Chef AJ - Lasting Weight Loss Through Calorie Density - ENCORE

If you think you know Chef AJ, buckle up. She talks about her traumatic childhood that resulted in her living with her aunt who was a Cordon Bleu chef. That aunt changed the trajectory of her life. She journeyed from being food addicted, obese, anorexic, and sugar addicted, to finding a sustainable way to maintain a healthy weight through the principles of calorie density. She explains how food affects weight, health, and aging. She shares the story of her sugar addiction and how someone told her that she was compensating for the lack of sweetness in her life by eating so much sugar. At the time, she thought he was crazy; but he was spot on. Chef AJ’s latest cookbook, Sweet Indulgence, offers a collection of delicious and healthy dessert recipes that are vegan, gluten-free, and sugar-free.

 https://sweetindulgence.chefaj.com/

https://www.youtube.com/@CHEFAJ/videos

 
https://wellelephant.com/ ACE40 discount code for ACE Plant-based Eating Class

Transcript

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Hi, friends. Lauren here. I want to wish you a very, very happy and healthy and prosperous New Year. This week we are running an encore presentation with chef AJ, one of our very favorite guests, and I believe that she's one of yours too. She's going to be talking about lasting weight loss through calorie density. And if you don't know chef AJ get ready. She is truly an interesting person. She talks about her traumatic childhood that resulted in her living with an aunt who is a cordon blue chef, and that really changed the trajectory of her life. And that's how she became the chef that we know and love. So give a listen and we will be back in February. Take care. Friends. Hi, friends. I'm Lauren Bernick and I'm flipping the script about growing older. My guests have been influencers since before that was even a thing. Welcome to the anti Anti-Aging podcast. Welcome to age like a badass mother Abby J or chef AJ, as she's known, has been devoted to a plant exclusive diet for nearly 50 years. A chef, culinary instructor, and professional speaker. She's the author of three bestselling books The Secret to Ultimate Weight Loss A Revolutionary Approach to Conquer Cravings, Overcome Food Addiction, and Lose Weight Without Going Hungry on Your Health. And the 10th anniversary edition of unprocessed and the soon to be released fourth book, a cookbook devoted entirely to desserts called Sweet Indulgence. Chef AJ's culinary career started at age seven when she received an Easy-Bake oven for Hanukkah. She moved on to be the executive pastry chef at Santi Restaurant, Los Angeles, where she was famous for her vegan sugar, oil, salt and gluten free desserts, which use the fruit, the whole fruit, and nothing but the whole fruit. She broadcasts her show chef AJ live on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and X daily. She's the creator of the Ultimate Weight Loss program, which has helped hundreds of people achieve the health and body that they deserve. And she's proud to say that her IQ is higher than her cholesterol. In 2018, she was inducted into the Vegetarian Hall of Fame. I'm proud to say that this badass mother is my good friend. Please help me welcome chef AJ. Now the roles reversed because I've been interviewing you for years. Monthly on chef AJ live plant based classics. And now you're going to actually make me talk today. I know I was thinking about that. I was like, I don't think she's going to relinquish control very easily. I'm asking I'm waiting for you to start interviewing me. So you have been plant exclusive for 40 something years. You know, the thing I think about you and I was rereading, unprocessed, your story and unprocessed. And, you know, I you're so upbeat and phenomenal, and I forget. I forget you really had some tough times, like you had you you got off to a rough start in life. You had seen it. I did. Can you I mean, tell a little bit about, you know, early life, depressing things, a little depressing, but it also brings us to where you are. Yeah, yeah. So I don't know. You know, I had, my father was, kicked in the head by a horse. And I say that because I think that accounts for a lot of his, violent behavior. He. You know, I didn't know him before that incident. So I can't really vouch for what he was like. But when I talked to neurologists today, you know, he didn't have brain scans or MRIs. They said that, you know, that kind of injury, it was visible, too, because he had this big gash in his head, like Frankenstein. Like it wasn't just like a little kick. It was like he was really kicked in the head by a horse. They said that can make a person, you know, violent. And so, you know, I think part of it maybe he had a disagreeable personality to begin with and it just intensified it. So, yeah, there was a lot of, you know, violence in the first 11 years of my life. And I really never disclose it in my books. I mean, I kind of give what Glenn Mercer says, the Disney version of my childhood because it's not, you know, my job to depress the reader. I mean, I do talk about it to people if if I feel it would help them. But mainly it was just it, you know, you can still have a rough start in life. You can have a rough life and still, you know, succeed in certain areas and maybe in all areas. But but the reason I did that, specific for my weight loss book is after working with so many people on weight loss, you know, a lot of them have had trauma and negative experiences, but so have people that don't have weight problems. That's what people don't seem to understand. And it was pointed out to me by Doctor Doug Lyle that, you know, there are actually more overweight men in the world statistically than women, and they have not necessarily had trauma. And so I'm not I'm not diminishing trauma in any way. I think people should get trauma therapy if they are suffering from past trauma. But that's not the reason you are overweight today. For most people, it has to do with the food, the food. But so when your dad left, you ended up living with some aunts. Your mom had to go to work. And so that part tell tell about that part a little bit. Yeah, that was it. That was a happy ending, actually. Until my mom came and took me back. No, I'm just kidding. So. So I was very blessed. You know, the thing is, is you don't always know, at 11 years old that what is happening is the best for you. Because even though it was a horrible childhood, I, you know, you still don't want to leave your parents because it's scary, you know, flying halfway across the country to live with an aunt and uncle, even though they were my favorite aunt and uncle. You know, it was scary and my aunt was amazing. She was born and raised in Switzerland, and she was the most loving, kind person I have ever met. And we lived with her, my uncle, my two boy cousins that were a little bit older than me and they were just they were like, you know, more like brothers to me than my brothers, who, you know, because when when there's trauma and abuse in a family, sometimes the siblings can really bind together and love and support each other, and sometimes they all forgo their separate corners of the world. And that's kind of what happened in my family. So having my boy cousins, Phil and Paul, that was a wonderful experience because, I mean, they were jokesters. I mean, they would tease me, but it was nothing like the childhood that I had had in Chicago. But what was the coolest thing about living there? One of the coolest things is my aunt's mother. Her name was Blanche, but they called her Mamie. I think maybe that was they. They spoke French in the house, you know, so I had to learn French pretty quick to keep up. And she was a Cordon Bleu chef. She had a five star restaurant in Switzerland. And so she did all the cooking in the family, because my uncle was a medical doctor, and he worked and my aunt was raising the kids. And so Mae made every single meal and every meal. It was like literally eating at a French restaurant every single night. There was no recipes. Mae Mae didn't speak English, so I couldn't really say, what are you doing? How are you doing it? But I could watch and she would go to like, I don't know if they had Farmer's market in 1971 like they have now. Like, you know, you can go buy stuff, but you go to the, the most, the best store that we had in, in, in that area which is called Gelson's. There's still a few left in Southern California. And she would buy the ingredients like leeks and she would just made without recipes, just amazing meals that, like most people don't eat in their whole life, but especially when you're 11, like, you know, like leeks with, you know what? I can't even like the sauce is like like in things with gruyere cheese and fondue and souffle. Oh, grandma. Yeah. And Amy's, I mean, like, the food was, I mean, that's probably pretty high and fat. It wasn't vegan, but, I mean, it was amazing. And what was interesting is my aunt was never overweight and neither was her mother. And yet they were able to eat this rich food because, you know, you know, they weren't eating processed food. That was one thing I noticed. I mean, they did have it in the house, you know, for their boys with Nestle Crunch in the pantry. And they were cereals, but they, they, they did not eat any processed food. My and what was interesting is they had the salad after the meal and that was, I guess, a palate cleanser, which, which is really interesting because, you know, if you're teaching people calorie density, you want to have the salad first to kind of fill up. But my aunt made the best salad dressing, and I never could get the recipe from her, not because she wouldn't give it, because that whole family cooked without recipe. She just took the vinegar. Took the oil, took this. I mean, that's how they all cooked. And that's kind of how I like to cook today. That's how I prefer to cook. But, you know, people always want exact recipes. And I'm like, no, just learn it. Don't learn that, learn that way. It's so much better because then you don't have to worry if you don't have enough of the ingredients. Just I don't know, the word for cooking like that may be improvizational, but that was the best, you know, so I could see her, like, you know, making, like, she would make, like, a pear galette and, you know, she would use, you know, real butter. Not not this fake, you know, you know, margarine or oil, but she didn't use real butter, and, you know, but she she could just craft things. And it was just like you know, to me, like it was the funniest thing in the world. We didn't have food TV back then, but it was sort of like watching it. And I, you know, I think, I think if I have good qualities, I think it's because they were instilled in me by my aunt. I love my Aunt Ramone. It's just more than anyone. So you went from a obese to anorexic, obese, blah blah. So what what was like the rock bottom and then how did you pull your self out of that? Well, there was a lot of rock bottom. So, I'll talk about I'll talk about my rock bottom with my weight. So it really wasn't, you know, I, I, I just assumed that, I mean, well, first of all, it is genetic. It's very, how how heavy or lean you are on any given diet that is genetic. And it's like Doctor Lyle talks about how 80% of your weight is heritable, but it's the other 20% that we have control our diet, our lifestyle, whether we exercise or not, those kind of things. And so because everybody in my family was obese or morbidly obese, I just thought I was doing pretty good, only weighing, you know, about 180 pounds at five foot six, instead of weighing, you know, like more than 2 or 300, like other people in my family of similar height. So I just accepted that this is my lot in life. And this was my set point, because no matter what I did, my weight would always come back to at least one 6165. And so I, I kind of gave up, you know, that I would ever, you know, be slender without having to use drugs like sense and which was the ozempic of my day more or, you know, not eating at all, which was what I did in my teens, which I don't recommend. And then what happened is shortly before my I think it was my 50th birthday, I, I fell, I slipped in an office building and it was it was caught on camera. It was a person mopping didn't put the sign. And I had this really horrific break in my left knee. And so of course I went to the emergency room was a really, really bad break and I was too fat for crutches I just couldn't use. So I, you know, I was I could not, you know, carry that much weight like, you know, and I couldn't use a walker. So I had to be in a wheelchair for four months because I couldn't, I just didn't have the upper body strength. And I had too much weight to, you know, to do anything. And so it was just very I don't like people taking care of me in that aspect. And I just, you know, didn't like that I couldn't take care of my own needs. I was, but they call them ADL activities of daily living. My own going to the bathroom, showering. And and I felt humiliated and embarrassed. And I said, okay, you know, because I had heard from one of the orthopedic doctors said, hey, you know, did you know that every pound you're overweight is like 10 pounds of pressure to your knee? Have you ever thought about losing weight? And I thought I, you know, I felt like saying, no, I haven't really, you know, but but it did kind of stick with me when he said that because I didn't realize that having this extra weight, it wasn't just like a visual thing, you know, that I was disgusted with myself. It actually was impacting my ability to live my life and do my job. And at the time, I was a pastry chef, had a restaurant, a vegan pastry chef, which, by the way, like, if you're a food addict, I don't recommend being in the baking business. But, I didn't know quite that again. And so that's kind of what happened is, I'm like, okay, well, now I got to figure this out, and I got to figure out a way that's sustainable because, ten is not sustainable. Plus, it was taken off the market by the FDA. Anorexia is not sustainable. And so it was going to the True North Health Center in January of 2011 and meeting Doctor Lyle, Doctor Gold Hammer, that I finally understood what was sustainable, not just for optimal health but for weight loss, which was calorie density. And by the way, I didn't invent calorie density. I mean, doctor Dean Ornish had written a book, a bestselling book in 1980, based in the principles of calorie density called Eat More, Way Less. And doctor McDougall also had a bestselling book called the McDougall program for Maximum Weight Loss. And the thing is, is up until audible, I never read a book. And so I had these books, probably, but I didn't read it. But having Doctor Lyle and Doctor Hammer there because they lectured there every week, you know, when it was explained to me, kind of like in a, in a classroom kind of fashion with a PowerPoint and the ability to ask questions. It was like, you know, like Oprah says, a light bulb moment. And it's like, wow, you really can't eat more and weigh less. And that's why people that really will commit to this and just put the nuts and the seeds and the avocado and the tofu and the oil aside just for like 30 days or even three weeks. I've never not seen it work. And, you know, people vary in the sensitivity of their stretch receptors. You know, satiety is based on a few things calories, nutrients and stretch. And so there are people like my husband. It's like that movie Life of Brian. He can eat like one little cookies for. And there's people like me, and you know who you are that need more gas in the tank just to activate our receptors. I think it's genetic and maybe a discordant history of dieting might have played a factor, but I do think it's largely genetic. And so I can't weigh in, measure my food in skimpy little portions. I need a lot of food. So like, my lunch is always like, I don't know, like two and a half pounds. They say that we eat. They say that most people Barbara Rawls, who's done the most research in calorie density at Penn State University, where she studies human eating behavior in her lab, she says most humans, adult humans for sure eat about 3 to 5 pounds of food a day. And so some people are on the lower end, some on the higher end. And so I need more volume in order to feel whole. And so this is what's so great to me is that, you know, I can eat big volumes of food and, and maintain a slender weight. And, whereas before I was eating very calorically dense food and not really eating that much food, which means I'm not only was overweight, but I was also hungry because I wasn't eating enough food. Well, can you explain that a little bit? So first of all, you know, calorie density and, that kind of thing. And, well, just explain the theory of that. But also, you know, we're talking about a whole food plant based diet. So if people don't know that it's legumes. So beans, peas, lentils, whole grains like brown rice and oats and quinoa, things like that. Fruits, vegetables, a little bit of nuts of seeds okay. And no oil. But so explain about calorie density with this. So yeah. And you know, there's a book called Value Metrics that Doctor Barbara Rawls wrote. And that is when I finally started understanding it. It's funny because I paid a dollar for the book. It was at one of those used bookstores. And boy, did that change my life because she had photos in the book. And I can learn better when I see, you know, like, that's why I love this. That's why I probably I learned calorie density better at True North because they were doing PowerPoints and I was like, oh, here's a picture. And she had pictures in her book. And for example, she said for the same amount of calories and a quarter cup of raisins, you could have two cups of grapes. What is going to fill you up more? And she had a lot of these kind of, comparisons in her book. So calorie density, which actually the doctors often call it energy density. It's the same thing. It's simply means calories per pound of food. And people say, well, I don't need a pound of food. Well, of course you do. You need several pounds of food a day. You may not eat a pound of a given food at a time, although I do, I easily eat a pound of potatoes every serving and a pound of fruit when I eat fruit or a pound of vegetables. But people need to understand that food varies in calorie density. Calories per pound from about 100 calories per pound on the low end, which are vegetables, non-starchy vegetables, and 4000 calories per pound on the high end, which is oil or oil. Whether it's flax, avocado, olive oil, coconut oil. And so there's a 40 fold difference in the calorie density of food. And if people are wanting to lose weight, if they simply change the average calorie density of the foods they're eating to what I call friends to the left or the red line fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, they can eat twice as much food and take in half as many calories. The problem is, most Americans eat. When I call to the right of the red line, they're eating animal products. They're eating processed sugar, processed flour, oils, and and that's that's the problem. Now, the thing is, is it's not that you can never have nuts and seeds or avocado. I eat avocado, I eat some seeds. I try not to eat nuts very often, but you just have to be mindful of their caloric density because they're about 3000 calories per pound for the nuts and seeds. And so, you know, for 300 calories per pound, I can have a pound of oatmeal. Right? So so once you you don't have to memorize how many calories in a cup of blueberries or half a cup of rice like Weight Watchers would have them. Do you just have to know, vegetables are about 100 calories per pound, fruits about 2 to 300 calories per pound, oatmeal, and things like potatoes and sweet potatoes. They're about 3 to 400 calories per pound. Whole grains, about 500 calories per pound. And legumes, beans, beans, Phillips lentils, 550 to 600 calories per pound. And then the winter squashes are actually only about 200 calories per pound. And so if you concentrate on getting most of your calories from these foods, you can eat what's called ad libitum. That doesn't mean you can't have a slice of avocado on your salad, or, you know, a quarter of an avocado or an ounce and nuts. It's just you've got to be mindful of the varying caloric densities. Also, when it comes to processed foods like sugar, like flour, like oil, there's no there's no fiber. And, you know, people always worry about where where vegans are going to get their protein. I wonder where everybody else in the world is getting their fiber, because most people in the world don't get enough fiber. And the thing about fiber, it's not just enormously helpful for so many things. It flushes toxins and waste out of the body. It binds to cholesterol. But where weight loss and satiety is concerned is fiber is the key to the kingdom because it's what makes you feel full on, virtually no calories. And when you have fiber in food plus water and food, fiber and water together create bulk. And that's what creates satiety. So if you could have dried fruit and it still has fiber, but it has no water, you know, and you could have, like, juice and it has water, but it has no fiber. So you want to not only just eat whole food, but you want to eat it in its whole food form so that every bite that goes in your mouth has the fiber and water intact and and calorie density is this will help you do that because water dilutes the overall caloric density in the food. And so and so does fiber. And it's you can't just like eat a bunch of like, you know, peanuts and then drink water. It's it's not how it works. You have to have the water in the food as nature intended. That's why soups can be so helpful for both satiety and weight loss. And by soups I mean vegetable or being based soups. Not like, you know, claims New England clam chowder. Right? Like tomato soup with cream. Yeah, like your aunt probably made, but, Yes, absolutely. That's right. But okay. So that's really in a nutshell. And when and would when you were saying to the left and to the right of the red line, I it's just so people understand like you have a chart and on the left side is, you know, all the things that you can eat pretty freely. That's why you were saying to the left of the red line, the legumes, the whole grains, the fruits and vegetables, and then a red line. And then to the right of that you have the things like the nuts and the seeds and the avocado and the oil and things that you you wouldn't eat so freely. So that's kind of how I guess you got yourself under control because you had quite, you know, like I said, we were talking about. I know you don't want to kind of dwell on that, the bad part of your life, but I mean, you, but I think that it's helpful to, for people to understand, you know, that all the things that you went through because, I mean, is it okay if I talk a little bit more about that? Yeah. No, that's fine, because because my, my adult life was hard too. I mean, I had I had four, I lost four babies. And I mean, they weren't, you know, fully I mean, they, they weren't, you know, grown babies, but it's still devastating, like when you're like, right about to give birth and your baby dies. And so to me, that's, you know, fetal loss is not unless you have like a corpse. Then they say, well, it wasn't a baby. But the thing is, is when a baby dies inside you like that, you can't always give it to you. You know, it's just I don't want to get graphic here when surgeries, but it's not like it's it's a little bit different what they have to do sometimes in emergency surgery situations to save the mother. And so basically I lost four children. And so this is really hard. And this is this is yeah the thing that was really hard is that like I said, unless you have a funeral and a corpse, it's like, well, you know, it wasn't a real baby, but the minute you're pregnant, it's a real baby. Cause something that was really hard and I still, you know, I mean, I, you know, you do the best you can. You totally find the expert that can help you with that. So, yeah, I mean, life is art and duty, but I know, but the part. So I know one of your babies you named Rachel, and you said that you, really didn't grieve her until I found this. So until you gave up, like, not only sugar, but, like, maple sirup and agave. And then all of a sudden, you started what? What was the connection to that? I remember when I was teaching at a cooking school in LA called Dick and James Cook Vegetarian. Thank you, Ryan Spiegel, for giving me my start. Even before doctor McDougall as a culinary instructor. And so one of the teachers there, and I can't even remember his name, I think he might have been the chef at the time at Real Food Daily and so in the cooking classes we would present, you know, like an entree and then another course, like a salad or soup and a dessert that was like kind of what the thing was. And I was a teacher there. So I went to his class and he was he was a macrobiotic chef. And so his dessert was something called chant. And I think it was like jello. Right? And it's like, I'm like, jello. What? Kind of like shallow, shallow like. And I'm like, I don't need dessert. It's not a dessert. And, you know, he was explaining in the hospital exactly. And he was explaining macrobiotic principles and not using sugar and, you know, and he said something. He says, boy, you know, you know, I told him and he said, sounds to me like you're using sugar to compensate for the lack of sweetness in your life. And I just thought about that and like it. But but then the more I thought about it, the more he was right. So I was using food in general sugar, sugary foods. And that is such a sugary foods. It's sugar, fatty foods. Because, let's face it, how many sugar addicts do you know that their only problem is like Jolly Ranchers or Twizzlers? Like always the sugar and the fat guys, let's be real. And, to compensate for the lack of sweetness and like, when it's a time he said that, I kind of thought, what? What a dope. And then, you know, after I gave up sugar, I'm like, oh boy, now what? That was not fun. You know? That was a bad week. But then. But you said it helped you grieve after that. Like, what was the tie in to that? No, I had to feel my feelings. Because if you're using anything as a drug, it blocks, you know, your ability to feel your feelings deeply. And I think that's why so many people use food, alcohol, drugs, real drugs as drugs, you know, you know, over exercising, overworking because it's running away from your feelings. So yeah, that was profound. Give me I mean, you you know, when people say, well, I'm not an addict, whatever it is, I say, okay, well, you know, just go without it for a week. And then they tell me, yeah, because they can't. You can't. That's how you know, you're an addict. A lot of ads can't go and go without it one day or even one meal, whatever their drug of choice is. Well, okay. So this brings me to I want to talk about your book that's coming out. So it's coming out. I, I think this is going to hopefully air August 22nd and your book comes out on the 27th. So if you are hearing this, you have to order this, preorder this book. What do you get when you preorder this book? Yeah. Well, I mean, I always say to people, if you're going to order it, please preorder it. And the reason is, is when in order to be what's called a New York Times bestseller, it's the preorder account, and preorders are any orders that come in through a multiple of places, such as Amazon, Barnes and Noble, small independent bookstores. And the first five days a book comes out. So if my books coming out Tuesday, August 27th, midnight, Pacific time on August 31st, any purchases after that will still be nice, but they won't help me qualify to be a New York Times bestseller. And when a vegan or a plant based book does well, I think the whole veganism movement does well because more publishers will be publishing more vegan books because they see that there is a market for it. And this book is not just a vegan book, although it is. It's a gluten free book. It's a sugar free book. Everything is sweetened with fruit. But to give people an extra incentive to please preorder it, we've spent six months creating over$1,000 worth of virtual bonuses that if you buy your book from any of the places, and to a special website chef, it's called Sweet Indulgence. In the notes, we wanna send you virtually a video of every single recipe in the book, and there's over 150 recipes and a few other bonuses too, like my Sweet Indulgence Masterclass that when people took it was it's 18 hours of classes. It was. It sold for $497. Another class I did with Lissa Maris called Make It Raw, Make a cooked, and the audio files of my last book on unprocessed. So it's the bonuses are worth more than the book, and the book is beautiful. The photos by our mutual friend Hannah Kaminski are just I mean, that's why, you know, people want a Kindle, but it's like, I almost wish we didn't have a Kindle because it's a coffee table book. Is this is this book is art. And just looking at it on your phone is not going to do these these photos justice. No, it's absolutely gorgeous. And so this is what I want people to understand about this book, is that, you know, you are a sugar addict, so you're not using sugar. These are desserts. These are gorgeous, fabulous desserts that you would bring to your friend's house. And you would you don't have to say it's vegan. It's sugar free. They would. Nobody would know. And everybody be like, this is the best dessert and it's healthy for you. I mean, as far as desserts go, but like, okay, I'm just going to name off a few of these things, like cookies. You have a cookie section. Oatmeal raisin, snickerdoodles. Thumbprints. You have thumbprints I love thumbprints, cupcakes. You have cinnamon bun cupcakes, peanut butter stuffed chocolate cupcakes with chocolate ganache that makes you love her. I know, it's gorgeous. Yeah, that's not that. And that's one of the more. Most of the recipes are easy. That one is probably, I would say the the most difficult recipe in the book because you're going to need a pastry and then you need to pipe it. You got to go actually, you know, you can just plop it on. But but we don't. We did is like, I don't eat every single dessert recipe in that book. There's just too rich for me right now. But these are recipes that I created when I was the pastry chef many years ago. It's a restaurant, and so we try to have something for everybody. In other words, we have some of the like people saying, well, what if you're following Doctor Esselstyn? I would say that at least 75% of the recipes in the book are low fat, the way I eat now. So if somebody was doing Esselstyn, Ornish, McDougall or predicted, you could have those recipes and those are very low fat, vegan, fat, low calorie, dense, anything is oil free. Also and salt free. And only two recipes with flour. What we did, and this was the brilliant idea of Jeanine Elder, who has her own, book called Potato Wisdom, and she designed the book so that there is a chart, or I should say, a grid in every single recipe. It's labeled with one, 2 or 3 strawberries to indicate the sweetness. Yeah. Suddenly sweet, nice and sweet. Or what's the what's the third one? Subtly sweet and decadent. Yeah. And they're all. Oh, man, I'm just looking at these. These looks so good. I'm sorry. It's a podcast. Yeah, yeah, we do the same thing with the level of fat. Whether it's low fat, moderate fat, or rich and decadent. So that way you can pick and choose how much fat you want and how much sweetness you want. I know women that are really, really low fat. There are some recipes in there. If you're just, you know, eating the standard American diet, you're probably not going to like, trying to take one that's pretty low in fat. You know, the apple pie, rice pudding. It's not going to be sweet enough for you because there's not even dates in there. But like Lauren said, the cupcake on the cover, the German chocolate cake, the peanut butter chocolate cheesecake. These are really rich desserts that were served in a restaurant that wasn't even vegan. And I didn't tell them that I was not using refined sugar as a sweetener. So it's like I'm looking at this butterscotch pie right now that looks oh, look at that. That's low calorie density. Can I say, like, the crust is two cups of gluten free rolled oats and it has cinnamon, vanilla bean powder. It has dates. Dates? Yeah. And then butterscotch pudding that you give the recipe for. And then you can top it with strawberries. So that's like, you know, I mean as far as like conventional food, most of the recipes are actually exactly. Yeah. So for our food, you know. Right I know I hate that, but that's true. Yeah. I don't want that to be true. Oh no. We well you know what. But yeah. But here's the thing. You know, that's the thing. It's like calorie dense. That's why. What are we had trauma or not? Calorie density is impersonal. It's basically just math and what people need to know. And I think this will make them feel a lot better if they read a book like The Pleasure Trap. Is that the fact that you seek the most calorically concentrated foods in your environment does not mean you're flawed in any way. It just means that you are just doing what you were genetically designed to do exist. Seek the most concentrated source of calories in any environment you're in, whether it's your home or anywhere else. That's what our ancestors did to survive. And so, of course, we like sugar and flour because they're 1815 hundred calories per pound, whereas fruit and vegetables are one, two and 300 calories per pound. But remember, sugar and flour did not exist in nature either did oil throughout most of human history. But you know, it's a problem. Is it us? It's the environment that we live in, you know? You know, if you go back to like, I forget, what are they called it? There's there's a couple hunter gatherer tribes left in the world. Is it the Hudson? I'm sorry, I can't remember the name. Oh, I'm not sure. But anyway, like, they're not eating Snickers, you know, they're not, they're not, they're not vegan, but they're not eaten. Oil or sugar or flour. Salt. They're eaten actual food. Like our ancestors did. But the good news is, is that, you know, you can learn to love whole natural food at a local density if you are willing to abstain from those higher caloric density pleasure trap for a while. But it's hard because for many people, that means not going to restaurants because, you know, good luck it. I mean, you have to lose. And we have, we have a couple of vegan restaurants here that can do S.O.S free, but restaurants are interested in your health. And if you tell them no oil, they'll either laugh at you or just, you know, say this is not possible and people don't realize the impact of just a little bit of oil, not just on their arterial health, but on their waistline. And I'll tell you, that's the biggest tip or trick you can give for weight loss is, is whether you're vegan or not. Just stop the oil. You don't need it. It doesn't make food taste better, I know it. You know what? You get used to not eating oil and then it's it tastes terrible. But like I went out, I went to Chinese last night, and I just got steamed rice and steamed vegetables and, you know, it was it was good. I mean, it's good to me just because I'm used to it. I know most people would be like, oh, they like it's great. What do I need help for? Well, that's why California Balsamic was created. That's right. Exactly. Yeah. You just sprinkle a little of that on there. It's delicious. Delicious. Yeah. Well, so why do you think a whole I mean, and you mentioned The Pleasure Trap. That's a great book. If anybody wants to read that. But, Why why do you think that a whole food plant based diet helps you to age? Well, I mean, in addition to keeping your weight down. Yeah. And, you know, you got me thinking that you got to interview Doctor Hamer. He would be a fun guest. And boy, he has aged. Amazing because he has been vegan longer than me, but he has been healthy vegan the whole time. I don't I don't think there's one wrinkle on his face anywhere. So I think I think like I said, just whether it's your weight or how you age, I think most of it is genetics. But the thing about the food you eat, is it determines how well you age. I don't think it necessarily determines how long you live necessarily, but it determines whether or not you age well or with debility, especially for things that are preventable. Like many of these lifestyle diseases like type two diabetes, like heart disease, like certain autoimmune conditions. And so I think that's where food really helps. But also other lifestyle behaviors too, like whether or not you exercise, whether or not you smoke, whether or not you drink alcohol. People don't realize that these things have invisible, can visibly age you. Not exercising, can visibly age you smoking. You know, if you have a smoking history or currently smoke that visibly ages, you people think alcohol is just so great. But I used to be an activity director of a retirement home, and some people drank and some people didn't. And I don't know, like the correlation between the drinkers and the wrinkles, that was pretty much the same early. Yeah, really. And that's when I started to know the drinkers in the wrinkles. Yeah. The drinkers. We're the wrinkles you know. So wow. Well what do you can you share your age with us. Yeah. I'll be 65 at my next birthday and I cannot wait because I want Medicare so bad. My health insurance is so expensive. So bad. What do you love about being this age? Okay. What do you don't love about. Okay, I guess, what I love is that I don't have to go through those painful things that I love not having a menstrual cycle. I tell you that. That's, like, great. But I didn't have one since I was 47. I love that I get in cheaper to the movies. That's good for what else? I, you know, not much. No. I'm kidding. Yeah. I mean, I love that. Oh. That's funny. Gosh. You're hilarious. You know, my my uncle who who I lived with with my Swiss saying he used to. He used to say getting old is not for sissies. And I didn't really know what that meant when I was, you know, a teenager. And even my mom said getting old sucks. And I'm like, there wasn't really a context until you get older. That doesn't mean life can't be wonderful. But you know, you can't control things that are happening in your body. Oh, I hear here's another tip. This is my best anti-aging tip for everyone. Oh, yeah. Stay out of the sun now. No, wait. Let me let me clarify that. I don't mean that you shouldn't go outside and get your vitamin D, but protect yourself if you know, because there are people like I get bashed all the time on other people's like social media and say how terrible I look, but I think my skin that I know it's, I think I think the skin on my face actually looks pretty good for my age. I mean, because you can see the skin on my hands, they don't. We all have that, you know? But but here's the thing. So so I'm not saying that you should never go outside in your sun, but I mean, like when I look at people that are ten years older than me that look amazing, like Victoria moran, I said to her she'd be a great one too. For this topic I did. I interviewed her already anyway. I remember her telling me she doesn't let the sun on her face and I never thought anything about it. You know, living in LA most of my life. But then when I moved to the desert, I saw a dermatologist because, like, you can sometimes just see one once a year, like they send you, you know, like a skin check. And he, he just basically read me the riot act. My skin was in really bad shape. I had these horrible spots all over the ended up burning off that were really painful. And, you know, he basically said, because they see so much skin cancer there. He said, you cannot get your face in the sun like ever again. And I took that very seriously. This was before the pandemic, and I bought one of those full coverage hats which look like we're all you can see is, is your eyes and you have sunglasses. And so I go outside every day. I walk my dog for at least an hour and it's sunny. I don't use sunscreen on my arms and legs, but my face has 70 sunscreen, a full coverage hat, sunglasses. I have not knowingly let sun on my face now for almost six years. I think that ages you more than anything is sun. Oh, absolutely. That's good advice. I've been putting sunblock on my hands for for years and I think that's been really helpful. I should have done that. Yeah, yeah. What what, did you learn about aging from watching your parents age? Well, they weren't. Here's the other thing. They were. They were so much older when I was born, my dad was 50, you know? So, I mean, this could be good or bad. I'm going to guess it's going to be bad. Well, you know, it's funny because, you know, I don't even know what this word means, but everything that happened, my father would say, well, that's just the vagaries of old age. So I learned that basically, you get old, you get sick, you die, you know, whereas, you know, other people that they do die, but they don't necessarily die of a long and lingering illness the way my father did with heart disease or my mother did with dementia, or my grandmother did with diabetes, or my grandfather did, you know, with cancer. So so I did not see people that were aging well, but they also weren't eating well. Right. Do you ever go to concerts? Do you have a favorite concert that you ever went to? Let me think about that. I like comedy shows better than concerts. Oh well. Oh yeah. Oh my God. Yeah. So actually when I lived in the desert, I lived near Fantasy Springs. So I saw Bill medley, I saw America, I saw Diana Krall, I saw Tony Bennett. I tend to like more of my parents music than my own. I tend to like that kind of music. I'm not like, I don't like loud blaring, right? Or rap. I like kind of smooth. I'm a smooth jazz. Oh gosh, I wish I could see Gregory Porter in In Concert. People don't know about him. He's like, I don't know who that is. You got to ask Alexa to play him. This guy is like the most amazing jazz singer and apparently he's from Sacramento, but I yeah, so I like oh, I just saw how he got his channel is like 90 years old Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Oh yeah. I'm going to go see him I think. Yeah, he was amazing. So yeah, I do like that kind of stuff. I just don't go often because, you know, it takes effort, it takes money and it takes effort. And there's just I'm not I don't love large crowds all the time. You know, that's what I thought about you. Yeah, I, I was thinking that I had a wish it would be like Disneyland, which is open for me and a few friends, like, because I love Disneyland. But it's like the experience. It's just there's so many people. Wouldn't that be cool? It's like, I had all this money and I could say, okay, just stay open for about eight hours. I'm just going to have. Yeah. I'm not. I have my closest like 99 friends and then, you know, not having to wait in line for the rides. Wouldn't that be so cool? That'd be amazing. You have to get this book. Sweet indulgence. I'll put it in the show notes. Take a look at it. It's fabulous. If you love dessert, you will love this. Whether you're vegan or not. Just take a look at it, all right? I love you, chef AJ you take care. Thank you Lauren. And if you don't love dessert get it for somebody who does. Oh that's a good idea. Be and that's another good idea. Perfect gift. Save it up for Christmas or Hanukkah or birthday. And if people buy more than one copy, you know, people are saying, well, if I buy a copy for somebody else, can they have the virtual bonuses? Sure. You just have to give us different email with each receipt. But of course, okay, I'll put it all in the show notes. All right. Well, you take care. Thank you. Bye. Thanks for listening, friend. From my heart to yours. Be well until we meet again.