 The insane benefits of polyphenols. All right, National Polyphenol Day is July 11th and National Polyphenol Month is here. So let's have a party for polyphenols, a powerful compound naturally occurring in certain foods that help you thrive. Here are my top three reasons why you need to get more polyphenols in your life. But first, it's important to note that polyphenols do not work as antioxidants. Not a day goes by that I see some health guru refer to polyphenols as antioxidants. I can assure you that polyphenols do not work as antioxidants. The world expert on polyphenols, Marvin Edes from Paris, France, addressed an entire group of us polyphenol researchers years ago and said, any of you who believe that polyphenols work as antioxidants, leave the room now because I have no time to convince you otherwise. That's pretty blown. So what do they do? Well, these plant compounds are produced by plants to protect their mitochondria from damage, particularly by sunlight, from stress. And these compounds actually protect the mitochondrion plants by uncoupling them and we'll get into that in a minute. Now, how do we get polyphenols? Well, when we eat plants that contain polyphenols or the babies of plants like their seeds or their fruits, we absorb those polyphenols through our gut, but hold on. Polyphenols are very poorly absorbable compounds. Maybe one to 10% of the polyphenols that we eat actually get absorbed and tacked through our gut wall. That's a problem because they're really useful. What we didn't know until recently is that our gut microbiome is actually dependent on polyphenols as an important energy source. So the gut microbiome eats polyphenols. They have to have polyphenols to grow and divide. The gut microbiome then takes polyphenols and turns them into absorbable compounds that can get through the wall of our gut. So we gotta have two steps in the process. We have to eat polyphenols but we have to have a diverse gut microbiome that can be fed the polyphenols and then and only then do they make post-biotic compounds that deliver the polyphenols to us. So we have to have the middleman and that's one of the things that's been missing from polyphenol research until recently. Now let me give you an example of how this works. There was a fascinating study looking at the microbiome and inflammatory markers in a human trial. One group drank several glasses of red wine a day. A second group drank the same wine with the alcohol removed and then the third group drank gin with the same amount of alcohol that the wine drinkers got. The experiment was designed to look at the diversity of the gut microbiome. Both of the red wines with and without alcohol increased the microbiome diversity and the inflammatory markers in the body of these people fell. Here's the bad news. There was absolutely no benefit for the gin drinkers. The point of the study was to separate whether it was the alcohol that might have an influence rather than the polyphenols. It turns out, sorry folks, the polyphenols was what made all the difference. Why? Because it gave the microbiome what they wanted to eat and the microbiome in turn made those polyphenols available to, among other things, tell our immune system to calm down. Now, number two, polyphenols are important to uncouple mitochondria. And with every passing day, we're realizing that one of the secrets to extend health span, the number of years we remain healthy and vigorous, polyphenols are some of the best, strongest mitochondrial uncouplers. Now, mitochondrial uncouplers simply is a way of saying that making energy, making ATP is extremely hard work and extremely damaging to mitochondria. And mitochondria ought to have a blow-off valve in that pressure cooker so that when they eat and damage of a pressure cooker, it gets too high, they can blow off steam. And little did we know that polyphenols are one of the best ways to ensure that pressure cooker can blow off steam. And it's got a fancy name called mitochondrial uncoupling. Another polyphenol that a lot of people have heard of is resveratrol. Now, resveratrol, the red wine polyphenol, is fascinating. It can activate a special family of genes called sirtuin gene. These genes are metabolic regulators and help protect our mitochondria from damage by, and you guessed it, uncoupling mitochondria, among other actions. In doing so, these sirtuin genes can also help preserve your NAD plus stores. Now, I've written about NAD plus in the energy paradox and unlocking the keto code. And it's now a buzzword in longevity, but keeping your NAD stores high are incredibly important. And activating sirtuins is a really good way to do this. Now, the other exciting news is that polyphenols can also target multiple signaling pathways to regulate the mTOR signaling pathway. And you've heard me talk about mTOR many, many times before, either called the mammalian target of rapamycin or the mechanistic target of rapamycin. Okay, so what are the best ways to get polyphenols in your diet? Well, first recommendation is eat the rainbow. Polyphenols are these intense colors, the yellows, the oranges, the reds, the purples, the blues that you see in colorful fruits and vegetables. Those are the polyphenols. Black coffee is loaded with polyphenols. Tea, whether green or black, is loaded with polyphenols. Extra dark chocolate, loaded with polyphenols. Extra virgin olive oil, loaded with polyphenols. Red wine, loaded with polyphenols. So anytime you're having a spice, which most spices have intense colors, those have polyphenols. Most herbs have their benefit because they are sources of polyphenols. So making your food taste delicious is just a great excuse for getting more polyphenols in your life. Now, it's often hard for most people to get enough polyphenols in their diet from food alone. That's why when I was looking at my patients and trying to figure out how I was going to get them to have more polyphenols in a pleasant form, I decided that the easiest way to do it was to have them drink their polyphenols in the form of a beverage that I called Vital Reds. I knew how powerful polyphenols were, but I also knew that most of my women patients really didn't want to take capsules or tablets. They weren't fond of swallowing a bunch of pills. But I knew from my female patient population that they would drink something. So I purposely made Vital Reds for my female patients to get adequate polyphenols in them. And what I did was take extracts of very important polyphenol containing berries and foods that had a much higher concentration of polyphenols than you would ever be able to eat and put it in a tasty beverage that you consume. And of course, the rest is history. That was the first product of Gundry MD and it's still one of our largest sellers for good reason. Now, you don't have to drink Vital Reds. You can mix it in coconut yogurt. It's phenomenal that way. You can make popsicles out of Vital Reds. I like to throw it in the pancake or waffle mix. One of our people swears they taste like fruity pebbles. I've even seen people use Vital Reds as a meat rub and talk about giving your food a phenomenal flavor. That's probably the best. So if you're thinking of marinating something in red wine, next time rub on Vital Reds. The more polyphenols I can get into you, the better your long-term health. Make sure to check out the next one here. The best thing about this formula is that you're going to feel it very quickly. Most users report feeling a distinctive noticeable energy charge within an hour of consuming.