Summary: Thank you to everyone who has submitted questions so far, and we hope you’re enjoying the podcast. Laura is also very happy to announce that she has finally earned her RD degree and will now be taking private clients. Now we have two RDs in our “Ask the RD” podcast! Here are the questions that Laura and Kelsey address in this episode: I would like to ask whether chia, flax, sunflower and pumpkin seeds fall within the paleo diet. Can I harm my health by eating a few tablespoons of these seeds on a daily basis? I usually put them into a breakfast smoothie. There’s a lot of talk in regard to exercise about ‘minimum effective dose’ or how to achieve the best results with limited time. I would be really interested to hear you discuss the ‘minimum effective dose’ of animal products. I think this would open up the paleo diet to a broader audience, including those that don’t want to eat a lot of meat for various personal reasons, whether that be ethics, spirituality, environmental values, or simply personal preferences. If you were to design a diet that is mostly vegetarian (so includes dairy products and eggs), but adds just a few key animal products that fill in the gaps normally left by a vegetarian diet. What would be the, say, five key animal products that you would add that would give the most bang for the buck and also be palatable for someone with more vegetarian sensibilities? Links Discussed: Chris Masterjohn: Understanding Essential Fatty Acids Chris Kresser: Why fish stomps flax as a source of omega-3 Chris Kresser: Essential fatty acids: not so essential after all Go Raw Sprouted Pumpkin Seeds 3-Ingredient Chia Pudding Recipe Great Lakes Gelatin Hydrolyzed and Regular Fermented Cod Liver Oil/Butter Oil Blend TRANSCRIPT Thanks again to Amy Berger of TuitNutrition.com for the amazing transcription! LAURA: Hey everyone, welcome to this week’s episode of Ask the RD. I’m Laura, and on the other end of the line is Kelsey. How are you doing this week, Kelsey? KELSEY: Doing pretty well, how about yourself, Laura? LAURA: Good, I’m just preparing to take my RD exam finally, so… KELSEY: Yikes! LAURA: So hopefully the next time I’m on this show, it’ll be actually legitimate Ask the RD. KELSEY: Right, double RDs. Excellent. LAURA: We can change it to Ask the RDs, plural! KELSEY: Perfect. Well, good luck! LAURA: Thanks. All right, well, are you ready to get started with our first question? KELSEY: Yeah, and this one’s for you. LAURA: Cool. KELSEY: I would like to ask whether chia, flax, sunflower and pumpkin seeds fall within the Paleo diet. Can I harm my health by eating a few tablespoons of these seeds on a daily basis? I usually put them into a breakfast smoothie. LAURA: Okay, so I actually think it’s a really good habit to have a few nuts and seeds every day. And it’s generally not something that will harm your health unless you have a condition that is sensitive to nuts and seeds, such as an autoimmune disease. And even though seeds are somewhat higher in omega-6 fats, they do have a lot of health benefits to them that I think make them worth eating. They’re generally pretty high in a lot of different nutrients, and a few of them are really high in omega-3 fats, but we need to talk about the various nutritional benefits of eating seeds, since I think there’s a slight misconception that they’re not healthy for you because of their omega-6 content. And I do want to address the omega-3 issue, because as many of our listeners probably know, the omega-3s that come from seeds is different from the omega-3 that comes from fatty fish, eggs, and that kind of thing. So, one of the major fats in these seeds is called alpha-linolenic acid, which is the plant form of omega-3, and it is an anti-inflammatory fat that does lower levels of C-reactive protein in the blood. And like I said, it’s important to remember that alpha-linolenic acid, which I’ll refer to as ALA,
