run the risk of how it being processed
contributing some form of foodborne illness.
So I don't typically do that with food that I would just pick
up from anywhere. But but yeah, it is interesting
how the degree of cooking changes a nutrient breakdown and
absorption in the body. So fascinating stuff, man.
Yeah it really is. I mean that that's the one
that's kind of the cool thing too about with you know freeze
dried organ meats is that like with with pluck even it's it's
raw when it when it gets processed.
So what they do is very similar to sushi is like they they
process the animal they immediately freeze the organs in
14 days. I think it is is that kills any
kind of anything that might be in it and then they they then
process the organs they unfreeze them and process them to uniform
size and then they freeze dry them.
So it's it's really is it's like it's just that's the way that's
that's going to be the most nutrient dense you can get it
and and then you know and then you can add it to your food you
can cook with it you can add it as a finishing salt.
What do you do with it from there?
It's up to you. But I'm just I'm just such a as
we've been talking about this whole time.
I'm just such a fan of like you know really being mindful about
what we put in our mouths that you know like we were talking
about with kids that they they start to exert a certain amount
of control and that's where it starts is what what they get to
put into their mouth. But we have to you know I think
as adults we got to use our our innate intelligence to to kind
of be mindful of like you know when when this doesn't work then
I should really stick to that. And I know that for me the junk
foods bringing them home, eating them that don't it just doesn't
work. Like it doesn't, it doesn't make
me feel good and I know better. And so now I don't need them,
you know, and I and I'm much more mindful about what I put in
my mouth. And I I hope that we all
progress that place because if we don't, we're just going to
continue on this cycle of, you know, chronic disease and
letting corporations kind of like and pharmaceutical
companies kind of dictate our journeys.
And it's not. That's not very high quality of
life. Yeah, no, I 100% agree, man.
We are most definitely speaking the same language.
I love what you're doing. I love the product that you've
made available to us. This whole conversation has been
great. It's made me hungry.
You can rest assured that when I go home for dinner tonight, I'm
gonna cook up my nearly raw seared venison and it's gonna be
seasoned with your pluck, all-purpose blend.
You can you can rest easy knowing that's gonna be the
case. Love it.
Yeah. Thank you Robert.
So appreciate you and and what you do and how you spread your
your you message in your talents to the world.
So thank you for modeling all that.
Appreciate it, man. Appreciate it.
Where do people go to find out more about you?
Get some pluck seasoning and improve their health and flavor.
Yeah, you can find us on an Amazon if you want to simply go
there. And you can also find us at
eatluck.com. And we got lots of exciting
changes coming in the new year. We just had larger bags
available now, so you get more and you Payless in the long run.
And we got some fun stuff coming in 2024.
And maybe, if we're lucky, Robert's going to make a savory
keto keto brick bar, right? That is potentially in the
pipeline. Man, I don't want to don't want
to make any promises yet, but I am working on something for
sure. Everyone should know.
I only said that because I want you to encourage him to make a
save. I want everyone to e-mail Robert
or message and say, yeah, yeah, let's make a savory keto brick,
you know, So I'm trying to push. Push the scales.
I made some samples and I've I've got a few prototypes and
I've been playing around with it and it's like man, I I it's hard
for me to make you know sample keto bricks that I'm
experimenting with when I'm in a prep because I've got to like
change all the macros up for like a very small, you know,
bite sized portion. But now the competitions are
over I'll be able to come out with some new formulas.
So definitely get ready to get some exciting things in 2024.
Plan for the bricks for sure. Nice.
I'm excited. Well, awesome, man.
Keep killing and keep doing what you're doing.
Keep eating healthy and making it accessible for others.
And if there's ever anything I could do for you, man, you know
how to get a hold of me. I do, and I very appreciate you
and it's very mutual. Awesome brother.
Well, until next time, man. Take care and happy holidays to
you. You as well.