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Sept. 29, 2023 - Dr. Oz Podcast
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The Big Butter Investigation: Is There Really A Better Butter? | Dr. Oz | S11 | Ep 55 | Full Episode
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Salted, unsalted, grasped, cultured, clarified.
But butter is better.
Here's the biggest thing.
Some of the things in the butter aisle aren't even butter.
We investigated.
And we're searching for the best fast food mac and cheese.
Don't worry, I got this.
Taste, texture, and of course, cheesiness.
Oh, I wish you could smell the cheesy goodness right now.
Plus, Kathie Lee Gifford opens up about her latest life-changing chapter.
Coming up next.
Are you ready for season 11?
If you've cruised the aisles of your local grocery store recently, you may have noticed the better options in your dairy aisle keep expanding.
Why?
There are 25 kinds of butter.
And is there really a better butter?
Plus, margarine, is it making a comeback as a health food?
Today, we investigate.
Once considered public enemy number one, Super Delicious Butter is working its way back into the American household.
From traditional uses, like on your toast and in your cakes, to more modern uses, like in your coffee and on top of your oatmeal.
In 2018, the average American ate almost six pounds of butter.
But there are so many new options for butters joining the scene.
They used to be salted or unsalted.
Now there's European, grass-fed, whipped, spreadable, cultured, ghee, clarified, compound.
What does it all mean?
An important question when there's no margarine for error.
Our Steve Investigator Tia Brown and Chef Charles Shen are here.
Tia did some research in supermarkets all around the place.
What has changed?
I mean, there used to only really be salted and unsalted butter.
Now there are so many options.
European, cultured, clarified.
And then they also come in so many different types of forms.
Whips, spreads, sprays.
But here's the biggest thing.
Some of the things in the butter aisle aren't even butter.
So consumers have to be extremely vigilant and make sure they're reading labels.
It might have been butter.
Not even butter.
All right, Chef Charles, what makes butter butter anyway?
So let's geek out over butter for a moment over here.
So any good chef knows there's no substitute for real, full-fat butter.
Very simply, there's...
There we are.
Yes, there's a butter lover.
So we only start with milk or cream, and then just the old-fashioned way.
We basically put it in a mason jar, and we shake it up.
Like, we churn it.
And then until the membrane breaks apart, we get solid.
So right here, we have solid butter.
You just gotta keep shaking it.
And look at this.
We got solid butter.
And real butter, that's all you need.
You don't need all the weird ingredients in there.
But when you're trying to make butter with things that are not butter, that's when the ingredients get a lot less simple.
What's this fluid called that's left behind?
So that's either cream, oh, there's also some buttermilk lipids in there.
Buttermilk?
Yeah, buttermilk.
Which is why buttermilk's actually good for you.
Yes.
Because it's left over.
I like this idea.
I like geeking out over butter.
Oh, I love it.
We should drink that later.
That's what I'm gonna do right now.
It's really good.
Is there salt in there?
It's a little salty.
It's perfect.
All right.
Well, Chef Charles and I are geeking out over butter.
That's really good.
I see.
We're going to cut through all the butter clutter to help everyone find the best butter for them.
And members of our Bite Club, they're right there, are tasting the schmears of the year at our butter bar.
They're ready to give their honest taste report for each other.
You all ready for this?
Eat away.
Alright, first, the best butter for the real butter lover turns out to be European butter.
Right.
I never even heard that before.
Me either.
So European butter is made in kind of like the old-school traditional way.
What is that?
You're taking the cream off of the top of fresh butter, you're collecting it, it's fermenting, and that result is European butter.
Nowadays, they use a different process for manufacturers in terms of, like, Just really using processed bacteria already, and you get the same results.
So it's still cultured butter, whether it's made the traditional way or with bacteria added.
Actually, specifically, why is it better, do you think, Chef Charles?
Well, I love European butter just because it has an extra buttery taste.
If you guys are a butter lover, this is definitely your go-to butter right here.
You can use it just as a regular butter, just like the same measurements if you're cooking.
And it has a tang to it, so if you do like a tang, this is definitely your butter.
And the bacteria is the same as like kefir has in it?
Yes, so basically we start off with cream, and then we add some live cultures like kefir, then we go into it, then let it sit, all the bacteria, just let it do its thing, and then we get rid of all the liquid, and then we have cultured butter.
Oh, I like this.
Butter bar shake-in time.
Describe the taste of this butter for us.
Give us a few words.
Well, I find this butter to be very rich and I'd say creamy, too.
So I'm finding it more rich than other butters I've tried.
European butter.
Oh, I like it.
Deliciously tangy.
Like, I like that little...
Deliciously tangy?
Oh, my goodness.
A gourmand over there.
All right.
Next up, the best butter for those watching their weight is whipped butter.
Wow.
Now, I've even thought about that.
Why, first of all, is it really lowering calories and why?
Whipped butter is real butter and it is lowering calories.
Listen, the great thing about whipped butter is what?
It's light, it's fluffy, it's easy to spread.
Traditional butter kind of makes a mess.
When it's cold, it's hard.
Whipped butter has none of that because when it's churned, air is processed into the butter.
So it's a win-win.
A third less of the calories in fat.
That's the biggest win with whipped butter.
But there's a catch, Chef Chen.
You have to wait.
You're gonna bake with it.
You gotta measure it differently.
You gotta measure it differently.
So when we're looking at this, you know, it looks about the same, but butter right here is actually heavier than whipped butter.
So what I always suggest is that when you're making things at home and you're substituting whipped butter, make sure you melt it and you measure it by weight rather than size.
Because look, butter is heavier.
So it looks like more to me, but in fact, in fairness, this is actually the exact same amount.
It's a cup of butter.
Yes.
It's a cup of whipped butter.
Yeah, so this is a lot lighter, but then you just want to make sure.
So measure by weight, not by size.
You'd only really needed this much.
You may never catch up.
I want all of it.
You want all of it.
Butterbar chicken, how does your whipped butter compare to the hard butter, the normal butter?
This one's a little lighter, and it's a little saltier than the European.
And I love the velvety texture.
Goodness, I love these adjectives.
Next up, the best butter to cook with is clarified butter, also called ghee.
Yes, so I love ghee.
This is like trending.
A lot of people are using this nowadays.
But ghee starts off with boiling traditional butter.
Then we allow the water to all evaporate.
Then you have three different layers.
We have whey, ghee, and casein.
So basically what they do is they take off All this whey right here.
Get rid of all that whey protein on top.
Then you're left with the liquid fat, which is the ghee, okay?
So the ghee is what we like right here.
Is this, that I'm ladling out.
Yes.
100% fat.
This is great for high heat cooking.
All right, next up.
The best butter for more omega-3s is grass-fed butter.
This butter comes from milk or cream from grass-fed cows.
To find out what makes this butter different, we caught up with Bruce Rivington from Cream Hill Dairy Farms, where he raises grass-fed cows.
Take a look.
Hi, I'm Bruce Rivington.
Our family has a grass-fed dairy in Hamilton, New York.
We take some of our milk and turn it into butter, which has high CLAs and the perfect balance of omega-3 to omega-6 for human consumption.
All right, Butter Bar check-in time.
Can you tell the difference between the way grass-fed butter looks and feels and tastes?
I feel like this is a good combination of both.
It's a little sweet, but a little salty, and I think I could definitely use this on my morning toast.
The final word on grass-fed butter?
Yeah, I love the fact that it's got the omega-3 fatty acids in it.
I think that would be my favorite choice.
Can you taste the omega-3s?
Not really, but it's really good butter.
Yes, thanks for being here.
Up next, should we be eating margarine again?
Again, surprising news about the butter substitute we all swore off.
John and Kate Plus 8s.
John Gosselin, the 10-year gag order finally lifted.
You believe Kate is an unfit mother.
Now, he's ready to reveal all.
She has a narcissistic personality disorder.
I have PTSD. There's a lot of stuff that happens, abuse-wise, mental and physical.
They offer me seven figures to stay married.
I can't be bought.
Plus, he turned in the Unabomber, who happened to be his brother.
That's coming up Monday on Dr. Oz.
Margin received bad press for being made with artificial ingredients and artery-clogging But it had been trying to make a comeback in recent years.
Trans fats were sometimes spotted with margarine, but in June 2018, the FDA made it illegal to add trans fats to products.
So did margarine get its reputation back?
Not quite yet.
To ensure an orderly transition in the marketplace, the FDA extended the compliance date for some products to January 1, 2020. In the meantime, here's how you can tell if your margarine or butter alternative is trans-fat-free.
Check the label.
Even if it says zero trans fat, it can legally still contain up to half a gram of trans fats.
So look for the words partially hydrogenated on the ingredient list.
Also know that corn, soybean, and vegetable oil all mean that there may be trans fats in the product.
After the trans fat ban, margarine found itself on the brink of obscurity.
But is margarine making a comeback?
Recent headlines report it's not only making a comeback, but it's coming back as a health food.
That's right, margarine's getting a whole new name, vegan butter.
Oz Team Investigator Tia Brown is back.
Help me with this.
What exactly is margarine, and is that different from butter?
Absolutely.
So there's one big difference between margarine and butter.
Butter has 80% fat, but it's milk fat, right?
So the USDA regulation says that butter has to have at least 80% milk fat.
For margarine, it's 80% vegetable oil fat.
And that's the biggest difference between butter and margarine.
But they both are 80% fat.
Both 80% fat, yes.
So if margin is made mostly from vegetable fat, then how do they get a bad reputation?
I would think vegetable fats aren't any worse than animal fats.
It's trans fat, right?
That's the magic word.
In order to make the consistency of vegetable oil something that we could use easily because it's not solid when it's room temperature, food scientists had to process it and change the chemical makeup.
And that's what the process called hydrination.
And what happens in hydrination?
Trans fat.
So the good news is that most brands no longer use trans fat and actually it will be illegal by the end of the year.
So no products will have trans fat in them starting next year.
So if that's the case, are all margarines, the ones that are legal and remaining, all equal?
Or are there subtle differences?
Yes, they're all equal because what?
Of the USDA regulation, 80%, at least 80% vegetable oil.
But everything that we think is margarine is not margarine.
And why is that?
We go down the aisles and you'll see buttery spreads, you'll see sprays, and people just assume it's all the same.
Those other categories are not regulated.
So it can't be a spread.
Even if it's a buttery spread.
No.
Margarine-like spread, buttery spread, no.
We don't know what it's in.
So butter, margarine, or spread.
Make it three big categories in your mind.
All right, margarine, just to pay off this big promise you make, is it really getting rebranded to vegan butter?
Is that a possibility?
Yes.
Butter is made from animals.
So it is vegan butter.
And you know, guess what?
Vegan butter's kind of a sexier name than margarine.
You guys think that's the case?
Thanks, Tia.
So, what goes into a name?
We decided to put this margarine rebrand to the test to see how people reacted to it.
So, we used you all as the guinea pigs.
The audience, before the show, was given a taste of bread with either margarine or vegan butter.
Margarine or vegan butter, and you didn't know what you were getting.
You didn't know what you were being offered.
But guess what?
It was the exact same thing!
Take a look at their reactions.
I like the vegan butter better.
It tastes healthier.
I like the margarine better.
I like the texture and the taste.
Now, what do you think?
First of all, I apologize for tricking you, but you had vegan butter and you had margarine, which again are the exact same thing.
Was there really a difference in your mind now as you think about it?
No.
Too close.
No.
Even more importantly, why did you like the vegan butter?
It was very tasty.
It was.
It sounded good, didn't it?
It did.
And I'm surprised.
This is the thing.
I love that when we can sort of roll back some of our belief systems, I think vegan butter's got a future.
Especially if you make it without trans fats.
And the fact that one of you went one way, one the other way, there's no difference.
It is the same product.
Enjoy both.
Thank you.
For a complete guide to butter and butter alternatives, visit my website.
I'll be right back.
Up next, the truth about fast food mac and cheese.
We go on a fast food mission to find out who has the healthiest and best tasting ones out there.
I'll admit it.
This show and my staff are obsessed with mac and cheese.
I mean, who doesn't love noodles smothered in cheese?
Who wants some?
I thought so.
I'm just kidding.
Not yet anyway.
We've investigated the cheese in the box kinds and today we're fact food checking the fast food mac and cheese.
Just a few weeks ago the internet exploded when people found out how some fast food mac and cheese is being prepared.
They went behind the scenes.
This is from a TikTok video.
People lost it.
When they realize what they're eating could be coming from a freezer bag.
So today, we're investigating the truth about fast food mac and cheese to find out which is the healthiest and tastes the best.
I sent my go-to tester and author to take us on a tour of some of your favorite fast food mac and cheese go-tos.
Take a look.
I'm the queen of mac and cheese, so when I heard fast food was stepping up their mac game to make my favorite home-cooked comfort food ready for pickup in minutes, oh, I had to see it for myself.
All right, guys, we're here at Pie Pie's.
We're trying to see if their mac and cheese is on point.
Do you have mac and cheese?
It smells like home-cooked.
It looks like it's creamy.
Yes, I just want an order of your mac and cheese.
Thank you, enjoy it.
Okay, it has the color that I'm looking for.
They use a different noodle.
Small mac and cheese.
Thank you.
All right, so one thing about Panera is that they sell their mac and cheese as a meal.
So far, they're the only one that uses white cheese.
Now, I wonder if the mac and cheese is also finger lickin' good.
You know, KFC has mac and cheese as a meal and a side.
I need a good meltiness on top, and KFC achieved that.
No crust, but it smells good.
It looks nice and creamy.
Now, when I get a sandwich, I don't usually get mac and cheese as a side.
Don't worry.
I got this.
Oh, now wait a minute.
This looks like the mix of cheese that might go into a home-cooked baked mac and cheese.
Subway just might have something on grandma's mac and cheese, and I can't believe it.
Now we're at Chick-fil-A. Now theirs is a newer menu item, and I heard that they bake it daily with multiple cheeses.
It's nice and thick.
It's nice and creamy.
It has a crust on top.
Mmm.
This might be grandma.
And I can get it at the driver.
Oh, I wish you could smell this cheesy goodness right now.
I'm bringing it back to you, Dr. Oz.
So, well done.
Renatha is here along with Chef Richard Blase.
Now, Renatha, you say you got really interested in the fast food mac and cheese after seeing that TikTok video.
Yeah, I mean, she literally pulled it from a freezer, put it in boiling water, and then cut it open and poured it onto a plate.
Now, I don't know about you, but that's not my mama's mac and cheese, okay?
No.
All right?
I mean, what's going on, Dr. Oz?
Well, Chef, you're gonna help us with these, but first off, your first impression after seeing that video?
Yeah, my first impression was, what's TikTok?
Behind that, it was, I'm not surprised at all.
It's fast food, it's not slow food.
Yeah, all right, come on over.
Let's deconstruct some of your favorite fast food mac and cheese options.
Where's the truth here?
We're gonna discover that, because listen, let's start at home.
There's two basic ways to make mac and cheese at home.
You make it from the box, or you make it from scratch.
Renatha, which one do you prefer?
Now, you know, okay, Dr. Oz, okay, you know I make it from scratch, okay?
I mean, usually what I put in my mac and cheese is macaroni, cheese, milk, butter, flour, okay, to make my roux, and you know what else I put in it?
A little love.
A little love, and come on, you know what it is, Dr. Oz, a foot.
A foot.
Come on, Dr. Oz!
I knew it was coming, the foot's coming there.
Very good.
That's true, so it's five ingredients.
Five ingredients.
Little love, but it takes a little longer.
Yeah.
Takes a little longer.
No longer.
All right, chef, if you make it from scratch, does it make sense to you about five ingredients, right?
But when you make it in a fast food setup, it's gonna be more difficult.
Yeah, so five ingredients with the homemade from scratch version, and then our research showed us that the typical fast food recipe has about 20 to 22 ingredients in the recipe.
22!
That's right, yeah.
So lots of ingredients, mainly because they have to be shelf stable.
They need to be thickened and emulsified.
So things that make it easy to execute when you have thousands of restaurants all around the world.
But out of curiosity, how does that compare to the boxed versions that we talked about recently?
Yeah, really interesting because the fast food version has, again, 20, 22 ingredients and your average boxed recipe has about half of that.
So walk me through the specifics of the fast food.
Actually, the macaroni, that's obvious.
What's everything else here?
Yeah, kind of fascinating to me.
Again, 22 ingredients.
You have, of course, things that are gonna give it that ooey and gooeyness, which is just a great thing to say.
What does that, ooey and gooey?
Right, so these are going to be some of my favorite ingredients to say.
Xanthan gum and guar gum, right?
They're in a lot of processed foods.
They're in salad dressings.
They're in ice creams.
And that's what's going to give it that sort of creamy texture.
And then you have, of course, cheese, which is amazing.
You need the cheese.
They have real cheese in it.
With real cheese, what I am amazed about is that you have different varieties of cheese that's in the fast food versions.
And then, you know, you have these spices, which aren't really giving a lot of flavor, but they are adding lots of color.
I'm excited about that.
Glad it's not food coloring.
Exactly, now it used to be food coloring, so a lot of fast food places now are doing this in a more natural way.
They have turmeric, annatto seed, and paprika to sort of color the mac and cheese.
And just to underline this, guys, the industry's changing.
They're hearing you.
You know, they could make it with the food coloring.
It's probably cheaper, right?
But they decide they want to do the right thing.
God bless you all for doing that.
Tell us more about the noodles in the fast food.
How do they keep those noodles al dente so they taste right to your mouth?
Exactly.
So, to keep them al dente, what they're doing is par-cooking them, and like you saw in the video, maybe packaging them and shipping them frozen so that the worker in the fast food restaurant can just heat it up and serve it to you.
Renatha, we actually called, rolled our sleeves up, a medical unit called a bunch of places.
They all, all made the macaroni and cheese like that if it was a fast food joint.
Wow.
So it's the norm.
It's not bad, by the way.
It's good to know that it's the truth.
It's the transparency I want.
I'm thankful there's no sawdust in here.
Yes, there's no sawdust.
That's right.
All right, up next, we're having a fast food mac and cheese throwdown.
Which tastes the best?
What's the healthiest pick when it comes to calories and sodium?
if you're gonna wanna stick around. - He was a child predator who moved into my neighborhood.
Any kind of abuse that you can think of, he did to me.
I figured I would escape with my life or with my death.
That's coming up on Tuesday.
Wednesday.
Renata is so happy she got the best assignment of her life.
She went out looking at fast food mac and cheese.
And we're back with the truth about what she found.
Which fast food mac and cheese has the least calories, which has the least sodium?
And the big question, of course, is which do you think tastes the best?
So our go-to taster Renata was asked, She was actually tasked with the mission to bring us the best fast food mac and cheese contenders to taste, and I've got two world-class expert tasters trying them out, Chef Richard Blaise and the biggest mac and cheese critic around, 12-year-old food critic Luca, whose reviews have gone viral.
And while they taste, let's break down what we found when it comes to nutrition.
Renata, talk about portion sizes.
When you bought the fast food mac and cheese, what came out?
So it's important to know that when we went to each restaurant, they all differ in how they refer to their portion sizes.
So I wanted to break this down.
I wanted to find out when it comes to calories and sodium, what's the best?
So the only way to do that is to turn it down a little bit and make it a serving size, which we're going to say is four ounces, okay?
First off, if you go and have four ounces of mac and cheese, what's the best value in terms of keeping your calories down low?
Which of the two competitors did best for this?
So the two that we are looking at here are KFC, okay?
And they're the lowest at, go ahead and let the people know, 133 calories, okay?
That's low, actually.
Surprising!
Super surprising, because you know, I can eat about two of these.
We all could.
You know I can eat about two of these.
So that's good.
I know that my calories are only 133 calories right here.
But the high one here is paneer bread at 235 calories, okay?
And that's still not bad.
That's still not bad when you're thinking about calories throughout the day.
Yeah, I'm actually impressed that that little number, that would work.
Okay, now, how about sodium, because sometimes folks add salt to make it taste good.
Who won the salt contest?
All right, so, drum roll please, it's Popeyes for the win at 356 milligrams of sodium.
Which is good, actually.
It's amazing, yes.
All right, so here's the thing.
The competitors were 420 to 750, so it makes a difference.
You either get, you know, the lower guys or you support the high guys.
You just pick the ones that make the most sense for your body.
And that way you can pick and choose the ones that do the best for everybody around you as well.
All right, let's see what our experts think when it comes to tastes.
So, Luca, you're a very serious food critic.
I see you're already here.
What do you look for in a mac and cheese?
You know, I look for buttery, creamy, and gooeyness.
You see?
Boom!
Knock you right out.
Whoa!
Then wake you right back up when you eat it.
Do you like to cook mac and cheese?
Yeah.
You're good at it.
All right.
Which fast food mac and cheese won you over?
Listen, it was a no-doubt for me.
This one knocked me right out of my seats.
Who was that?
Oh.
Oh!
Panero breast.
Does that surprise you?
It was blinded to you.
Okay.
Luka knew, right from jump, you knew.
Luka loves the ooey gooey.
I love ooey gooey, stretchy, and chewy.
I'm a texture guy.
So for me, my favorite was this one right here.
Chick-fil-A. Okay.
Chick-fil-A, oh my goodness.
Kanye's right.
Kanye's right.
Yes.
All right, I tell you, here's the reality.
There's something for everybody, because we didn't even get to all the companies that make these things.
Pick one that works for you, and you'll be happy.
Not an everyday treat, but worth it once in a while.
Go back to school.
We'll put the nutrition guide to fast food mac and cheese online.
We'll be right back.
Up next, the great Kathie Lee Giffords here opening up about new beginnings and what she's learning about love.
Can we toast to that?
Can we toast to that?
Yeah.
Big, dark, and handsome.
Thanks.
I've been missing my next guest ever since she left today's show after 11 years.
Today, Kathie Lee Gifford is here opening up about her new beginnings and how her faith is helping her embrace one of the biggest changes of her life.
Please welcome my good friend, Kathy Lee Gifford.
Hi, everybody.
They do love having you here.
Oh, yeah.
Great to see you.
Am I here or here?
I'm here right now.
Anywhere you are, you're welcome.
How are you all today?
Good.
Oh, how do I do it day after day?
I used to say that all the time.
We do it in unison, of course.
Actually, how has your life changed since you stopped anchoring the morning show?
Oh, in all the good ways it has.
I had been planning to leave the show two years earlier, and there was so much going on at NBC, and they just kept asking me, Kathy, will you stay just another six months or another year?
And because I went there...
Thinking I would stay one year.
Eleven years later, yeah.
I thought I'd stay one year with Regis, too, and that was 15. I fall in love.
And I don't do light love.
No, I don't.
I don't.
And so I left a job that was no longer challenging for me, but I never leave the people.
So it was so great to see everybody this week.
And it's not you, no.
It's not just the people that you work with on camera.
It's the crew.
It's everybody there.
The security guards are just a great group of people.
How has your faith helped you?
And I adore your faith.
It's one of the reasons I love having you.
I know.
You've always been very respectful.
In fact, that's just respectful.
I honor the fact that you're able to put it front and center.
You've made your decisions in life.
It's been your lodestar, taking it in the right direction.
It's my everything, because I can't do anything without him.
So how has it helped you make this massive change to reinvent yourself?
So many of us, I put myself in that category, we're fearful of change, right?
Yeah.
Because you fear you'll fail, you don't know the unknown.
Fear can paralyze you, of course.
And it's not, I mean, I battle fear as well, but I just know where to take it.
You know, perfect love casts out all fear, the scripture says.
And I know He loves me perfectly.
Therefore, when I really think about that, I think then there's nothing to be afraid of.
You know, there's a peace that passes all understanding when you walk with God.
I mean, when I held my dead husband in my arms that morning, I had the peace that passes all understanding.
If you can have that kind of peace at a moment like that.
You know, and there's tons of joy in my life.
You know, people are saying you reinvented yourself.
First of all, they say, why did you retire?
And I said, no, I'm refiring, not retiring.
Refiring.
Oh, that's good.
What I'm doing, and this is why I'm so excited, I'm doing now what I was born to do originally.
My dearest and fondest and most exciting dreams when I was a little girl were to be an actress and a singer.
I didn't know I'd end up being a writer, but that has been a great blessing, discovering that along the way.
But yeah, all I wanted to be was Hayley Mills in Disney movies.
And then I wanted to sing like Barbra Streisand, still waiting for that.
One of the things you did that struck me the most, and it's a unique move, is you moved from the big city.
Yes.
Down to Nashville, Tennessee, a city that I adore.
Yes.
But it's, you know, you write your next chapter there.
Why there?
Why now?
Well, first of all, Nashville's not a new experience for me.
I did my first sitcom in Nashville, Hee Haw Honeys, back in 1978. Oh my goodness.
And I made friends with Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers and the Gatlin brothers and Barbara Mandrell and a whole bunch of people that are still my friends.
And I loved the town then and I loved the country music and I loved, I was very much at home there.
And I realized it's the culture there is so different from so many places in our world today.
It's a culture of kindness, not a culture of chaos.
You're surrounded by like-minded people.
They love their country music, and they love all kinds of music, and they love my wine, Dr. Rosso.
What's not to love?
Exactly.
What have you learned about Kathie Lee living in Nashville?
Um, I've learned that to be patient, eventually all good things will come to you.
I've had many troubles, many, many ups and downs.
A lot of them were public, unfortunately, but I think that also was a testimony to the world of a very personal and loving God who always picked me up, you know, always picked me up and kept me gone.
And so I'm just, I'm a grateful, look, what does this say?
Grateful.
Grateful.
What a beautiful rest.
Yes, my friend Jill Martin gave that to me yesterday.
It's a beautiful Jennifer Miller break.
So I just remind myself, grateful.
You know, if you wake up every morning and you have a pulse, you have a purpose.
God's not done with you yet.
I've heard you say my joy is non-negotiable.
My joy is non-negotiable.
I will negotiate.
If you wanted me to come and host this show with you, which I can't believe you haven't asked me, but I would say, Dr. Oz, you know me very, very well.
I will negotiate how much you're going to pay me.
Yeah.
I will negotiate the hours that I will work for you.
You know that I will work very, very hard.
But if you're asking me to not be with my children on Thanksgiving, I'm sorry, my joy is non-negotiable.
You see what I mean?
You kind of keep your perspective and your priorities.
And the only way I can do that is on my knees.
Every morning.
I have to give it to God every single morning.
And just say, Lord, help me.
Help me do it right today.
So if I don't make your work on Thanksgiving and Christmas, will you come host a show with me?
Yes, I would be delighted.
I knew it would work.
We're up next.
Love is in the air for Kathy Lee.
It is?
On television.
Somebody better tell me.
What's his name?
And maybe even in real life.
- All right, stay with us. - I hope he doesn't.
Good morning.
Oh, there you are.
What a day you had, huh?
Flat tire, missed the rehearsal dinner.
It was fine.
Actually, it was fun.
Really?
It's not like that, I told you.
Well, you wouldn't even have met if I hadn't bailed out on that gala.
And then this man just happens to walk into the wrong party.
And then the two of you just happen to figure out that you're going to the exact same place right here.
Which means they could have met here.
It's not like that.
The both of you.
Well, we look forward to meeting this young man very soon.
Do you have to?
Yes!
We're back with Kathleen Gifford, who's opening up about the new beginnings she's embarked on since leaving the Today Show.
We just saw a clip from one of her latest projects.
It's a new Hallmark movie.
It's called A Godwink Christmas.
Meant for love.
Meant for love.
Which is all about divinely inspired events.
Tell us more.
What is a divinely inspired event in your mind?
Well, these are movies we're making now based on my friend Squire Russianel's books called The God Wink Books.
And if you believe in Sovereign God, which I do, I know you do, and certainly Squire does, there is no such thing as a coincidence in your life.
In fact, there's no word for coincidence in the Hebrew language.
Because there is no such thing as luck or coincidence.
Oh my goodness.
If God is sovereign God and He loves us, He sees everything, He knows what's going on, and He loves us and cares about us.
So when something seems like a coincidence, next time it happens, just realize that that's where the divine and the human intersect.
He's winking at you and going, I got you.
See?
See?
You're right where you're supposed to be right now.
And these are real true stories.
Thank you.
They're true stories.
Tell me about a God wink in your life.
A perfect example.
I started to work at Good Morning America years ago, but I was also doing commercials for them then.
And it was 4 o'clock in the morning, I'm walking down a hall, going to do an Alpo commercial with a smelly basset hound.
Alpo?
Not too thrilled to be there.
And I look over and over a sink, I see the greatest set of buns I've ever seen in my life putting in contact lenses.
And I go, have I got an operation for you?
Because I just had radial keratotomy on my eyes and had 20-20 vision.
That was a precursor to LASIK. And the voice emanates from the sink that says, yeah, with a fool on either end.
That voice belonged to Frank Gifford.
That's how we met.
Oh my goodness.
That was a god wink.
Thank you.
Walking to make a dog food commercial.
Yes, I don't know what happened to that dog.
There he is.
That was, oh, sweetheart.
He was such a beautiful man.
Beautiful man.
He'd be happy now.
My son is engaged to get married, and my daughter's madly in love, and it's all good.
It's all good.
I should talk about him, but I have a picture of Cody.
Look at him.
He's so handsome.
They're both working for Hallmark, so it's a family deal now.
Cody graduated from Oxford and got his master's degree in screenwriting, so he's on the other side of the camera.
Cassidy's doing a series with Roma Downey right now.
They're in their third season of something called The Baxters.
It's going to start airing pretty soon.
Yeah, he's got a lot of your husband in him.
Yeah, yeah, he does.
What's it like being a mother-in-law?
Do you think it's going to take well to that?
Well, first of all, his fiancée is darling.
They've been together six and a half years.
And there they are.
Her name is Erica Brown.
And her mother is beautiful.
Her mother, Michelle.
I haven't met her father yet, but I'm about to.
They're going to get married at my house.
So it's going to be great fun.
And Cass, I got a feeling, is going to be right around the corner.
So it's going to be...
It's a joyful time.
You know, I mean, I'm spending my time in a place I love now, doing what I've been waiting to do my whole life.
I directed for the first time the movie that I did, God Who Sees.
Yes, yes.
It's important to you to do movies around faith, isn't it?
Well, the one I wrote for Craig Ferguson and myself is not a faith movie, but I wanted to write a movie about people who don't know that God loves them yet.
Yeah.
They don't know it.
But they're good people.
They're doing the best they can.
They'd do better if they would just hold on to his hand.
But look at that scene.
That is Nicole C. Mullen.
Oh, my goodness.
And she is one of the most...
And Israel, if you've never been, I'll put it on your bucket list.
It's the most extraordinarily beautiful place I've ever been.
Speaking of beauty and love, you've spoken about Frank as being the love of your life.
So far.
So far?
Yeah.
He did a kick out of that.
Are you hopeful that you'll have other loves?
Of course.
Well, I don't want a whole bunch of them.
TikTok.
I don't have time.
A few dates, maybe.
That would be fun.
But, no, of course I'm hopeful for that.
I mean, I have this extraordinary life I'd love to share with somebody.
But I'm not going to...
I don't need company as much as I would love somebody to share my faith.
I mean, my life is exciting.
And I'm a load for any man.
And I am.
I am.
I know that.
I mean, they get...
One guy I dated said, she's like a...
Somebody asked him, what's it like to go out with Kathie Lee Gifford?
And I think he said, she's a bucking bronco.
That's a good apt description.
I'm going to take that as a compliment.
But you did go on a date recently, and we heard all about it.
Yeah, I went on a few dates with a very sweet guy, but we weren't right for each other.
So, you know, I had a lot of fun, did a lot of dancing.
You dance everywhere in Nashville.
My life before, nobody in Greenwich, Connecticut goes to honky-tonks and dances.
No.
They don't do it.
They're behind their gates, you know, looking at their hedge fund money.
And God bless them.
I wish I had some hedge fund money.
If I could find a hedge fund guy and his money, And he loves Jesus and he has his own teeth?
I'm in.
You know?
This is why we all miss you.
And there are a lot of people who wanted to send you messages, but one person in particular insisted.
Take a look at this.
How is it possible that I saw you every single day for eleven years?
Eleven.
And now I'm talking to you on camera this way.
Kath, I miss you to the moon and back.
And just to show you how much I miss you, I left you a little something secret in your dressing room.
She's you.
She does adore you.
That's hard.
That's the hardest part, is that I don't get my Regis Dose and my Hoda Dose anymore.
But if I ever needed her, she would get on the first plane and be here as fast as her sweet, beautiful Egyptian butt could get here.
She would.
And that's all of my friends.
My friends are like that.
So she actually did leave you a little present.
How tall is he?
Come on over here.
It is tall, but it's not a he.
You need a whole team, a whole village to transport this baby.
Oh my...
Stop.
Oh my goodness.
I thought you might appreciate that.
Thanks, guys.
That's gonna go on my bar in Nashville.
Wow.
So, she left one for me also.
This is mine.
Okay, good.
There's yours.
Is this gift?
Is this my wine?
It's yours.
It's yours.
Better be my wine.
It's yours.
Hoda, I love you, and I love everybody over there.
Thank you.
Dr. Oz, I love you.
So, before I let you go, let's toast to what's left on your bucket list.
What's the number one thing you want to check off?
Grandchildren.
I was hoping you'd say that.
It's the best feeling.
I'm getting Cody on the phone right now.
Are you going to spoil them?
I won't spoil them with stuff, Dr. Ross.
I will not spoil them with stuff.
Stuff does not make you happy.
You spend the rest of your life trying to get rid of the stuff you've got.
The best gift I can give my grandchildren is the gift that I gave my child.
Know God.
Know Him personally.
Walk with Him.
Be His friend and be...
You know, that's the best thing you can do.
I love you.
I love you, too.
Kathy, give her a toast to all your accomplishments.
All you're doing.
As she drinks, check out her movie, A God Who Ate Christmas, Meant for Love.
It's airing Sunday, November the 17th, on Hallmark Movies and Mysteries.
We'll be drinking.
Stay with us.
Cheers!
Today, science weighs in at an age-old debate.
Who multi-tasks better, men or women?
What do you guys think?
Who's better at checking the...
All the women say women, and they're mostly women in the audience, so they win.
But, but, the true answer may surprise you.
I want to go in the audience here, because I've got two victims who have nominated.
Gamal, how are you?
I don't know.
And Cindy?
Yes.
All right, so, married couple, right?
And Gamal says he's better at multitasking.
Is that true?
Absolutely.
And Cindy, is that not true?
Come on.
We're better.
Women are better.
All right, so, I've heard these kinds of complaints all the time, but I've got an idea.
We have a test today to actually, once in all, solve the problem.
Okay.
All right, and decide who's better at multitasking.
Are you into this?
Yes.
Absolutely.
Audience, you excited?
Yes.
Come on, come on.
So, to put the skills to the test, we've designed the ultimate, ultimate task.
I want you to actually take your phones, pick up your phones.
I've set them up already.
And we're going to mirror your phone, so we'll see how you're doing.
And you're going to, while you are packing groceries into these bags, you have 30 seconds to do this, you're going to text, row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream of the song.
You ready to go?
You're doing it together, though.
30 seconds or less.
Let's see who's right.
Ready, set, go!
Here we go.
Cindy's got that.
Cindy's got to do both.
You're multitasking.
Gamal's doing nothing right over there.
Gamal, you are texting, not packing.
This is what women complain about.
The men are not listening.
Cindy's cruising through the packing part.
Only a few seconds left.
Ten seconds left.
Oh, my goodness!
Cindy may actually pull this off.
Are you done already?
Uh-oh.
Uh-oh.
Let me just say here.
I do terrible.
Row, row, bow your boat.
So you didn't quite do it right.
And row, row, row, row, row.
Alright, so here's the thing.
The fact that matters, although you threw these all in the back, you didn't do it right on the screen.
And Gamal, interesting, you didn't need it right either.
And you know, here's the thing.
Here's what science says.
The reality is, even though we all think we're great multitaskers, 2% of us, 2%, 1 in 50 people can actually do two things at once without compromising performance.
So interesting.
So it turns out both men and women are equally bad, equally poor at multitasking.
That was tough.
Does that surprise you?
I still might be slightly better.
Yeah, you were better.
I gotta say, you're better than Gamal, but not good enough.
We all fall into the trap of multitasking, but when you try to do two things at once, your brain just can't handle it.
So focus on one thing at a time to get that thing done correctly, to avoid making mistakes.
We do this in medicine, by the way.
When we try to do two things at once, people get hurt.
We don't let people do it on purpose.
Remember the power of change that lies in the power of you.
Just one person with one voice speaking the truth.
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