Are You Eating Bananas The Wrong Way? The Truth About Green Bananas!

Welcome to the Dr. Gundry podcast. Let's talk about green bananas. You're eating bananas all wrong. Now, let me guess. You've got a bunch of bananas on your counter right now, and you're waiting for them to turn nice and yellow, maybe with a few brown speckles, because that's when they're really good, ready, right, soft, sweet, perfect. Now, hold on to your hat, because I'm going to tell you everything about bananas that's just going to ruin them for you. That beautiful ripe banana is one of the sneakiest sugar bombs in your kitchen. And the version your gut buddies actually want you to eat, you've been throwing in the trash, or worse, you're waiting for it to disappear. Now, I eat my bananas green, on purpose, rock hard, barely peelable green. In fact, many times I have to use a knife to peel my green banana. And by the end of the next 10 minutes, you're going to want to as well. Now, before I tell you why green bananas are the only bananas to eat, make sure to follow this podcast if you're listening in. It's free, and that way you won't miss an episode. Or if you're watching this on YouTube, hit the subscribe button right now. Okay, bananas are really two foods with one peel. The green banana has what's called resistant starch. The ripe banana has primarily fructose, and there's a huge difference between the two. A resistant starch, as the name implies, means that it is resistant to digestion. And you don't have the digestive enzymes to break those starch molecules apart so that you can absorb them as sugar. However, your gut bacteria, your gut buddies, do have those enzymes, and they can break those starch molecules apart by fermentation. And the fermentation of these starches will produce what are now called postbiotics. And postbiotics are a class of compounds that we're realizing probably holds the key to both our immediate and long-term health. Some of those postbiotics are called short-chain fatty acids. And probably the most important is a fatty acid called butyrate. Now, here's what's so unique about butyrate. The cells that line your colon, your large intestine, 80% of their nutrition comes from butyrate. Doesn't come from oxygen, doesn't come from carbohydrates, doesn't come from proteins. It comes from the single short-chain fatty acid butyrate. And that butyrate is produced by your microbiome in your colon from the fermentation of soluble fiber resistant starches. So, the more resistant starches, like in a green banana, you can give them the more butyrate they produce, which feeds your colon cells. Now, why do you want to do that? Well, there's beautiful studies showing that if the colon cells do not get butyrate, they get really angry, and they actually become weird-looking. And there's some very good studies correlating a lack of butyrate with the development of colon polyps and of colon cancer. But, it gets worse. It turns out that butyrate can be absorbed from your colon, and mitochondria, your energy-producing cells, love butyrate. And probably equally as important, your brain loves butyrate. And finally, I mentioned colon cancer. Butyrate in and of itself is very anti-neoplastic, anti-cancer. And high levels of butyrate suppress cancer cell growth. So, there's so many reasons to give your gut buddies what they want to eat, and it just so happens that green bananas are a great way to accomplish it. Now, on the other hand, what if you let it ripen? Well, all those starches change into primarily fructose. And here's the bad news about fructose. Fructose is a mitochondrial toxin. Yes, you heard me right. Fructose is a toxin. Now, unlike glucose, the other sugar molecule, fructose is not absorbed directly into your bloodstream. Most of the fructose that you eat is absorbed into a large vein that goes to your liver called the portal vein. Now, why does it go there? Because, as you probably know, your liver is there for detoxification. And fructose is converted into two compounds. One, triglycerides. That's that number that you see on your lipid panel, LDL, HDL, triglycerides, total cholesterol. Triglycerides are made from fructose to detoxify it. And to store fructose as fat. The second compound is uric acid. Now, many of you know about uric acid. It causes gout. What many of you don't know is that uric acid also causes insulin resistance. Uric acid causes fatty liver. And if you've been paying attention, we now have an epidemic of fatty liver in this country. And if you're paying attention, we now have young people getting gout. Gout used to be called the disease of kings because gout in the old days used to come from eating large amounts of meat and shellfish, which also produce uric acid. But now we're seeing it in a totally different, healthy population. Why? Because of the fructose in our food. And experimental studies show, and human studies show, that the more fructose you eat, the fatter your liver gets. And you don't want a fatty liver, I can assure you. What happened? Well, about 10 million years ago, great apes suffered a genetic mutation that they lost the ability to make an enzyme called uricase. Uricase broke down uric acid and made it harmless. So, what? It was a perfect opportune time, because at about that time, climate change was happening. And we know all about that. And forests were actually shrinking. So, great apes could take ripe fruit and convert it into triglycerides, fat, and cause insulin resistance, which promoted fat storage, and so they could store fat by eating fruit during only certain times of the year, and outcompete monkeys who didn't have that ability. So, they became great apes because of their ability to take fruit and turn it into fat. And that was great. Now, humans inherited that mutation. Now, for years, we thought there was a thrifty gene that allowed humans to make it through the hard times by storing fat for the winter or for the hard times. It wasn't until recently we realized that that thrifty gene was the great ape mutation that we inherited. Now, that was really useful because even in the jungle fruit only ripens once or maybe twice a year. The rest of the time there isn't any fruit. So, we were able to take advantage of fruit or other sugars and store it as fat for the hard times and it was a big advantage. Now, fast forward to today. We now have unlimited amount of fruit available to us 365 days a year. We literally have endless summer. Number two, our fruit has been hybridized for sugar content. I mean, for goodness sakes, we have cotton candy grapes. We have apples the size of cantaloupes. And yet we still think of these as individual servings. And we forget that we can have something as {quote} as healthy as berries 365 days a year, every day. So, that every day we're eating a commodity that was incredibly rare not so long ago. And we're getting it every day of the year. Recently I had a colleague who was uh vacationing in Italy. And at the hotel they were staying, they actually called me from there and they said, "You're not going to believe this. The fruit that's served at this hotel is basically in a little shot glass and it's one strawberry or one blueberry or one raspberry and that's your serving of fruit. And I said, "Oh yeah, I see this all the time both in France and Italy at these hotels. That's a serving of fruit. It's not this big giant bowl of berries. That's your serving of fruit. And think about it. That's what they understand we should be doing. In fact, they probably wouldn't even give it to us except we're American tourists. But that's what I mean. This idea that fruit is nature's candy ought to be treated that way. This is candy. And it's driving our epidemic of fatty liver disease, of gout, of insulin resistance. Now, an apple has got six teaspoons of sugar and it's all fructose and that's not what you want to be eating. So, what do I really do? Well, first of all there are three great green things that you should get into your diet. And that is a green banana. The greener the better. And Costco's often a great place to find them. And peel them. Many times you have to use a knife and throw them in the freezer or peel them and eat them. Now, they don't taste very good. But remember you're eating for your gut buddies, not for you and you're certainly not eating to make your liver fatty. A green mango. Buy them green and slice them thin and put them in your salad or make a green mango salad. Green papaya, same thing. I mean, Thailand and Southeast Asia, green mango salads are all over the place. That's where I learned to eat them. Now, one ripe fruit I do trust is an avocado. Believe it or not, it is a single-seeded berry. It's got a lot of soluble fiber and lots of healthy monounsaturated oleic acid. So, that's a good one. Now, there are still fruits that really are only available once a year. Those are pomegranates and passion fruit seeds. Kiwis are more available, but if you can find the golden kiwis, they're usually only available once or twice a year and they're much safer. And please, eat the skin. It's really loaded with polyphenols. Grapefruits are one of the lowest low fructose fruits you can eat. And in general, they should only be available once a year. I grow blackberries and raspberries in my garden. And they're only available for a short period of time once a year. And that's when I eat them. Do not be, you know, tricked into thinking that berries, or any fruit for that matter, is good for you year-round. That's not how your design works. When in doubt, give fruit the boot. There's no human need for fruit. Just ask an Eskimo. Finally, you got to have your fruit? Yeah, fruit is loaded, or it used to be loaded, with polyphenols. Those amazing plant protective compounds that your gut bacteria love. Unfortunately, our fruit has been bred for sugar content. But if you got to have your fruit, get out your juicer. I know you have one. Put your fruit, your berries in the juicer. Take the juice and throw it down the drain. That's the problem. Take the pulp. Those are the polyphenols and the fiber and mix it in your goat yogurt, your sheep yogurt, your coconut yogurt, or just mix it in a bowl and eat it with a spoon like I do. You'll get the benefit of the polyphenols without all the fructose. So, that's it for today. Green bananas, green mangoes, green papayas, they're friends for your gut buddy. The ripe fruit, if you're going to have it, get it in season only, and that is a very short time period. And if you got to have it year-round, reverse juice it and watch what happens to your health and your gut buddies will thank you for it, and so will I.