Super Jam

Over the last 10 years or so, there has been an explosion of research into the impact of the microbiome in our gut on our health. Exposed by this research has been a long list of powerful chemical agents and signaling molecules that directly and positively impact our health that are created by various microbiome bacteria. These different critters convert various specific foods we eat into these vitally necessary chemical messengers that control various functions in our body. A recent paper demonstrated that the microbiome bacteria in a pregnant woman’s gut are required to activate certain genes inside the growing baby. These molecules can cross the placenta barriers and directly affect the maturing fetus.

There are over 500 different species of bacteria in the average person’s microbiome, not to mention lots of fungi and viruses that are also a part of the microbiome. All this research has shown that true health heavily rests on having the right bugs in the right amounts in our gut. When this research first started, many companies began to promote blends of probiotics to take orally to support the health of our microbiome. Many still exist today, however, most of the research has shown that taking oral probiotics has little effect on changing the composition of our microbiome. Nevertheless, we can massively change our microbiome by controlling what foods we eat that end up feeding our good guy gut bugs. My philosophy has been for some time now to feed the good guys and starve out the bad guys. This works a portion of the time. Many bad guys like to eat bad food – sugar, excess carbs, overcooked proteins, and overheated oils. Many of the bad guys like doughnuts. Many of the good guys like good real food.

Polyphenols are one of the food components that have a super beneficial impact on our microbiome. These are the chemicals that provide the deep purple and red colors in fruits and veggies. This is why blackberries, blueberries, and raspberries are so good for us. They promote bacteria that produce a bunch of different health-promoting signaling molecules that cross into our bloodstream and tell our body to do all sorts of good things for us. It was this awareness in mind that prompted me to start making refrigerator berry jam many years ago. I added erythritol and pectin to the berries to gel up into a jam. This was good and served me well for many years. But with more new research about how the gut works, I am changing my old recipe to make a super jam!

What new information did I come across? I knew that polyphenols were good for us, but what about the health of the gut lining itself? When I began researching how to heal the gut, I discovered that the small intestine primarily uses the amino acid glutamine as its energy source in healing. More recently, I found that the large intestine uses the short-chain fatty acid butyrate for healing energy. Butyrate is formed by certain gut bugs when they eat soluble fiber. I created a product called Gut Healer that combined glutamine and several types of soluble fiber along with aloe vera and other healing herbs to stimulate the healing of an inflamed gut. That is a great product that does wonders for folks suffering from painful bloated guts.

Last week I got the idea to combine the essential ingredients from my Gut Healer  (the glutamine and the soluble fiber) in my refrigerator jam recipe. It truly made a delicious functional food. To add to the ingredients, I swapped the erythritol with allulose to add a new layer of GLP-1 stimulation. Allulose, a rare sugar that does not trigger any blood sugar response, is also a great stimulant for releasing the hormone GLP-1 which reduces appetite. Now I have a jam that is chock full of health-giving polyphenols supplying healing energy for both the small and large intestines that is also an appetite suppressant. Wow, what a combo!

A point of awareness about refrigerator jams — they must be kept in the refrigerator, not in the cupboard. Why is this? Essentially, refrigerator jams are simply jars of fresh fruit with pectin added to make them thick and spreadable like jam. Usually, some sweetening is added to make the product more like jam, but not enough is added to inhibit the growth of mold or bacteria. We don’t think about sugar like this, but it is toxic to bacteria in high concentrations. That is why it is used as a preservative for fruit. It might make one pause to wonder if sugar is also toxic to us. I avoid it most of the time. My body is good at keeping my blood sugar levels up even when I eat zero carbohydrates.
Okay, so let’s make some Super Jam!

I generally make at least a quart of this jam at a time, so this recipe is for one quart. First, you want to obtain a couple of pounds of fresh or frozen berries. I use the frozen three or four-berry blend from Costco. These need to be fully defrosted – either by letting them sit out at room temperature for a long time or by popping them into the microwave and heating them a bit at a time until they are no longer frozen. Take one-third to one-half of the berries and put them into a blender along with any juice from the bag. Blend these for 10 seconds or so to liquefy them. To this add a quarter cup of allulose, a dash of stevia liquid, and 2 tablespoons each of pectin, glutamine, and inulin. If you like a bit of tartness in your jam, you can also squeeze a fresh lemon into the blender with the other ingredients. Blend all this until it is smooth.

Take the remaining whole berries and put them into a mixing bowl. Pour the blended mixture over the whole berries and mix it all together with a large spoon. Spoon the mixture into your quart jar and put the full jar into the fridge. The berry mixture will thicken up over the next few hours, at which point it will be ready to use. I find my jam lasts several months in the fridge.

Another point of awareness: there are many types of pectin. For this recipe, you want to use a pectin designed for low-sugar jam recipes. Both pectin and inulin are soluble fibers that your gut bacteria will eat and turn into Beta-Hydroxybutyrate (BHB). This is the food your colon cells want to provide the energy to heal. Additionally, the berries are a high-fiber food in addition to the polyphenols providing gut health benefits. The added glutamine will feed the small intestine cells directly without any bacterial conversion.

If you want to kick the fiber benefit one step higher, you can put that delicious jam onto a special toast that acts just like fiber. The bread I am referring to is a new one I found a few months ago called Carbonaut. Specifically, I am buying the low-carb, gluten-free version since I can’t do gluten. As far as keto breads go, this one looks and feels just like plain white bread. It feels weird eating white bread after all these years of not eating any bread. Until now avoiding both gluten and carbs has made bread a real challenge. I have tried to make many low-carb gluten-free breads in the past, but they were more like quick breads; like banana bread in texture.

So there you have it – Super Jam. I am thinking of putting together a mixture of all the dry ingredients as a product to sell in the office if there is any interest. Let me know. david@fairoakshealth.com

Take care,

David

Ellen

A couple days ago Ellen and I went to the big Quilt show at the Folsom Community Center. Sunday Feb 2nd should be the last day. The amount of creativity expressed through these quilts is amazing. Here is Ellen with Amber at the show. Amber and her mother are the ones that invited us.

Milk lowers colon cancer risk