5 Foods That WON'T Break Your Fast!

Now, fasting is all the rage, but it doesn't have to mean total deprivation. In fact, there are a few smart things you can consume that won't break your fast and may even make your fast more effective. Whether you're fasting to support your gut, burn fat, improve mental clarity, or extend your health span, this episode is for you. I'll walk you through the surprising foods and drinks that won't disrupt your fasting window and a few sneaky ones that might just break your fast. Plus, I'll share some tips on how to fast smarter, not harder. But before we get into it, please don't forget to like this video, subscribe, and share it with someone who needs a little fasting clarity. Now, a big question is, does whatever you're going to put in your mouth stop ketone production? And quite frankly, that's all you should be paying attention to. The reason you're doing a fast, an effective fast, or what I call time-restricted eating, is to spend more time in a 24-hour period where you're producing ketones. Now, ketones are a fuel for cells, but ketones really are useful for one thing and one thing only. Ketones tell your mitochondria, your energy-producing organelles in almost all of your cells, to waste calories, to uncouple, to repair themselves, and simultaneously to make more mitochondria to help with the efforts. So anything that we can do to produce ketones for a longer period of time during a 24-hour period is a good thing in my and many other people's opinions. And that's where the entire idea of time-controlled eating or time-restricted eating came about. So here's the good news. Black coffee or tea with no sweeteners are the real deal. These can actually help with energy and mental focus while fasting. Black tea and coffee have polyphenols, which actually helps further mitochondrial uncoupling without being in ketosis. So black coffee, black tea, green tea, great. Now, the problem with milk in your coffee or tea is that milk contains sugar. But good news, heavy cream has no sugar. And heavy cream will not break a fast. But unfortunately, heavy cream cancels out the polyphenol availability. And you can add allulose or monk fruit. That doesn't break the fast either. Just remember, in general, fats do not spike insulin. Fats have no effect on insulin production. And just as a refresher course, sugars promote insulin production and proteins promote insulin production. And anytime your insulin rises, that shuts off the flow of free fatty acids out of fat cells. And with rare exception, it shuts out the production of ketones in your liver. Now, there's one exception, MCT oil. But the great news is that MCT oil, unlike any other fat, is absorbed directly through the wall of your intestines and goes directly to your liver where it actually promotes ketone production regardless of what your insulin level is. Now, this is in a way miraculous because adding MCT to your regimen will guarantee that you will manufacture ketones. Now, what I like people to do is stick with small amounts initially. You wanna start with a teaspoon and work your way up to a tablespoon. And preferably, you wanna have about three tablespoons of MCT oil per day. And particularly look for MCT C8 MCT. That's the most ketogenic of the MCT oils. Good news, my very popular product, MCT Wellness, doesn't break your fast. But we'll discuss more about that in a minute. Basil seeds. Now, while I haven't seen any research saying they won't, I suspect basil seeds will not break your fast. Now, here's why. Basil seeds basically expand in water very much like chia seeds, but they have even more fiber, meaning that when you eat basil seeds, they're great for making you feel full and staying hydrated. The great thing about it is that basil seeds are eaten by your gut microbiome, the good guys. And they actually tell your brain that they're getting what they like to eat and you don't have to be hungry. You don't have to look for anything more. Similarly, psyllium husk. Now, psyllium husk is basically pure soluble fiber. Now, this supports digestion without breaking your fast. So it's easy to use. Put it in water or tea. Please don't put it in juice or use sweeteners. It will absolutely keep you feeling full and curb cravings. Now, there's a study that I've mentioned in the last couple of books that is really exciting to me. And there's a theory called the gut-centric theory of hunger. The Chinese took volunteers and put them on a water fast for two weeks. All they got was water. Half the group got 100 calories per day of non-absorbable soluble fiber. We can't digest it. We can't absorb it as a fuel. But our gut buddies think it's delicious. That's their fuel. The group that just had water were obviously very hungry. The group that got the 100 calories a day of like psyllium powder had no hunger for two weeks on a water fast. Why is that? Because their gut buddies got what they wanted to eat. And they literally sent text messages up to the brain like for instance, GLP-1 that says, hey, our needs are met. You don't need to go look for anything else. We're fine. And the more we study the really deep connection between the good guys in our gut and our hunger centers in our brain, we realize that it's the gut bugs that are driving hunger, not stretching out your stomach, not bulking up. It's what these guys wanna eat. So if you're struggling with going a longer time between meals, don't be afraid. Please add these soluble fibers. They won't break your fast and they'll support that you're not hungry. Okay, what else works? Nuts work. Now this is controversial, but my friend Dr. Walter Longo's research in humans show that in small amounts, like a handful of pistachios, macadamias or Brazil nuts are okay during fasting mimicking protocols. Now he gave people who were fasting a one of his nut bars and it's called the fast bar for their morning meal. The other group had to wait until lunch for their first meal. And he studied ketone production and that bar did not break ketone production. Now that's the only study that I know that's ever been done in humans. So you can decide if that's enough, but please avoid flavored nuts like salt and pepper or chili nuts or sugar nuts. Almost all of these have hidden sugars in the ingredients. And remember, sugar and or protein will break your fast. It will stop ketone production. All right, let's talk about supplements. Now, I love hearing from you. I get these questions all the time about what will break fast, what doesn't. Now supplements like electrolyte powders are great and they do not break a fast, but please avoid anything sweetened with sugar or oftentimes fake sugars. Now my MCT Wellness or Vital Res, which I'm drinking right now, are just fine. If you're using another brand of powder supplement, here's what to watch out for that will kick you out of a fasted set. Just look for hidden sugars or proteins. I get asked all the time about gummy supplements. Now for the most part, you should skip these as a majority of them have sugar in them. Now I'm happy to say that our Gundry MD gummies do not break a fast because they use prebiotic fiber as their sweeteners, and that gives your gut buddy something to eat. Now natural sweeteners like Stevia or monk fruit probably don't break a fast, but it's always something to watch for. Other things to watch out for, chewing gum. Yes, even sugar-free activates digestion and actually may pull you out of a fasted state. And be wary of healthy fasting drinks that contain collagen, protein, or flavor boosters with sugar or amino acids. You have to remember that not only does sugar up your insulin production, but also protein consumption ups your insulin production. And once insulin rises, insulin shuts off release of free fatty acids from cells. And without the release of free fatty acids from cells, you're not going to make ketones, with the exception of if you're consuming MCT oil. So use these fasting safe options strategically to help you push through your non-eating window, especially if you're doing longer fasts like 16 plus hours. Now these tricks I've found with my patients really help first-time time-restricted eaters ease into the habit of shortening their eating window and lengthening their non-eating window without crashing or stressing the body. And please remember, fasting should support your health, not stress your system. And you really need to adjust when needed. Now, I just want to reiterate what time-controlled eating or fasting actually is. Remember, the object of the game is this is not personal suffering. You're not going on a religious quest. What I get from my patients is not about being hungry or being a monk in a monastery. Fasting means that you are going to limit the amount of time during a 24-hour period when you're not eating. That's what that means. Going 24 hours without eating, going 48 hours without eating, going two weeks without eating. More and more we're realizing that's not a good idea for reasons that I've gone into on other podcasts. But the more we can stay in a continuous period of fasting beyond about 12 hours, the more benefit we get from mitochondrial uncoupling, which may be the greatest health span longevity trick there is. The good news is that once we stop eating, about eight hours later, if you are metabolically flexible, you will start making ketones as a natural process of not eating. So that means let's suppose you stop eating at eight o'clock at night and you go to bed at 10. About four o'clock in the morning, you will start making ketones and you will start uncoupling mitochondria and you'll start getting the benefits that ketones give. But if you start eating at eight o'clock, you only got about four hours of benefit. If you start eating at nine o'clock, you get five hours of benefit. 10 o'clock, six hours of benefit. 11 o'clock, seven hours of benefit. Noon, eight hours of benefit of being in ketosis. So the longer I can push that out, the better you're gonna do. And this has been confirmed in human studies, particularly the Italian athlete studies, who a seven hour window had remarkable benefit in reducing insulin-like growth factor, in improving performance. So the more I can get you to a six to eight hour eating window, the better you're gonna do. And again, you don't wanna do this overnight. You don't wanna dive into the deep end of the pool without learning how to swim. And that's why taking baby steps of pushing break fast a little farther each morning, each week, is gonna make a big difference. And know the tricks when you're not doing well, when your brain isn't working well, when you're getting hangry, you can give your gut buddies what they want to eat and keep going. And so these tricks that we've just talked about are a good way of getting food into your stomach that isn't gonna break your fast. So if you really wanna do Dr. Longo's of fasting mimicking diet, you know that a week long vegan fast once a month works wonders compared to daily time restricted eating. And I have that vegan week long fast in multiple of my books. You just have to eat vegan for five days. That's pretty doggone easy. So with the right tools, you can make fasting more sustainable and more powerful. So stick to this list, listen to your body, and as always, let your gut be your guide. More amazing episodes just like this one. Watch now. Time restricted eating or intermittent fasting is such an effective treatment for so many diseases.