The Brain Health Kitchen – by Dr. Annie Fenn
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This is a cookbook built around the MIND diet, which we talked about in our “Four Ways To Upgrade The Mediterranean Diet” article.
As such, it’s a top-tier gold-standard diet to be following for brain health, and having it as a book of recipes makes actually eating this way a lot easier!
The book does talk about the science first before getting to the recipes, so don’t worry, you won’t have to reverse engineer the dietary guidelines from the recipes; everything is explained well.
The recipes (of which there are 100) are diverse enough to be interesting without being so complicated as to be difficult. The ingredients are largely nutritional powerhouses, and most if not all can be found in your nearest reasonable-sized supermarket. Also, the recipes are (as you might reasonably expect), very plant-forward, but not entirely plant-based (as you might have guessed from the salmon on the front cover).
Bottom line: if you’d like to eat more healthily for your brain, but are a little stumped on what to do with the four ingredients you remember are brain-healthy, this book will help expand your horizons—not to mention your culinary repertoire!
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Ginger Does A Lot More Than You Think
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Ginger’s benefits go deep!
You are doubtlessly already familiar with what ginger is, so let’s skip right into the science.
The most relevant active compound in the ginger root is called gingerol, and people enjoy it not just for its taste, but also a stack of health reasons, such as:
- For weight loss
- Against nausea
- Against inflammation
- For cardiovascular health
- Against neurodegeneration
Quite a collection! So, what does the science say?
For weight loss
This one’s quite straightforward. It not only helps overall weight loss, but also specifically improves waist-hip ratio, which is a much more important indicator of health than BMI.
Against nausea & pain
Ginger has proven its effectiveness in many high quality clinical trials, against general nausea, post-surgery nausea, chemotherapy-induced nausea, and pregnancy-related nausea.
Source: Ginger on Human Health: A Comprehensive Systematic Review of 109 Randomized Controlled Trials
However! While it very clearly has been shown to be beneficial in the majority of cases, there are some small studies that suggest it may not be safe to take close to the time of giving birth, or in people with a history of pregnancy loss, or unusual vaginal bleeding, or clotting disorders.
See specifically: Ginger for nausea and vomiting of pregnancy
As a side note on the topic of “trouble down there”, ginger has also been found to be as effective as Novafen (a combination drug of acetaminophen (Tylenol), caffeine, and ibuprofen), in the task of relieving menstrual pain:
See: Effect of Ginger and Novafen on menstrual pain: A cross-over trial
Against inflammation & pain
Ginger has well-established anti-inflammatory (and, incidentally, which affects many of the same systems, antioxidant) effects. Let’s take a look at that first:
Read: Effect of Ginger on Inflammatory Diseases
Attentive readers will note that this means that ginger is not merely some nebulous anti-inflammatory agent. Rather, it also specifically helps alleviate delineable inflammatory diseases, ranging from colitis to Crohn’s, arthritis to lupus.
We’ll be honest (we always are!), the benefits in this case are not necessarily life-changing, but they are a statistically significant improvement, and if you are living with one of those conditions, chances are you’ll be glad of even things described in scientific literature as “modestly efficacious”.
What does “modestly efficacious” look like? Here are the numbers from a review of 593 patients’ results in clinical trials (against placebo):
❝Following ginger intake, a statistically significant pain reduction SMD = −0.30 ([95% CI: [(−0.50, −0.09)], P = 0.005]) with a low degree of inconsistency among trials (I2 = 27%), and a statistically significant reduction in disability SMD = −0.22 ([95% CI: ([−0.39, −0.04)]; P = 0.01; I2 = 0%]) were seen, both in favor of ginger.❞
To de-mathify that:
- Ginger reduced pain by 30%
- Ginger reduced disability by 22%
Read the source: Efficacy and safety of ginger in osteoarthritis patients: a meta-analysis of randomized placebo-controlled trials
Because (in part) of the same signalling pathways, it also has benefits against cancer (and you’ll remember, it also reduces the symptoms of chemotherapy).
See for example: Ginger’s Role in Prevention and Treatment of Gastrointestinal Cancer
For cardiovascular health
In this case, its benefits are mostly twofold:
- It significantly reduces triglycerides and LDL cholesterol, while increasing HDL cholesterol
- It significantly reduces fasting blood sugar levels and HbA1c levels (both risk factors for CVD)
Against neurodegeneration
This is in large part because it reduces inflammation, which we discussed earlier.
But, not everything passes the blood-brain barrier, so it’s worth noting when something (like gingerol) does also have an effect on brain health as well as the rest of the body.
You do not want inflammation in your brain; that is Bad™ and strongly associated with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
As well as reducing neuroinflammation, ginger has other relevant mechanisms too:
❝Its bioactive compounds may improve neurological symptoms and pathological conditions by modulating cell death or cell survival signaling molecules.
The cognitive enhancing effects of ginger might be partly explained via alteration of both the monoamine and the cholinergic systems in various brain areas.
Moreover, ginger decreases the production of inflammatory related factors❞
Check it out in full, as this is quite interesting:
Role of Ginger in the Prevention of Neurodegenerative Diseases
How much to take?
In most studies, doses of 1–3 grams/day were used.
Where to get it?
Your local supermarket, as a first port-of-call. Especially given the dose you want, it may be nicer for you to have a touch of sliced ginger root in your cooking, rather than taking 2–6 capsules per day to get the same dose.
Obviously, this depends on your culinary preferences, and ginger certainly doesn’t go with everything!
If you do want it as a supplement, here is an example product on Amazon, for your convenience.
Enjoy!
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Peace Is Every Step – by Thích Nhất Hạnh
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Mindfulness is one of the few practices to make its way from religion (in this case, Buddhism) into hard science. We’ve written before about its many evidence-based benefits, and many national health information outlets recommend it. So, what does this book have to add?
Thích Nhất Hạnh spent most of his 95 years devoted to the practice and teaching of mindfulness and compassion. In this book, the focus is on bringing mindfulness off the meditation mat and into general life.
After all, what if we could extend that “unflappability” into situations that pressure and antagonize us? That would be some superpower!
The author offers techniques to do just that, simple exercises to transform negative emotions, and to make us more likely to remember to do so.
After all, “in the heat of the moment” is rarely when many of us are at our best, this book gives way to allow those moments themselves to serve as immediate triggers to be our best.
The title “Peace Is Every Step” is not a random collection of words; the goal of this book is to enable to reader to indeed carry peace with us as we go.
Not just “peace is always available to us”, but if we do it right: “we have now arranged for our own peace to automatically step in and help us when we need it most”.
Bottom line: if you’d like to practice mindfulness, or practice it more consistently, this book offers some powerful tools.
Click here to check out Peace Is Every Step, and carry yours with you!
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The Art Of Letting Go – by Nick Trenton
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You may be wondering: is this a basic CBT book? And, for the most part, no, it’s not.
It does touch on some of the time-tested CBT techniques, but a large part of the book is about reframing things in a different way, that’s a little more DBT-ish, and even straying into BA. But enough of the initialisms, let’s give an example:
It can be scary to let go of the past, or of present or future possibilities (bad ones as well as good!). However, it’s hard to consciously do something negative (same principle as “don’t think of a pink elephant”), so instead, look at it as taking hold of the present/future—and thus finding comfort and security in a new reality rather than an old memory or a never-actual imagining.
So, this book has a lot of ideas like that, and if even one of them helps, then it was worth reading.
The writing style is comprehensive, and goes for the “tell them what you’re gonna tell them; tell them; then tell them what you told them” approach, which a) is considered good for learning b) can feel a little like padding nonetheless.
Bottom line: this reviewer didn’t personally love the style, but the content made up for it.
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Neuropsychologist Explains What She’s Got Out Of 6 Years Taking L-Theanine
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Inka Land, MSc neuropsychology, PgDip(c) Nutrition and Disease, talks about her use of l-theanine and the biochemistry behind it:
So, what’s the tea?
While she’s tested over 60 supplements, she regularly uses only a few. L-theanine made the cut, and has been a staple for over six years due to its noticeable effects on her brain, nervous system in general, and gut. Some notes from the video:
- L-theanine was discovered during university studies as a way to enhance focus and reduce stress. Initially, 50mg doses combined with coffee showed no effect, but increasing to 150mg, paired with 100mg of caffeine, produced significant nootropic benefits.
- L-theanine enhances sustained focus, enabling prolonged attention on repetitive tasks while avoiding distractions. It’s particularly effective for maintaining concentration during monotonous activities.
- L-theanine alleviates gut inflammation by boosting antioxidant activity and supporting glutamine metabolism. Combined with l-glutamine, it is more effective for reducing gut inflammation, and she mentions anecdotally that it seemed to help her personally recover quickly from food poisoning.
- Known for its calming effects, L-theanine reduces anxiety and regulates the nervous system. It is beneficial before stressful or crowded events and has anecdotal support for alleviating social anxiety specifically, though that’s not been formally tested in RCTs (yet). That said, since it has been tested against anxiety in the lab (usually combined with stress tests), it would be strange if it didn’t help alleviate social anxiety too, since what’s required for the nervous system is the same.
- Studies suggest 100–200mg twice daily, but she personally takes 250mg in the morning with coffee or 200–250mg PRN.
Want to try some? Here’s an example product on Amazon 😎
For more on all of this, enjoy (and kindly disregard that she clearly is holding a jar of curcumin in the thumbnail):
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
L-Theanine Against Stress, Anxiety, Inflammation, & More
Take care!
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Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain – by Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett
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We’ve reviewed books about neurology before, and we always try to review books that bring something new/different. So, what makes this one stand out?
Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett, one of the world’s foremost neuroscientists, starts with an overview of how our unusual brain (definitely our species’ defining characteristic) came to be, and then devotes the rest of the book to mostly practical information.
She explains, in clear terms and without undue jargon, how the brain goes about such things as making constant predictions and useful assumptions about our environment, and reports these things to us as facts—which process is usually useful, and sometimes counterproductive.
We learn about how the apparently mystical trait of empathy works, in real flesh-and-blood terms, and why some kinds of empathy are more metabolically costly than others, and what that means for us all.
Unlike many such books, this one also looks at what is going on in the case of “different minds” that operate very dissimilarly to our own, and how this neurodiversity is important for our species.
Critically, she also looks at what else makes our brains stand out, the symphony of “5 Cs” that aren’t often found to the same extent all in the same species: creativity, communication, copying, cooperation, and compression. This latter being less obvious, but perhaps the most important; Dr. Feldman Barrett explains how we use this ability to layer summaries of our memories, perceptions, and assumptions, to allow us to think in abstractions—something that powers much of what we do that separates us from other animals.
Bottom line: if you’d like to learn more about that big wet organ between your ears, what it does for you, and how it goes about doing it, then this book gives a very practical foundation from which to build.
Click here to check out Seven and a Half Lessons about the Brain, and learn more about yours!
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Body Language (In The Real World)
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Forget What You Think You Know About Body Language
…unless it’s about a specific person whose habits and mannerisms you know intimately, in which case, you probably have enough personal data stored up to actually recognize patterns à la “when my spouse does this, then…”, and probably do know what’s going on.
For everyone else… our body language can be as unique as our idiolect
What’s an idiolect? It’s any one given person’s way of speaking/writing, in their natural state (i.e. without having to adjust their style for some reason, for example in a public-facing role at work, where style often becomes much narrower and more consciously-chosen).
Extreme example first
To give an extreme example of how non-verbal communication can be very different than a person thinks, there’s an anecdote floating around the web of someone whose non-verbal autistic kid would, when he liked someone who was visiting the house, hide their shoes when they were about to leave, to cause them to stay longer. Then one day some relative visited and when she suggested that she “should be going sometime soon”, he hurried to bring her her shoes. She left, happy that the kid liked her (he did not).
The above misunderstanding happened because the visitor had the previous life experience of “a person who brings me things is being helpful, and if they do it of their own free will, it’s because they like me”.
In other words…
Generalizations are often sound… In general
…which does not help us when dealing with individuals, which as it turns out, everyone is.
Clenched fists = tense and angry… Except when it’s just what’s comfortable for someone, or they have circulation issues, or this, or that, or the other.
Pacing = agitated… Except when it’s just someone who finds the body in motion more comfortable
Relaxed arms and hands = at ease and unthreatening… Unless it’s a practitioner of various martial arts for whom that is their default ready-for-action state.
Folded arms = closed-off, cold, distant… Or it was just somewhere to put one’s hands.
Lack of eye contact = deceitful, hiding something… Unless it’s actually for any one of a wide number of reasons, which brings us to our next section:
A liar’s “tells”
Again, if you know someone intimately and know what signs are associated with deceit in them, then great, that’s a thing you know. But for people in general…
A lot of what is repeated about “how to know if someone is lying” has seeped into public consciousness from “what police use to justify their belief that someone is lying”.
This is why many of the traditional “this person is lying” signs are based around behaviors that show up when in fact “this person is afraid, under pressure, and talking to an authority figure who has the power to ruin their life”:
Research on Non-verbal Signs of Lies and Deceit: A Blind Alley
But what about eye-accessing cues? They have science to them, right?
For any unfamiliar: this is about the theory that when we are accessing different parts of our mind (such as memory or creativity, thus truthfulness or lying), our eyes move one way or another according to what faculty we’re accessing.
Does it work? No
But, if you carefully calibrate it for a specific person, such as by asking them questions along the lines of “describe your front door” or “describe your ideal holiday”, to see which ways they look for recall or creativity… Then also no:
The Eyes Don’t Have It: Lie Detection and Neuro-Linguistic Programming
How can we know what non-verbal communication means, then?
With strangers? We can’t, simply. It’s on us to be open-minded, with a healthy balance of optimism and wariness.
With people we know? We can build up a picture over time, learn the person’s patterns. Best of all, we can ask them. In the moment, and in general.
For more on optimizing interpersonal communication, check out:
Save Time With Better Communication
…and the flipside of that:
The Problem With Active Listening (And How To Do It Better)
Take care!
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