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April 7, 2025 - Dr. Oz Podcast
42:42
Are Your Allergies Even Real? Dr. Oz Investigates the Truth | Dr. Oz | S10 | Ep 114 | Full Episode
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We are a nation riddled with allergies.
But what if you outgrew them and didn't know it?
People are walking around thinking they have this allergy and they no longer have it.
We're doing a big allergy experiment.
Are you all allergic or none of you allergic?
And the results even surprised Dr. Oz.
Oh my goodness!
Plus, it's the Dish on Oz.
This week, we decode your chicken labels.
Could you be buying chicken all wrong?
Coming up next.
Y'all ready for season 10?
Yeah! I love you, duck-a-dye.
I love you, duck-a-dye.
Today, a news alert that will make you rethink your health.
Are you really allergic to the foods and medications that you've always feared?
Studying new estimates say that 28 million of us who thought we were allergic to penicillin might not be.
It makes you wonder about the other things you've been staying away from our whole lives.
So what's the deal?
Are some allergies overblown?
And how can you tell if you are really allergic to something?
So you've got a big allergy experiment that may change everything.
I'm actually going to find out about my own allergy, which is to wasps.
Is that something I still need to watch out for?
So let's get right to the experiment.
Who in the audience...know someone they think has a penicillin allergy.
Hands up.
Most of the audience, right?
You frequently hear that people are allergic to this antibiotic, penicillin, right?
It's one of the safest and most effective tools for treating and preventing infections, especially during surgery.
So, before the show, we asked three volunteers who all think they have a penicillin allergy to join us up here on stage.
And we tested them backstage to see if they've got allergy to penicillin.
Something they believe they've had their entire life.
Is it true?
Do they really have it?
So Ashley, what kinds of precautions have you been taking since you were told you had a penicillin allergy?
So my mom told me that I had a penicillin allergy when I was very young, and she always made a big deal every single time I went to the doctor or had any type of medication prescribed.
So I knew that it was a bad allergy, so for that reason I was...
It's over the top about it.
I told every single doctor.
All my friends even knew about it.
Every time I went somewhere, it's like, hey guys, just so you know, I have a penicillin allergy just in case anything happens.
And that's really how I dealt with it.
Well, if you have an allergy, you need to do those things.
Yeah, absolutely.
Amina, what would happen if you took penicillin?
If I gave one of these pills to you right now, what would happen?
So when I was four, I got my first reaction to penicillin.
There was a rash all over my face and it was on my body and everything.
And basically, if I took it again, I would get another rash like that or even worse, basically.
Yeah, who wants that?
And the worst part is the part that's concerning.
And Roberta, how has the allergy disrupted your life?
It's changed my life in the fact that when I go to the emergency room or if I'm afraid of changing doctors, you always want to tell them, I'm allergic, I'm allergic.
Concerned with my children, because supposedly it was passed down.
My two children, two out of three, are allergic as well.
The whole family has the problem now.
I don't know.
Or do you?
So you got tested backstage.
I do not know the answers yet, but we're going to find out.
Are you ready to find out for yourselves if you really have a penicillin allergy?
Yes. You'd all be better off knowing the truth here.
Yes. All right, let's bring in allergist Dr. Tanya Elliott.
She has the results.
There she is.
So let's go through this, if I don't mind.
Actually, if you don't mind, take a step forward.
Actually, Amina, you should take a step forward too.
And let me just see here.
Roberta, you take a step forward also.
So here's the question.
Are you all allergic or are none of you allergic?
Dr. Elliot, the results?
All three of you are no longer allergic to penicillin.
Oh, my God.
That's amazing.
How's that going to change your life?
I don't know, because I still think that I might tell the doctor, I may have a penicillin allergy.
I don't know.
It's something that's ingrained in you.
I grew up thinking I had an allergy.
And there's no harm telling a doctor that you're allergic to penicillin, even if you're not, right?
Yeah. Well, I don't know.
You don't know.
Good. Pay attention here, Dr. Ellie.
Come on over here.
Celebrate your answers, your results here.
It is a big, big problem to tell people you have an allergy when you don't.
Because especially in medicine, we do things we shouldn't do then.
We use medications that aren't in your best interest.
We've got to take risks because you can't use the things you want to do.
So help analyze this for us.
This study that we just did is our show version of something that the entire medical community has now been alarmed by.
And there's research now about what's really going on with all the people who thought they were allergic to penicillin.
Yeah, there was a study that recently showed out that showed that 19 out of 20 people who think that they're allergic to penicillin 95% of people are not.
Yeah, and that's significant.
So we have two major reasons why that happens.
One has to do with the way that we classify an allergy.
So someone may say, oh, I had a headache, I had stomach discomfort.
Those are the common side effects of most antibiotics, but people will write down that they have an allergy, and then the doctor says, okay, penicillin allergy, moving on.
That happens.
The other piece of it is the science of it, and that's what we proved with this test.
80% of people...
will grow out of their allergy within 10 years.
So the allergy just goes away.
It can fade over time.
Explain how this happens.
I thought once you had an allergy, you'd have to be in a different body not to have it anymore.
Well, our body develops memory to the things that we're allergic to in the form of antibodies.
So if you're not exposed to something regularly, the memories fade, right?
We know that memories fade, and so that's what happens.
The antibody levels go down over time, and eventually they can just fade away.
So by not being exposed to it for a long time, for being a good patient, not taking the penicillin that you shouldn't have taken, you actually outgrow the problem.
How can misdiagnosing yourself as having an allergy to penicillin affect the care you get from a doctor?
So you said it before, penicillin is one of the safest and most effective antibiotics out there.
And so studies that have been shown that people that go through surgery, we often give penicillin intraoperatively to prevent infection.
And the folks that say they're allergic to penicillin have worse outcomes because they receive an alternative that isn't as good as treating that infection.
All right.
So what should you do if you want to get retested to see if you actually are allergic to penicillin?
So this is where I ask patients to do their homework.
They need to write down what exactly happened, stepwise, what exactly happened, even if they have to ask their mom or dad what happened during the reaction, how long ago it happened.
And then the other thing I say is talk to your pharmacist and find out what prescriptions you've received in the last five or so years.
You may be surprised.
You may have received a relative of penicillin.
So here's the thing.
These are pretty surprising numbers.
95% of us who I think are penicillin allergic aren't.
So maybe begin to think about my own allergy to wasps.
Because I've never gone anywhere in my life without an EpiPen.
My wife carries two to be careful.
And I love bees.
I have bees, right?
Keep them at home.
But wasps, they were always a problem.
So up next, have my own fears of an allergy been overblown?
We're going to find out the results of my allergy test.
Now you just did it.
And we're going to investigate whether you can outgrow or develop sudden allergies as an adult.
So stick around.
All new Oz.
If something happens to me, our assets are documented.
Susan Powell, missing for 10 years.
All these new secrets surfacing up.
Now, bizarre, never before heard audio.
This is going to stun you.
From her husband and her father-in-law.
You hear that desperation in his voice in those recordings.
Plus, an alleged killer cop speaks out about his time in jail with Drew Peterson.
That's coming up tomorrow.
Thank you.
We're back investigating the breaking news on food and medication allergies.
Are you really allergic to things that you've always feared?
Now, before the show, Dr. Tanya Elliott did an allergy experiment on me.
And I'm about to find out.
If I'm really allergic to wasps, I've been told all my life to stay away from these little suckers.
There I am getting a little prick first, and you inject it under my skin.
I have not looked at my arm yet.
So please, together, let's diagnose whether I've got a problem.
So this is, that's wasp, yellow jacket's that, and hornet.
That's a yellow hornet, exactly.
Dr. Oz, you are no longer allergic to wasps.
You're kidding!
I'm good to go!
Good to go.
I don't have to carry EpiPens around with me anymore.
You don't.
You know how much money that will save?
Forget about anything else.
I mean, that's ridiculous.
I have to do those little things every time.
And that's because I didn't get a raised response.
So it's a pretty easy test.
That's right.
If you had a big raised welt...
And a reaction and redness, then we would have called that a positive test, and we would have said you still have an allergy.
But this is a negative test.
You see the prick from the needles we stuck you with, but other than that, this is a negative test.
So how common is this that someone my age would no longer be allergic to an insect that I was told...
I remember when I was four years old, I was stung by, I think it was a wasp or a yellow jacket, and I told my dad, who's a doctor, That the whole world had turned gray.
I said, Dad, someone took the color out of the world.
It was the summertime.
The trees were green.
They no longer were green.
They had turned gray.
I remember the cars jerking forwards.
They hit the accelerator because they knew I was dying.
Because when the blood pressure drops so low, you don't see color anymore.
You're about to expire.
That's the fear I've had in my heart all these years.
This is a pretty simple way to figure out that was all unnecessary.
Right. The negative test is 99% accurate at saying you are no longer at risk for an anaphylactic reaction to a wasp.
And how common is it that people like me can actually outgrow our allergies?
Yeah, about 50% of the time if you've had an anaphylactic reaction, you can grow out of it.
50%?
50% of people.
So people are walking around thinking they have this allergy, and, you know, 50-50 chance they no longer have it.
And what about all these food allergies?
Every single person I know has got something going on.
Penicillin, 95% of the time goes away.
Things like wasps and bees, 50%.
What about peanuts and tree nuts?
Right, so we know that peanut affects about 2% of the population, right?
Peanut allergies.
Peanut allergy, in general, 2% of the population.
However, 20% of those people will grow out of their peanut allergy.
My goodness, 105 people.
So for tree nuts, about 10% of people will grow out of allergy.
And then we also have milk and egg here.
So these are the two most common allergens in children.
By the age of five, 80% of kids will have grown out of their milk and their egg allergy.
What percent?
80. We're a nation walking around petrified of allergy.
Are you guys all stunned by these numbers?
I mean, literally, I get on a plane, I can't eat nuts, I can't drink milk, I've got an egg issue, and it turns out that most of the people either were misdiagnosed or have already outgrown the problem.
That's right.
And what about the converse?
I know that people actually develop shellfish allergies as an adult.
They didn't have it as a kid.
What's that about?
Right, and so we talked about this once before where there are a couple of risk factors for the development of shellfish allergy.
One is the use of alcohol chronically.
The other is the use of antacids, and it has to do with the way that those things, Change the pH of our stomach and impact the way that we break down shellfish in particular.
So suddenly now the shellfish is being broken down differently and seems foreign to the body.
So that's one piece of it, right?
The second piece of it actually has to do with hormones.
So allergies are more common in kids, in boys actually, up until the age of puberty.
Then we see a flip and we see that women are more likely to have allergies at...
Puberty and beyond.
And it has to do with fluctuations in hormone levels, particularly estrogen, which can stimulate histamine, which is what's responsible for causing allergies.
So we see pregnant women having increases in their allergy symptoms, and I'm one of them with a stuffy nose every day.
And then we also see it during the perimenopausal period.
God, my goodness!
All these things about allergies we have no idea about.
So it's worth...
Seeing somebody, if you've got an allergy, it's worth paying attention to hormones in your stomach, because you can actually develop allergies otherwise.
Let's just turn the tables on this, guys.
Let's stop being a country full of folks who have allergies.
What is the safest way for people to figure out if they're allergic to something, like dairy, or they're just intolerant to it?
Right, so that's the other thing, where a lot of people will report, oh, I have an allergy to something, and we're actually mischaracterizing what it is.
It's more of an intolerance, so the food just doesn't agree with you.
Back in the day, we used to say, oh, that just doesn't agree with me.
Now we say, I'm Allergic to it, and people kind of get confused with terminology.
It's more an intolerance to something, and the best way to figure that out is keep a food diary.
Just keep a food journal.
So write down how you're feeling every day, all of your symptoms, if you're having bloating, headaches, stomach discomfort, and then just keep a diary of everything that you've eaten.
That's intolerance, what you just described.
That's an intolerance, right?
If you have an allergy, you're eating a little piece of shellfish, your face is blowing up.
And so you know it happens immediately.
Whereas with an intolerance, it's a lot more subtle.
And it tends to be the more that you eat, the worse that you feel.
And so if you sit down with an allergist with your food diary, they can identify what foods may be triggering your symptoms.
Encyclopedic. Good luck with the pregnancy allergies, by the way.
Thank you.
We'll be right back.
Today we're talking barbecue with some of the biggest names in the business.
And I'm giving you a buyer's guide to a healthier store-bought barbecue.
And an easy-to-make-at-home version your family will love.
You won't want to miss our barbecue sauce investigation.
Thank you.
For many Americans, barbecue, it's life.
It's that smoky, sweet, and tangy sauce that brings families together, makes our bellies happy.
But is there a bottled or jarred barbecue sauce in the grocery store that's more healthy than a sugar bomb?
That's the big question.
Today we are committed to finding a healthier barbecue sauce, doing all the research for you so you know exactly which to buy.
And I brought in a chef who knows barbecue to get us the answers.
Please welcome my friend, Big Daddy, Chef Aaron McCargo Jr.
Who's here teaching us.
The things that a chef actually does.
Before you get started, as a chef, do you actually go out and buy store-made barbecue sauce?
To keep it real with you, Doc, I do.
You do?
I do.
I ain't gonna sit over the stove for 12 hours and make sauce every time I want barbecue.
Good, thank goodness.
I'm not alone, I tell you.
No, you're not alone.
But you know what?
Right now, the barbecue scene is big.
There's a lot of big flavors out there.
You can use a lot of different sauces for different things.
There's a lot of variety here.
So let me ask, come on over here.
Nothing's going to match the real thing, right?
But what's the difference between the kind that you make from scratch, you an expert, and the kind that we all buy in the grocery store?
I'll tell you like this.
I'm a sports guy.
So this is like boxing.
It's a five-punch fight right here.
We got the bases.
We got like some acid.
We got the ketchup, brown sugar.
What's the shine?
It's just some simple spices and ketchup.
So that's how I like to roll.
We slide over here, and now we've got the Marshawn Lynch, a bag of Skittles.
So we've got a lot of things going on over here.
So you're talking about every two tablespoon servings, it's about 25 to 70 calories.
So all this is a very colorful plate to just make a simple barbecue sauce.
Let's talk about this little thing here.
This is liquid smoke.
You ever wonder what that is, liquid smoke?
Come on back here.
I did a little homework on this.
Get ready for your chef.
All right, so here's what they do.
It's very straightforward.
Something like wood chips, right?
They torch the wood chips, funneling the smoke into a condenser, right?
That's a condenser.
Then, as it begins to rise, that smoke will cool and begins to form little droplets, little droplets, right?
These droplets are then filtered, not once, but twice, and they're captured, right?
They're put into a bottle form to add the smoky flavor without the smoke.
So it actually is not a synthetic chemical.
It's coming from wood chips that have been torched.
So we investigated and found 10 brands, 10 brands of barbecue sauce in the grocery store.
All of them contain this hidden ingredient.
And you know what?
It's raising some serious health concerns.
Take a look.
In barbecue country, smokiness is everything.
And slow-cooking meat is an art form.
But for the rest of us, barbecue comes in a bottle or on the menu of the chain restaurant down the street.
And when barbecue went commercial, there was a need to get that slow, smoky flavor fast.
Enter liquid smoke.
It's the hidden ingredient in most of the barbecue you eat.
Liquid smoke replicates the flavor of smoke curing by collecting the liquid byproduct from burning different types of wood chips.
Invented in Missouri in 1895, the process of creating liquid smoke is not new, but it has seen a recent spike in use.
Despite the popularity of liquid smoke all across the country, barbecue purists say nothing can replace that genuine smoker pit taste.
The smoke flavor from the meat comes from the actual smoke from the wood, you know.
So you can get a flavor out of this liquid smoke, but it's not going to be the real thing.
But other foodies swear by it.
How do you get great, amazing barbecue without the outdoor space or smoker?
I love a bit of liquid smoke in my ribs and burgers, roasted vegetables.
A couple drops of this stuff adds that unique smoky flavor.
You can use it indoors.
It's vegan and gluten-free.
It takes seconds rather than hours.
It's a great way to bring in that backyard barbecue flavor to all your recipes, especially in the dead of winter or you just don't have access to a barbecue.
Yet some health experts are concerned.
Claiming the real smoke used in liquid smoke contains carcinogens and toxins that can damage DNA.
And now those fears are spreading throughout the online community.
It's clear there's a real concern brewing online over this ingredient in our barbecue.
But how much of it is hype?
I'm going to call in a health and safety expert, nutritionist Toby Amador, for answers.
So Toby, people are concerned liquid smoke is a cancer-causing ingredient.
What does the actual science say?
So the science is that natural smoke does have carcinogenic agents called PAHs.
And the liquid smoke does have...
Smaller amounts of it in it.
And so that's probably what you've been hearing about online.
But liquid smoke is actually filtered.
So you take out those or much of the PAHs while still keeping that liquid smoke flavor.
So all that scary stuff that you hear online, the science just doesn't back it up.
And is there any real difference between liquid smoke and the natural smoke flavor that most of us crave?
So according to the FDA, if the liquid smoke is directly added into the food, then it will be listed as smoke flavor.
But if it is actually exposed, the food itself is exposed to the smoke, then on the label, you'll actually read that it is naturally smoked.
Tony, thank you very much.
Okay, Big Daddy, Chef, you say...
You know, barbecue sauce is never going to be a health food, but we don't have to banish it off the menu either.
No, you really don't.
You just got to make sure you look at the label very carefully and choose wisely.
All right, so guess what?
The Big Daddy's got three-step buyer's guide when we come back.
Plus, I make your own recipe that is so good, you will not believe it is actually healthier for you.
Work, family, endless errands.
It's time to reset and rebalance.
If we don't take the time to do this, symptoms get louder and then diseases show up.
We have a personalized plan to jumpstart your energy.
That's coming up Friday on Dr.
Oz.
So my Patagonian gaucho friends down here in Patagonia have shown me a little bit about the asado.
The asado is how they would cook their meat traditionally.
This is a piece of beef, by the way.
Oh my goodness.
That's a flank portion of the animal, and I'm flipping it over because you never put direct flames on the meat down here.
You only use the embers that have been already heated and burned off from the pieces of This is tenderloin from a cow.
This is skirt steak.
Also from a cow.
And ribs, you recognize ribs, of course.
But look carefully here.
We've got blood sausages.
Corizo over here.
Different sausages.
And this is the famous Red Stag, which is local here and why folks come here quite frequently to sightsee and look around.
I was so proud of myself.
That's a video I posted after learning all about Argentinian barbecue.
It opened my eyes to the ways you can make barbecue a lot healthier because nothing that I showed you there was actually bad for you in terms of what was added to it.
So Barbecue Authority chef Aaron McCargo Jr., a.k.a.
Big Daddy, has three simple steps.
To find a grocery store barbecue sauce that's a healthier option.
You can sort of emulate what it would have been like to make your food 100 years ago.
So the first step to a healthier jarred barbecue sauce is to mind your label.
Chef McCargo, what does that mean?
That means you want to skip any barbecue sauce that's 20% or more in sugar or sodium.
So 20% more of your daily value of salt or sugar.
That's exactly right, Doc.
So this label we just showed, it's supposed to be less than 20% sugars.
This has 28% sugars.
So it's got some of that stuff that you don't want in there.
That's a big no-no.
14 grams added sugars.
There's no need for that.
Now, how do you actually do that?
How do you make it taste good without a lot of extra sugar?
So the next step is to get a healthier jarred barbecue sauce and add it at the right time.
You don't just throw it in there in the beginning.
All right.
So you take the...
Then the ribs are out.
They haven't been...
Oh, these are falling apart.
I love this.
I love that.
That's sexy.
Real sexy.
All right, so you got your ribs out here.
Yes. Now, they're not basting in barbecue sauce.
Exactly. Then how do you add them on here?
Now... Pretty much, I'm a bastion brush type of guy.
And if you take your brush and just really, you're talking about two tablespoons per serving.
That's all you need.
So we want to just take that.
Brush and just give it a nice glaze and give that look that you're looking for.
Now look at this versus what we often end up with, which is this.
Yes. I mean, please be honest.
That's what we do, right?
That's not how you're supposed to eat your ribs.
It's not supposed to be that because now you're defeating the purpose of having a barbecue.
Right. So you might as well just go ahead and drink the sauce and do a shot of ribs later, you know?
Right. All right.
The next step to get a healthier barbecue sauce is to doctor it up to give it more flavor but not more sugar.
This is my secret and I'm not going to keep it a secret anymore after today.
What you want to do is look at the back of the label and pick those basic simple ingredients that you see on the label to doctor it up with.
So keep yourself a little extra smoked paprika, a little extra cayenne, a little bit of extra Worcestershire.
Treat it like a marinara sauce.
Add a little bit of this, a little bit of that.
Taste as you go and build it to that flavor.
But keep the salt and sugar off to the background because you really shouldn't need it after a good rub.
Chef, I love this.
You got it.
Now I got a little treat for you guys.
What if you're feeling inspired?
Like you want to go out there and wow your guests with an at-home barbecue sauce with fresh flavors?
Well, joining us now is the Executive Director of Culinary Operations at the famous Virgil's Barbecue Spots in New York City and Vegas and Atlantis and the Bahamas.
Please welcome Chef Glenn Rolnick.
Hey, Dr. Ross.
We've collaborated, we've made a barbecue that even a doctor can sign off on, but still get a great chef who's got to serve.
Tons of customers, world-class people, went world-class food, and we've made some special natural ingredients come together to make magic.
So walk us through what you've got.
We absolutely did.
It was a challenge, so...
They asked me to do it, and I'm like, of course, I'm up for a challenge.
So what we did, we took all healthy ingredients.
My little trick is to cut the oranges, cut the limes, cut the jalapeno, and put them in the vinegar.
So while you're cooking all these three ingredients down, you're cooking that down with the fruit and the jalapeno inside.
So what we do is we have cumin here, we have cinnamon, we have red pepper flakes, we have Texas chili powder, which is great, cayenne pepper.
A little bit of salt.
As you see, we do not put a lot of salt in this.
We try to make this very healthy.
Where's the sugar?
And very tasty.
There is no sugar.
I like you.
I like it.
No sugar.
Notice, no sugar.
Big Daddy, there's no sugar.
There is no sugar other than your ingredients that you have here.
So you have your natural sugar from your juice, and here we use dates.
We have a date puree here that we use.
So this will thicken it up as well as give it flavor.
And it looks like this when we're done.
Yeah, this is what it looks like when we're done.
And the best protein source?
The best protein, I like ribs, St. Louis ribs, and I love whole chicken or chicken thighs.
All right.
I like a lot.
All right, so how do we do this?
So we cook the baby up.
So, yeah, we smoke these up like you would.
You would season them up.
And if you have a smoker, it's great.
If you don't, we have a little liquid smoke that we add to the barbecue sauce.
That's only if you don't have the opportunity to use a smoker at your house or at your work.
So we would take this.
We would smoke this the way it is or bake it in a slow oven.
Slow and...
You know, low is always a technique for barbecue.
So you want it to be very tender.
You want it to be very flavorful.
So once that's ready, you don't need to put this on from the beginning.
This goes on towards the end.
So maybe the last 15 or 20 minutes of cooking is when you're going to add the sauce onto it.
If you want it to caramelize a little bit from the natural sugars.
Oh my goodness.
It just fills your mouth with a dance.
A lot of flavor, right?
There's a symphony happening in my mouth.
Every one of my taste buds is being titillated.
Here's the thing.
You run one of the most successful barbecue joints around.
Yes, we do.
The real challenge is when you serve these customers of yours who expect the best, do you think our barbecue sauce could make it into your shop?
Our barbecue sauce can definitely make it into Virgil's.
I like it!
Definitely, definitely.
Help me embed it.
Check out Virgil's Road Trip Cookbook for more fun barbecue recipes.
Glenn, thank you very much.
You're quite welcome.
Be right back.
We're going to show you a few of these.
It's The Dish on Oz, and today it's all about chicken.
We are breaking down all the different types, like organic and air-chilled, so you know what to buy the next time you're at the supermarket.
And I'm making my mom's famous chicken cacciatore.
That sounds so amazing.
I can't wait to try it.
Oh, yeah.
Ooh, yes, look at me like that again.
Oh, yeah.
If there's one thing that brings us all together, it's food.
So we're calling everyone to the table to dish on everything.
From the latest food hacks and trends to everyday recipes you can make for dinner tonight.
Singing is my first love, but my other passion is baking.
I'm an iron chef, but mostly the executive chef of Butter Restaurant and mother to an 11-year-old.
This is the first recipe I ever made in a professional kitchen.
They were terrible.
My cooking is like me.
A mix of Caribbean heat meets southern sweet.
This is like my girlfriend in the kitchen.
I am, as a chef, first and foremost about flavor.
It's simple, it's celebratory, and most of all, it's about having a great time in the kitchen.
What is going on?
I'm trying to help.
Let's dish!
Welcome, everyone, to the Dish on Ice, and today we're talking about one of your favorite foods, chicken.
I'll check.
You're excited.
What's on the menu?
First... Could you be buying chicken all wrong and not even know it?
Our buyer's guide is cutting through all the label confusion for you.
And then, are you a skin-on or a skin-off person?
We're going to talk about when to keep it and when to lose it.
Then, winner, winner, Alex is making chicken dinner, and she's sharing her mom's amazing chicken cacciatore recipe that I literally cannot wait to taste.
It smells so good in here!
Before we get to that, though, why do you guys think everybody loves chicken so much?
Easy, versatile.
It goes with anything.
It's really hard to mess it up.
I mean, it's pretty versatile.
You buy it.
You can freeze it.
You can pound it into patties.
You can leave it whole.
Save a lot of money the more whole you buy it.
Tacos. You can do everything.
We could go on and on.
Yes, chicken.
It tastes just like chicken.
We love it.
Yes. But the reality is there's a lot.
When you go to the groceries market and you look in your refrigerator section or your freezer section, there's a lot to choose from.
I know there's a lot of labels and it can be very confusing.
So Jamaica took a trip to the grocery store chicken aisle to survey the selections.
So I'm in the grocery store in the chicken section.
And buying chicken can be a lot more confusing than just choosing by what's on sale.
I mean, look at this.
There's organic, there's free range, there's air chill, there's kosher.
I mean, that's a lot of chicken to choose from.
But don't you worry.
We're going to break this bird down so that you're no longer confused.
I mean, come on.
We got you.
All right, we're going to solve some of these issues now.
Chicken labels are first in our chicken investigation.
We're going to clear up with what really matters with a little game.
This little birdie here is the prize.
If you know the answer, you can grab it and squeeze it.
It makes that noise.
Thank you for demonstrating, Alex.
But here's the thing.
If you don't let me finish the question, you're disqualified.
It's like Jeopardy.
This is like double Jeopardy.
Alright, number one.
Our USDA allows this label to be placed on any poultry product that has an open air access for a minimum of five minutes per day.
Yes, Janika.
Oh, a tie.
Air chilled.
Is that air?
Yes, air chilled.
Yes. What does that have to do with air chilling?
They're going outside and walking around.
What if it's warm outside?
I swear I saw that in there.
Isn't it humane?
Free range.
No. Free range.
Guys, I don't think we're clarifying.
We're just confusing ourselves.
What are we doing?
I made my own question in my head.
That's where I came in.
I was thinking it might be cold outside, but it doesn't mean it's air chilled.
I just saw that.
I was like, that's it.
Let's try this next question.
Maybe we'll get one of these right.
The label means cold, purified air is used to cool the chicken for stronger flavor and less chance of contamination.
I'm a psychic.
I knew what you were going to ask.
I just said it a little earlier.
Air chilled chicken.
Yes! Now that we've confused the audience, next we looked at the price of the chicken.
Daphne? So, Jamaica, what is your tip to the most flavorful chicken at the best price?
Well, I would suggest you do bone-in chicken with the skin on.
And it may be a little bit more work, but it pays off because you will save about $530 on average a year by buying that versus just buying the skinless, boneless chicken.
It's a lot more expensive that way, and I love to save a good dollar.
Yeah, hello.
Just by doing that little bit of extra work, taking the bone out yourself, taking the skin off yourself, you get the same result, but you save...
Over 500 bucks a year.
That's awesome.
That's a lot of money.
So I'm going to weigh in on the skin-on debate because I feel like skin has a lot of flavor.
It is a lot of fat, and fat does carry flavor.
So I cook my chicken with the skin on, but then I take the skin off to eat it.
So you get all the flavor benefits of it, but you're not adding that extra bit of...
But how bad is chicken skin really?
Well, I have some skin in the game.
Oh, God.
See what I did there?
Yeah. There we go.
The thing is, the skin of the chicken is maligned, but it actually has a lot of the healthy fats that our heart needs.
You know how much extra calories is in the skin of a chicken?
300? No, maybe 50 per serving.
Really? What?
So, I mean, yes, if you're on a diet, take it off, but if not, I just eat it with the breast.
It makes the breast taste much better.
If it's dark meat, you can take the skin off.
Light meat, I don't know how you eat it without the skin.
You need a little bit of that.
And it's not bad for you.
Wow, I love that.
That makes me so happy.
That's like when I realized that...
I could have whole milk or 2% milk and not have to be sad about it.
It's better if it's whole milk.
We'll get to that later.
That's another show.
Next, we looked at flavor because there's nothing worse than under-seasoned chicken.
You guys, this viral video of Oprah tasting a chicken dish that resurfaced on social media says it all.
Watch this.
Do you like it?
I hope so.
Just say yes.
No! I do like it.
I like it very much.
I think, did we add salt and pepper?
I think we needed salt and pepper.
No, there's no salt and pepper in it.
You can add it yourself.
I would just like...
I think it's delicious.
Okay, Spencer, I don't know whatever made you pull that tape out of the vault, but it made me laugh.
And here's the deal.
This is what I was thinking.
I always wanted...
Anybody who came on the show, no matter what they did, to have a good experience.
And I also wanted to stay in my own truth while allowing them to have that good experience.
So I was having a moment of trying to decide, do I want to have a great time?
What is my real moment of truth?
Because the truth for me was that I am used to having salt and pepper on my chicken.
That's just the truth.
That's what I was thinking.
This chicken needs some salt and pepper.
Even then, though, like, she's still being really nice.
Because you could tell she just, no.
She did not like it.
No. She didn't like it.
And people are obsessed with Oprah's reaction.
Because it was very graceful.
Very gracious.
And being thoughtful about being a good host, but also wanting to give valuable feedback.
You guys, Alex and Jamaica, taste food on TV all the time.
You've got to, I mean, I know I have eaten some food that was not totally 100%.
Do you give the honest answer?
Do you bite your tongue?
What's your strategy?
Alex, you want to go first?
I mean, I say, you know, it's like in the South, there's a bless your heart situation.
There's sort of like a threshold, you know what I mean?
I think you can always see the silver lining in a cloud, so I think you should always give the positive feedback first.
And then maybe, you know, just give like a little tidbit of info, like how about that salt and pepper?
How's that going?
How are we feeling today?
Hug it out and move on.
I don't know.
I am never one to crush anybody's spirit, so I just start talking about them.
Like, look at you and your little apron.
You're so wonderful.
I just love everything about you.
Don't forget about it.
Don't talk about the food, but I love you.
You're so amazing.
It depends on who I'm talking to.
Yeah. Oh, really?
Look at how serious you got.
Sorry. If I know them and they're my friends and they know that I'm honest in that way, then I know that we'll be cool afterwards.
But if it's somebody that I don't know, I'm not going to just be like, your chicken sucks.
Even though I really want to.
But wouldn't the good thing be to tell them the truth so they could get better?
You don't want them to go make that for their mom or their boyfriend and it's just, I want to say it like that.
I want to say your chicken makes me gag like you just did.
But I can't.
I can't.
So I have to be nicer and be like, you might want to try it.
You're buying some butter.
Your outfit's cute.
Acid. You compliment their clothes.
People love when you talk about them.
So, Jamaica does have a formula that anyone can use to avoid an embarrassing flavorless chicken situation.
Yes. Give us this formula.
It's a very simple formula.
It's herbs plus acid.
Plus fat, all right?
You got to remember that formula when you're in the kitchen.
So you can, for example, use like fresh rosemary and lemon juice and butter, and that's just going to give that acid and that flair and that flavor.
Like oregano, buttermilk is phenomenal, a little olive oil.
Just keep that formula in the back of your mind when you're making chicken and it'll be flavorful and flawless.
Flavorful and flawless.
Double promise right there.
All of this chicken talk is making me very hungry and I know you guys are too and all of you are too.
Stick around because Alex has a chicken recipe that packs a flavor punch.
up next.
I love getting to talk with you on my show every single day.
But when the cameras stop rolling, the conversation is not over.
I still have a lot that I want to talk about.
So download the Dr. Oz podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Winner, winner, we had your chicken dinner.
Dambling today.
What are we making today?
Alright, so we're making chicken cacciatore, which is a truly special recipe.
You know, it's not a big story, like, and then the pan fell on the floor and it was big drama.
This was just the dish where I was this high, I peeked my nose over the pan while my mom was cooking, and it was the first time I thought, you know what, I'm going to cook for a living.
I'm going to become a chef.
You're all starting the chicken cacciatore.
Yes, which I think is a very heart-healthy meal, so I'm pretty excited that, you know, I was covering all my bases.
Right here, the foundation of the dish.
And this, you don't want to rush.
Onions, a little bit of mushroom, a little bit of garlic.
You add that bay leaf and thyme.
Those are your little fresh elements.
Add the white wine in.
Get a little zen with it.
You know what I mean?
Let that white wine cook a little bit.
We brown the chicken in this pan.
Then we take it out, let it sit, hang out, build this foundation.
Will you help me just put the chicken back on here?
Because now we're going to add the tomatoes right over.
I just want to put my face in it.
Let's talk about canned tomatoes because there's 80 million of them in the supermarket.
80 million cans.
Just buy the whole peeled ones because kept whole, they're just more intact.
They're fresher.
They're tastier.
San Marzano, worth the money or not?
Yeah, it is worth the cashola, but, you know, there's so many amateurs and imitators.
How big can San Marzano be?
How many tomatoes can we get from there?
Seriously. And you can just let this simmer stovetop, and then it just turns into this.
Oh, yes.
With very little effort, you just get this sort of golden brown, you get those mushrooms.
That tomato, I mean, this just makes me hangry.
I'm noticing about you, Alex, you are the queen of the set it and forget, not just the description of what she is, but the set it and forget it, the meals that make you look like an absolute kitchen goddess, but that you kind of put the work in at the beginning and then you leave it alone and let the oven or the stove do its magic.
So much cooking that we see is do this, run around, flip things, things are burning.
Most of the best cooking happens when you just take a step back, take a deep breath, good for the respiratory system, and you just let the ingredients come together.
Cook, for God's sake.
Alex, I think if people came to you and you described this dish, you would make anybody want to cook for a living.
I mean, I think it's like when you sing.
Heart eyes with us.
Oh, thank you.
I truly like the dish.
It's like you can feel the love when you taste this.
You know that someone put their heart and soul in this.
This is what cooking with love is.
And then, of course, if you want a big mess of buttered noodles to go on the side, you could.
What? You could have some bok choy steamed.
You're doing so well.
Steamed bok choy.
Please. Green beans.
I want some kale.
So you just literally let it rest for 10 minutes?
You literally let this cook.
When it's cooked, the chicken is cooked, and you know that.
You put a sprig of rosemary in there, kind of like when you're steeping for a nice cup of tea.
You're just going to let the rosemary hang out in there for like 10 minutes while it rests and take it out.
We don't want that overly medicinal rosemary taste.
Just a hint of it, but no evidence.
Why doesn't chicken get the rest while we do all the work?
It's not fair.
I know, but chicken deserves this love.
It works so hard for us in America.
It deserves a vacay.
What, 10 minutes?
Take the 10 minutes.
All right, while this chicken takes a well-deserved break, so will we stick around because we're tasting it when we come back.
The ultimate test from the chefs.
Stick around.
Thank you.
All new Oz.
If something happens to me, our assets are documented.
Susan Powell, missing for 10 years.
Now, bizarre, never before heard audio.
This is going to stun you.
From her husband and her father-in-law.
You hear that desperation in his voice in those recordings.
That's coming up tomorrow.
Thank you.
We are back with the dish on Oz and we are tasting Alex's chicken cacciatore.
This is a tough audience.
Yes, what do you guys think?
Oh yeah.
You're going to need that.
Yes. It is messy.
So good.
In a good way.
It's a good messing.
It's family meal.
Like, this makes me just want to get around the table, people that I love, get a nice crusty piece of bread, drag it through this whole sauce.
The chicken is juicy.
Daphne, no bread, no pasta.
Okay, please.
Please! You've been hanging out too long.
Stick to the protein, people.
No. It's just something about Italian food.
I mean, I love Italians.
Like, you guys are good lovers of food.
Oh, well, well.
I think.
Only of food.
I love the pregnant paws.
Yeah, there really was.
Wow. I guess I'll stick to chicken.
I have to agree with you on both counts.
Of course you would.
I love this dish because it makes me feel like I could curl up on my couch on a cold or a rainy day and just have whatever movie on and it would really make me feel just like, okay, I can take a nap.
Really cozy.
It's homey.
I love it.
And it feels like it's going to eat even better the next day too.
It's one of those second time arounds.
Excellent. Do you have a favorite chicken dish at home?
Yeah, you.
You know what?
I actually made Chicken piccata.
I love it.
Look at his face.
I love the way she says that.
Chicken piccata.
Chicken piccata.
I love it.
It's so good.
I love the capers.
That's like my favorite thing.
That's my little acid that I love.
There's the capers and the juice.
But I came home one day.
It was just a regular day.
Nothing special.
But I was like, you know what?
I made it through today.
It was a good day.
I'm going to make this chicken dish.
I zoned out, made the chicken, had a little bit of moscato because you guys know I love it.
And I just sat down on the couch and said thank you to myself.
It was nice.
It's funny.
Mastering a chicken dish is actually what gave me My first real boost of confidence in the kitchen.
Yeah. Because making a whole roast chicken, you guys, having that smell coming out of the oven, being able to set it down in front of the family, it is just...
Nothing will make you feel like such a kitchen goddess.
Like, you just own...
It is your kingdom.
And I will tell you, the technique that changed the deal for me.
So I make...
I do a dry rub, so I just do a lot of salt under the skin as opposed to butter and all the things that people normally tuck under there.
And what that gives you is an extra crispy golden brown skin.
But I start with the breast side down.
I do the first half of the roast breast side down so that all the juices concentrate in the breast.
Then I flip it for the second half of the cook.
They all redistribute, and you get a really juicy bird with really crispy golden brown skin.
I'm going to try that.
And I cook vegetables underneath that roast in the chicken fat that's rendering off.
Give it to us.
How am I hungry while I'm eating chicken?
That's living.
We're showing you how to live.
It is a party in the kitchen every Wednesday.
The Dish Crew is back next week with more delicious meals you're going to want to try.
It's healthy, it's delicious, and we will see you then.
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