Improve your gut health to tackle digestive and weight issues - and up your feel-good factor!
Digestive issues are on the rise – 86% of Brits have had gastrointestinal complaints, ranging from being bloated to extreme pain, and Google searches for ‘gut health’ have risen by 400% in recent years.
The good news is that improving our gut health can have a massive impact on both our physical and mental health, and it needn’t be complicated or require expensive ingredients or supplements.
Alana and Lisa MacFarlane, who were part of groundbreaking gut health research at King’s College London, assembled an expert team of scientists, doctors, nutritionists and dietitians to write The Gut Stuff.
They say, ‘We got fed up with gut health being associated with swanky, expensive health food products and ingredients. So, we wrote this book to prove you can get all the ingredients in the supermarket to make family gut-friendly meals. We pooled together top gut experts to bring you the science, then created simple ways to action them.’
Here, Alana and Lisa highlight some of the main reasons your gut might need care, and simple changes you can make.
Limit ultra-processed foods
They are bursting with additives and emulsifiers, which can have a negative effect on our microbes. Microbes are the gut bacteria and microorganisms that help keep our gut healthy and in turn help regulate our metabolism, keep our immune system healthy, and influence sleep. Aim to eat a diet higher in natural foods, that don’t come with a long ingredient list, such as wholegrains, lean meats, vegetables, and fruit.
Enjoy more fibre
A lack can negatively affect your microbes. Get more plant diversity into your life to up your fibre intake. Thirty different plant variants a week is a good target. Try mixed bags of salad, different colours of peppers (each colour counts as a variant), mixed frozen veg, lentils, pulses, and use a sprinkle of nut and seed mixes on soups and salads.
Reduce stress
It’s bad news for your beneficial microbes and one of the biggest hurdles in modern life. Take three deep breaths before eating, enough to switch to rest and digest mode. Planning your meals and taking your time to eat can help reduce overeating (and stress!). Try healthy gut recipes like sourdough French toast with a mixed berry compote for breakfast, chicken noodles with miso and lots of veg for lunch, and lentil and aubergine parmigiana with spicy courgettes for dinner.
Get post-antibiotic remedies
Antibiotics can be lifesavers, but they’re like a nuclear bomb on your microbes! These can regenerate in time, but not always in a good balance. Having a regular intake of fermented foods rich in probiotics (good bacteria) can help improve this. Good choices include live yogurt, miso, kimchi, sauerkraut, kefir and kombucha.
Don’t eat late at night
Overindulging before bedtime can disrupt your sleep and your microbes. Research shows the better quality of sleep you have the more likely it is that you’ll have a greater number of beneficial microbes. Go to bed earlier too – aim for at least seven hours a night.
Move more
Exercise can positively change your microbes and how they function. Studies in women have shown that those who did at least three hours of exercise a week had increased levels of gut bacteria associated with a lean BMI. You don’t need to do high intensity exercise as this can actually stress out the body (and can therefore negatively influence your microbes), simply do more exercises you enjoy – like walking with friends.
Cut down on booze
Excess alcohol can damage your gut lining and reduce beneficial microbes. Binge drinking (more than six units for women) can be particularly problematic, with studies suggesting negative gut results can last one to two weeks. If you’re going to have a drink or two, then red wine is a good option as it’s packed with healthy polyphenols (plant-based chemicals, which can help your microbes be more efficient.)
• For more information, and great gut healthy recipes, check out Alana and Lisa’s book, The Gut Stuff: Nourishing Recipes and Expert Advice for A Happy Healthy Gut (Pavilion Books, £26)