Episode 13: The Magic of Five Vegetables a Day with Aimee Gallo
Aimee Gallo 0:00
I think what people are not aware of, is exactly how profound produce is in completely turning your life around and revitalizing restoring health and reversing disease. Like that awareness - I don't think is really fully present. And people just are overwhelmed at the thought of actually making that happen.
Matt Johnston 0:20
The human experience is the greatest project any of us will undertake, it's often the one we spend the least amount of time working on. My name is Matt Johnston. I'm a self-professed personal development junkie, retired pro golfer, I now work for an organization that provides employee and health benefits to hundreds of thousands of people. It should be common sense to realize that what happens at work is what people bring home and what happens at home comes to them to work, but that's too often ignored. That's why each week I hope to uncover a little more around what it means to be a human working and living in the 21st century. We'll be learning from experts, having conversations and getting insights and all those things that fall at the intersection of Life and Work, emotional and physical health skills and money. All the relationships we navigate each day and of course the purpose and meaning we all desire. This is The Human Assignment.
Welcome back to the podcast. My guest today is Aimee Gallo. Aimee is a Certified Nutritionist, specializing in functional medicine and fitness and she's the founder of Vibrance Nutrition. At the age of 12, Aimee discovered the impact food choices have on our overall health and she's never looked back. For over 25 years, she's explored different dietary modalities and studied nutrition's role in human health, receiving two degrees in nutrition and numerous certifications and specializes in topics such as fat loss, sports, nutrition, functional medicine and holistic health. Aimee has worked in private practice for over 15 years, helping countless people to dramatically improve their quality of life and health through sustainable lifestyle shifts, uncovered in a collaborative, shame free environment. She has been a contributor on topics of health and wellness for numerous publications Athleta's Chi Blog, Mother Earth Living Magazine, and was recognized as a leading Mom in Business in 2014 StartUP Nation. Through exploring the research and observing outcomes in clinical practice. Aimee has become convinced that the answer to chronic disease and the healthcare crisis lies at the end of our fork and can begin with one simple action that she's going to share with us today.
I've been wanting to have someone on the podcast to talk about nutrition for a while and when I found out about Aimee, I thought that she'd be a great person to kick us off. Her message is simple and accessible. And for me, what's important is it speaks beyond any diet fad. I think you'll really enjoy this interview; Aimee passion is just infectious, and she has deep knowledge and experience in this area. So, if you want to learn more about Aimee, go to her website VibranceNutrition.com, check out their Instagram or Facebook page, Vibrance Nutrition. We have links to both of them in the show notes. Aimee has also offered a free guide to listeners called Five Ways to Increase Your Veggie Intake by Five Servings in Less Than 15 Minutes. You can download that guide in the show notes. The link is there. And Aimee has said that that, coupled with her Veggie Hunter app will give you a great start at leveling up your produce intake. As always, thanks so much for listening to the show. If you if you wanted to support us, the best way you can do so is by going over to iTunes and giving us a review. And without further ado, it is my pleasure to introduce to you Aimee Gallo.
Aimee, welcome to the show.
Aimee Gallo 3:45
Thank you so much. I'm so happy to be here today.
Matt Johnston 3:47
Thanks, so much for taking the time. Our mutual friend Mike Kelly introduced me to you, and he said that - he said this a couple times - and anytime Mike is raving about someone I'm always listening, so I've spent the last few weeks digging into your content. And I'm really excited about the opportunity to talk.
Aimee Gallo 4:04
Thank you, yeah.
Matt Johnston 4:06
There's many different directions that we can go here today. You're the you're the founder of Vibrance, Nutrition. And we're going to talk about lifestyle, what have you, but I thought that we'd start with this, you know, global problem that we're facing or this healthcare issue that we're facing here. I'm living in Canada, and I'm looking at a statistic right in front of me, from the Conference Board of Health that says that 80% have type two diabetes and heart disease cases and 40% of cancer cases, maybe even more than 40% of cancer cases are linked to lifestyle behaviors that can be avoided. In Canada, more than 50% of the world lives with chronic disease, healthcare costs are out of control. And you have the answer to the healthcare crisis, I've heard.
Aimee Gallo 4:50
I do. I believe I have one of the major answers to this problem. And I live just south of the border from you, in the United States. And our statistics are pretty abysmal as well. We have, at this point, in 2017, our health care costs went up nearly 5%, it exceeded $3.6 trillion, which is unaffordable, you know, no matter who you're expecting to pay for it. Whether it's the government, or the people, or the insurance companies, no one has that kind of money to take care of the problem.
And so ultimately, it's going to be up to us as individuals to really spearhead the answer. And as challenging as that conversation has been, in the media, what we see between the experts who are talking about it, I feel like nobody is really addressing the root of the issue. And that is that the reason why our health care costs are so high is because we are predominantly dealing with chronic disease in industrialized nations. And chronic disease, occurs over many, many years, and costs a lot of money each year. And this is part of the reason why our health care costs are so high.
The other thing that everyone is neglecting is that chronic diseases largely - as you mentioned - a disease of lifestyle. It is a disease of lifestyle choices. It is due to inactivity. It is due to what we're consuming, and how we're going about our lives and whether or not we're taking care of stress and our physical bodies. And the answer that the answer I believe, the simplest answer to the healthcare crisis really comes down to vegetables.
Matt Johnston 6:36
Damn it.
Aimee Gallo 6:42
I know. [Laughs]
Matt Johnston 6:43
I was hoping it'd be something a lot sexier than what my mom has been telling me for years.
Aimee Gallo 6:48
Right? I know, I know. That's the that's the conundrum actually. That's my big my big lot in life is trying to figure out how to make vegetables as sexy as chocolate.
Matt Johnston 6:59
Well, I'm just joking because as I told you, I raced home. I'm doing this is interview from my house. And I did that because the most important thing in prep for talking to you is making sure that I made a green smoothie. So that I was closer to my five servings of vegetables today. Aimee, why don't we take just a step back and talk about you and where you've come from. You're a certified nutritionist. You've been in this world for over 25 years learning and serving people. How did you get into this?
Aimee Gallo 7:32
So, it's funny that we're actually talking about this about 25 years after I got started. Because I see dietary trends, correlating very strongly with fashion trends. And 25 years ago, we had the Atkins diet, you know, which is a low carb diet that began with a state of ketogenesis - ketosis rather. And we had this resurgence in vegetarianism and veganism which was 25 years after the onset of the Atkins diet in the 70s, and Frances Moore Lappé's work on vegetarianism that was very popular during the 70s as well. So here we are, you know, circling back around to the big dietary trends and in industrialized nations is this meatless eating, combating with a low carb keto diet. And that's ultimately what got me started. I became, I was 12 years old, and I just picked up a book and a bookstore called 101 Ways to Save the Animals. I thought it was going to be a book about dolphin safe tuna and saving the rainforests and - if you have children - like I was 12. So very formidable, formidable like that. That's the right word, right?
Matt Johnston 8:46
Yeah, you nailed it, formidable.
Aimee Gallo 8:47
Yeah. It's a very, very tender age in terms of development. And this book was written by the founder People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which is an animal rights group. It was about factory farms, and fur farms, and animal testing and all of this horrific stuff that I had no idea existed. And I was appalled, I was mortified. Like I couldn't - I had a hard time grappling with the fact that I lived in this world. And this is what was going on. And this is what the adults were doing in this world that we lived in to these creatures that were so innocent and pure.
And I became one of those militant radical animal rights activists and I got rid of all my animal tested products, my leather and everything. And about nine months into that I came to this realization that I could not continue eating meat and be in integrity with my beliefs. So, I decided to go vegetarian. And at this point, I had just turned 13 and I had family members that were very concerned about that choice. They thought I would be anemic. There's no way you can get enough protein on a vegetarian diet. I was like, you know, there are a lot of people in India are doing just fine.
Matt Johnston 9:54
[Laughs]
Aimee Gallo 9:55
So, I think they're wrong, but they're not going to take my word for it. So, I went to the library and I started reading. I went in looking for the nutrition - justifying the vegetarian diet from a nutritional adequacy standpoint. What I found was these conversations happening about heart disease, and cancer and diabetes and how all of that is impacted by what we're putting on our plate, and that the diseases of our life that we're seeing right now are actually due to what we're eating, not genetics, or some unlucky draw. That we have a lot of power and how we lived and how we died. And again, being 13 years old, I was just like, "Holy smokes, people need to know about this!"
And so, I went on my crusade as it were, of preaching the benefits of diet, and at that point, it was a vegetarian diet because I thought that was the answer for everything. And it's not. But that that awareness and that fascination of how much choice we actually have - how much say - how much we can influence the path of our own lives simply by what is at the end of our fork was so powerful and has never gone away. Like I've just gone deeper, and deeper and deeper into the research and it's a very exciting time to be in this field. Nutrition is only 100 years old, really. So, it's a very new field. And we're learning so much. It's amazing.
Matt Johnston 11:26
So, what is it - as a nutritionist - what do you what goes into that? What do you do? How do you support your clients? And who are your clients who would come to you?
Aimee Gallo 11:34
Most of my clients are, I guess we're officially middle age now. Which is something I'm still coming to terms with. Most of my clients are 35 and older, you know, 35 to 60, generally female. And I think that's true for just in the field in general, like women are more likely to seek nutrition guidance than men are, and to seek support for that process. But typically, it's someone who is - they're at a stage of their life where they're starting to feel decline. They're tired. They wake up with aches and pains, digestion is off. Maybe they've gone to the doctor for an exam and they are they've been diagnosed with pre-diabetes, or their cholesterol is high or they're they've just been put on blood pressure medication. And there's this general sense of, "I'm not ready for this, I'm not ready to go down this path."
I look at my parents, and I don't want to - I'm not ready to be there yet. And I see this is the way that we go, right? You get started on one medication and five years, you're on, you know, five to six more, right? It's this long, slow, steady decline. And I work with people who aren't ready to go down that path. And they are aware that the choices that they're making, in terms of movement, in terms of what they're eating, are having an impact, but they're, you know, they've got families, they've got careers that are very demanding. They may be juggling taking care of elder parents as well as raising children and even though they have a sense of what they need to be doing, making that actually happen is where the struggle is. Because knowing you need to eat - everybody knows they need to eat more vegetables, right? This is not a new message. I think what people are not aware of is exactly how profound produce is in completely turning your life around and revitalizing restoring health and reversing disease like that awareness, I don't think is really fully present. And people just are overwhelmed at the thought of actually making that happen. Because they envision it's going to take, you know, three hours of chopping vegetables to make dinner every night and that's absolutely not true.
Matt Johnston 13:49
I'm getting this picture of the slow boil. You know, and I think that when I think of my own life and the habits that I get into nutrition, and otherwise. I'd like to change, it's sort of just kind of was like it was a slippery slope. And when I'm eating like crap, it kind of goes on for weeks on end and I don't really know I don't really know what happened. Like that's kind of the image that I'm getting, it just seems like a big behavior change. It's hard to imagine that, you know, eating vegetables is really gonna do anything for you.
Aimee Gallo 14:26
It's so simple that it is really easy to dismiss. And vegetables are, you know, they're not they're not big money-makers. So, we don't have a lot of commercials encouraging us to eat our vegetables. And they're not you know - they just sit there. They're not very they're not especially glamorous, although, I'd be I'd be hard pressed to challenge anybody to walk by a fresh produce stand and not like not have it catch your eye. You know when it's when it's all laid out there and it's fresh and as vibrant and the colors are just glowing, you know, and just like, they're, I'm a little biased, but...
Matt Johnston 15:08
You're a little biased. [Laughs]
Aimee Gallo 15:09
I'm a little biased. I can't help but just stop and marvel at that abundance and that vibrancy. And when we consume that - like when we take that into our bodies - our cells respond with that same vitality and vibrancy.
Matt Johnston 15:22
We started this interview, obviously, a little bit, tongue in cheek, talking about the big picture. I wanted to paint the global picture, the macro picture of why health is so important. And I think that, we talked before and in our emails back and forth about the top 10 causes of death in the United States and, and at least nine out of 10 of them are cured by lifestyle behavior. And anyways, I just want to take a second at the start here, to really sort of paint the picture of the why until before we get into this is what you need to do.
Aimee Gallo 15:57
Sure, absolutely. If you look at in the US, if you pull up the Centers for Disease Control and you take a look at that website, they list the top 10 causes of disease in the United States. Number one is heart disease. Number two is cancer. And then we have accidents, chronic respiratory diseases, right - like COPD, chronic lung issues - stroke, Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, flu and pneumonia, kidney disease and suicide. And in looking in the literature, looking at the research, I can find evidence supporting that nine out of 10 of those causes of death can be alleviated or prevented - in some cases reversed - through vegetable consumption, through produce consumption, fruits and vegetables. The only one I don't have evidence for is unintentional injuries due to accidents, right? Everything else - even suicide, even the flu - can be prevented with produce. And that is completely missing from the conversation of healthcare.
Matt Johnston 17:02
Yeah, and I think that in our conversation before we started recording, and as I've been able to download some of your PDFs - I'm on your email list, now - this feels like an empowering discussion, right that my health is in my hands. So, what do we do? We eat more vegetables? Okay, what does that look like?
Aimee Gallo 17:23
Ultimately, that's what comes down to. The good news is in countries most countries, most governments say five a day, five a day, five a day, five a day. And most of us do not get five a day. So that's where you start. That's the first big goal is five a day. In the United States, only, only 9.3% of adults consumed two to three cups of vegetables a day. And in Canada, there's like 28, almost 29% of Canadians 12 and older consume - sufficiently consumed - five servings of fruits and vegetables a day. So, you know, Canadians are rocking it. The US needs to get above that 10% level. And ideally one of my big missions before I die, is to see the US on par with Canada, on par with the UK. I'd love to see 25 to 30% of Americans consuming sufficient fruits and vegetables per day. Which if you if you start with the Dietary Guidelines for our governments, and they're saying, you know, five servings a day, which is about 400 grams.
Research is showing that ideally, we actually need about 800 grams of produce a day which is double. That's 10 servings of fruits and vegetables a day which is legitimately daunting. And that what they're saying - so if you take if you take all of the research, all the observational research that's been done on produce, and you look at who lives the longest to retains their health and their vitality throughout their lifespan - it is those who are conserving, consuming that upper end, you know 700, 800 grams of produce a day. However, every serving counts when it comes to heart disease, stroke, cancer, all caused mortality death from any causes. The research shows every serving of vegetables reduces your risk of dying from anything by about 5 to 10% depending on you know, who you talk to. For heart disease, stroke and all-cause mortality that goes up to that 800 grams a day.
For cancer, it seems that the benefit to produce consumption peaks out at about 600 grams. I think with cancer, there is a lot of pollution that you know, environmental toxicants that are contributing to increased cancer risk. And until we address that I really don't think - like produce can only do so much. One of the benefits of produce one of the reasons why produce helps prevent cancers, is because it allows our cells to talk to one another in a way and send appropriate messages. Like "Oh this cell is, you know, mutated. It's not a healthy cell. We need to - this cell needs to be killed off. We need to - this cell needs to end life" and when you don't have the right vitamins the right phytochemical antioxidants to prevent cell injury in the first place and then to facilitate cell to cell conversation, these messages get missed. Anti-inflammatory messages are not produced and, you know, there's downstream effects that lead to all of the chronic disease that we're seeing worldwide. That's all, you know, compelling information, but how do you actually make that work in real life? Right, like, that's the big hairy question.
And when I so when I'm working with people, I really encourage the first thing that you have to do is actually start looking. Because produce is everywhere. Sometimes it's really well hidden but produce is everywhere. We really just need to start looking for it. And if you start looking for it, you'll find it, you'll know where to get it. So, I take this approach with my students and with my clients - become a vegetable hunter. You are, as a vegetable hunter, you are always on the prowl. You are always looking, you know, where is your prey hiding? Where does your prey tend to congregate? Because when you're hungry, you want to know where you can find it.
When you go to a restaurant, look at the menu, where's the produce on the menu? Sometimes it is just a salad. And so, you get a salad as a starter or you ask the server to substitute the rice for steamed vegetables. And for, you know, for those of you - I don't particularly like steamed vegetables, they're very boring by themselves. You know, give me some vinegar, some balsamic vinegar or some hot sauce, or you know, salt and pepper. Give me something to flavor those puppies up. But where's my produce? I'm always gonna find my produce at every meal. In Canada, the Canadian government's done a great job now with our current recommendations of making half of your plate produce. Right? I'd love to see it taken a step further where for every four servings of vegetables, which is going to be about two cups cooked, that you have for your one fruit, so that the ratio is about four to one.
Matt Johnston 22:33
Okay. I love this concept of the veggie hunter. Be a veggie Hunter, like just picturing us all owning that. Owning that image of the veggie hunter.
Aimee Gallo 22:43
Veggie hunter, always on the prowl. The other thing too, is like with hunting, you aren't born knowing how to hunt. And so, to have this expectation that you should already know how to do this - that this should come naturally to you - is setting yourself up for a lot of frustration. Especially in, I mean, our children aren't really learning how to cook. A lot of us never learned how to cook, because our parents were busy. And I mean, you know, once TV dinners came on the scene and in the 50s and 60s that changed everything. You don't necessarily need to learn how to cook to consume 6, 7, 8, 10 servings of produce a day, you just need to be able to find someone who does know how to cook it.
Matt Johnston 23:23
Right.
Aimee Gallo 23:25
Whether that's your partner - and for some of my clients, it is it's their partner who does the majority of the cooking - others are traveling and they're dining out all the time. And so, they are their mission, their hunt becomes about finding the restaurants that are very produce forward, that feature a lot of produce on the meal so that they can get the variety that they're looking for and always know that there's going to be something there for them. When you're learning, and some people are intimidated by vegetables simply because they haven't had a lot of exposure. So, you don't know what you like or don't like, and you have to walk into this with this attitude of experimenting. And some vegetables you may not like.
That's okay. Start with what you like, and you work from there. If you know that you like broccoli and you like bell peppers, then your job is to make sure that you get broccoli and bell peppers every day for a week. And that's where you start and then you can take it from there. The wonderful thing about produce is that once you - and this works with children as well - once they have developed a palate for one, their taste buds shift, and their palate expands. So, broccoli is a cruciferous vegetable, it has kind of a sulfurous, silverish sort of bitter back note to it, particularly as its aging. And once you know if you if you don't like broccoli, try broccolini the cousin.
Matt Johnston 24:49
Yeah.
Aimee Gallo 24:50
Yeah, the long skinny stalks, it's a little milder. If you like broccolini then then you edge into broccoli, but once you get a cruciferous first vegetable and then your ability to expand to other cruciferous vegetables - like cabbage, like kale - it becomes easier because your palate has already adapted to one member of that family. And cruciferous vegetables especially are very, very powerful cancer reducers. They help prevent cardiovascular disease, they facilitate the liver and being able to toxify the pollutants that we're getting from our air from our water. So, they're very, very important to be including on a regular basis. And there's the there are numerous, numerous amounts of cruciferous vegetables, which I would bore people if I just started listing them off, so I'm going to refrain from doing that.
Matt Johnston 25:39
This has been awesome, this is great.
Aimee Gallo 25:41
So, you start by being mindful looking for your produce. And then and you start with what you know you already like and mindfully getting some of that every day. Right. And when it comes to learning how to empower, you know, take that into your own kitchen, start with what's easy. By all means get frozen vegetables. Always have them on hand keep them in the freezer. By pre-cut, buy pre-cut bags of lettuce, make sure you rinse them and wash them before you consume them, but let someone else do the chopping for you if that's not your thing. If you don't have time, there is nothing wrong with that. It is far better to consume something frozen or something pre-cut and packaged than it is to not - to go without.
Matt Johnston 26:26
This feels almost too easy. And like in my mind, I keep thinking why did Aimee choose vegetables? What about eliminating carbs? Like what about the ketogenic diet? What about all the other diets that that are literally polluting my inbox right now? Like I go to the you go to the bookstore and there's an entire section related to different diets. Why aren't we talking about one of those? Why are we talking about vegetables?
Aimee Gallo 26:54
Here's the thing, one of all of these diets focus on what to get rid of right? "Sugar is the problem," or "Oh meats the problem." And [dismissive sound] that's my general my general responses and the devil is in the details and everything is nuanced. If you look at populations that lived the longest, currently the blue what's known as the Blue Zones, these individuals are not vegan. They are not in chronic ketosis. They eat a well-rounded diet that is, you know, kind of like a Mediterranean diet - with some variations depending on region - that includes a lot of produce. It does include animal protein, not to the degree that that Americans get, or you know, no like big 12-ounce porterhouse steaks or anything like that, right but they are consuming some animal protein.
And so, when whenever a diet theory is encouraging complete elimination of a major food group - that's when I raised my eyebrow. And it's funny that I say this right, because I was the militant animal rights vegan who was like, "Meat is gonna kill you get it off your plate." But, you know, that was 25 years ago, and that dietary theory worked for me for a time. And well, I don't even know if that's completely true knowing what I know now, but it but it didn't work forever. And this sense that, "Oh, there's one way to eat and we all need to be eating this way," is just outright false. There's way too much genetic variation. If you look at how human beings have evolved, we have Inuit who evolved in the northern Arctic areas. There's no way that the diet that they evolved on is in that's best for them that has allowed them to survive. It's - we know that's not the same as what a tribe in the Amazon rainforest consumed. It's radically, like - we have the ability to consume a wide variety of stuff and survive, which is super cool.
But now the question is what do we need to thrive? Right? And when you look at the populations that are thriving, not just surviving, they have high produce consumption. They have little to no processed packaged foods that they're consuming. They are consuming some animal protein, but it doesn't make up the bulk of their plate. They're moving. Not you know, they're not running marathons every weekend, but they are moving actively daily. They're walking, you know, low impact or low intensity activities of daily living, right. They are living in communities that are supportive. They have a sense of belonging and a sense of purpose. And these are things that are, you know, that big chunks of these common aspects of these communities are missing in the industrialized worlds. Certainly, the more technologically advanced we become; it seems the less community oriented we are. And that's also a big part of our health that is not given adequate consideration. However, my specialty's in nutrition.
Matt Johnston 30:19
I would love to do a deep dive there with you and hopefully we can. That's really helpful. And I guess why I wanted to bring that up is because this does feel confusing to people. And I think that you know, we talked a little bit before we got on to recording that it's easy to get confused by this by this topic of nutrition - overwhelmed and just go to what's most convenient for me. I'll drive back to the office from here and there's three drive-thrus en route. It's going to be a busy afternoon. I know that and it would be really easy just to you know, scoop in and have a burger or what have you. And so, your message really is accessible, and it makes so much sense. I was hoping that you might be able to speak to some, some success stories that you've had. Because, you know, we're, we're all busy, right? Like life is crazy we're - I know, I know you're a mom - work is busy with families raising kids, there's all sorts of things happening this stuff feels like it should take a lot of time.
Aimee Gallo 31:23
It doesn't it doesn't have to. One of the things that I do - of course, I work with people individually one on one and I also do group programs. One of them happens every March or April. It's the Glorious Greens program. And it's a free program. So, if anyone wants to join, you know, in 2020, you're more than welcome to. And it's - essentially it was my test project, right? Like will people actually listen if I show them compelling research and tell them to eat a green leafy vegetable? I can't believe that people would actually be interested but it turns out they are. Which has me, of course. absolutely thrilled.
Here in the United States, the average American consumes about two tablespoons of green leafy vegetables a day. So that's a problem. And so, I started with greens and the goal is basically find something green, put it on your plate, eat it every day for 30 days. I don't care how much, I don't care what it is, your job is to be on the prowl, right? Let's stay on step one of becoming a vegetable hunter. And what people notice within that 30 days is - signs of inflammation would go down, right? Chronic injuries start to heal. People wake up, they feel more energy, more stable energy throughout the day, their digestion improves, constipation disappears, bowels regulate. Heartburn goes away skin starts to change. And I was like this is awesome, because I actually have no idea how many - how much - how many greens these people are actually eating but this is great.
And what I did that as I was - I asked myself the question, so what would happen if a group of people did 10 servings a day? One, is it possible? Two, what like what's going to happen? I created a program where that's our goal. And I lead people through a step by step process of one, determining how they're going to get their produce. How is this going to work for you in your life and so you know, you assess your lifestyle, you assess your obstacles, we work together to overcome those obstacles. And then over the course of the month, each week, you elevate your produce consumption a little more, little more, a little more so that at the end of 30 days, you are getting 10 servings a day. Even though most of the participants did not achieve 10 servings a day most achieved seven, you know about six to eight, six to nine. Moods - and I have them take I have them take a questionnaire at the beginning of the 30 days and then again at week three, so 21 days in. And they do like a self-assessment on various aspects of their health.
Everyone across the board, increased mood, digestive symptoms decreased an average of 50% among participants joint and muscle pain dropped an average of 20 to 70%. Depending on the individual people with osteoarthritis rheumatoid arthritis had a little less but still experienced reductions and pain. People talked about glowing skin improved energy cravings for sugar, and starch dropped an average of 65% and this is again within three weeks, right? So, if you want to follow a healthy diet, but these cravings are like getting under your skin and sabotaging you, what if instead of focusing on "No, I can't have that chocolate? No, I can't have those French fries." You focus on consuming vegetables instead. And the cravings just go away. Like how easy could that be? Right? People have come off of their blood pressure medication. Within that month, I had one participant I followed up with three months afterwards, her pre-diabetes was reversed. I see this in private practice as well - a reduction, a complete reversal of pre-diabetes. And so, these are some of the things that can happen with just focusing on produce, just focusing on increasing our vegetable consumption. One thing.
Matt Johnston 35:22
So, in terms of - and you touched on this at the start of the interview but just some like - and you have this in some of your materials we'll direct people to your site at the end of this - but just some of the quick tips on like, what are to get 10 servings a day? What are some things that we can do? What are some ways that we can really - we can sharpen our skills as a veggie hunter?
Aimee Gallo 35:42
So, as I said, if you if you dine out, which most of us do, you know, look on the menu for your vegetables - where are you going to get your vegetables at that meal? Where can you make a substitution to increase your produce consumption because even if it comes with a side veg, it might be three scrawny stalks of asparagus. That's like, you know, maybe half a serving. So, whatever - assume that they're going to underserve produce to you when you dine out and ask for double. "Yes, I'd like the chicken yaki soba. Can you double the vegetables in that? Thanks."
Matt Johnston 36:16
Okay,
Aimee Gallo 36:17
"Give me a big bowl of pho, double the veg." If you are you know if you do like to cook at home - I encourage bulk prep. I also encourage also keeping frozen vegetables and at all times. What I do is I roast a sheet pan of vegetables once or twice a week. You can get about 10 to 14 servings on a sheet counted veggies and so that is one way that you can have some to eat throughout the week. You know, at least one meal you've got your roasted veggies. I add vegetables - chopped up vegetables - to spaghetti sauce, I add it to my lasagna. Where can vegetables go with what you're already cooking? You can squeeze in some butternut squash into the macaroni and cheese and the kids won't know the difference. It's the same color. It's very mild.
Making a smoothie in the morning, you know, you add your protein powder, add your berries, there's a serving of berries which are really great for brain health as well as preventing macular degeneration as we age. So, add some berries in there and then add a cup of cauliflower, add a cup of zucchini, add a cup of spinach - well, two cups of spinach - to get a serving of veggies and blend that in with your smoothie. There's a lot of vegetables you can add to a smoothie that are extremely mild, blend very easily and you won't even know they're there. And this is a great way to get the children to consume vegetables especially during that age when they are completely and utterly horrified at the thought.
Matt Johnston 37:54
How are you - have you been able to sneak them in in your kids?
Aimee Gallo 37:58
Yeah, so my son - he started - had a vegetable hating period. And I mean, he did. My ego was so challenged by this, it was so disappointing. But, um, it was about from the age of two, which is very common, from two to about three and a half. So, it was a good 18 months and that's when I really honed my skill of sneaking it in. Like, I sneak it in. And even then, I was lucky if I got like, half a cup to a cup into him a day. It wasn't much but I would puree vegetables and add them to meatloaf. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, that was a popular one. We did add vegetables to some morning smoothies, and we would have smoothies every morning. He'd have a smoothie with his daddy. I would puree - like you put carrots into spaghetti sauce and just like blended in. He did eat marinara sauce. That was like one of the only vegetable things he would eat. But he wouldn't broccoli, he wouldn't eat carrots. Like the kid would not eat anything, unless I hid it. So that worked for him.
There are some children who have who have very strong receptors to the bitter taste, and they'll detect that right away and they'll reject it. There are other children who have sensory issues where the texture of vegetables is a problem for them. And so, then that's something that you need to work around, right. And it's the same thing with the children as the adults. Find something that works and just do more of that. Okay. And, and in our in our home, too. We just kind of had - and this works with partners too. You can do the one bite rule. Or just like just try one bite. That's it. If you don't like it, no biggie, but you just try it. And our taste buds change. Our children's taste buds change over time, adult taste buds change over time, and that's an important piece to bring to the conversation. Not just because it doesn't - you don't like it right now or you don't like it this way - doesn't mean that you won't like it forever.
Some people don't realize that they do like Brussel sprouts because they've been boiled to death. But they go to a nice restaurant and they experience you know, deep fried Brussel sprouts and they're like, this is amazing. They're actually good. And if that's where you start, great. Brussel sprouts, I'm totally pumped to see that happen rather than to just leave the vegetable off the table completely.
Matt Johnston 40:27
Right, right. Yeah, I know there's a lot of bad memories from like, the school cafeteria that you get into Brussel sprouts that's six days old and nuked five times. Well, that's - those are great. That's those are great, actionable, actionable ideas and thoughts. This is this is fantastic. So, I know that I'm looking at time and I know that we're gonna we want to be mindful of your time, to wrap things up. But are there some books or resources that help pump people up? If people want to learn more that they should be they should be going to - that you recommend?
Aimee Gallo 41:10
On my website Vibrance Nutrition dot com, people can sign up to be on my newsletter and I'll send out tips on produce, information on produce. I'll, you know, analyze research and share what I learned about produce and health overall. And that's a great way to just kind of get little bits of - little tidbits of information - on a semi-regular basis to again help you be mindful and to inspire you to lead a what I'm what I'm calling a produce forward lifestyle. I also really encourage people to look at vegetable specific cookbooks, not necessarily a plant based meatless cookbook, but a cookbook that focuses on vegetables and that will allow you to see different ways that they can be prepared. Different flavor combinations that go well together. And that can help you expand your repertoire.
You can also go to Pinterest, right? Like go to a grocery store, choose a vegetable, bring home a head of cauliflower, go to Pinterest, figure out what to do with it. And play, just play, the kitchen is a playground. It doesn't have to be intimidating. It's our expectations of what we demand of ourselves and what we feel we should be able to accomplish that I think, intimidates people and turns them off a bit. But allow it to be a playground, you know, if you're ready to do that, if you're ready to go there. The other thing is, for those of you who are interested in increasing your produce consumption and kind of monitoring how you're doing, we created an app over the summer called Veg Hunter. If you go to Veg Hunter dot com, you can download that app either on your Android or your iOS device and that's no zero cost to you. And it is essentially it's a produce tracking app. So, you can track by servings you can track by color.
And it allows you to get a sense over time, how you're doing, what colors you might want to increase. Because each color represents a certain set of phytochemicals, antioxidants and phytonutrients that do different things in the body that there's like all good stuff. All good stuff. So, you want you want to eat that rainbow. Right?
Matt Johnston 43:30
Very cool. And again, that app is called?
Aimee Gallo 43:33
Veg Hunter dot com. V-E-G Hunter dot com.
Matt Johnston 43:38
Sweet. Well, Aimee, thanks so much for taking the time and being on today. I encourage anyone to go to your site. That's again Vibrance Nutrition dot com. Your Instagram page as well. I noticed that you're really active there. That's Vibrance Nutrition. Correct?
Aimee Gallo 43:55
Correct, that's at Vibrance Nutrition. Yeah. And I post a lot of pictures of like, you know, what does it look like - how many servings. Like here's what I had for lunch, I had lunch out, this is how I got three servings of vegetables at lunch. So that also allows people to get a sense of what it looks like in day to day living.
Matt Johnston 44:10
Yeah. And you just you model it so well. You're a mom, you're in the trenches, you're running a business, you're busy, and you're certainly an inspiration on there and your message is really accessible. I really appreciate you sharing it with us today and all that you're doing and certainly look forward to checking back in the months and hopefully years ahead.
Aimee Gallo 44:36
Thanks a lot. Me too.
Matt Johnston 44:38
Well, to be continued.
Aimee Gallo 44:39
Alright.
Matt Johnston 44:40
Thanks again.
Aimee Gallo 44:41
Thanks so much, Matt.
Matt Johnston 44:42
Take care.