We often label desserts as bad and feel guilty after eating sweets. Sugar stimulates your nervous system and hunger hormones, and it can actually cause some people to eat more and create a vicious cycle of addiction. I know this cycle very well. And for years, I love the high and sugar because I got when eating processed sugar and sweets. And yes, it can take a lot of work to get out of this cycle. My inspiration to make delicious sugar-free recipes came from my journey over these last couple of years as I have been healing my relationship with food and my body. Cutting out refined sugar is when we really start to feel energized and clear minded again. And there are so many amazing ways to enjoy sweets and desserts without feeling deprived and guilty. I’ll show you three of my favorite treats that I love to make when I want to dessert or a little sweet treat that will not make your body crash or wreak havoc on your system. 

Dance! Baby!

But before we go into my Wholicious kitchen, I want to show you a practice that lights me up, gives me a ton of energy, and you know what it’s totally for free. Dancing baby! I love dancing as a tool to help me shift my energy, get back into my body, let go of any emotion, and also I’ll use it as my exercise for the day. If I’m not dealing with my feelings and not allowing myself to emotionally express, I crave to escape with food and especially sugar. So dancing, first thing in the morning really can help you let go of all those energies that don’t belong to you and really open up your body to connect with yourself and your divine energy. It helps you to step into your power and love and accept your beautiful body. 

Okay, so feel free to dance with me. I’m going to show you my goddess dance. This is a practice I started about four years ago. The only rules for dancing, there’s no rules. There’s no guidelines. Really it’s about dancing without restrictions without any judgments. This is a great time to really connect with your inner self and allow yourself to let go and surrender to the moment. Okay, when do I dance? I dance when I’m sad. I dance when I’m happy, when I’m angry, when I’m frustrated. Or I just need to move my body and shift some energy. I never regret dancing and you know what, always remember to have fun. I really love to dance when I need to release some emotion. So sometimes I’ll catch myself having a good cry when I dance or I need to laugh or have a good scream. Whatever goes goes and the biggest thing y’all is don’t judge yourself. Really let go and surrender. 

Okay, feel free to join me as we dance. Okay, so, what I like to do before I start, is like to close my eyes. So I invite you to close your eyes. Put your hand on your heart, hand on your belly. Take some deep breaths in. Really letting that breath out. Start to move your body. Feel your body tune into yourself. Get present with yourself. Two feet on the ground can feel the energy moving up your feet back of your legs at the back of your spine and start to sway move your arms really feel it. Really feel every part of your body. Be so grateful that your body can move like this. Closing your eyes and really just tune in and let yourself go and have fun!

Deep breath. Shake. Get it all out. We come to an end, really takes a deep breaths in and out. Oh I like to end with my hands again on my heart and my stomach. Really feeling my body, feeling my feet, putting a smile on your face. Really acknowledging yourself, acknowledging your body to move like this. Feeling your heartbeat underneath your hand. Hmm just tune in for a couple seconds and get still and get quiet with yourself.

Now you can open your eyes. How yummy does that feel? So invigorating and you know what you will never feel upset or sad after you dance. Now that we’re feeling amazing and confident in our body, we definitely deserve some sexy nourishing sweets and treats. 

Today’s Episode

Today we’re gonna make a creamy adaptogen hot chocolate, then some protein chocolate chip cookies, and this orgasmic fried date with tahini honey and pecans. See you in my Wholicious kitchen.

Okay, so these three recipes today are all about enjoying desserts and sweets without the guilt or shame. No deprivation y’all. Okay, I’m starting with an adaptogen hot chocolate. Then I’m going to make this decadent fried dates with tahini, pecans, rosemary and honey, and then finishing with a plant based protein chocolate chip cookie. 

Hot Chocolate Recipe

So first, let’s dive into the adaptogen hot chocolate. And I’ve already got our almond milk warm. And in episode two, I made a Tumeric latte. And you can reference back to that to see how I made homemade almond milk, but I’m going to tell you really quickly, a fast, easy way to make almond milk. Alright, so this is nice and hot and steamed. So a quick way to make almond milk, you can take two tablespoons of almond butter and blend it in the blender with two cups of water. And you’ve got all the milk without the soaking and the straining, none of the nonsense. So that’s like a quick little tip. And again, if you missed the immune boosting episode, with the Tumeric latte, you can go back. Alright, so I’ve got my hot almond milk. And then I’m going to add raw cacao. So the raw cacao was the first adaptogen going in today. And Episode One Dr. G was on, and we really spoke about the healing properties of adaptogen so that you can go back and really hear the whole spiel. But I’ll just remind you guys, what an adaptogen is. Adaptogens really help our bodies adapt to outside stressors. And the reason I love this latte so much, this hot chocolate latte, is because I don’t drink caffeine. And when I was getting off caffeine, I really needed something to boost my energy and the raw cacao gives me so much energy plus it’s full with antioxidants and it helps release the happiness hormone. 

Okay, next we’re going to add all the rest of our adaptogens. Okay, so what I’ve got going on here is I’ve got maca root, which is really great for libido, stamina, sexual health, and hormone balancing. I’ve got some Lion’s Mane amazing for brain health and energy. We’ve also got Tocos. Tocos is a brand soluble, which is high in Vitamin E really great for the skin, really great for collagen production, and I’ve got mesquite that’s multi. And last, we have the lucuma which is and they all kind of look the same, but the lucuma is actually really high in vitamin C and it’s actually a really great natural sweetener. So I’m going to throw all these babies in here. 

And this is why this gives me so much energy you can already see it’s loaded with all these adaptogens raw cacao. I’m going to make this just a little bit sweet. I’m going to do just like I don’t know, one big teaspoon of maple and if you want this to be zero, you know sugar calories low low glycemic, you can definitely put a couple of drops of Stevia. Alright, I’m going to blend this for about 30 seconds. Okay, perfect. Oh my gosh, I always call this an adult hot chocolate. This is really overall great for sexual vitality and health. That’s why I like to call it an adult hot chocolate. Oh my gosh. Okay, I have to have a sip of this. Before we move on to the tahini. Oh my gosh. It’s amazing. So creamy. Okay, so decadent. All right, I’m gonna put that to the side and sip on that because I already have so much energy from dancing earlier but this is like the best combo.

Happy Accidents

I love Halva. Halva is made with dates and tahini has sesame from the tahini and pistachios and this just reminds me of kind of like a deconstructive Halva without all the sugar. So that’s where this kind of came from a lot of my creations, y’all in the kitchen kind of happened by mistake. I know a cookbook, one day is going to be called, “Happy Accidents.” Because I’ll be creating in the kitchen and experimenting and all of a sudden I’m like, oh my god, this is gonna be awful. And then it becomes a favorite one of my restaurants and it sticks. So that’s kind of like where my best creations. This is where this came from. 

So I’m going to put a couple big tablespoons of olive oil on here because we’re going to fry the dates in the olive oil. So you want a really nice quality extra virgin olive oil. 

Everyday Pan

We’re going to get this pan hot. And this is kind of my everyday fit pan I use. I always get asked what pans I use this as my everyday pan from Always brand. I love it so much. It’s really important with pans y’all that you make sure they’re toxic, free. So this is a clean, toxic free nonstick pan. I love it. 

Tahini Dates

Alright, so my oils getting hot. I’ve got these amazing big juicy dates here. I’m going to add the dates, we’re going to want these to sizzle just a little bit. Okay, this dish happens really quickly. So this the heat is medium high. These are pitted, make sure your dates are pitted for this. You don’t want to bite into a big pit, right? All right, just happened many times. Okay. All right. In love, alright, do you hear the sizzle, okay. Really want to fry those dates in the oil. And the best thing to do too, is really take your spatula, I’m using a wooden spoon. I really always cook with wooden spoons and press the date into the oil and let them fry. Okay, and I’m going to flip them and I’ll show you you can kind of see on that guy starting to get a nice kind of golden carmelized skin. Okay, so we’re gonna let this go for a couple minutes. And let me just flip these. Oh, yeah. 

Chefs Make Mistakes Too!

Now be careful because this dish happens really quickly. And it’s very easy to burn these days. Believe me, I’ve done it. Chefs make mistakes too. People always ask me oh my gosh, do you ever burn anything or make mistakes in the kitchen? I’m like, Oh my God. Are you kidding me all the time. Okay, I’m going to turn down our heat because it’s getting pretty hot and I don’t want to burn my dates. And okay, these are looking good. I want to show like see how they’re kind of getting a little bit fried. Kind of dark and carmelized Okay, that’s perfect. 

Alright, so what I’m going to do now is I’m really going to turn down my heat almost as low as it can go because I’m going to add the tahini and the thing with the tahini is we don’t want to burn the tahini. So I’ve got my creamy tahini here. Add the tahini. Okay. And my heat is on pretty low. And I’m gonna give this a nice little stir for only about 20 seconds. I want this to cook down just a little. Just a little let’s really coat the dates in the tahini. Okay, so a couple minutes, you’ll see how it’s starting to kind of stick to the pan. Okay, that’s okay. All right, just a couple more seconds here. Just really keep your eye on this now. I like this really saucy. Alright, this is looking good. Okay, perfect. That’s it. Turning off the heat. Okay. All right. So I just want to show, look at how nice and caramelized see how brown that tahini got but it’s not burned. Okay, you see this?

All right. Now look at this. Oh my gosh. So amazing. The smell is like unbelievable. Like I can’t even smell. Okay, let me clean this because I have to have perfect presentation for y’all. Okay, now I’m gonna put a little couple little sprigs of rosemary. The rosemary really brings out the dates and the nuttiness of the tahini. Going to finish it with malden and sea salt. Just a little bit of malden okay. Then I’m also going to do like a little bit of cinnamon. Okay, the sweetness of the cinnamon with the tahini and the dates. Finish it with some chopped pecans. Okay, a little bit of crunch. I need texture. So you’ve the dates are so smushy and soft. So I want like a crunch. So the crunch of the pecans is perfect. And then I’m adding some raw honey. So I’m just going to drizzle this honey. Right on top here. Look at this. Are you kidding me right now? 

Okay, this dessert makes me so excited and I know I just danced and show you. So do my goddess dance. But this definitely makes me like want to shimmy, like get really excited. Alright, check out this fried dates with the creamy tahini, olive oil with honey, the rosemary, pecans and cinnamon. And this is pretty hot. But I have to get in here and have a bite before we make those cookies. Oh my god. Yeah, so I can’t wait because I’m gonna get in here later. But it’s really like the best balance. It’s amazing. 

And it really hits all the fields for me, because it’s a little bit savory and the sweetness and without the guilt because I spent most of my life not being able to eat dessert or I restricted myself from eating desserts and I labeled them bad because I was afraid that they were going to make me fat, right. And then I would have shame and guilt and all the things. So no more of that as I’ve continued to heal my relationship with food and really learn to love and accept my body. It is possible to love desserts, eat desserts with joy and love and accept your beautiful body. Okay, so that’s a huge big theme of mine very passionate about sharing that message, and helping y’all continue to create a healthy relationship with food. 

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Alright, let’s dive into the chocolate chip cookies. So these chocolate chip cookies, I have served at my restaurant, Source Cafe, opened it at about nine years ago, and I’ve been making these protein plant based cookies for about nine years. They are a fan favorite. And they’re actually in my cookbook, ‘Sexy Nourishing Food For Your Mind Body And Soul.’ And also this adaptogen hot chocolate is also in my cookbook. So check that out because that was a labor of love passion project and people have been asking me for years, please chef, can you share your chocolate chip cookie? So here it is. Alright, so this cookie is quick. And it’s no fuss because I think if you’ve been following me on Wholicious, you’re gonna know that I’m not a baker and I don’t like I’m not a fussy baker so it needs to be easy and foolproof. 

Dry Ingredients

Today we’re using a gluten free flour brand, and it’s Bob’s gluten free flour. You can use any gluten free flour blend. This one’s made out of potato fava beans, and peas, and high in protein already. Okay, so I’m going to add that about two cups. 

And then coconut sugar is the sweetener of choice today. And you can sub monkfruit in this if you want this to be like even lower glycemic. It won’t be paleo because of the potato in the flour. Okay, people always ask oh, if I sub monkfruit with the gluten free flower like no. So I’m going to do one cup of coconut sugar, a big scoop here. Okay, just like that. And then I’m going to add a little bit of baking soda and xantham gum. Okay. 

And then flaxmeal. So the flaxmeal is actually going to work as our egg in the dish and it’s really going to thicken our dough and help it rise a little bit. So I have flaxmeal also, I love flax because it’s high in omegas and it’s high in fiber and high in protein. So already, we’ve got a very high protein cookie here. 

And then I’m using some of my favorite protein powder, Nuzest protein powder. It’s made out of peas. Clean ingredients, three ingredients and high in protein and I liked the protein powder because it gives a little bit of a vanilla flavor. And it also doesn’t bloat me out. A lot of protein powders can cause a lot of bloating and gassiness. So I’m gonna give this a whisk. Okay, so we’ve got all of our dry here with this baby around. 

Wet Ingredients

And then we’re going to do our wet to get all the clumps out here. Kind of take my whisk and and smash down the clumps. Okay, that looks good. All right. I’ve got five tablespoons of water, just a little bit of water in here. And then I’ve got our coconut oil. Okay, and obviously the coconut oil you can see I melted. This will not work if you don’t melt it. Okay, and then I’m going to put a big tablespoon of vanilla extract. Oh, looks good. That was a big one. Okay, and let me whisk this. Okay, perfect. And I’m going to add our wet to our dry and give this a little whisk. 

Can You Eat This Cookie Dough Raw?

Okay, getting all the clumps out here and I have to tell you that this is a really great cookie dough if you want to eat it raw. Sometimes I’ll even put it in a jar and keep it in the fridge. Bake it off when I want to or the cookie dough is really great if you’re making like a nice cream or a smoothie bowl and you want to have like a cookie dough ice cream. This cookie dough is delicious. You can pull a couple little pieces out from the fridge, roll them up in the balls and mix it in with your ice cream or an ice cream. If you missed my episode, where I made banana ice cream, that would be perfect with this cookie dough. 

So I don’t know about you, but when I was growing up, I used to love some cookie dough. But with all the raw egg and stuff it never worked out well for me. Okay, this looks good. I need to pull all the dough off here. And I need to just kind of shake it out of this whisk. Okay, there we go.

I’m gonna add our chocolate chips. Okay, so these chocolate chips are paleo chocolate chips. They’re made with a really high quality raw cacao. And also, they’re made with coconut sugar. So you can use any chocolate chip here, you can even use chocolate chips with monkfruit. I love a paleo chocolate chip because I know that I’m not getting the process of white sugar, right. Alright, so I’m going to fold this in with my spatula here. 

Soft Cookies

And these only bake for like 8 to 10 minutes. Now for me, I like an undercooked cookie because I want it to be a little bit softer and smushy. And specially because these don’t have a egg you can get away with it. So I like to undercook my cookies and then pull them out of the oven and let them sit. So when they cool, they’re fully baked, but then they’re just a little bit softer. All right, look at this dough. Can you imagine this dough in the fridge and you just can pull out a little one tiny little bite. Look at this. You know what I love about it. It’s loaded with protein. And actually for me if I was going to sit around and I don’t just sit around eat cookie dough all day, but if I wanted to cook you’d have a treat. I might add a little collagen to it because I want more protein. Okay. It’s kind of delicious. And it’s fun to eat cookie dough without the guilt and the shame. Okay, took me years this didn’t happen overnight y’all. It took me years but it’s possible. 

Okay, I’m gonna do a little spray here with our coconut oil. And then I’m using a scoop, you can use your hand or spoon. But these scoops are really easy to buy off of Amazon. And I’m going to do a nice scoop here. Kind of like an ice like a medium sized ice cream scoop you can use. Okay, just kind of pull these in, scoop this baby up. And you can obviously make these smaller. 

Cookie Cake

You can make many cookies with this, you can make a cookie cake meaning if I wanted this to be more of kind of like a brownie cookie, or a cake, I would put all this dough in here and smash it down with my hand and bake it. Man cookie cakes in the south when I was little were so popular. Oh man, those made me feel so awful. Love those things. Alright, this looks good. I’ll bake those a little later. And then what I do with my hands is kind of just pressed down like this. Just kind of pressed down like that. You can obviously make a thinner cookie. You know, everyone’s kind of particular with their chocolate chip cookies. I like a little bit of a fatter cookie.

But if you want this to be nice and thin, you can really press it out and make a nice thin one. I’m going to throw these in the oven for about eight minutes. Okay, I don’t want to overcook them. Okay, let’s check those cookies. I pulled them out of the oven a couple of minutes ago. All right, look at these babies. Okay, cook them for about eight minutes. And I’m going to show you get a nice plate here. I’m gonna show you how soft they are. Okay, let me get this one. So it looks like a good one. And I purposely didn’t use all the cookie dough because you know why I want some of that for my fridge. Look at this. Oh my gosh, see how soft it is. And these have been out for probably five minutes, but I mean they are so soft. Oh my god. This was my adaptogen. I mean, this is the perfect snack, the perfect sweet treat snack. 

So I hope you got inspired today and are excited about some healthy sweet treats without the guilt. Chocolate chip protein cookies. Which by the way, you can eat these as a snack like they’re loaded loaded with protein and healthy fat and fiber and if you have kids, like you don’t have to feel guilty serving your kids a chocolate chip cookie. Right? Look at this. That is a plate full of happiness right there. Look at those cookies. So we have the adaptogen hot chocolate. We have our beautiful protein cookies today chocolate chip protein cookies, and then let’s not forget about our gorgeous fried dates and tahini. Thank you so much for joining me today. Take care of yourself, your mind, your body and your soul. And give it a thumbs up if you love this episode and felt inspired. And if you’ve had any questions, comment below because I love staying connected with you. Subscribe to my YouTube channel so you can be an active part of my vision of a healthy world through food. And remember, healthy is the new sexy!

The post Chef Amber’s Wholicious™ – Episode 7 How To Remove Guilt and Shame From Eating appeared first on Chef Amber.

Meet the Chef

I’m Amber Caudle, aka Chef Amber, I’ve been a professional chef for over 25 years, a holistic lifestyle advocate, and your host of the show Wholicious. On our delicious journey, it’s all about how you can become the most powerful version of yourself. I’ve created many recipes that help you feel better in your body, let go of immune disbalances, inflammation, and extra weight. Get rid of brain fog, increase your energy and have more focus and clarity, and feel more confident and happier in your body. 

What’s the First Step When it Comes to Food? 

Learn how to simplify things to maximize your quality of life. A big first step towards this is by learning how to prepare your own healthy food which I will show you later in my Wholicious kitchen. I will teach you how to cook and prepare meals that are gluten-free, dairy-free, and free of processed sugars. 

Healthy is the New Sexy

I want to get rid of the stigma around the word ‘healthy’ as the food we will cook together is so much more than that. My favorite word to describe food is sexy. You will hear me say that a lot. Healthy is the new sexy baby. You don’t have to deprive yourself of food and eat food that doesn’t light you up because you know what? Food is supposed to make you feel amazing. One vital ingredient that also flows into Wholicious is self-care and faith. Throughout the series, I’ll meet you here on my spiritual corner and I will share profound spiritual practice tools that will help you create a supportive mindset and body, mind, soul connection. When you are in total acceptance and in love with your body, the noise in your head is calmer and you’ll feel free and clear-minded. You will start to feel grounded, centered, vibrant, and gain more energy. Also, my guests throughout the series will join me to share different perspectives on forming a healthier relationship with food and body, helping you to live a life full of abundance and freedom. 

Today’s Episode

So for today’s episode of Wholicious, I’ve invited a remarkable guest and friend Dr. Christian Gonzales aka Dr. G. He is an expert in naturopathic medicine and believes everything is connected from the foods we eat to the way we think and interact with the world and the people in our lives. I agree with that y’all. Let’s dive right into my Wholicious kitchen so we can create some delicious sexy food. 

Today we are going to be cooking this beautiful yummy budda bowl with broccoli rice, delicata squash, roasted oyster mushrooms, some pistachio pesto, and then we’ll finish with a decadent sweet potato brownie loaded with adaptogens and served with a creamy bureau nut cashew cream.

Kitchen Basics

And so before I get started, I want to go over my four essential pieces of kitchen equipment that I can’t live without. First, a sharp knife. Second, this le creuset.  I use it for everything roasting, steaming, boiling. I haven’t everyday pan my always pan. Okay, I use this mostly for my eggs and poaching, sauteing and last, the Vitamix. The Vitamix, I really can’t live without my Vitamix. I use it for pesto’s and soups, and purees, sauces, basically anything. And of course that can make a really mean Margarita. 

I already introduced Dr. G. He’s going to be on a little later. And today, Dr. G and I are going to be talking about the healing properties of food, cancer-fighting foods, and the powerful world of adaptogens. And so the menu today is really inspired because of Dr. G being on the show. And I really wanted to make a bowl today that had all different types of components. And so I wanted to make a budda bowl. 

What is a Buddha Bowl?

A budda bowl is a vegetarian bowl, loaded with different veggies and grains and beans. 

And it’s actually a really great way to eat the colors of the rainbow. It forces me to eat the colors of the rainbow. And I really believe that when we’re fueling and nourishing our bodies with the right foods, that’s really when we glow from the inside out. And y’all I firmly believe that what we put in our bodies matters right now today. 

Budda Bowl Recipe

Okay, let’s get started on this broccoli rice. First I’m going to add my onion and a little garlic.

And I like to saute with avocado oil or coconut oil. I finished with olive oil. That’s usually what I finish with and I saute with avocado and coconut. Okay, so I’ve got my onion, my garlic, my oil, I’m going to let that go just for a couple minutes, I’m going to add a little bit of salt. Okay, and I’ve got this on high heat right now because I really want the onions and the garlic to carmelize. 

Okay, while this is going let’s go ahead and get our delicata squash chopped up. So delicata you can use any squash here you could use kabocha, butternut squash is pretty accessible all year round. So what I’m going to do is I’m going to cut off the ends of the squash. And then I’m going to cut it in half and then it’s pretty easy to cut it in half again. Now going with the spoon, I’m going to scrape off my seeds and I’m going to do it down into my trash here. All right, then cut some really nice half moons about half-inch thick. Let me get these seeds. So about a half-inch thick, just like that. I’m gonna put my squash in here. Really a staple in my house always for meal prep, I always have broccoli rice ready. And I always have squash roasted and that way you can have all of your different vegetables and grains and rice ready in the fridge and then you can assemble your bowl. 

So while I’m slicing the squash, I’m actually going to add our broccoli rice. So this is rice broccoli, I actually did this in the food processor, but you can cheat it. You can buy this frozen and you can also buy this in the produce section non-frozen too to make it easier. Okay, so I’m going to add my broccoli rice and give it a little stir here. I’m going to let this saute for just about a minute before we add the coconut milk and the rest of the ingredients. I’m gonna let that go for a minute. 

Now, to add a little bit of avocado oil and paprika. I’m using a smoked paprika, my favorite. All right. And I’m just gonna give this a little toss. Okay, and we’re gonna roast this in the oven at 350 for about 25 minutes. All right, so our broccoli rice is looking perfect. I’m gonna go ahead and add some coconut milk and I’m using whole fat coconut milk and I’m going to turn down our heat to about medium now.  Okay, that looks amazing. 

Broccoli Hack

Now I want to say one thing that I did learn from Dr. G that I’m sure we’ll talk about later today is a good hack in the kitchen for cruciferous veggies which broccoli is. To use mustard seed powder and mustard seed powder brings out the nutritional benefits and actually makes it a really powerful cancer-fighting food. So I can’t wait for Dr. G to go over a little bit more of that also. I just added all of our spices. I added cumin, mustard seed powder, salt, pepper, and more paprika. Cumin and smoked paprika is a favorite combo of mine. 

I’m going to add a squeeze of lemon here and I just squeezed the lemon right my hand just don’t get the seeds. Okay, and that’s perfect. Okay, I’ve got some Swiss chard here. So next what I’m going to do is give this a nice little chop here and it can be rough because it will cut down into the broccoli rice. Then I’m going to cover it and I’m going to let this cook for about eight minutes. I don’t like to cook my broccoli past about 10 minutes because it really loses the nutritional value. So that’s just like a nice rough chop. I’m gonna add this to my rice. Okay, and I’m going to cover this. Okay. Smells so good. All right, so our squash is roasting. I already have some squash ready for us. We’ve got the broccoli rice going. Now I’m going to start on the oyster mushrooms. 

Cancer-fighting Mushrooms

So the oyster mushrooms are one of my favorite mushrooms. Because it’s so great for brain health. It’s a cancer-fighting food. It’s loaded with vitamins and minerals. For me, it satiates me and makes me feel like I’m really getting some meat in my dish. Okay, I’m going to turn on this and I’m going to go ahead and saute the mushrooms and I’m going to use again some avocado oil. Can you tell how much I love my avocado oil. Okay, I’m going to do a big drizzle of that. I’m going to do about medium-high on the heat. And I’m going to let those go. Perfect.

Pistachio Pesto Recipe

So today, we’re gonna do a pistachio pesto with cilantro and parsley and a little bit of basil. Hey, so I’ve got my pistachios. Why do I love pistachios? I love them because they are great with so many vitamins and minerals and really great for brain health and heart health. Second, the cilantro and parsley. They both help pull heavy metals from the body. They’re both really great herbs to help with liver and cleansing. So I’ve got my herbs, I’ve got my pistachios, I’m going to add two whole garlic cloves here. I’m going to do the juice of two oranges. 

I really believe to make the good pesto, you need an herb, a nut, a good olive oil and a good acid and so today the acid is going to be some oranges. Then I’ve got again, some cumin and salt, pepper and I’m adding a little crushed red pepper here because I want like a little spice. But when you taste this, you’re going to love the creaminess and the sweetness of the pistachios with the cumin. It’s to die for. And then I’m going to add our olive oil right here. And I’m going to give this a good blend. Okay, that is not a good sound. 

Ginger Hack

Okay, I forgot my ginger y’all. So I want to show you a hack for ginger. You can take the end of a spoon and really just peel it like this. Look how easy this is. Sometimes I think people fight with the ginger and you have to get the peeler off out or the knife. So here we are. Look at this. So good. And I’m only going to need about a tablespoon of this. So this is a that’s a nice big tablespoon and that will make this a little spicy also. Okay, all right, we’re almost there. Let’s check our mushrooms. Beautiful. Oh yeah. So you can see they’re starting to get nice and carmelized. I’ve liked when I sauteed mushrooms. I keep the heat to medium and high and I let them sit for about two to three minutes before I go and move the pan. If you continue and constantly move the pan, they might get a little bit watery and you’re not going to get that nice and carmelized brown on the outside of the mushroom. Okay, I’m going to add my salt and pepper. A nice little pinch. Okay.

And you know the beautiful thing about oyster mushrooms. You don’t really need a lot. This is so simple. We’ve got a little bit of oil, salt, pepper and we’re going to finish it with lemon. They don’t need to be overcomplicated. Okay. Oh yes. Beautiful. Okay, let’s check our broccoli rice here. Okay, our broccoli rice is looking good. I’m actually going to turn this off the heat and I’m going to let that sit. 

Time to Assemble the Bowl

To finish, I’m going to add a big handful of basil. The basil really adds a lot of sweetness, especially with the cumin and the paprika. And we’re done. And then we’ll assemble our bowl. Okay. The basil, my gosh, that smells so good. And I am going to add a drizzle of lemon. Because it’s all about the acid. You know, really the two components to make a great meal y’all. It’s acid and salt. That’s it. If you’ve got that, you can make anything taste amazing. All right, this looks perfect. Okay. Oh yeah, look at this. So nice and carmelized. So brown. Those literally have about one more minute. 

So a big, big handful of baby greens. And then I’m going to put a nice big scoop of broccoli rice. Hey, oh my gosh, Dr. G is going to love this. Then I’m going to add some mushrooms. Hey, look at those mushrooms. So carmelized nice and brown. Oh, so good. And then we have our squash. We have our roasted delicata squash with paprika. Hey, I’m just gonna take some of these guys. Look how colorful this bowl is. Do you see all the nutrients do you see all the vitamins, healthy fat. This is loaded with plant protein.

If You Eat a Plant-based Meal Does that Mean you’re Going to be Deprived of Protein?

And that’s not true. There is so much protein loaded between the squash and the broccoli.

Healthy Fat is Good for the Brain

We’re actually going to add some avocado. There’s about eight grams of protein per avocado. Okay, so so far, we’ve got our broccoli rice our mushrooms, the delicata. Now let’s add a little avocado because I have to basically put avocado on everything. And it’s really great for brain health. Has protein and the amazing healthy fat for our brain. 

Okay, like to cut that in half. And then to take my spoon and spread right underneath the skin like that. And then can just do a couple of nice slices. And I’m just going to put those right on top. Okay, then to finish this baby, I’m going to add a little pinch of maldon sea salt. Okay, it’s the best salt. A little bit of sprouted pumpkin seeds. And I buy sprouted. I think the brand is called Raw sprouted, but it’s really important to buy sprouted pumpkin seeds because you can digest them better. So I’m doing Sprouted Seeds. I’m gonna do a little drizzle of lemon on top. And then to finish some amazing extra virgin olive oil. Oh, and I know what I forgot. Hey, that’s amazing. A big scoop of this creamy, amazing, delicious pesto. Oh yeah, that’s what makes it. Right there. Okay, all right, y’all look at this. Our budda bowl with broccoli, rice, delicata squash, carmelized oyster mushrooms with baby greens, avocado and that delicious, creamy pistachio cilantro pesto. 

Cashew Brunette Cream Brownie Recipe

Now for dessert can’t wait. We’re going to make a sweet potato brownie loaded with adaptogens with a cashew brunette cream. Okay, for the sweet potato brownie today, we’re going to keep it easy and simple. We need two pieces of equipment. The food processor and of course the Vitamix. 

For the Love of Brownies

Okay. I love this brownie. Let me tell you why I love this brownie. First of all, it’s impossible to mess up. It’s very easy. It’s fast. It’s simple. We’re gonna make it in the food processor. When I bake y’all I keep my baking really hassle-free and really easy. I’m a blender baker, okay? Then we’re going to make a brunette cashew cream, and we’re going to make that in the VitaMix. 

Okay, so to get started, everything is going to go in this food processor. Every time I go home y’all when I go home to Georgia to visit my family. I always make this. It is such a favorite. I’m adding the coconut sugar. Okay, and don’t worry, I’ll give you the ingredients. I’ll give you the the measurements. And so then I’m going to add some raw almond butter, raw organic almond butter and this is where I love to give substitutions. So if you’re allergic to almonds, you don’t like almonds, any butter of choice we’ll set up here. You can do tahini, cashew butter, walnut butter, pecan butter, anything peanut butter, peanut butter, chocolate delicious. So I’m going to add our almond butter. This is where I like to say like get creative in the kitchen right? Or maybe you want to you wake up one day and you have all the ingredients and you’ve got tahini in the in the pantry but you don’t have almond butter than make it with tahini and see how you like it. Alright, so I’ve got my almond butter. Great. Then I’m going to add our coconut oil. I’ve already melted it here. Okay, make sure your coconut oil is melted. And this brownie is so great because it’s loaded with plant protein, healthy fat. I’m making this the Paleo version today. 

What’s Paleo? 

Paleo is grain-free, dairy-free, gluten-free. 

And the flour today we’re going to use is almond flour and coconut flour. And the chocolate chips today are actually a raw cacao chocolate chip that’s made with maple and and coconut sugar and so that way this stays really low glycemic and low sugar. So I’m going to do about a cup. Okay of almond flour. Okay, then I’m going to do coconut flour. You know what I love about coconut flour is that it is loaded with protein. Like nobody realizes how much protein coconut flour has, and so much fiber. So where did the adaptogens come in? Well, I’ve chose to put Chaga mushroom and Lion’s Mane powders, they’re mushrooms. They’re flavorless. You can’t taste them. Adaptogens. 

What the Heck is an Adaptogen? 

Well, an adaptogen helps our bodies adapt to outside stressors. 

And I started putting adaptogens in my food and drinks years ago to help me with some hormonal balances. I was I was recovering from Adrenal Fatigue. So I was using a bunch of maca root and I always use Lion’s Mane because it’s so great for brain health and it helps me really with mental clarity and focus. The Chaga mushroom, Chaga mushroom is like the queen mushroom and it’s got the highest ORAC value, the highest antioxidant value and it also has antiviral properties. It’s so great. And I know Dr. G will say that he loves the Chaga mushroom, because it is known to help with cancer-fighting properties. 

Alright, what else are we doing? Oh my gosh, our main ingredient is the sweet potato. So today I’m actually using a roasted yam. And here again, you can sub pumpkin, you can sub white sweet potato, purple sweet potato, orange sweet potato, any of those work. I’ve even used roasted zucchini in this and steamed pureed cauliflower. So see how I mean how easy it is to be creative and do substitutions and play around. 

Keto Substitutes

If you really want this to be more of a Keto brownie, you can make sure that your chocolate chips are made with monkfruit. You can sub instead of the coconut sugar we use, you can actually sub monkfruit for that and then make it really low glycemic try using cauliflower instead of the potato. Okay, if you’re a Keto if you’re a Keto person out there. Alright, what else are we adding, we’re going to add a little bit of vanilla extract. Okay, and then our cinnamon and baking soda, okay, and a little pinch of salt. Okay, so now I’m gonna give this a quick little blend. 

Perfect. Now I’m going to add our chocolate chips. Okay, I’m going to save a little bit for the top because I like to put a little bit of chocolate chips on the top to melt. So we’re going to do a little bit of chocolate chips, we’ll save some, and then I’m going to put, I don’t know about a fourth a cup of coconut flakes in there. Give that a little bit of texture. And we’ll do one more little blend. Okay, perfect. You know what the best is about this dough is you can eat it raw. It’s so delicious. Why? There’s no egg in it. And it’s basically loaded with loaded with protein. So good. 

I’m gonna do a little spray here. And then I am going to use my hands it works best. My hands are clean. And this is my brownie in my kitchen right so I’m going to definitely use my bare hands for this and flatten it. And I’ve got the oven preheated at 350 that this will go in for about 20-25 minutes. Let me get all the chocolate chips out here. Oh and another adaptogen in here that I forgot to talk about is the raw cacao from the chocolate chips from the Paleo chocolate chips and raw cacao is really great for energy. 

What is an Adaptogen Really Great for Energy?

Raw cacao is great for energy and actually helps with depression. Do you ever eat chocolate you feel happy after? So it kind of releases the happy hormone. It’s actually got a high antioxidant value also.

When I was getting off caffeine, I actually started drinking raw cacao drinks in the morning instead of coffee. So this is an adaptogen brownie and then when we get into the brunette cream, we’ve got even more adaptogens over there. Okay, nice and flat. I’m going to put this in the oven for about 25 minutes. Okay, so that’s going to bake for 25 minutes at 350. Okay, let’s start on our brunette cream. First of all, let’s talk about bureau nuts. 

Bureau Nuts are my Favorite Nuts. Why? 

They’re the highest antioxidants. They actually have the highest amount of protein and they’re the lowest unsaturated fats. So they became really popular because of the lower fat, higher protein and higher antioxidant value and they are from Brazil and they’re fabulous.

They’re delicious. They’re a great snack. And what I like about them is that they’ve got a nice nutty peanut flavor. And so if you’ve got a peanut allergy, this is a great way to get your peanut butter fix. So you’re going to notice when you try them that they definitely have like a little bit of a peanut butter flavor. So in the Vitamix, I’m going to add the bureau nuts, and I’m going to add cashews but before I blend this I want to talk about soaking nuts. 

Benefits of Soaking Nuts

So I have soaked both of these nuts overnight and rinsed them and strained them. You never want to use the water that you’ve soaked your nuts in. The reason that we’re soaking the nuts is because it removes any of the enzyme inhibitors that are blocking any absorption of any of the minerals or nutrients that are coming actually from the nut. If you ever noticed that you eat nuts and seeds and you feel a little bloated or gassy. You can start to soak your nut. So these have already been soaked and rinsed and strained. Okay, same with the bureau nuts. 

Alright, there we are. We’ve got our cashews, our bureau nuts. Then I’m going to add maca root and mesquite. So the maca root really really known for hormones actually known for sexual vitality and health and libido and energy and I took a lot of maca as I was healing my hormones and my adrenals, and my thyroid. Okay, I get that and the mesquite gives it a nice and multi flavor like I love a multi a multi flavor. Okay, I’m going to add some coconut milk, and I’m using whole milk coconut milk. And here’s another way that you can substitute to y’all like if you are allergic to coconut, then you can sub almond milk here or any liquid of choice. Okay, I just like the creaminess and the fattiness from the coconut milk. And then I’m gonna add some maple syrup. Okay. Now I’m going to blend away. Okay, perfect. 

Let’s take a look at this cream. Oh, yeah. Okay, so All I smell is the maple and the maltiness from the mesquite mixed with the bureau nut. It’s so good. So this brownie I made earlier, so we didn’t have to wait. So let’s get in here. Okay, I’m going to cut a nice slice here for us. And let it take this delicious cream here. So creamy look at this cream and I’m going to put a nice bed here on the bottom of it. And one thing I love about this bureau nut cream is that there’s so many options for it. First of all, it’s delicious drizzled on nice cream or ice cream, a smoothie bowl can put it on your yogurt and granola. I love it on toast with some bananas or apple slices. Or you can use this as as a dip, like I’ve used that. Use it as a dip for apple slices before and it’s delicious. 

Okay, that’s a big dollop of our adaptogen maca, bureau nut cream. And then I’m going to take our brownie here. And what I also love about this brownie is that usually adaptogens are in drinks and elixirs, but it’s really fun to use adaptogens in creams and brownies, it’s a great way to get them in. So just wanted to say that okay, I’m going to add some chocolate chips here for a garnish. Oh my gosh, Dr. G is going to love this. I can’t wait for him to try the budda bowl and our sweet potato adaptogen brownie. I just know he’s gonna love it.

Special Guest: Dr. Chrisitan Gonzalaz

Okay, y’all so excited. Christian Gonzalez is in the house today, aka Dr. G. He is definitely a great friend, an amazing naturopathic doctor. And I’m so excited he’s here.

CA: Thank you so much for coming on the show today. 

Dr. G: Thank you. Oh my gosh, walk in. There’s food everywhere.

CA: Oh my gosh, you’re like, Yes!

Dr. G: I know. It’s good quality. 

CA: Thank you. 

Dr. G: It’s coming from you. 

CA: Thanks so much. So one thing I always think of when I think of you is I think of you as a person that live definitely a holistic lifestyle. And you really walk your talk, right and you live with so much integrity. And I really appreciate that about you. And you have inspired me over the years to make so many changes in my health and live a life that’s more holistic. And there’s a joke and a saying and my friends group, my family that if we’re making a change in our makeup or laundry detergent, or I’ve switched rock a cow or cleaning products, right? Somebody will say is it Dr. G approved or all say, “is it Dr. G approved?” and I can kind of get like my family to make a change because my mother loves you too. And I’ll say Well, Dr. G approves Mom, come on. 

Dr. G: So it’s amazing. And it’s beautiful when your work can transcend that and yeah, all of a sudden, someone could say like something is Dr. G approved. Yeah, I hear that. Sometimes they’ll be like, Oh, I’m talking to my mom. And I brought in something. I’m like the groceries and she goes to that Dr. G approved? And it’s funny. It’s a nice thing that has caught on. 

CA: Today we’re going to be talking about the healing properties of food and the powerful world of adaptogens and cancer fighting foods because I know that’s a passion of yours too. But before we get started, I know the Wholicious community wants to see your take your reaction and taste this budda bowl. So let’s talk about the budda bowl. For me, I love a budda bowl because it forces me to eat all the colors of the rainbow. So we’ve got broccoli rice with a little Swiss chard, some oyster mushrooms, and you know I love the oyster mushroom. We can talk more about that. Delicata squash, we have a raw pesto here. Definitely some raw sprouted pumpkin seeds and avocado because I always eat avocado for fat and brain health. So you can have a bite here. But this is like the Mac Daddy bowl. This is the Mac this is a Mac but it will and there’s just so many things that we can talk to to this bowl. That’s why I was like okay, what am I going to make for Dr. G? I need to make a budda bowl because I want to talk about healing properties of food. And a couple kitchen hacks that I’ve learned in the kitchen from you. Those oyster mushrooms. I love the oyster mushrooms because they’re so meaty, so meaty. 

Dr. G: Man. Every time I eat your food. It’s so flavorful, but so nutritious and I feel like a new man.

CA: I love that that’s a great compliment.

Dr. G: But I’m glad you put in the mushrooms. This is actually a powerful anti cancer bowl.

CA: Powerful anti-cancer bowl because we’ve got the mushrooms, and I know both and we’ll get more into adaptogens later. And then we’ve also got the broccoli rice. And I have to tell you what I put in here. And it’s something I learned from you a couple years ago is I started adding mustard seed powder to all my cruciferous veggies, and I stopped overcooking my broccoli, right, keeping it about eight minutes as you recommend, I think that you taught me to cut up the cauliflower and broccoli, and maybe let it sit for a minute. 

Dr. G: Well, broccoli is incredibly nutritious. Yeah, not only for anti cancer, but really for hormones to. The sulfur in it is conducive to us detoxifying, it’s a very sensitive vegetable. It’s got  big sensitivity. That’s what I say, yeah. But certain vegetables are really resilient. And you could just cook the crap out of them, and still get all the benefits. But generally speaking, we overcook our broccoli. And we’re really just benefiting from the fiber at that point. But we’re breaking down all those important components. So if you’re a fan, is really that therapeutic component. But for that to be created. There’s an enzyme, which is really, really delicate. That enzyme when we eat raw broccoli, we chew it mechanically, we activate that enzyme to create those. So for your body, right? Yeah, but most of us, including me, don’t like raw broccoli, it hurts my stomach, it’s too much. So I need to cook it. Now there’s two ways. There’s a mustard seed route, which, you know, we take our broccoli, cut it up, and then we can cook it lightly. And then add in mustard seed to replenish those therapeutic nutrients, which is amazing. But some of us don’t like mustard seed powder. There are a handful of people, I don’t think as much of a taste, it has a little bit of a taste. 

CA: But it doesn’t make a difference for me, either. 

Dr. G: But for the people who do, you can just cut your broccoli or cauliflower. And that’ll mimic the mechanical movement and your mouth, and the crushing and the activation of that enzyme to create those of your fans. And leave it out. Leave it out for 30 minutes or so 40 minutes and you’re ready activating it. And then if you want to cook it, you can cook it too. But you’re already activated and you don’t need to put the mustard seed powder. But those are two routes, where with this one hack, all of a sudden we’re going through life now more empowered and going yes. Okay, if I’m making a budda bowl. And it’s got some broccoli components in there. I know I did my part to make sure it’s therapeutically powerful, perfect, 

CA: Right? Because we don’t want to just eat it and not get the therapeutic benefit. Exactly. Yeah. So that’s, I love that that’s been a favorite hack. I’ve shared that with so many people. So thank you. It’s amazing. And then let’s talk about what else is in here. Well, we’ve got those oyster mushrooms. So I know brain health and it’s a great cancer fighting food too. 

Dr. G: All mushrooms are mushrooms, mushrooms are especially and a lot of my work was in breast cancer. Mushrooms are one of the most powerful foods across the board, Reishi shitai, white button mushrooms, oyster mushrooms, Lion’s Mane for the brain. But regardless, all of them have incredible therapeutic properties. And all of them have some sort of effect some more than others on the immune system. We want to all optimize our immune system, especially in the past three years, everyone’s more aware of oh, I need to be immunologically stronger and healthier. Although it’s not just eating a mushroom. And now you’re immunologically strong, there’s so many more levels. But if you’re having a food like this every single day, we see in studies that it can reduce the your your risk for breast cancer, white been mushrooms was the one that was studied. But regardless, they all act the same way because they have a carbohydrate chain, a polysaccharide chain where the immune system sees it and they go alright, we need to activate. It actually initiates the immune system to activate. Now even if you have autoimmune disease, where you quote unquote have a super hyperactive immune system. It’s interesting the intelligence of food it can help modulate to so it doesn’t get over activate it goes okay, let me actually pull back and calm down. That’s the powerful part about mushrooms. It can modulate your immune system. It’s underactive, it can bring it up to more active if it’s overactive. It can it could come down the fire. 

CA: Amazing. I didn’t know that about calming down the fire. 

Dr. G: New modulating foods and that’s it when you think about it. The intelligence of food and the connection to the body. It’s literally inflammation to all of our systems, how to work in harmony, and what to do. 

CA: Amazing. I love this. And what are some other cancer fighting foods?

Dr. G: Aside from broccoli, just all cruciferous vegetables the whole class is really powerful, especially when it comes to hormonally driven cancers like prostate, or breast, uterine cancers. These are the things that we need to look for because they all have components with hormones, the cruciferous vegetable, the whole class of vegetables, which is like kale, brussel sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli, broccoli sprouts, all of them have a positive effect on clearing estrogen from our body and also opting for the healthy accretion of the healthier form of estrogen. For example, when we eat a really inflammatory diet, and we’re exposed to a lot of Zeno, estrogens like plastics in our environment, or endocrine disruptors like scents or fragrance that we’re breathing in all day, plugins, for example. What happens is in our body, those chemicals mimic estrogen. And in that mimic phase, it’s being metabolized to a very specific pathway that is not conducive to breast health, or really health in general. I think of it like three roadways when estrogen is being metabolized. And one roadway is the clearest one, which we want most of the estrogen to go to the highest ratio. The other one’s got bumps and other ones got bumps and glass and roadblocks. Now, when we have all of these endocrine disruptors, it’s going through the bumps and it’s opting for that, that bumps glass robot road leads to genetic damage. And genetic damage is essentially what’s leading to things like breast cancer. So when you’re eating these cruciferous vegetables, it’s actually shifting the road which estrogen is being metabolized through which is amazing, right, because again, eating food is signaling the body. It’s helping clear out that toxic form of estrogen and opting for a healthier form of estrogen which is easier metabolize. So cruciferous vegetables across the board, one of the most powerful being broccoli sprouts. 

CA: Broccoli sprouts I know and they didn’t make them on the bowl today but I have an

easy 

Dr. G: It’s easy because you can you can dress them with sprouts you literally have like, you can put tahini and make a sprouts snack.

CA: I put in my smoothie, like get the broccoli sprouts, then. Yeah.

Dr. G: Especially if anyone has a predisposition to hormonally based cancers like your dad had prostate cancer, your mom had breast cancer or your dad has breast cancer even or you have just endocrine disruption, like hormonal acne. 

CA: We all have, I feel like we all have disruption, right because of plastic in the environment. And I mean, I finally years ago, I started cleaning up my makeup and my laundry detergent and stop drinking out of plastic water bottles. I mean, all the things that disrupt our hormones.

Dr. G: I mean, 93% of people was 2,000 participated with 93% of those people run by the CDC have BPA high levels of BPA, which is metabolized in like a day or two, which is pretty crazy in a day. Because that means within the past day, we’ve been exposed to some sort of endocrine disrupting plastic, and that’s one of the nastiest ones out there. There’s others but regardless, 

CA: They terrify me. You can’t even touch the register tape.

Dr. G: I do sometimes but sometimes I opt not for it. 

CA: Me too. 

Dr. G: Unless I’m making a purchase, which I might bring back. Yeah, but other powerful foods. Tumeric is one tumeric and ginger. And there’s a really good spices, you roots that you can use. I know you use a lot of it in your foods, but something that can be utilized really easily. You can make a tea at night, right? You can add it to your food, you can add it to your smoothie, ginger and Tumeric both but Tumeric tends to be the one that is even more studied, and showing so much variety and the routes of how it helps people with their immune system and reduce cancer inflammation, reduce growth of blood vessels to cancer. Blows up cancer cells like a grenade. It’s pretty incredible how intelligent Tumeric is. Turmeric when it comes to healing the body and it’s potent anti inflammatory. Ginger works very similarly to. So two really amazing spices that we see beans and legumes. We don’t really talk about beans and legumes. I know they do have yeah, they do have anti cancer, anti cancer data behind them. It’s really amazing stuff. And interesting is a lot of us demonize beans and legumes for the anti nutrients. But many of these anti nutrients are the very nutrients, nutrients that have been shown to help be helpful at reducing or preventing cancer, okay, which is incredible. So you have to find your happy medium, some of us are sensitive to it. So we can cook them out we can soak them.

Exactly, yeah, 

CA: If I eat legumes I’m definitely soaking my beans overnight. Any of my grains and legumes. Yeah, please help a little bit with the enzyme inhibitors. 

Dr. G: Yeah, that’s easy. It’s an easy process. And you know, it’s not like I’m on my process. So and then when it just comes to one of the most powerful easy ones is leafy greens. And this is this should be obvious but if we think about it, there are very important nutrients in leafy greens and really all vegetables and fruits. Yeah, but you have to think of in terms of color, right? Yes, because each color class represents a different levels of polyphenols, flavonoids, different nutrients that have been shown to be the very nutrient or antioxidants that have been helpful for reducing inflammation and overall cancer. So the way I the way I see it is leafy greens should be one or two servings a day. Okay, and then the rest you just want to get in there. You want to get all the colors and this is what how colorful this.

CA: I know and I had to add the delicata because I’m such a squash. I have an obsession with all squash, kabocha, and delicata right now, but it’s like getting the colors of the rainbow and sometimes I’ll catch myself eating broccoli and spinach and it’s like, oh, no, where’s my squash or where my yams and let me get some lentils in there and yeah, yeah. 

Dr. G: I’ve been adding a ton of pomegranate to my yes adding seeds on pomegranate seeds on there and different color squash but it’s even more visually appealing yeah to the body like we know and if you have kids aside from the topic of cancer, if you have kids that’s visually more appealing to and you can teach them you can make mushrooms taste good. So really, really important is one thing I always say is the variety, variety variety, 

CA: Variety is so important and I love going back to the kid thing because one of my favorite famous things I always make and I have it on one of my episodes are my veggie smoothie bowls, and I use a purple sweet potatoes. With blueberries right? I’ve made one for you before and it’s bright purple and it’s beautiful. But underneath I’ve got cauliflower and I’ve got zucchini and a teeny bit chlorella so you’re already sneaking in those extra veggies and it looks beautiful and it tastes like ice cream and it’s all about sneaking in the health you know without and making. It tastes great. 

Dr. G: If a kids see a blue bowl. Yeah, or a green bowl and

CA: it kind of tastes like ice cream or yogurt.

Dr. G: But look, we’re taking a step back from your skill is to make it taste good. Not everyone. I tried to do what you did. It did not taste like that. It tastes like raw cauliflower. 

CA: You’re like this taste like raw cauliflower. 

Dr. G: Right? So we really have to hone in on the taste. Yeah. Because me I got a taste but like a kid. I’m like, it doesn’t taste good. I don’t want it. Yeah. But yeah, so those are some of my favorite foods like tumeric, ginger, all the cruciferous vegetables are so important to have the variety in that. And leafy greens having one or two servings of those. And then just getting into variety. It also speaks to not just the antioxidants, but when we talked about all these foods, they’re all fiber rich. 

CA: They are and we’re deficient in fiber. I read that we like there’s 2% of Americans that eat enough fiber.

Dr. G: 2%. Very small amount, very small amount, especially evolutionarily. Right. And fiber is important signal for our microbiome, which is indicated in inflammation in our body which is implicated, and blood sugar, which is implicated in hormonal balance. Right? So if you think about where is where is a lot of our body dysfunction happening? It’s starting at the microbiome, right? So if we can heal that it’s stands to believe that a lot of our physical health can be healed from that point. We know you and I love mental, emotional, spiritual health. Yeah, Mind Body stuff. Yes, though, if we’re talking solely on physical, you have to have to nurture your microbiome. Yeah. And you do that with variety. And you do that with colors. And you do that with fiber rich foods, right throughout the day, and then you train it over time. And then all of a sudden, you go, Well, I don’t have gut issues. I feel like my arthritis is better. My skin issues are better. It’s because you’re giving the body what it needs. 

CA: Yes, I love that. We touched on gut health because it’s a very passionate topic of mine. And in a couple episodes on Wholicious, I dedicated a whole episode to gut health. And we really focus on healthy microbiome. And when I finally started to clean up my diet, probably about eight, nine years ago, I mean, I was drinking too much alcohol, too much caffeine, eating processed foods, I wasn’t really paying attention to what I was putting in my body. I was gassy, bloated, fatigued, and I didn’t even realize there was like a gut, brain connection also. So yeah, it all starts in the, in the gut. And I know you and I, we always like to go mental, emotional, spiritual. So maybe we can touch a little bit on that part.

Dr. G: What we see as doctors is someone come in usually to the point where they have found a physical dysfunction or if something’s uncomfortable, or they just my knees really hurting and keeps getting inflamed, or, you know, I’m starting to get these rashes on my body or my my stomach’s starting to bloat. But what you’re seeing is above the glacier, below the glacier is a culmination of so much. And I was just having this conversation before we got on air is you can’t, at least as a practitioner, you can’t practice fully as a practitioner, and only see the physical. Which is unfortunately the paradigm of medicine in the United States. It really is. That is half medicine for me. Yeah. Full medicine, holistic medicine is to address those physical issues. But also look at what’s under the glacier. Now inevitably, what we see under the glacier is childhood stuff, connection with your parents, your siblings, lovers, lack of authenticity and your own body and body meant not standing in integrity or your own truth, lack of community, all of the very things that you know that you’ve been holding back from yourself, but not putting onto the surface and seeing yourself in the most honest light. It’s those things that really take a toll on the body. And actually there is a there’s a measurable connection, right? We can test how stressed you’re making yourself, right? By tracking your cortisol throughout the day, right? It doesn’t have you can get off work. You can be home all day and you can just be with your own thoughts, and we can still track your cortisol right? And what happens is we tell ourselves stories over and over about everything about ourselves, about our relationships, about our work, yeah. And they perpetuate our reality. But what happens is they also perpetuate the release of cortisol in our body over and over and over. When it comes to trauma, when we experience it, or we think about it, it’s like it was yesterday. It’s like the inciting factor happened yesterday. Many times, it happens when we were young, and we adapted to that trauma. And when we have that adaptation, becomes part of our persona. And we forget that we don’t cry, or we forget that, you know, we’re really stone cold, or we forget that we’re really codependent with people. Yeah. However it manifested for people. It’s the same version. It’s the same part of a movie though the same thing. It’s just a manifestation. So like that, you have to get to the root of that. Because there’s no one walking on this earth, who’s not carrying a generational trauma?

CA: No, everyone is. I just learned that a couple years ago, and I’ve been looking underneath the glacier and peeling back the layers. I was like, why aren’t I? Why aren’t I at optimal health right now? And it’s like, Oh, I gotta look at some generational stuff.

Dr. G: Right? So yeah, so you see, you see two people, people who are unknowingly carrying generational trauma or people who are carrying the burden of working through it. Yeah, that’s it. That’s two different types of people. Why? Because the world is the way it is. And the world is the way it is because we carry so much crap. Right? Because we are so egocentric, right, and it carries through generations and generations. As we’re growing now and becoming more self aware we’re understanding that, okay, we can break that generational trauma, and also step into our own authenticity. The thing with that is that when we do we realize true health for me, yes, there’s no such thing as health until you embody your authentic self. Then comes all the other stuff. Then comes all of all of the gut healing foods, then comes all the exercise and the diets and biohacking. You can’t do any of those things. Without the first one. 

CA: You can’t. And I’m so glad you touched on that because it really is like a band aid. If you’re doing all the other things. You’re not really looking at the root cause.

Dr. G: I work with patients. And before I really had this realization, especially and I had it to the cancer treatment, I saw them and they pick up be on the best diet. They could be on the best biohacking. They could be best exercise regimen, best detox, they could spend all this money. But until they stepped into like, I really need to repair that relationship with x. Yes. And I need to step into my own self, my newest self, I need to shut that. Yeah, I mean, we’re afraid to be ourselves. We live in fear. And what do you think that fear energy does to our physiology? We live in fear. We don’t know what it is to be living in love and be ourselves. And listen, I’m guilty of it. I don’t wake up every day. Sometimes I’m like, oh, no, I’m back to my old field. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. But awareness and caring that and that you can always have a choice. You always have a choice. 

CA: I always say to myself that I wake up and I need to shift my energy to the right a little bit through. I’m like, wait a second ever, you can either choose faith or fear today, what are you going to do? Like, what’s your game gonna be? You know, because of course, we’re human. Of course, I wake up and I’m like, Oh, my God, a room. I’ve got all the noise in my head. But it’s like, yeah, how do I want to live today? I want to live in faith, and be the best version of myself today. And it’s hard. It’s not easy.

Dr. G: That’s what that’s what I say, bearing the burden of breaking generational stuff. Yeah, you could tell which people were doing it because you sit down and talk to them and you could tell they have going, they’re going through it. I’ve gone through it. Yeah. But it’s what you’re doing is you’re setting the precedent for when you do have kids if and when. You’re creating a new space for those children to grow up authentically, without the crap that your grandfather held, or your grandmother held there, your dad or your mom. And now you have space for this child. That’s the biggest blessing you can give your kid, period.

CA: It is. I’m so glad we touched on that. I didn’t even ask you at the beginning. I wanted to know like what inspired you to get into naturopathic medicine. What was like the thing?

Dr. G: I was in dental school, two years into it, and my mom got diagnosed with breast cancer. And I went home for my winter break. And I was taking her to these visits. And I was just so displeased with how conventionally she was being treated, or how we just treated cancer. I was on another plane thinking that oh, you know, we there’s more of a team effort or we understand cancer more. And then when I went into the oncologists office, I was like, we don’t know shit about cancer. Nor do we know anything about even diet, because they were they brought her home, they brought me home at two boxes of ensure boost, and just looking at these products. And at the time, I knew enough about nutrition, at least like fitness nutrition to go, why would I ever give this amount of sugar, this amount of ingredients first ingredient being inflammatory, that second and third, high sugar and that opened up my eyes to another world and going that there’s a big disparity between what we can do for cancer patients and what’s being done. So it just so happened and it’s funny because as soon as your awareness opens, you get presented with things left and right. Exactly. And it’s like my blinders opened and then all sudden this book comes into my life and it’s funny because I can tell the story. I’m on the plane on the way back to dental school in the Midwest, and I see ND and I go, the author’s name and ND to this book. And I couldn’t believe that the editors made a mistake in writing ND instead of MD, and I go, this is this is stupid how, like how, and I opened the first second page, and I read about the author and I go ND but wait, what’s happening? Naturopathic Doctor, at the time, I didn’t have an iPhone, so I couldn’t like look it up. Even when I landed, I had a flip phone. So then I went straight home, and I opened up my computer, and I did all the research. And I had like a hot flash of intuition. And it was like, this is where you need to be not here. Now define my logic on all of those loans that I had. I left and through leaving, it opened up the sense of purpose. And that’s how it happened. After that, I was able to go treat people with cancer and my mom did pass away. I was able to treat people after seeing even that process of death, too. It was the whole process. I just think that the way we do death in America, the way we do cancer healing and treatment in America is so off. It is off. So off. We are not working with the body. And people aren’t dying with dignity.

CA: No, they’re not. I lost a family member too to cancer and they’re not dying with dignity. It’s crazy.

Dr. G: It’s horrible. So through that process, I learned okay, it’s not just for me, I was like, oh, well, all they need to do is just eat a healthier diet and no cancer. It’s not just diet. It’s there’s so many more factors to it. Two of the factors we weren’t talking about in school, and in residency were and I learned more when I was doing my own work about environmental toxins, which I do talk a lot about, we talk about like a cow and heavy metals and pesticides. And then the trauma stuff we were just talking about. To me the two biggest factors, the two biggest factors for cancer. Were number one is trauma that you’re holding in the body, and two is environmental toxins. Then comes diet then comes exercise, all the other things, but those two biggest factors for cancer are those two.

CA: Okay, so we have to talk about adaptogens because I know you and I have talked about adaptogens that we can do it all day. It’s my favorite topic of mine. And I love my mushrooms. So I started drinking lion’s mane and Chaga and Rishi putting those three mushrooms in my tea about two and a half years ago when I was healing my adrenals from Adrenal Fatigue and I was coming off the caffeine. They gave me so much energy. They also helped balance my nervous system and really helped with brain health because I had so much brain fog. And then I always do maca, maca for my hormones, sexual health, energy too. So I want to ask you and I love we’re gonna taste the brownie here in a minute because I think it’s unique to put adaptogens in food and not just drink them right. So we do have some maca and all three of the mushrooms and our brownie later. But what are some of your favorite adaptogens? And yeah, tell me just a quick.

Dr. G: It’s fantastic when you could think about doing adaptogens and food. Yeah, because not everyone is going to comply and take all these tinctures and powders. Yeah, I do love Reishi as a powerful adaptogen that you can take at night actually because it’s not an energizing one. Quadriceps is another one and actually grows on bugs. But quadriceps is more of a stimulating one that you can take during the day especially for athletics. So let’s say before workout quadricep mushrooms is pretty good one that I like. Sometimes I couple that with something called Rhodiola.

CA:I love Rhodiola. It’s fantastic for nice energize. 

Dr. G: Yeah, that’s an energizing one. Make sure you take that. Whereas something like schizandra or holy basil, usually those are more calming, but  they help your adrenals and your nervous system. Some things that we don’t talk about are vitamin C, and how important that is for your adrenals. When your vitamin C deficient, your adrenals are suffering. When you’re sick or your stressed, you’re using a lot of vitamin C, and your adrenals are working. So a lot of adrenal rich foods or adaptogenic foods that we don’t talk about are all the vitamin C rich foods. So and the thing is remember, we can eat a bunch of vitamin C rich foods, but a week later, it’s not gonna be stored in our body, we’re gonna be paying it out to water soluble vitamin. So you always have to make sure you’re replenishing vitamin C rich foods. It’s not just for the immune system. It’s also for your stress system. So another one of my favorite ones, and I love maca too. Yeah, great one.

CA: Yeah, I love maca. Okay, I know we could talk about adaptogens all day. So I think we should try this brownie. 

Dr. G: Let’s do it. Okay. 

CA: I had to bring myself a fork because I just had to get in here. So I’m going to tell you what this brown is. It’s a sweet potato brownie using sweet potato as the base. And then it’s got almond flour and some paleo chocolate chips. So there’s no sugar that’s made with coconut sugar, and a little bit of coconut and then in the brownie. I’ve got lion’s mane and Chaga and then in the bureau nut creams, you’ve got a lot of antioxidants with the bureau nut and then we’ve got macca, lucuma and tocos. 

Dr. G: It’s like a treat. It’s like a treat. Right? It’s a more early afternoon treat. I love these.

C: It gives me so much energy and it’s a desert without the guilt and it’s loaded with healthy fat and plant protein. 

Dr. G: That’s why I love your food. It’s things like this with no sugar. Exactly. And I can enjoy it, but it tastes so good.

CA: I know I mean this my whole mission on earth is to make a paradigm shift in the world through food and have healthy food taste delicious, right? It doesn’t have I think healthy food gets the stigma of being so bland and boring. And all the things and no, like when we’re eating good food, and we’re filling our bodies with the right food. We feel confident, amazing, sexy in our body. So I always like to say that healthy is the new sexy. Like when it comes to food.

Dr. G: Well, there’s the thing because every time I eat good, like good, flavorful food, not like something really boring that I’m putting together that is healthy. Yeah, but flavorful. It gets my it gets my whole juices flowing. I feel alive. Yeah. You know, I come into your restaurant, I’m dancing on the chair. My body’s just moving. And I’m like, oh, I need more food like this. I always forget. But then I come back and I go I need to eat like this day. Love it, I get home and I really bland meals, then I come back. So this type of food.

CA: Always love cooking for you. And today was amazing. We could talk for hours, this was so fun. And I just want to thank you for making such a difference in my life and inspiring me and my family. So thanks for the work you’re doing for the world and the community. So yeah, it’s really amazing. 

Dr. G: And likewise, thank you for the gifts your talents that you’re giving us, community and people. It’s really amazing stuff.

CA: Thank you. And one last question for you. Is there a tip or a tool that you can share with the wholicious community that they can implement, and their daily life for holistic living?

Dr. G: Yeah, make time for yourself. You have to make time for yourself. I don’t care if it’s 10 minutes in the day, three hours in the day, if you have time in the morning, especially to set yourself up. And finally just to come back yourself to come back to your body to get in your body. Whether it’s yoga, whether it’s meditation, whether it’s breathing, whether it’s journaling, whether it’s just going on a walk, something that it has nothing to do with your phone or your family or your partner or anything. You time.

CA: All these spiritual practices. I’m going to be sharing the Wholicous. It’s all about coming back to yourself being present yourself. Like you said 10 minutes. Okay, so before we go today, tell people where they can find you.

Dr. G: Okay, most of my work is on Instagram. So it’s at d-o-c-t-e-r  dot Gonzalez g-o-n-z-a-l-e-z. I’m also a co-founder of the swell score, which is curated and handpicked supplements. But not only that, things for the home, beds, bedding, air fresheners, whatever it is, all by doctors and scientists. And it’s a platform where you can just it takes all of the guesswork out. You know all the research out and you just go yes, I want to know the best b 12 The best vitamin C the best bedding, the best pillows, all there. So check it out. That’s just swell score. Perfect.

CA: Okay, awesome. All right. Thanks again. 

Thanks y’all for joining today. Take care of yourself, your mind your body and your soul. And if you felt inspired today and you love this episode, give it a thumbs up. And if you have any questions, comment below because I love staying connected with you all. Subscribe to my YouTube channel so you can be an active part of my vision of a healthy world through food. And remember, healthy is the new sexy. See you on the next episode!

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