October 1, 2024 • 29 mins
On this show, Karolyn is joined by one of her favorite regular guests, naturopathic oncologist Dr. Tina Kaczor to discuss the health benefits of eating seasonally. In addition to explaining why eating seasonal makes sense, Dr. Kaczor will provide some practical tips. In addition to being a highly respected naturopathic oncologist, Dr. Kaczor is the co-host of the popular podcast The Cancer Pod, available wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts.
Five To Thrive Live is broadcast live Tuesdays at 7PM ET and Music on W4CS Radio – The Cancer Support Network (www.w4cy.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com).
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Five To Thrive Live is broadcast live Tuesdays at 7PM ET and Music on W4CS Radio – The Cancer Support Network (www.w4cy.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com).
Five To Thrive Live Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Media (www.talk4media.com), Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Any health related information on the following show provides general
information only. Content presented on any show by any host
or guest should not be substituted for a doctor's advice.
Always consult your physician before beginning any new diet, exercise,
or treatment program.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Hello everyone, and welcome to Five to Thrive Live. I'm
Caroline Gazella and I co host the show with my
good friend doctor Li Alschuler. Today our topic is seasonal eating,
which is a great topic because people often ask us
about different diets and eating patterns, and this is one
that I I really like. But before we dig in,
(01:02):
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at doctor ohiroproatics dot com. So with Me Today is
one of my favorite guests, so I try to have
her on the show as often as I can. Doctor
(02:24):
Tina Kayser is a naturopathic oncologist, editor in chief of
the Natural Medicine Journal, and the creator of Roundtable Cancer Care.
She is also the co host of The Cancer pot
a popular podcast for cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, and everyone
in between. Doctor Kaser, welcome back to five to Thrive Live.
Speaker 3 (02:44):
Thanks so much for having me, Carolyn.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
All Right, so let's just jump in. What does it
mean to eat seasonally?
Speaker 3 (02:54):
Well, eating seasonally means consuming fruit and vegetables, and we
could talk about meat consumption as well, but I'm going
to really stick to the plants today at their peak
harvest times from a local or at least regional source
in your area. So what this does aligns your diet
with the natural growing cycles of produce in your area.
(03:16):
So it's only relatively recently that we've been able to
eat whatever we want whenever we want. Right, So you
can get strawberries year round, and you know, maybe eating
them occasionally has no big deal off or out of season,
but by and large, it's probably in our best interest
biologically to eat with the rhythms of the seasons in mind.
(03:38):
And you know, we have an inherent sense of this.
What's interesting about this is like we generally don't crave
hot soup in summertime or cold fruit salads in the
winter time. And from an Eastern medical perspective, that all
makes sense. I'm not going to go into that today,
but we inherently want to eat differently according to the seasons,
(03:59):
and we crave what is in season. I'm going to
make it sound technical, and it's here's the summary, is
biological rhythms. That's ours included. And we have a seasonal rhythm, right,
We have daily, monthly, and seasonal rhythms in our bodies
can affect how bioactive compounds in the plants work in
our bodies, and that can influence our rhythms. So our
(04:22):
rhythms are influenced by the plants differently at different times
of the year. And so what they're calling this is
chrono nutrition or chrono like chron chron chronology, right, the
word chronology, chrono nutrition or chrono nutrition. And it's a
research field that focuses on our biological rhythms, diet and
(04:44):
our metabolism all interact with each other. So it's pretty
exciting and it's really fledgling right now in science.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
You know, that's such a cool way to describe it.
I haven't heard that description, and I love the fact
that you're trying it back to rhythms because it makes
me think of circadian rhythms and internal clocks and how
when we're in sync with a variety of rhythms, our
health is better. So why did you get interested in
(05:12):
eating this way and why do you encourage your patients
to eat seasonally?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Well, Carolyn, You know me, I like to geek out
on the data, but when it comes to this, this
is a question I should give you some scientifically sound answer,
but it's really not about that, honestly and truly, I
got into this because it's the most practical way to
get people at the time, my patients to eat a
wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Right, I'll talk about
(05:38):
the evidence, and there isn't a ton of scientific evidence,
But for me, I started thinking about this in the
context of trying to maximize people's intake of fruits and
vegetables and at the same time help them manage the
higher cost of going organic. Right, in general, eating in
season means what you're eating your plant food is healthier,
(05:58):
it's at its peak, it's nutritional value, it's vine ripened
or it's ripened on the plant. It's not being transported,
so in transport a lot of nutrients are lost or
they're just never produced. They never got the chance to
produce them because you just picked the tomato while it
was green, threw it on a truck green because then
it's hard and it's easy to transport. And they even
(06:19):
spray them sometimes to with chemical compounds to speed the
ripening process. In most people know. We all know that
a vine ripened tomato tastes better than one that came
from somewhere far away off season. So it has to
do with the flavor profile, it has to do with
getting a variety of plants. And there's another reason, and
(06:42):
it's not why I originally did it, but we now
know that plants have their own microbiome, right, So microbiome
is the big word of the year last couple of years.
We humans have microbiomes in our gut, on our skin, mouth,
all different microbiomes. Plants also have their own plant microbiome,
and it may be a big part of their nutritional
(07:03):
value to us as humans. So it's just not talked
about enough. But they're flowers there, leaves, their roots, their fruit.
The role of these plant organisms may be one of
the reasons our own immune systems grow so intelligent when
we eat a very wide variety of plants. So our
immune systems and our gut are kind of reaching through
(07:25):
our cells and sampling everything that goes floating by in
our gut. And what's going floating by is new organisms,
new bacteria, new viruses from the plants. They're inside the
plant cells. I mean, this is a this is news
to a lot of people. But if you take a
part of plant cell, you can see that there's bacteria
right there, and where it's in the leaf, we're eating
(07:46):
their bacteria and that could be a big part of
their nutritional value. So I'm saying that because that's kind
of a new thought process. I didn't find evidence for it,
but it just makes sense to me. Since our immune
systems are sampling antis as they go by. Bacteria are
natural antigen presentation to our immune system, so it only
makes sense. Oh wait, when we think cost savings, seasonal,
(08:09):
eating seasonally is the least expensive way you can possibly
get clean and fresh and organic food.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, and I'm glad that you brought well, First of all,
I'm glad that you brought up that the plant microbiome
actually serves us from a health standpoint when we eat seasonally.
But I'm really glad that you brought up the cost
because the reality is is when we eat seasonally. Even
grocery stores have more of those foods because they're in season,
(08:38):
and that should in fact bring THEMN the cost of
those foods. So and cost is a factor when it
comes to eating fruits and vegetable So I'm really glad
that you brought that up. So I want to geek
out with you on the research now. I have read
the research showing that eating seasonally is better for the environment,
(09:00):
which honestly is a big reason why I like it.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
Now.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
I'm worried about the environment. I want to be conscious
and sustainable and I'm trying as best as I can.
So I really like that aspect of eating seasonally. But
is there research demonstrating that this way of eating is
actually better for our health? What does the research tell us,
doctor kser.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
Well, I have to admit to you it's not a
really well researched area as in clinical trials, you know,
definitively telling us that there's less cancer or less cardiovascular
disease or something like that. There was one study I
found that was done in the UK, published in the
year two thousand, that did find some benefit for lowering
the risk of cardiovascular disease and various cancers. But the
(09:45):
results were mixed between males and females and what they
were eating. It wasn't strong. It was an observational study.
I think that this idea is really kind of new.
I think our appreciation, as you said, for or Kadian
rhythms and how much they determine our health and our
risk of disease processes has grown a lot in the
(10:08):
last ten years. So I think maybe that will get
us looking at these various natural rhythms and helping us
realize that when you're in harmony with the rhythms of nature,
you are likely to derive the most health benefits. Right,
You're going to lower risk of disease. I don't have, like,
you know, really solid studies, but I've been a natchpath
(10:29):
for twenty four years and maybe a naturalist my whole life.
I don't know. I'm confident that the research is going
to prove this to be true. I'm confident that we'll
find that eating with seasons, eating locally, you know, close
to home of whatever is growing, because remember the plants
in us. When we're eating close by, you are following
(10:50):
the light dark cycles, you're following the temperature cycles. We're
in the same environment, and so there's something to that
that changes our reaction to the food. And I think
we're going to find when we do prove this, that
eating with them with the rhythm of our surroundings on
our nature and our natural surroundings, will only do us good,
(11:10):
just like we found that with circadian rhythms with our
daily cycles.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
And I look at it like when I was researching
organic foods and the health benefits of organic foods years ago,
there was nothing, and now just recently I looked, and
the research is showing that it has more nutrition or
more nutritional value. And I think just logically, as an
end of one, I can say that there's there's more flavor,
(11:36):
and the foods just seem more nutritious when I eat
them in season, And I think that's that's kind of
a logical takeaway. So let's use fall as our example,
since that's the season we're in right now. So what
does fall eating look like? And how can we eat
more seasonally this time of year?
Speaker 3 (11:57):
You know, it depends where you live, So to a
seasonal diet, is that's going to change? You know, someone
down in Texas is going to eat something different than
someone up in New York or in Oregon, for example,
there is a website. I'm going to pull up the
website for you. It's uh, well, I'm gonna tell you.
I'll give you the website so everyone can find it,
(12:19):
Seasonal foodguide dot org. And what they do is they'll
take in your state, time of year, and then you
can look up a produce to see what time of
year that's best, or you can just have its list
all the produce that's available that time of year. So
for Oregon, for example, early October, and it lists all
the protus available in season in Oregon in early October.
(12:42):
And it is extensive. I mean, we're talking I just
I wouldn't I'd read it to you. But it's literally
dozens and dozens of plants, winter squash and turn ups
and sun chokes and sage and pumpkins of course, because
it is October, melons and kale, which could be year
round in a lot of places, right, Charred celery, cantalope.
(13:04):
It goes on and on, bois and berries, and so
I think going here is a nice start if this
is something you want to pursue. I think it's easy
to do, it's economical. They do have recipes on here,
which is interesting. So I think fall is a nice
season to start this because you can also buy a
(13:24):
lot of things in season, and they do stay longer.
Generally speaking, fall plants, a lot of them really do
stay for months. I mean you can think of cold
cool storage for potatoes and cabbage and things like that,
or even the winter squashes. They stay a long time.
So it's a good season to start buying produce in
your area because it is unlikely to go bad. I
(13:46):
mean in the springtime, of course, things come in and
they go bad very quickly. They're meant to be eaten
soon after they're picked. They're not meant to be stored
and eaten later.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
So yeah, I love that website seasonalfoodguide dot org. And
I was not familiar with that, and I love when
I learned new things from you, so that that's perfect,
and the fact that they have recipes. I am a
big soup eater in the fall. I start up in
the fall and then I do soup in the winter.
(14:18):
I'm a big soup girl. So I think that some
of these fall vegetables also really lend itself well to
these hardy fall soups that you can make and it's
it's just really a comforting food this time of year
for sure.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
You know.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
One of the easiest things to do with fall vegetables too,
is just a tray of roasted veggies, right russell sprouts
and potatoes and some onions and carrots and whatever else
you want to put on your on your roasted veggie tray.
You can put winter squashes on there if you'd like.
Another another easy thing to do is cut the winter
squashes and half you take out all the seeds and
(15:03):
you can roast those on the side if you'd like
to roast those. But you can also just you know,
compost them or whatever. Put it upside down and put
it in the oven. I mean some of the some
of the fall roasted vegetables are just so easy and
they are so delicious because they're in season.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
M M. I love that idea and roasted deggies. That's
one of my go tos because it is easy. I
think you know me well enough, doctor Kaser. I'm not
much of a cook, so I go for ease and
I like that.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
You know.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
The other thing that I do is I rely on
my local farmer's market to eat seasonally. But I am
in northern New Mexico and when the winter rolls around here,
the farmer's market kind of turns into more of a
indoor craft sale with not much food, so that means
(15:55):
I have to go to my local supermarket. What advice
do you have about eating seasonally at the supermarket? Just
any shopping tips?
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Well, I do. I mean think of locally and regionally first,
as you know, at least your own region, continent, country.
I think when you're going to the Southern Hemisphere, you're
flipping the You're flipping the switch completely. So I try
to look at sources like a lot of grocers now
will say where things are sourced, right, So whether it's
(16:31):
your avocados or your you know whatever, plums, whatever is
whatever you're buying, and do try if you can't buy
it ultra regionally, like your own state and your own
region down the road at a farmer's market, ideally you
know where you're talking to the farmer and talking to
them about the challenges and what they sprayed or couldn't
spray or that kind of thing. At least try to
(16:53):
get from the United States, because I think we do
control better and organic is ideal. Other than that you
can get I mean, we do have the luxury of
refrigeration and freezers, so you can get things in the
freezer section. But I think if you can go to
your local farmer's market or a CSA a consumer supported agriculture,
(17:19):
that really is ideal. Another website that it's really really
handy is local harvest dot com org. It lists all
the farmer farmers markets, lists CSAs in your area. You
would be shocked and any zip code you can just
put your zip code in there and you'll be shocked
at how much is in your area that you probably
didn't even know about because a lot of those are
word of mouth, you know, from growers to the buyers,
(17:41):
and they're not listed anywhere online. They're not there's no
time to keep up a website. You're busy farming. So
I really like that website.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
Yeah, local harvest dot or so remind me again, what's
a CSA and is that like a coal I haven't
heard that.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Oh, Consumers supported agriculture is just what it sounds like.
You have an agreement with the farmer that you're gonna
buy their product in season. So for example, you might
pick up a box, or they might you know, distribute
their boxes. I did one in Eugene and we just
we bought the whole season. I don't know what it costs,
but let's just say it costs like three hundred and
(18:17):
fifty dollars to do. You know, three months worth of
whatever comes in for them makes it into the boxes.
So they distribute it evenly to their to their buyers.
So let's say they sell ninety memberships. Everything that they harvest,
they split it between those ninety people in a box,
and every week you go pick it up. If they
have a great season, you have a lot of produce.
(18:38):
If it's a horrible season or some nasty bugs come
and eat all their kennel up, you won't get into
kennlop that year. You're kind of in it with them.
And what I like about community supported agriculture when you
can afford to do this is the farmer. These are
local farmers, so you know they're farming fifteen acres or
thirty acres. They're not farming large swaths, so it's very
(19:00):
very family oriented. These are family farms, and I kind
of like the idea of making sure that we're all
in it together. They get to survive and make a
living regardless of what their crops do. Of course, we're
in an agreement that they're going to do their best
to give us food and we support them. Other CSAs
are week to week. You can actually just go in
(19:20):
and out of them and just say, okay, I'll grab
a back box this week for twenty bucks and you
know that kind of thing. So there's different ways that
people set them up. You don't have to buy a
whole season's worth, but it's consumer supported agriculture. It is
directly buying from the farmers so that the farmers can
actually make a living on a small farm. And it's
very which is very challenging to do today.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Yeah, and I actually know that that you're reminding me.
We do have one locally in my area. I just
have not ever looked into it. But it's it's a
cool it's a cool thing. And I love the idea
of supporting the local farmers because that's why I go
to the farmers market, you know, like you said, I
can I can be at a booth and I can
talk to the farmer and you know, and it's it's
(20:04):
it's great to support the local farmers. I'm a country girl. Yeah,
I can for the country. So anything we can do
to support the local farmers. And the other thing about
shopping in the grocery store. And I understand that there's
there's good food, you know, in the frozen section and everything,
but I think shopping the perimeter has always been something
(20:25):
that I've kind of focused on over the years because
that's where I'm going to find, you know, fresher stuff
and potentially more seasonal stuff.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
Yeah. Yeah, And I noticed at least I'm visiting upstate
New York and there's a lot of grocery stores that
are supporting local produce. I mean it's it's big grocers,
it's a grocery shop, but it does say like this
basil has grown down the road or this plant, So
you really could look at that. If there's somebody working
the vegetable section, they can walk you right to everything
(20:56):
that's local if they didn't put it all in one
section already. So just look at the labels, see where
things are coming from, and you know, lean towards whatever's
whatever's nearby, and in that communal sense of like supporting
people that you're probably bumping into somewhere else in your community, right, Yeah, And.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
I think that would be kind of a good benchmark
to choose your supermarket, because you're absolutely right. In my neighborhood,
there are supermarkets that do feature a lot of local
produce and local farmers, and then there are supermarkets that
do not. So I choose the supermarkets that emphasized local
(21:39):
and for this for this very reason.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
Yeah, And I was just going to add, this is
how the organic movement became so big, right. It didn't
become It was not a top down change in our
society to have more and more people eating organic. It
was a bottom up movement. So people bought more organic,
and people bought more organic more stores had to integrate
organ onto their shelves. So eating locally is no different
than that.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Yeah, let's talk a little bit about meat. I do
eat meat. I try to keep meat as more of
a side dish, so I don't emphasize it as much.
But I found out probably about a year ago, of
a local farmer in southern New Mexico that travels up
(22:24):
to northern New Mexico and kind of camps out in
a parking lot and brings their meat, which is great local,
organic wonderful meat. And it's like a pop up.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
You know.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
She doesn't really advertise or anything. She just has a
little male list. I'm on her mail list, and I
get a little email and says, hey, I'm in your area.
What advice do you have about meat? Is it the same?
We should just look for local farmers and support our
local farmers as much as possible.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
Yeah, on that note, from a practical perspective, yes, I
mean I think it's very much the same. We want
to look to local growers, local ranchers, maybe regenerative ranchers,
where they're taking care of the land as they take
care of the animals and regenerating our biodynamic farm. Biodynamic
farms are basically self sustaining cycles of biodynamic meeting. They've
(23:23):
got the animals, they've got the plants. They're using the
animals dung to compost the plants. You know, it's kind
of a self perpetuating ecosystem that they create on the
farm that's really really nice, and that's almost always organic. Also,
you got to think about hunting. I mean, I think
when I think of this, and I think of traditional
disonal eating. We used to be able to eat meat
(23:47):
when the kill happened, and then after that it was dried, stored, right,
it was cured. So fresh meat was often eaten when
the season for that animal, when they were available, and
so we did have a bit of a cured meat
versus fresh meat in our history like historically. Now, I
(24:11):
think what the best we can do. If you can
get game, great, if you get wild game in season,
that's great. Then it's local and it's sourced well. Other
than that, yeah, I think local growers where you can
look at the people in the eye and say it
was this done ethically? Was it done in a way
that is in keeping with the animal's natural diet. That's
(24:34):
the most important thing when you're eating an animal. You
want to make sure the animal ate its native diet.
So I don't care if it's organic. If you can
slap enable, if you can slap a label on an
organic beef, but that beef somehow ate organic corn, that
would be bad. That would not be a good product.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Right.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
You want to fed because beef cattle should eat grass.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
So yeah, I just wrote about this, Yeah I did,
because you know, a lot of the studies that vilify
red meat are looking at grass fed. They're not really
drilling down to the source of the red meat. And
I think that that's a problem. I think that not
(25:18):
all red meat is created equal. And I think that
we're finding now that grass fed meat has almost as
much Omega three content as fish, you know, So I
think that's really important about the sourcing of the red meat.
So what final advice do you have for someone who
might be intimidated about eating seasonally?
Speaker 3 (25:44):
I would say, if you look around, it's such a
natural thing to do. You might be doing it without
even knowing it. Yet. I know people who are like, oh, no,
I only eat tomatoes when they're in season. They don't
know that they're doing it for health reasons, They're doing
it for flavor reasons, or you know, we all know
apples come in the fall and they are delicious to fall,
(26:05):
and by the following spring they try to you know,
they try to keep on the shelves a long time,
but they do get mealy indifferent. They don't taste as good.
And so I would say it's not it should never
let it be intimidating. You should just be mindful of
what you're putting in your mouth, and you'll grow to
appreciate that everything tastes better when it's freshly sourced and
(26:27):
maybe not picked or harvested that long ago, which means
it has to be local.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
To be that. Yeah. I loved it in the beginning
when you said that this is inherent and I really
believe that, And I think that just trusting your intuition,
because your body really does know what it wants, what
it likes, and what it needs. And I think you're
right at a deep cellular level, we want to eat seasonally.
(26:54):
M m, yeah, that's yeah.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
Yeah, our taste buds know it.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
Yeah, absolutely. So where can people find out more about
you and your work and your podcast? Do you have
any websites that you'd like to share with us? Well?
Speaker 3 (27:08):
As you mentioned at the start, I have Roundtable Cancer
Care and you can find that online at the same
name of the website Roundtable cancer Care dot com. And
the podcast called the Cancer Pod you can find that
also online with the same name website The cancerpod dot com.
Or if you're already listening to podcasts, we are wherever
you are listening, so you can find us by just
(27:29):
typing in the Cancer Pod. You can this is funny,
but you can google my last name if you spell
it correctly, you will find me and you'll probably find
my work. So if you have a topic you want to,
you know, know if I've weighed in on a type
of cancer, most likely because of my world of oncology
Kaczo r and then put it in your topic and
you might find something. I've been doing it for a
(27:50):
while and so there's lots of writings and interviews and
such and yeah, and of course the Natural Medicine Journal.
I think it's a great resource and I'm always involved
with the content there and I'm the editor in chief
there and that content is valuable for practitioners and the
public as well.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Yeah, Naturalmedicine Journal dot com. And I highly recommend the
Cancer Pod if you like podcasts. Doctor Kaser and her
co host cohort hosts are amazing, So I look for
the Cancer Pod for sure. So thanks again doctor Kaser
for joining me.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
All Right, Well, that wraps up this episode. If five
to Thrive Live once again, I'd like to thank our
sponsors pro Thrivers, Wellness sleep Formula, immuse post biotic to
give your immune system that extra boost, cognism stead of
coaling to enhance memory, focus, and attention and doctor Oheira's
award winning shelf Stable Probiotic. May you experience joy, laughter,
(28:46):
in love. It's time to thrive. Everyone have a great nights.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
The statement JFA.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
The city is a stratly large l
Any health related information on the following show provides general
information only. Content presented on any show by any host
or guest should not be substituted for a doctor's advice.
Always consult your physician before beginning any new diet, exercise,
or treatment program.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Hello everyone, and welcome to Five to Thrive Live. I'm
Caroline Gazella and I co host the show with my
good friend doctor Li Alschuler. Today our topic is seasonal eating,
which is a great topic because people often ask us
about different diets and eating patterns, and this is one
that I I really like. But before we dig in,
(01:02):
I'd like to thank our sponsors. Beginning with Amuse, a unique,
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Immuse is an ingredient in many immune supporting dietary supplements.
Look for Ammuse on the label or go to amusehealth
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(01:23):
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and urgs. You can find Prothriver's Wellness Brain online at
(01:44):
pureformulas dot com. And there's also Prothrivers Wellness Sleep, which
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and it contains twelve probiotic strains that are shelved stable
so no refrigeration is required because of a unique three
year fermentation process, It's a very effective probiotic. Learn more
at doctor ohiroproatics dot com. So with Me Today is
one of my favorite guests, so I try to have
her on the show as often as I can. Doctor
(02:24):
Tina Kayser is a naturopathic oncologist, editor in chief of
the Natural Medicine Journal, and the creator of Roundtable Cancer Care.
She is also the co host of The Cancer pot
a popular podcast for cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, and everyone
in between. Doctor Kaser, welcome back to five to Thrive Live.
Speaker 3 (02:44):
Thanks so much for having me, Carolyn.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
All Right, so let's just jump in. What does it
mean to eat seasonally?
Speaker 3 (02:54):
Well, eating seasonally means consuming fruit and vegetables, and we
could talk about meat consumption as well, but I'm going
to really stick to the plants today at their peak
harvest times from a local or at least regional source
in your area. So what this does aligns your diet
with the natural growing cycles of produce in your area.
(03:16):
So it's only relatively recently that we've been able to
eat whatever we want whenever we want. Right, So you
can get strawberries year round, and you know, maybe eating
them occasionally has no big deal off or out of season,
but by and large, it's probably in our best interest
biologically to eat with the rhythms of the seasons in mind.
(03:38):
And you know, we have an inherent sense of this.
What's interesting about this is like we generally don't crave
hot soup in summertime or cold fruit salads in the
winter time. And from an Eastern medical perspective, that all
makes sense. I'm not going to go into that today,
but we inherently want to eat differently according to the seasons,
(03:59):
and we crave what is in season. I'm going to
make it sound technical, and it's here's the summary, is
biological rhythms. That's ours included. And we have a seasonal rhythm, right,
We have daily, monthly, and seasonal rhythms in our bodies
can affect how bioactive compounds in the plants work in
our bodies, and that can influence our rhythms. So our
(04:22):
rhythms are influenced by the plants differently at different times
of the year. And so what they're calling this is
chrono nutrition or chrono like chron chron chronology, right, the
word chronology, chrono nutrition or chrono nutrition. And it's a
research field that focuses on our biological rhythms, diet and
(04:44):
our metabolism all interact with each other. So it's pretty
exciting and it's really fledgling right now in science.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
You know, that's such a cool way to describe it.
I haven't heard that description, and I love the fact
that you're trying it back to rhythms because it makes
me think of circadian rhythms and internal clocks and how
when we're in sync with a variety of rhythms, our
health is better. So why did you get interested in
(05:12):
eating this way and why do you encourage your patients
to eat seasonally?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
Well, Carolyn, You know me, I like to geek out
on the data, but when it comes to this, this
is a question I should give you some scientifically sound answer,
but it's really not about that, honestly and truly, I
got into this because it's the most practical way to
get people at the time, my patients to eat a
wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Right, I'll talk about
(05:38):
the evidence, and there isn't a ton of scientific evidence,
But for me, I started thinking about this in the
context of trying to maximize people's intake of fruits and
vegetables and at the same time help them manage the
higher cost of going organic. Right, in general, eating in
season means what you're eating your plant food is healthier,
(05:58):
it's at its peak, it's nutritional value, it's vine ripened
or it's ripened on the plant. It's not being transported,
so in transport a lot of nutrients are lost or
they're just never produced. They never got the chance to
produce them because you just picked the tomato while it
was green, threw it on a truck green because then
it's hard and it's easy to transport. And they even
(06:19):
spray them sometimes to with chemical compounds to speed the
ripening process. In most people know. We all know that
a vine ripened tomato tastes better than one that came
from somewhere far away off season. So it has to
do with the flavor profile, it has to do with
getting a variety of plants. And there's another reason, and
(06:42):
it's not why I originally did it, but we now
know that plants have their own microbiome, right, So microbiome
is the big word of the year last couple of years.
We humans have microbiomes in our gut, on our skin, mouth,
all different microbiomes. Plants also have their own plant microbiome,
and it may be a big part of their nutritional
(07:03):
value to us as humans. So it's just not talked
about enough. But they're flowers there, leaves, their roots, their fruit.
The role of these plant organisms may be one of
the reasons our own immune systems grow so intelligent when
we eat a very wide variety of plants. So our
immune systems and our gut are kind of reaching through
(07:25):
our cells and sampling everything that goes floating by in
our gut. And what's going floating by is new organisms,
new bacteria, new viruses from the plants. They're inside the
plant cells. I mean, this is a this is news
to a lot of people. But if you take a
part of plant cell, you can see that there's bacteria
right there, and where it's in the leaf, we're eating
(07:46):
their bacteria and that could be a big part of
their nutritional value. So I'm saying that because that's kind
of a new thought process. I didn't find evidence for it,
but it just makes sense to me. Since our immune
systems are sampling antis as they go by. Bacteria are
natural antigen presentation to our immune system, so it only
makes sense. Oh wait, when we think cost savings, seasonal,
(08:09):
eating seasonally is the least expensive way you can possibly
get clean and fresh and organic food.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, and I'm glad that you brought well, First of all,
I'm glad that you brought up that the plant microbiome
actually serves us from a health standpoint when we eat seasonally.
But I'm really glad that you brought up the cost
because the reality is is when we eat seasonally. Even
grocery stores have more of those foods because they're in season,
(08:38):
and that should in fact bring THEMN the cost of
those foods. So and cost is a factor when it
comes to eating fruits and vegetable So I'm really glad
that you brought that up. So I want to geek
out with you on the research now. I have read
the research showing that eating seasonally is better for the environment,
(09:00):
which honestly is a big reason why I like it.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
Now.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
I'm worried about the environment. I want to be conscious
and sustainable and I'm trying as best as I can.
So I really like that aspect of eating seasonally. But
is there research demonstrating that this way of eating is
actually better for our health? What does the research tell us,
doctor kser.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
Well, I have to admit to you it's not a
really well researched area as in clinical trials, you know,
definitively telling us that there's less cancer or less cardiovascular
disease or something like that. There was one study I
found that was done in the UK, published in the
year two thousand, that did find some benefit for lowering
the risk of cardiovascular disease and various cancers. But the
(09:45):
results were mixed between males and females and what they
were eating. It wasn't strong. It was an observational study.
I think that this idea is really kind of new.
I think our appreciation, as you said, for or Kadian
rhythms and how much they determine our health and our
risk of disease processes has grown a lot in the
(10:08):
last ten years. So I think maybe that will get
us looking at these various natural rhythms and helping us
realize that when you're in harmony with the rhythms of nature,
you are likely to derive the most health benefits. Right,
You're going to lower risk of disease. I don't have, like,
you know, really solid studies, but I've been a natchpath
(10:29):
for twenty four years and maybe a naturalist my whole life.
I don't know. I'm confident that the research is going
to prove this to be true. I'm confident that we'll
find that eating with seasons, eating locally, you know, close
to home of whatever is growing, because remember the plants
in us. When we're eating close by, you are following
(10:50):
the light dark cycles, you're following the temperature cycles. We're
in the same environment, and so there's something to that
that changes our reaction to the food. And I think
we're going to find when we do prove this, that
eating with them with the rhythm of our surroundings on
our nature and our natural surroundings, will only do us good,
(11:10):
just like we found that with circadian rhythms with our
daily cycles.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
And I look at it like when I was researching
organic foods and the health benefits of organic foods years ago,
there was nothing, and now just recently I looked, and
the research is showing that it has more nutrition or
more nutritional value. And I think just logically, as an
end of one, I can say that there's there's more flavor,
(11:36):
and the foods just seem more nutritious when I eat
them in season, And I think that's that's kind of
a logical takeaway. So let's use fall as our example,
since that's the season we're in right now. So what
does fall eating look like? And how can we eat
more seasonally this time of year?
Speaker 3 (11:57):
You know, it depends where you live, So to a
seasonal diet, is that's going to change? You know, someone
down in Texas is going to eat something different than
someone up in New York or in Oregon, for example,
there is a website. I'm going to pull up the
website for you. It's uh, well, I'm gonna tell you.
I'll give you the website so everyone can find it,
(12:19):
Seasonal foodguide dot org. And what they do is they'll
take in your state, time of year, and then you
can look up a produce to see what time of
year that's best, or you can just have its list
all the produce that's available that time of year. So
for Oregon, for example, early October, and it lists all
the protus available in season in Oregon in early October.
(12:42):
And it is extensive. I mean, we're talking I just
I wouldn't I'd read it to you. But it's literally
dozens and dozens of plants, winter squash and turn ups
and sun chokes and sage and pumpkins of course, because
it is October, melons and kale, which could be year
round in a lot of places, right, Charred celery, cantalope.
(13:04):
It goes on and on, bois and berries, and so
I think going here is a nice start if this
is something you want to pursue. I think it's easy
to do, it's economical. They do have recipes on here,
which is interesting. So I think fall is a nice
season to start this because you can also buy a
(13:24):
lot of things in season, and they do stay longer.
Generally speaking, fall plants, a lot of them really do
stay for months. I mean you can think of cold
cool storage for potatoes and cabbage and things like that,
or even the winter squashes. They stay a long time.
So it's a good season to start buying produce in
your area because it is unlikely to go bad. I
(13:46):
mean in the springtime, of course, things come in and
they go bad very quickly. They're meant to be eaten
soon after they're picked. They're not meant to be stored
and eaten later.
Speaker 2 (13:56):
So yeah, I love that website seasonalfoodguide dot org. And
I was not familiar with that, and I love when
I learned new things from you, so that that's perfect,
and the fact that they have recipes. I am a
big soup eater in the fall. I start up in
the fall and then I do soup in the winter.
(14:18):
I'm a big soup girl. So I think that some
of these fall vegetables also really lend itself well to
these hardy fall soups that you can make and it's
it's just really a comforting food this time of year
for sure.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
You know.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
One of the easiest things to do with fall vegetables too,
is just a tray of roasted veggies, right russell sprouts
and potatoes and some onions and carrots and whatever else
you want to put on your on your roasted veggie tray.
You can put winter squashes on there if you'd like.
Another another easy thing to do is cut the winter
squashes and half you take out all the seeds and
(15:03):
you can roast those on the side if you'd like
to roast those. But you can also just you know,
compost them or whatever. Put it upside down and put
it in the oven. I mean some of the some
of the fall roasted vegetables are just so easy and
they are so delicious because they're in season.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
M M. I love that idea and roasted deggies. That's
one of my go tos because it is easy. I
think you know me well enough, doctor Kaser. I'm not
much of a cook, so I go for ease and
I like that.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
You know.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
The other thing that I do is I rely on
my local farmer's market to eat seasonally. But I am
in northern New Mexico and when the winter rolls around here,
the farmer's market kind of turns into more of a
indoor craft sale with not much food, so that means
(15:55):
I have to go to my local supermarket. What advice
do you have about eating seasonally at the supermarket? Just
any shopping tips?
Speaker 3 (16:09):
Well, I do. I mean think of locally and regionally first,
as you know, at least your own region, continent, country.
I think when you're going to the Southern Hemisphere, you're
flipping the You're flipping the switch completely. So I try
to look at sources like a lot of grocers now
will say where things are sourced, right, So whether it's
(16:31):
your avocados or your you know whatever, plums, whatever is
whatever you're buying, and do try if you can't buy
it ultra regionally, like your own state and your own
region down the road at a farmer's market, ideally you
know where you're talking to the farmer and talking to
them about the challenges and what they sprayed or couldn't
spray or that kind of thing. At least try to
(16:53):
get from the United States, because I think we do
control better and organic is ideal. Other than that you
can get I mean, we do have the luxury of
refrigeration and freezers, so you can get things in the
freezer section. But I think if you can go to
your local farmer's market or a CSA a consumer supported agriculture,
(17:19):
that really is ideal. Another website that it's really really
handy is local harvest dot com org. It lists all
the farmer farmers markets, lists CSAs in your area. You
would be shocked and any zip code you can just
put your zip code in there and you'll be shocked
at how much is in your area that you probably
didn't even know about because a lot of those are
word of mouth, you know, from growers to the buyers,
(17:41):
and they're not listed anywhere online. They're not there's no
time to keep up a website. You're busy farming. So
I really like that website.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
Yeah, local harvest dot or so remind me again, what's
a CSA and is that like a coal I haven't
heard that.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Oh, Consumers supported agriculture is just what it sounds like.
You have an agreement with the farmer that you're gonna
buy their product in season. So for example, you might
pick up a box, or they might you know, distribute
their boxes. I did one in Eugene and we just
we bought the whole season. I don't know what it costs,
but let's just say it costs like three hundred and
(18:17):
fifty dollars to do. You know, three months worth of
whatever comes in for them makes it into the boxes.
So they distribute it evenly to their to their buyers.
So let's say they sell ninety memberships. Everything that they harvest,
they split it between those ninety people in a box,
and every week you go pick it up. If they
have a great season, you have a lot of produce.
(18:38):
If it's a horrible season or some nasty bugs come
and eat all their kennel up, you won't get into
kennlop that year. You're kind of in it with them.
And what I like about community supported agriculture when you
can afford to do this is the farmer. These are
local farmers, so you know they're farming fifteen acres or
thirty acres. They're not farming large swaths, so it's very
(19:00):
very family oriented. These are family farms, and I kind
of like the idea of making sure that we're all
in it together. They get to survive and make a
living regardless of what their crops do. Of course, we're
in an agreement that they're going to do their best
to give us food and we support them. Other CSAs
are week to week. You can actually just go in
(19:20):
and out of them and just say, okay, I'll grab
a back box this week for twenty bucks and you
know that kind of thing. So there's different ways that
people set them up. You don't have to buy a
whole season's worth, but it's consumer supported agriculture. It is
directly buying from the farmers so that the farmers can
actually make a living on a small farm. And it's
very which is very challenging to do today.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Yeah, and I actually know that that you're reminding me.
We do have one locally in my area. I just
have not ever looked into it. But it's it's a
cool it's a cool thing. And I love the idea
of supporting the local farmers because that's why I go
to the farmers market, you know, like you said, I
can I can be at a booth and I can
talk to the farmer and you know, and it's it's
(20:04):
it's great to support the local farmers. I'm a country girl. Yeah,
I can for the country. So anything we can do
to support the local farmers. And the other thing about
shopping in the grocery store. And I understand that there's
there's good food, you know, in the frozen section and everything,
but I think shopping the perimeter has always been something
(20:25):
that I've kind of focused on over the years because
that's where I'm going to find, you know, fresher stuff
and potentially more seasonal stuff.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
Yeah. Yeah, And I noticed at least I'm visiting upstate
New York and there's a lot of grocery stores that
are supporting local produce. I mean it's it's big grocers,
it's a grocery shop, but it does say like this
basil has grown down the road or this plant, So
you really could look at that. If there's somebody working
the vegetable section, they can walk you right to everything
(20:56):
that's local if they didn't put it all in one
section already. So just look at the labels, see where
things are coming from, and you know, lean towards whatever's
whatever's nearby, and in that communal sense of like supporting
people that you're probably bumping into somewhere else in your community, right, Yeah, And.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
I think that would be kind of a good benchmark
to choose your supermarket, because you're absolutely right. In my neighborhood,
there are supermarkets that do feature a lot of local
produce and local farmers, and then there are supermarkets that
do not. So I choose the supermarkets that emphasized local
(21:39):
and for this for this very reason.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
Yeah, And I was just going to add, this is
how the organic movement became so big, right. It didn't
become It was not a top down change in our
society to have more and more people eating organic. It
was a bottom up movement. So people bought more organic,
and people bought more organic more stores had to integrate
organ onto their shelves. So eating locally is no different
than that.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Yeah, let's talk a little bit about meat. I do
eat meat. I try to keep meat as more of
a side dish, so I don't emphasize it as much.
But I found out probably about a year ago, of
a local farmer in southern New Mexico that travels up
(22:24):
to northern New Mexico and kind of camps out in
a parking lot and brings their meat, which is great local,
organic wonderful meat. And it's like a pop up.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
You know.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
She doesn't really advertise or anything. She just has a
little male list. I'm on her mail list, and I
get a little email and says, hey, I'm in your area.
What advice do you have about meat? Is it the same?
We should just look for local farmers and support our
local farmers as much as possible.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
Yeah, on that note, from a practical perspective, yes, I
mean I think it's very much the same. We want
to look to local growers, local ranchers, maybe regenerative ranchers,
where they're taking care of the land as they take
care of the animals and regenerating our biodynamic farm. Biodynamic
farms are basically self sustaining cycles of biodynamic meeting. They've
(23:23):
got the animals, they've got the plants. They're using the
animals dung to compost the plants. You know, it's kind
of a self perpetuating ecosystem that they create on the
farm that's really really nice, and that's almost always organic. Also,
you got to think about hunting. I mean, I think
when I think of this, and I think of traditional
disonal eating. We used to be able to eat meat
(23:47):
when the kill happened, and then after that it was dried, stored, right,
it was cured. So fresh meat was often eaten when
the season for that animal, when they were available, and
so we did have a bit of a cured meat
versus fresh meat in our history like historically. Now, I
(24:11):
think what the best we can do. If you can
get game, great, if you get wild game in season,
that's great. Then it's local and it's sourced well. Other
than that, yeah, I think local growers where you can
look at the people in the eye and say it
was this done ethically? Was it done in a way
that is in keeping with the animal's natural diet. That's
(24:34):
the most important thing when you're eating an animal. You
want to make sure the animal ate its native diet.
So I don't care if it's organic. If you can
slap enable, if you can slap a label on an
organic beef, but that beef somehow ate organic corn, that
would be bad. That would not be a good product.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Right.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
You want to fed because beef cattle should eat grass.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
So yeah, I just wrote about this, Yeah I did,
because you know, a lot of the studies that vilify
red meat are looking at grass fed. They're not really
drilling down to the source of the red meat. And
I think that that's a problem. I think that not
(25:18):
all red meat is created equal. And I think that
we're finding now that grass fed meat has almost as
much Omega three content as fish, you know, So I
think that's really important about the sourcing of the red meat.
So what final advice do you have for someone who
might be intimidated about eating seasonally?
Speaker 3 (25:44):
I would say, if you look around, it's such a
natural thing to do. You might be doing it without
even knowing it. Yet. I know people who are like, oh, no,
I only eat tomatoes when they're in season. They don't
know that they're doing it for health reasons, They're doing
it for flavor reasons, or you know, we all know
apples come in the fall and they are delicious to fall,
(26:05):
and by the following spring they try to you know,
they try to keep on the shelves a long time,
but they do get mealy indifferent. They don't taste as good.
And so I would say it's not it should never
let it be intimidating. You should just be mindful of
what you're putting in your mouth, and you'll grow to
appreciate that everything tastes better when it's freshly sourced and
(26:27):
maybe not picked or harvested that long ago, which means
it has to be local.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
To be that. Yeah. I loved it in the beginning
when you said that this is inherent and I really
believe that, And I think that just trusting your intuition,
because your body really does know what it wants, what
it likes, and what it needs. And I think you're
right at a deep cellular level, we want to eat seasonally.
(26:54):
M m, yeah, that's yeah.
Speaker 3 (26:56):
Yeah, our taste buds know it.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
Yeah, absolutely. So where can people find out more about
you and your work and your podcast? Do you have
any websites that you'd like to share with us? Well?
Speaker 3 (27:08):
As you mentioned at the start, I have Roundtable Cancer
Care and you can find that online at the same
name of the website Roundtable cancer Care dot com. And
the podcast called the Cancer Pod you can find that
also online with the same name website The cancerpod dot com.
Or if you're already listening to podcasts, we are wherever
you are listening, so you can find us by just
(27:29):
typing in the Cancer Pod. You can this is funny,
but you can google my last name if you spell
it correctly, you will find me and you'll probably find
my work. So if you have a topic you want to,
you know, know if I've weighed in on a type
of cancer, most likely because of my world of oncology
Kaczo r and then put it in your topic and
you might find something. I've been doing it for a
(27:50):
while and so there's lots of writings and interviews and
such and yeah, and of course the Natural Medicine Journal.
I think it's a great resource and I'm always involved
with the content there and I'm the editor in chief
there and that content is valuable for practitioners and the
public as well.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Yeah, Naturalmedicine Journal dot com. And I highly recommend the
Cancer Pod if you like podcasts. Doctor Kaser and her
co host cohort hosts are amazing, So I look for
the Cancer Pod for sure. So thanks again doctor Kaser
for joining me.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
All Right, Well, that wraps up this episode. If five
to Thrive Live once again, I'd like to thank our
sponsors pro Thrivers, Wellness sleep Formula, immuse post biotic to
give your immune system that extra boost, cognism stead of
coaling to enhance memory, focus, and attention and doctor Oheira's
award winning shelf Stable Probiotic. May you experience joy, laughter,
(28:46):
in love. It's time to thrive. Everyone have a great nights.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
The statement JFA.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
The city is a stratly large l
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