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Sept. 14, 2023 - Dr. Oz Podcast
42:41
Nuke It! New Microwave Rules to Avoid Cancer & Food Poisoning | Dr. Oz | S11 | Ep 25 | Full Episode
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Microwaves.
Dinner in seconds.
But at what price?
New microwave rules to avoid cancer and food poisoning.
A must-see before your next meal.
Plus, shrimp.
What's considered a healthy meal may have a dark side.
Overcrowded habitats that have been described as looking like swamp.
Questions of contamination, pesticides, bacteria.
We investigate.
Coming up next.
Are you ready for season 11?
- Yeah! - Listen carefully.
Listen.
You know what that sound that you're hearing is?
That's the sound of hot new microwave rolls ready for you to use right now.
Everything you need to know about your go-to kitchen tool.
For example, someone in this audience is one of the most outrageously dirty microwaves in America.
Why?
And what happens when you heat your food up in a microwave like that?
Could it put you at risk for food poisoning?
I've always wondered how microwaves can get that crusty anyway.
Take a look at how they can become a hotbed of germs.
So I asked people all across the country to send me photos of their microwaves, and here are some of the dirtiest.
This viewer wanted to warm up their hot cocoa, but ended up with a hot mess instead.
We've all been there.
This viewer thought it was an egg-cellent idea to hard boil an egg in the microwave, but the yolk was on them.
See what I'm doing there?
Disaster, right?
And the last photo comes from someone sitting in our audience right this minute.
She was secretly turned in by her friend, who says this microwave has not been cleaned in five months.
Yes, five months.
And she wasn't alone, by the way.
She had other competitors.
Whose microwave is this?
Put your hand up.
Oh, my goodness.
I'm a little embarrassed now to tell you that that was mine.
And I'm gonna kill my friend.
Former friend.
Yes.
Leia, how could you do that?
I am a great friend.
This is a microwave intervention.
I mean, this is desperate.
So, Leia, let's start with you.
Why are you concerned about your...
What's your name, by the way?
Rebecca.
Why are you concerned about Rebecca's microwave?
Because when I go over there, it's like my internal need to clean starts to dance.
I mean, look at that.
She should be charging rent to the bacteria that's living there.
That's an income.
It's horrifying.
I feel so sad for you and your family.
You're so mean you're not coming to my house anymore.
I'll bring the spirits.
We can clean it with bourbon, vodka, something.
What's going on there?
Why don't you clean the microwave?
I feel like I thought all the bacteria just gets killed when you turn the microwave on.
And then my kids, like, put stuff in it.
It just gets dirty all over again, and I hate cleaning.
How many folks might not be cleaning their microwave enough?
Yeah, no one's sure how much.
We don't know what enough is.
So we did a little test here.
We took a poll.
A third of you all out there are cleaning your microwave frequently.
The rest are, on average, cleaning your microwave four, maybe five times a year.
So...
Rebecca's not alone here.
Now here's what the deal is.
Lea went out and she got into Rebecca's house and she swabbed her microwave, there she is, for germs.
Then we used a germ counter to find her score.
Anything above 50 is considered dirty.
Rebecca, my dear, how do you think you fared?
I mean, I don't think it's gonna look too good, but I really did think the germs are killed from the microwave heat.
Well, are you ready for the score?
Whether they're alive or not, that's the germ score.
I'm not sure if I'm ready, but yeah.
Well, I think Leah's right.
You should be charging rent because it's $1,143, which is a lot more than $50.
Oh, my God.
All right, I'm feeling that I maybe need to start cleaning my microwave.
Leah, invite her to your house from now on.
I think so, and I think I'm a better friend than you realize.
All right, well, I'm going to get you back for two weeks.
Turning me into the Dr. Oz show.
So, you sit right there, because we've got some answers for you.
Chef Julia Collin-Davison is here from America's Test Kitchen.
She uses a microwave every day.
People assume, actually, that the germs are killed by the microwave.
I sort of thought that was the case, too.
Not necessarily.
It doesn't get hot enough?
Well, not necessarily.
I mean, bacteria is teeming all over the microwaves, inside and out, especially if they're not clean.
And if you think about it, so you're gonna defrost some chicken, and some of that poultry juice might leak out onto the turntable or splatter up onto the ceiling.
Take the chicken out, you close the door.
It is a warm, dark, lovely place for bacteria to grow, like salmonella.
It's like a house party, right?
Bacteria house party.
And then you go to heat up, say, a cup of coffee.
And all that salmonella could then interact with your coffee.
It's a classic case of cross-contamination.
Rebecca, you got a diner going there in your microwave.
All right, so what is the new rule for cleaning microwaves?
How do we do it?
Yeah, luckily it's really easy.
You want to clean it once a week.
And it's so much easier than cleaning a conventional oven.
You don't need a lot of harsh chemicals.
Just a bowl of water and some lemons.
So we're going to squeeze the lemon juice and drop the lemons in.
And the lemons add an acidity.
And that acidity acts as a natural degreaser.
Now, if you don't have lemon, you could use vinegar.
But lemons smell nice.
And so you want to put this bowl in uncovered.
Heat it on high power for three minutes and then let it sit in there with the door closed for five minutes and let that steam naturally loosen any cooked-on food.
Then you just go in with a rag or a sponge and you wipe it away.
It'll just wipe right off.
Rebecca, take notes here, please.
This is how you do it.
And it makes your kitchen smell nice.
Now, here's the thing.
A lot of people think they shouldn't cook in the microwave because the microwave, because of the way it heats things up, will destroy the nutrients.
Yeah, that myth has been around since microwaves first made their way into home kitchens back in the 70s, but it's absolutely not true.
Research has proven that microwaves are completely safe and actually might be beneficial.
It actually allows food to hang on to more nutrients, and it won't introduce new cancer-causing substances like carcinogens that you would get from other cooking methods like grilling or roasting.
So actually give some specific examples of how you cook foods in order to preserve their nutrient value.
Yeah, vegetables are a great example of this.
Take broccoli, which has a lot of vitamin C. Compared to just boiling it, you might lose up to two times the amount of vitamin C from boiling that you would from microwaving.
It's a nice fence, actually, because if you boil it, the water is right next to the, whatever the vegetable is.
It sucks out the juice.
That's it.
It's like a washing machine.
It's just washing the nutrients out, so those nutrients are left behind in the cooking pot, not in the vegetable.
And also, the microwave is a lot faster, and the more quickly you can cook something, the more nutrients are left in the vegetable.
So how do you actually do it?
Yeah, so you put it in a bowl, add just maybe a tablespoon of water.
You want to create some steam.
Put a lid on it and put it in the microwave.
Go in and stir it every once in a while.
Stirring creates more even cooking.
How do you put a lid?
There's no lids to these kinds of containers.
Yeah, you use a plate.
That's what I do.
Not a napkin, a plate.
Not a napkin.
So think about it.
If you want something to be brown and toasted and crisp on the outside, you want to draw the moisture out.
That's perfect for a paper towel.
It'll absorb moisture.
If you want to steam something, put a plate that traps that moisture.
So cauliflower, great with protein, antioxidants in spinach, all these are wonderful for the microwave.
The other hack you have, which I think is fantastic, is a microwave rule for tea.
Yeah, this is really cool.
So research has found that if you microwave tea, it activates up to 80% of its natural nutrients, including amino acids and antioxidants.
Now, obviously, you need to use a microwave-safe mug, and the tea bag, you have to make sure there's no metal staples, and that it's made of paper, not that nylon mesh.
You should use paper anyway.
That's true.
No mesh.
All right, so how do you actually do it?
Yeah, so you put boiling water in, and you let it steep for 30 seconds, and then you put the whole thing in the microwave for a minute on high, uncovered, and that activates the tea.
Clean microwave, mind you.
Clean microwave.
Rebecca, keep that in mind.
All right, up next, what's the perfect amount of time to heat up your leftover food evenly?
The scientific rule revealed to nuking your food.
No more burning in your mouth, no more cold spots, which no one likes.
Stay with us.
Dear Sherilyn, I arrived at the Weld County Jail the night of August 15th.
Chris Watts.
His letters from jail.
And an Oz exclusive.
He admitted that he actually killed his daughters not once, but twice.
His words.
His details.
His confession.
When he put his hands on her neck, he couldn't let go.
Call it to Oz.
That's coming up tomorrow.
We're back with the new microwave rules you need to follow.
Now we're answering your biggest question.
What's the best way to reheat your food evenly in the microwave?
We're revealing the secret, the scientific secret that is, to heating up your food so you can finally avoid all those scorchingly hot bites in the ice-cold spots.
Lisa says heating up her food has been frustrating.
Like for many of you, she complains that catastrophes happen.
So what happens when you heat your food up?
You know, I heat stuff up all the time.
I hand it off to my son.
He sits down.
He takes a bite.
It's great.
The next bite, ice cold.
Yeah.
All the time.
So what's your technique?
What do you do?
It's really sophisticated, Dr. Oz.
I have a very, very big system for this.
I throw it in the microwave.
I set it for five minutes.
I go do something else.
I come back.
I get it.
And I hand it over to my customer.
Yeah.
I wish it was that easy.
I made that mistake as well.
So we got Julia Collin-Davison here.
Stay with us for a second.
She experimented in her test kitchen to find the formula for heating up foods the right way.
She tested out some of your favorite meals to reheat.
Chicken and pasta.
Yep.
For chicken.
All right.
Explain what you do.
You just heard from Lisa.
It's a catastrophe for her.
I've done that, and we've all been there.
There's an easy solution.
First, put the chicken in a bowl.
Sounds a little weird, but what you want to do is you want to cover it.
And I think these plates are a great, easy cover, and the bowl is just a really nice way to hold the plate aloft.
You want to cover it because it traps the steam, and that steam keeps the chicken moist, and it also allows it really to heat through more evenly, rather than getting the tail end really jerky-like.
Right.
You have to put any water in this?
No, you don't have to put any water.
There's enough natural moisture in here.
Now, the real key...
Besides this setup is the power level.
You don't want to put it on 100% power.
You want to put it on 40% power.
That'll heat food through more evenly.
I have never in my entire life changed the power level of a microwave.
Really?
Lisa, do you change the power level of your microwave?
I don't know that I know how to do that.
How many of you, put your hands up, know how to change the power?
Well, that's not many.
Yeah, I thought so.
No, not many at all.
That's like a fifth of the audience.
All right, show me how you do it.
All right, so every microwave's a little different.
You want to look at the manual.
For this microwave, you want to put the cooking time in, and then we're going to hold down the power level, and you can see it's going 90, 70, 60, 40. There we go.
And you press start.
So 40% power doesn't mean it's actually emitting a weaker frequency.
All microwaves emit one frequency.
At 100% power, it's emitting that the entire time.
At 40%, it's emitting that intermittently.
And so when it turns off, it allows that heat to dissipate and the heat to more evenly work its way into the food.
Oh my goodness.
Yeah, so if you have a solid piece of food, like a piece of chicken, a square of lasagna, it just heats things through more evenly.
I learned something.
That's Yeah, it is cool.
And do we have to check the temperature?
Yeah, this is the other thing about reheating food.
You don't want to cook it again.
It's already cooked.
You want to heat it through.
Safe temperature for reheating any food is 160 degrees.
That means all the bacteria will be killed off and it's safe to eat.
And also, if you continue to go much above that, and that happens fast in a microwave, it'll get up to 200 in the blink of an eye and it's dried out and you lose a ton of flavor.
More's not better.
Yeah, so when you learn your microwave, microwaves are all different, right?
This is a lovely microwave, it's got 110 watts.
Some microwaves are about half that, 700 or 800. So that can also translate to how long you microwave your food.
So learn your microwave.
Problems with pasta.
Yeah.
Why is it so difficult to heat up pasta?
Right?
Well, if you just put this in the microwave uncovered or paper towel over the top that helps dry it out, it comes into a solid mass, you know, that you can't break up.
It gets crispy around the edges.
What you want to do is you want to add just a little bit of oil.
That helps, and you wanna toss it around.
That'll help prevent the pasta from sticking together.
Just a little bit of water, about a tablespoon of water.
Again, that's gonna create steam that'll cook the pasta through evenly.
Cover it again?
Cover it again with a nice thick cover to trap the steam.
Now this, unlike a solid piece of food, this you can stir, right?
So you can put it in 100% power.
Every minute, go in there and stir until it's nice and hot.
Oh my goodness.
I love this.
Thank you very, very much.
Thank you.
Fantastic advice.
We're going to post these rules on DrOz.com.
Be sure to get a copy of the America's Test Kitchen 20th Anniversary Cookbook, which is spectacular.
We'll be right back.
Tacos.
It's a fast food boom.
Slipping in your back pocket, nobody will ever know you ate it.
But what's really inside that crunchy shell?
You have chicken?
Yeah.
And a beef taco?
Yes.
All new Oz.
That's coming up on Wednesday.
It is everyone's favorite seafood from fried, right?
Then there's the steamed versions.
I love these.
And of course, you mix it into a yummy pasta.
Oh, it just melts in your mouth.
Shrimp has become kind of an obsession.
You're actually eating more shrimp now than ever before.
Over 1 billion pounds of shrimp are eaten every year in the United States alone.
And it's healthy, sure.
But everyone feels a little weird about it, right?
You wonder, am I buying the right shrimp?
Is it clean?
Is it safe?
Investigative reporter Mara Scavacompo joins us.
She brought us the story.
Why is it so important to you?
Well, frankly, Dr. Oz, it's because I love shrimp.
And, you know, clearly I'm not alone.
The average consumption of shrimp in this country has gone up almost half a pound per person.
Okay.
In the last few years.
So we're eating a lot of shrimp.
You know, people think of it as this indulgent luxury item like lobster and steak, but prices have actually gone down, which makes it even more appealing.
So when I learned that there could be a dark side to the industry, I knew we had to investigate.
Let's take a little walk.
I love what Mara's work is.
She loves the investigation so much.
Her spirit lives in them.
So I listened to her advice.
So, we decided to go through some of these scary shrimp headlines that we've seen over the years, raising red flags of what we should be aware of.
Now, I'm not showing the U.S. on this map for a reason, right?
Because how much of it is consumed here?
Almost none.
90% is raised overseas.
All right, so, not much comes from the U.S., from our domestic waters, but in India...
Over there, there's been a hot debate over whether imported shrimp contains worrying levels of antibiotic-resistant bacteria due to some recent testing.
How about Thailand?
They've been caught using forced labor to harvest shrimp and accused of unsanitary conditions.
And over there in China, one of the major suppliers to the United States, of course, but there have been some threats like water shortages and contamination due to sewage runoff.
As our hunger for shrimp has grown, the way it's brought to our place has greatly changed.
Today, much of the world's shrimp is farmed.
What do we know about farmed shrimp?
Well, here's the thing.
Because it's coming from overseas and so many other countries, in some cases it's coming from countries with poor governmental oversight.
You know, what's unique about things that are raised in this country is that we know what the governmental oversight is.
And when you have poor regulations, that leads to things that you just mentioned.
Things like diseased shrimp, overcrowded habitats that have been described as looking like swamps, Overuse of antibiotics, slave labor in raising these shrimp, these are all things that come from countries with poor oversight.
All right, so domestic shrimp from the Gulf has long been hailed as the best option by experts.
Let's go to Paul Greenberg, fisherman, extraordinary author of American Cats.
You say there's only so much shrimp to go along.
Mara's pointing out numbers that are stunning about how much more we're consuming, but it should be the other way around.
Well, I mean, we do have shrimp in this country, but we don't have enough.
And so we end up, you know, shrimp is this incredibly productive animal that can breed lots of babies really quickly, but we are eating a lot of it.
So, so much of it is coming to us from abroad, and it's coming from these countries where they not only have poor health oversight, they have really poor ecological oversight.
So we're losing millions of acres of vital mangrove forests to shrimp farms that are displacing all of those really important habitats over time.
Another fear that's been exposed is that of plastics.
Yeah, well plastics are a huge problem in all of our seafood.
Right now we have about, oh gosh, 5 to 10 million metric tons of plastics going into our oceans every single year.
So does shrimp eat that plastic?
It's getting into all of our seafood.
When they did a recent survey of all the seafood that was coming out of the San Francisco area, for example, they found that about a third of all seafood had plastic in their guts.
And yeah, shrimp is going to be part of that.
A third of the seafood.
Yeah, in their guts.
And, you know, the thing is, is that this plastic is coming to us in all these weird different ways.
Like, you know, you have like a sweatshirt like this, right?
And you wash the sweatshirt, right?
In your washer and dryer.
In your washer and dryer, just like at home.
And you think, okay, I'm just washing my sweatshirt.
But, you know, if you look at it, a lot of the stuff that we wear has these what are called microplastic microfibers.
And you can see that when you do wash these kind of things, that these microfibers come out into the water.
Wow, I see it.
Yeah.
It comes out into the water, and surprise, surprise, where does it end up?
It ends up in our seafood.
And you'd think, right...
So this is the shrimp.
This is the water the shrimp's gonna live in, right?
And you would think, right, that our water filtration systems would kick that plastic out.
But again, surprise, surprise.
The plastic's in the water.
And this is coming to us from the microfibers in our clothes.
It's coming sometimes from toothpaste, from our face wash.
We are just overloading the oceans with plastic.
Again, these are small bits of plastic that our water treatment facilities aren't designed to manage.
They get into us this way, but they'll get into our fish even before they get to us that way, because they're eating them.
That's right.
That's right.
And the thing about plastic is we still don't know.
The jury's out.
We don't know the toxicity of plastic.
But we do know that plastic is sticky chemically.
And so things like PCBs could be potentially brought into our fish and to our shellfish through the consumption of this plastic.
And if it's not the shrimp, it's the plankton that the shrimp eat.
So there's a hundred different ways of getting into the food room.
We can't always stop.
That's right.
So scientists still don't understand the effects of microplastics on human health, but there's evidence that we may be eating them more than we want.
And I'm worried about the increasing exposure of plastics all of us have, especially kids.
Now, shellfish probably aren't the main source.
More likely to ingest microplastics from, frankly, the water bottles or the Breathing.
It's in the air.
We reached out to the National Fisheries Institute for a statement, and they said in part, shrimp producers work with regulators and third-party certifiers, as well as the restaurant and retail sector to ensure safe, wholesome, and delicious products make it to American plates.
You can go to dros.com for the full statement.
Now listen to everybody.
Shrimp has a lot of good things going for it.
I like the antioxidants, right?
That little reddish color, very good for you.
It's low in calories.
It's delicious.
I don't want you giving up shrimp.
That's why another member of our investigation squad, Mark Shasker, says, overall, if you get the right shrimp, it's a net positive.
Given all the problems with imported farmed shrimp, I set off to find someone who still catches it the old-fashioned way, in the ocean.
My journey took me to the Louisiana Bayou.
Lance.
Hey, how's it going, man?
Welcome aboard.
Louisiana' Lance Nacio is a third-generation shrimper.
Shrimping is what I love.
It's what I was brought up doing, living off the resources.
And my father did it, my grandfather did it.
You know what I mean?
I have a passion for it and I want to pass it on.
Lance took me out on his shrimp boat to show me how it's done.
So Lance, how much shrimp can you catch in a day?
You know, we've had some days where we caught as much as 5,000 pounds in a day.
Wow.
And what's a bad day?
A bad day is 200 or 300 pounds.
Okay.
And what kind of shrimp are we trying to catch today?
White shrimp.
The white shrimp are typically larger shrimp.
They're really sweet and succulent because we have the Mississippi River and the Enchafalaya River that meets the Gulf along the coast in these estuaries, and they taste sweet, our shrimp.
So this here is like shrimp heaven.
We're gonna catch and eat some really tasty shrimp.
For sure.
It was time to cast the nets and catch us some shrimp.
And catch shrimp we did.
These ones aren't raised with antibiotics or other nonsense.
Up next, we are headed to the fish section of our local supermarket to give you the ultimate shrimp by our sky.
Stick around.
Jeffrey Epstein's Accusers, the side you haven't heard until now.
I walked into this room.
It's a dimly lit room with a massage table.
Jeffrey came in.
He began to sexually abuse me.
That's coming up on Thursday.
We're back with your ultimate shrimp buyer's guide.
Investigation Squad member, Marskevacampo is here.
Paul Greenberg, author of American Cash, joins us as well.
First, we want you to avoid buying seafood soaked with salt and sodium tripolyphosphate.
That's an additive that food manufacturers use to make the seafood heavier.
Is that the only reason?
And how do you know if you've got this sodium tripolyphosphate in your product?
Yeah, well, if it's heavier, you can charge more.
So you see the appeal there.
You know, sodium tripolyphosphate is an additive, so it does need to be listed on the ingredient label.
So the easiest way to know is to read the label.
So we found one bag of shrimp that says right on it, shrimp, water, sodium, and sodium tripolyphosphate.
Right there.
The easiest way to ensure that you don't get it is to look for a bag that just says shrimp.
You can also look for certifications.
There are two you should look for.
BAP or ASC. If you have either one of those, you know you're good to go.
But if you look at the shrimp from here, you can't tell the difference all that much.
You might be able to tell the taste difference over time.
So should people be buying frozen or fresh?
Just lay it out for us.
Yeah, from a value perspective, go for the frozen shrimp because you can keep it in your freezer.
It thaws beautifully.
It'll be delicious.
It'll keep much longer.
And keep in mind, just because you're buying something that isn't frozen at the moment you buy it, it doesn't mean it was never frozen.
It just may have been pre-frozen, so it's not really worth the extra price.
That's true, Paul, right?
Yeah, definitely.
And, you know, shrimp is this product that you can get it either frozen in a block like this, which is not such a great value because you're actually paying for the ice, or you can look for IQF, Individually Quick Frozen Shrimp, which are individually frozen, have much better texture, much better taste.
And, you know, if you want to go a step further than IQF, as Mario's saying, look for these certifications, because this ASC, the BAP, the GAA, sorry a lot of alphabet soup here, but that means they weren't treated with antibiotics, and we really want to avoid that.
Alright, let's talk about this issue of domestic wild shrimp versus the farmed shrimp.
Yeah, so basically, when given a choice, I just choose American.
Because whether it's farmed or wild, we have much better regulatory oversight.
And the other thing that I say is, you know, when you're getting shrimp, if you want to avoid that whole sodium tripolyphosphate issue, get the shrimp with the shell on.
Because it's actually super easy to shell.
You just peel the shell right off.
You know, after you get a certain ways down the line, you can just kind of pinch it and pull it.
If it had the shell on, it's not gonna have been treated with tripolyphosphate.
And then after that, I don't know about you, when I cook, I love to use the shell for stock.
I thought my father-in-law was the only one who did that.
That's such a clever idea, seriously.
Your father-in-law and I could get along.
No, you use the shell, it's got flavor to it.
It's delicious, it's delicious, and probably transfers some of that antioxidant pinkness into the broth.
For more on stories like this, check out Mara's YouTube channel.
It's youtube.com slash Marascampo.
Thank you both for being here.
I appreciate it.
We'll be right back.
Up next, the ultimate revenge body, a woman who lost 140 pounds after being turned down by her college crush.
It's the age-old argument.
Is the best revenge no revenge at all?
Or is the best revenge a dish best served cold?
We've heard all the sayings, but maybe the best revenge is running into an old college crush years after they rejected you while you are now looking fabulous.
That's exactly what happened to my next guest.
This is Rachel Hefner.
At 300 pounds, she was rejected by her college crush.
Because of her weight.
But Rachel channeled rejection into losing 140 pounds.
Look at this.
This is the new Rachel.
And then she took that revenge body to the next level, winning bodybuilding championships.
Look at her now.
What do you think about that?
Please welcome Rachel Hefner.
Oh, my goodness.
I mean, you're obviously not shy.
Not at all.
Thanks for joining me.
Yeah.
So let's start at the very beginning.
How did you get to 300 pounds?
That's such a different person than I see on set here.
Um, well...
My mom was sick growing up and I didn't really learn a lot of nutrition from her because she was always really sick so I basically just ate what was ever in the pantry or whatever was around and then she was always trying to make me feel good so she would stop at McDonald's, you know, Taco Bell, easy stuff.
And then she passed away when I was 12. I'm sorry.
It's okay.
She's better off.
She was really, really sick.
So when I moved in with my dad, he would try really hard to teach me nutrition.
But by that time, I had already found these bad habits and hadn't really wanted to change.
I was so upset.
I would emotionally eat or I'd hide food.
He wouldn't know about it.
And then...
He's also a man, so he would go about it the wrong way and make me feel bad about it, or he'd use exercise as punishment.
Instead of getting grounded, I would go walk laps or stuff that he thought would help give a positive influence, but it didn't.
It made it the other way.
So you're in college.
You're not the weight you want to be at.
Did you have a relationship with this young man?
We had been friends on and off throughout school.
We went to like, I think we first met in fifth grade.
So you sort of liked each other.
He liked you.
Yeah.
So you get to college and you find out that he's not interested in you because of your weight.
Yes.
How did that affect you?
Why was that a catalyst for you to become who you are today?
I think I was just fed up with not feeling good enough for anybody and with myself.
I remember being 19 and being totally okay with not hitting 26. Oh no.
Yeah.
So, being 28 now, I'm feeling good about that.
So how did you do it?
You lost 140 pounds over about four years.
So it wasn't like, you know, it was fast, but it wasn't in six months.
Right.
That's a lot of effort.
How did you pull the strings?
So basically what I did was I just made better choices.
I walked to class rather than taking a shuttle.
I made sure that the roommate I had at the time, we decided that we were going to do this together.
So we threw out all the junk food in our room, made sure that there was no You know, temptations or anything like that.
And then we made a schedule.
We decided we were gonna go to the gym four times a week.
So is the right thing done every day with some camaraderie?
Yes, definitely.
When you get through all this remarkable transformation in your weight, you have skin left over.
Yes.
But not surprisingly, having weighed 300 pounds.
What were your thoughts about that?
How did the skin affect you?
This skin, it continuously reminded me of the girl that I used to be and how I felt and how that girl felt.
And I just decided that I had worked too hard in that time to just keep dealing with it.
So you did it.
You had the excess skin removed with surgery.
I did, almost two years ago.
The 13th will be two years.
So to prepare for that operation, doctors will often ask you to get to the lowest weight you're going to be and make sure you can stay there.
Yes.
So what did you do?
So, I actually work for a gym now, and my boss, who is now my coach, he taught me everything he knew about it, and then I made sure that I changed the way that I trained, so I made it more, you know, HIIT, cardio, high intensity, made sure I got all my steps in, got all the water in, because water helps with the elasticity of your skin, and did it all the natural way.
And you lost the last 30 pounds.
Yes.
So let me brag on you for a second.
Yes.
Michelle didn't just let that surgery study down, you actually sped up after that.
You went on to 11 bodybuilding awards in 2018, including Miss Indiana Women's Physique.
So you get into bodybuilding because you're gonna lose a lot of better weight, but this is a fairly extreme effort you're making.
This is a whole different spectrum of options than where you were.
Yeah.
What pushed you there?
I'm a very goal-oriented person, in case you can't tell.
I like to push myself to the extreme.
And Adam, who's my coach, I've been around him and watched him train people and watch him coach people up to doing this and watched him go through a prep myself.
And I was like, you know, that might be kind of fun.
I'll give it a shot.
So can I meet Adam?
Yes, we can meet Adam.
So Adam is joining us now via Zoom.
Adam, you work with a variety of clients ranging from professional bodybuilders to everyday folks.
Were you shocked when Rachel decided to compete?
No, no.
So when I first met Rachel, she told me very specifically that she would never step on stage.
She will never be caught dead in a bikini.
And that's fine.
I mean, not everyone's goal is to step on stage.
But I knew once her surgery was over, when she lost that weight, when she had the excess skin removal, when she had that surgery, very specifically, I knew that she'd be caught in a limbo of identity, very much so.
So she needed to put a definition to her.
More or less who she is.
And I think finding her love and passion for bodybuilding was going to take that next step.
It definitely helps her.
Helped her get to the next level.
Well, thank you very much.
Congratulations on your success with Rachel.
Thank you, Adam.
Thank you.
So, Rachel, now...
The question that we all came here to hear the answer to.
Have you seen your old college crush since you've lost the weight, transformed your body, and how did he react to your revenge body?
I have seen him actually quite a few times over the years.
He did ask me to hang out later and I politely declined.
I actually thanked him and said that he was the reason that I was where I am today because without that catalyst, without that extra push, I wouldn't have pushed myself to do it, I don't think, on my own.
And then he actually trained with me earlier this year.
He did?
Yeah, he came in and he needed a little bit of help to lose a little bit of fat before an event, and so I helped him.
What if he gets a revenge body?
Would you consider him then?
No, we're just different people.
He's a great person.
Like, he's still very sweet, but I'm just not interested in that.
All right.
For all of the folks watching right now who are struggling, and there are quite a few, what do you have to say to them?
I would say the best thing I can tell you is to never give up.
Because you're gonna hit a wall, it's gonna be really hard, but I promise that it's going to be worth it in the end.
And whatever it may be, it doesn't have to be health related, it could be any type of goal, it's never worth giving up on.
Ever.
Well I'm proud of you.
Congratulations.
Thank you.
If you have a good revenge body story you want to share, head to DrRoz.com.
We'll be right back.
Chris Watts.
His letters from jail.
His words.
His details.
His confession.
When he put his hands on her neck, he couldn't let go.
All new Oz.
That's coming up tomorrow.
It's a go-to dinnertime staple for family meals that can be found in almost every pantry in this country.
Today, what should you be looking for when buying pasta sauce at the grocery store?
How do you pick the best jar for your family?
What if you could buy a sauce That had the soul of Italy, full of the robust flavor, with the health of California.
Think about that.
Italy, Cali.
Icalia.
We'll put it all together.
We'll make a little Icalia version of pasta sauce.
That's what we're going to try to do today.
Joining us now is registered dietitian Kristin Kirkpatrick, who's here on behalf of my trusted sponsorship partner, Silver Palette.
That's the beloved book.
That changed the way families cook.
We all love it, we adore it, but this tomato sauce issue is a big opportunity.
Tomatoes are great, but the pasta sauce, tomato sauce, even more important.
Why?
Even more important because it contains an antioxidant called lycopene.
Lycopene has been linked to better glowing skin, lower rates of heart disease, and the lycopene goes up when the tomatoes are heated as opposed to raw.
So that's why tomato sauce is the way to get the lycopene.
Isn't that a cool idea?
Somehow, our ancestors figured out that it's actually even better for you to use the tomatoes in a heated saucepan.
And then if you add a little oil to it, it's even better.
Even better.
Even better.
Well, that's called pasta sauce, right?
So there's tons of options out there.
I know you all know that.
It's hard to find out if you're getting the most out of your tomato sauce.
And people all put headache stuff in there.
So what are some of the pitfalls that consumers fall into when they're trying to pick the jarred sauce that they should like?
Yeah, so number one, this is tomato sauce.
Tomatoes should be the first ingredient, not tomato paste.
So if you wanna get the most bang for your nutritional buck, San Marzano tomatoes, that's what you wanna look for first.
Second's gonna be sugar, Dr. Oz.
So a lot of manufacturers will put sugar in to cut the bitterness of the tomatoes.
But a top brand will only use top-notch ingredients.
Those San Marzano tomatoes actually have a natural sweetness.
You don't have to add the sugar.
And then sodium.
I have seen brands that have as much as 1,000 milligrams of sodium in a serving.
So that's half of what some Americans need to get, right?
And so what you want to look for is you want to stay in the 300s.
If you can go to 100, even better.
Sodium's got to be lower.
And again, it's not impossible to find tomato paste not, sugar not, salt not.
There's examples that they taste great.
What pasta sauce do you recommend?
One that you think recommends and combines the soul of Italy, that you're speaking about, San Marzano tomatoes, with the healthfulness of California.
So Silver Palette is what I recommend to my patients, what my family uses.
They use those San Marzano tomatoes with a combination of juicy California tomatoes, which you, Calia, I love it.
And they don't have as much sodium as some other brands.
So if you want a low sodium option, you can definitely get that.
Obviously no added sugar, because they're using those sweet, sweet tomatoes.
As scratch as possible, this is gonna be like your grandmother's.
And no additives.
So they are steaming off the skins of these tomatoes, and that yields a higher rate of lycopene and beta-carotene.
You mentioned olive oil, Dr. Oz.
They have olive oil in the recipe.
All of this is amazing, and it doesn't come at a sacrifice to taste.
You're getting that big tomato flavor that you're looking at that your grandmother had, but you're getting it in a jar.
I trust your advice always.
But in this case, you actually have a lot of data to support your advice.
For one, that major consumer group that we all trust a lot voted the sauce the best tasting in this category.
Health benefits, of course, are one thing.
Taste has to dominate, because I know you're not going to eat it if it doesn't taste good.
So to really put this to the test, we asked a few Italian home cooks, the real thing, to try a silver pallet pasta sauce in their dinners and report back.
back here's their honest testimonials delicious This tastes like something we would pick off the vines, mash up, put into the jars, flip the jars upside down, and have homemade sauce.
This tastes spectacular.
So, lasagna is done.
Can't wait to try it.
It's good.
It's good.
You want more?
Delicious.
Make sure you pick up a jar low sodium silver palette marinara.
Mikey liked it.
We enjoyed the cooks.
Georgette and Michelle are here today with recipes.
Michelle, what did you make with the silver pallet sauce?
I made my Sunday go-to lasagna, the Italian classic.
And obviously the whole family liked it.
Absolutely.
The most difficult customers.
I barely got a piece.
Georgette, what did you make for us?
And compare this to the other types of jarred sauces you may have made.
Again, this is a very important recipe for you.
Right.
I made eggplant parmesan.
Parmesan.
Okay.
And it's my go-to that all my family loves, even the picky grandchildren.
They're all always happy with it.
Did the pasta sauce deliver to your palate?
Absolutely.
Authentic Italian.
Absolutely.
So, you like the taste?
Delicious.
Wonderful.
I think fantastic.
It's a real tribute to you that you can make pasta that tastes so fantastic.
But I want to actually let the men who created Silver Palate do the judging.
Are you okay with that?
Yes.
They have pretty discriminating palates as well.
Let me introduce you to these two gentlemen, Bob and Peter Harris.
And they are related to Bob, who I adore, same age as my father, who I lost this year.
But he had the strength that you have and you still continue to...
And your son, Peter, suffers the way I did for many years, being advised by his father for most of their adult life.
So what do you guys think?
You've tasted this.
Thoughts, Peter?
Both dishes are delicious and amazing.
The real reason we created this...
The real reason we created this was I know so many people who do make their own sauce, like their grandmothers used to.
Many men, I might add.
And now they don't have to.
Well, kudos to you.
Where do you find Silver Palette Sauces?
Most local supermarkets across the United States and, of course, silverpalette.com.
So, with all that said, since you're comfortable with the recipes as they were made, you've got a little gift.
And, Bob, you've talked long and hard about this.
What is the gift?
I would like to give everybody in the audience a free jar of silver-palate pasta sauce, as well as a free carton of silver-palate oatmeal, which is the best oatmeal you can buy.
We're getting both.
Why is it the best oatmeal?
Well, number one, it's double toasted in granola ovens.
Silver-palate oatmeal is thicker, and it's heartier than any other oatmeal.
I had some today.
I have some every day.
Well, if I can talk to you, I'm gonna do it.
That's very kind of you.
And for everyone at home, thanks to our trusted sponsorship partner, Silver Palette, beginning tomorrow at 12 p.m.
Eastern time.
Be one of the first 1,500 people to go to DrOz.com to receive a coupon for a free jar of Silver Palette pasta sauce or of Silver Palette oatmeal.
And I want my entire studio audience to have the pension samples you need, so thanks to Bob, you're all going home, as he said, with a jar of Silver Palette pasta sauce and Silver Palette oatmeal.
We'll be right back.
Today, a prescription I thought I'd never, ever give.
It's one that may help you make your next workout a little less painful.
Rene, is that pronounced right?
Rene.
Rene for my audience this year.
She won't be saying her name very often because she's walking on this treadmill.
She's power walking now, but I'm going to speed this up a little bit.
You feeling okay?
I'm getting there.
Rene's hanging with me.
So I'll turn it up a little bit.
Just get you going a tiny bit more.
You still feeling okay?
I'm doing okay.
What usually happens in my household is as I begin to push my wife...
Daughters to do things, they get a little bit more irritable.
Does that happen to you?
Yes, definitely.
Can I go a little faster?
Yeah, sure.
I'm gonna take you up to a running room.
All right?
All right.
You run much?
Yeah, my husband owns a gym.
It's kind of required.
So I have a secret weapon that may help you as I push you a little faster.
I want you to, listen carefully, to swear.
You're allowed to use a four-letter word or I will protect you.
And you know why?
New research is telling us that people who are stressed out when they're working out perform better if they curse.
Really?
So not only will dropping an F-bomb make a difference by increasing your endurance, but you're going to be able to fight through the pain.
You're going to push through.
You ready to do this?
I'm ready.
All right.
I'm going to do super speed now.
All right.
Let's do this.
Oh my god, can you go to seven?
Yeah, why not, sure.
All right, are the curse words ready?
I'm ready, one, two, go!
This sucks!
I hate this!
Is it helping at all?
Yeah, it's a little bit better.
I can go higher.
You're going higher?
Why not?
All right, so you don't want to go higher with more curse words.
It's as high as it goes.
I'm giving it all I can give, Captain.
All right.
I'll take a breather.
That was so great reading.
I don't know if that helped you at all, but I'm hoping you remember that next time you're working out hard.
Would you give it a shot?
Yeah, why not?
People might stare at you.
What the heck?
Who cares?
Okay.
Get out there, get exercising.
Give Kirstie a chance if you're not happy with what you're doing.
Remember, the power of change lies in the power of you.
It's one person with one voice speaking the truth.
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