Watch the full interview below or listen to the full episode on your iPhone HERE.
Stu: This week, I’m excited to welcome Rory Bland to the podcast. Rory, from Rory’s Kitchen website shares his journey around gut healing, biohacking, personal growth, animal-based eating, and so much more. In this conversation we discuss Rory’s 30-day experiment on the carnivore diet as a tool to improve his gut health. He shares exactly what he ate and drank during this time, including the ups and downs and lessons he learned. Over to Rory.
Audio Version
Some questions asked during this episode:
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What do you think compromised your gut health in the first place?
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Where did the idea to try the carnivore diet come from?
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What exactly did you eat and drink during the 30-day diet?
Get more of Rory Bland:
If you enjoyed this, then we think you’ll enjoy this interview
Dr Paul Saladino: The Complete Guide to the Carnivore Diet
Elle Russ – Optimising Thyroid Function
Chris Kresser – The Importance of Nutrient Density
The views expressed on this podcast are the personal views of the host and guest speakers and not the views of Bega Cheese Limited or 180 Nutrition Pty Ltd. In addition, the views expressed should not be taken or relied upon as medical advice. Listeners should speak to their doctor to obtain medical advice.
Disclaimer: The transcript below has not been proofread and some words may be mis-transcribed.
Full Transcript
Stu
(00:03)
Hey, this is Stu from 180 Nutrition, and welcome to another episode of the Health Sessions. It’s here that we connect with the world’s best experts in health, wellness, and human performance in an attempt to cut through the confusion around what it actually takes to achieve a long-lasting health. Now, I’m sure that’s something that we all strive to have. I certainly do. Before we get into the show today, you might not know that we make products too. That’s right, we are into whole food nutrition, and have a range of superfoods and natural supplements to help support your day. If you are curious, want to find out more, just jump over to our website. That is 180nutrition.com.au, and take a look. Okay, back to the show.
(00:45)
This week I’m excited to welcome Rory Bland to the podcast. Rory, from Rory’s Kitchen website shares his journey around gut healing, biohacking, personal growth, animal-based eating, and so much more. In this conversation we discuss Rory’s 30-day experiment on the carnivore diet as a tool to improve his gut health. He shares exactly what he ate and drank during this time, including the ups and downs and lessons he learned. Over to Rory.
(01:15)
Hey guys, this is Stu from 180 Nutrition, and I am delighted to welcome Rory Bland to the podcast. Rory, how are you, mate?
Rory
(01:21)
I’m very excited and I’m feeling good.
Stu
(01:24)
Excellent, excellent. Got a whole heap that I really want to dig into today, and I think this is going to be a really special episode for our listeners because it relates to so many of their potential issues that they’re facing, or perhaps don’t even know they’re facing. But first up, for all of our listeners that may not be familiar with you or your work, I’d love it if you could just tell us a little bit about yourself, please.
Rory
(01:46)
All right, cool. I’ll give the nutshell thing, and I think we can go into the story and the journey after. My name’s Rory, I’m 33. I live in Brisbane, in Australia. And I guess I now share my gut health journey online, that’s part of what I do. I’m actually a social media creator for different brands and businesses, that’s what I do for my bread and butter. Well, not bread and butter anymore, it’s just me these days.
Stu
(02:14)
Just butter.
Rory
(02:15)
What’s that, sorry?
Stu
(02:16)
Just butter.
Rory
(02:17)
Yeah, just butter. Just butter. Well, not even butter. I’ve had a lot of gut troubles and health issues over the years. Decades actually, from the time I was, gosh, four years old up until… I mean, still dealing with them now, but right now is the best I’ve ever felt in my life. And I’ve been on an intense journey the past 13, 14 years to figure out what was going on with my body, starting with fatigue, moving into joint pain, moving into depression, brain fog.
(02:51)
And tried a lot of things over the years from veganism, to vegetarian diets, anti-candida. And then I basically landed now, a couple months ago, into the carnivore diet and the carnivore version of the GAPS Diet, being specific. And I’ve been doing this, and it’s completely turned my life around, and I’ve just been showing the journey now. And that’s, I guess in a nutshell, where I am and who I am. I’m just a dude that had health problems and just wanted to fix it and was desperate, and just started sharing up on social media. And yeah, now I’m on the other side of the hard bits, and now it’s starting to get good. Yeah.
Stu
(03:36)
That’s awesome. That is fantastic. And I feel like we do share some similarities. Because of the journey that I’ve taken with 180 Nutrition, and I guess had the ability to connect with so many different health experts in all of the different areas from diet, exercise, and human performance. And have tried a lot of the strategies that we’ve spoken about on the podcast from vegetarian, super plant-based, all the way through to almost the carnivore side of things as well. And so I’m very, very keen to hear how you got on. But I guess my first question is, what do you think compromised your gut health in the first place? And I know that many of us are going to be out there thinking, oh, you know what, I’ve had these issues for so long and I can’t explain it. And maybe something’s right, maybe something isn’t. My doctor says everything’s okay. From your perspective, where do you think it started?
Rory
(04:34)
That’s a really good question. I can’t pinpoint it to exactly, but it was between the ages of two and four I think it began. Around four years old I was diagnosed as an asthmatic, which we now know is also related to the gut, and also food intolerances. And I had grommets put in and adenoids taken out. So grommets is basically, your head is full of mucus, it’s inflamed gunk, and they do these grommets to drain it. It’s quite a full on procedure. And getting adenoids of glands taken out is also full on, because that affects the immune system as well.
(05:16)
But obviously if there’s something like this happening, there’s obviously something underlying, but we didn’t know back then. So asthmatic for many years, and then on lots of steroids, on lots of antibiotics as well. And it just started to compound, moved into acne, it moved into eventually the joint pain and skin conditions, and all sorts of things as well. But it really stemmed from when I was four. And then I think just going on so many steroids, so many antibiotics, and the just compounding effect. Yeah, it’s been almost three decades, which is crazy to think of having health problems.
Stu
(05:58)
Okay. And so, at what point did you think, I’m going to take this into my own hands? Because clearly you would’ve gone through conventional medicine. And it’s a tricky one, because conventional medicine versus functional practitioners, and then everybody in between, naturopaths, nutritionists, food sensitivity specialists, all of that, they offer their own solutions. And I’ve been through a lot of that as well, and I never really had any success in terms of coming to a solution without thinking, you know what, I’m going to just fiddle and try and do some stuff myself. At what point did you think, no, I’m tackling this on my own?
Rory
(06:50)
The point for me where I became aware of health as a thing, or started to become aware of anything in general was probably just after 2006. Because my dad had a heart attack, he died at 46 from atherosclerosis. And I also have family history, mum’s had surgery, my brother who’s two years younger has had open heart surgery. I’ve had about six to 10 people in my family have heart stuff. That from the age of about 17 put me onto it, but then didn’t really think much of it. I was vegetarian for a bit, and I still didn’t really notice health problems. But it was when I was vegan for a couple of months and living in a yoga retreat, that’s when I started noticing I was tired for the first time. Up to then, didn’t have any problems that I could detect, or that I could really see.
(07:39)
And because I didn’t see acne as a problem, it’s just something I got rid of with Accutane. Which is a really intense drug. But then, yeah, started noticing low energy. And I was like, okay, well go to the doctor. What’s up? They put me on iron and B12, because that’s what you do. You’re vegan. And then it’s like, oh, well that didn’t work, I still felt low energy. Then I got really poor diet advice from the doctor as well, and I tried to do that. Didn’t really do anything. And then I was like, okay, well, I’m just going to start doing honey and yogurt and maybe I’ll stop being vegan. Maybe that’ll help. Didn’t do anything. Then I went into, I found an expensive raw food naturopath who got me on some auto ship MLM supplements, plus raw food and green smoothies, and all these sorts of things.And I didn’t really feel any better, and I was just spending more.
(08:31)
It was basically one thing after another to try and figure out what was going on with my body. And over the years, the health problems compounded the more I tried things. I always had this leaning towards vegetarianism, plant-based. I did it all together for about four years. And that was really aligned to my ethos because I didn’t want to harm animals, all these sorts of things. And I really thought it was good for the environment as well. That was always where I would try and lean towards. But I found a way to manage my symptoms of brain fog, of candida, of itching all over my body, inside my body, feeling tired, fatigued, up and down. I found a way to, I guess, manage it myself. Because taking supplements, doing cleanses that I always recommend from naturopaths. And obviously doctors, they said, “You’re fine. There’s nothing wrong with you.”
(09:28)
Well, I feel horrible, but I was doing all these things to try and manage the symptoms. And I found a little okay spot where I didn’t feel horrible. That was the thing, I was trying to feel great, but I was like, okay, at least I don’t feel horrible. Right? And I didn’t know how good I could feel, and I kept self-medicating mainly through diet. And it just got to a point where I’d tried a lot of things. And I don’t say I tried everything right, because I didn’t, didn’t try the thing that worked. But the thing that really got to me was just, I was so sick of suffering. One day, last year in August, I couldn’t eat anything without reacting. And I thought it was food intolerances. We think, oh, if I just remove these foods, then I’ll feel better. But there’s more to it, you got to heal the gut.
(10:21)
But I couldn’t really eat anything. I couldn’t eat grains, dairy, eggs, gluten obviously, soy. I’d break out when I’d have beans and legumes, I’d get rashes and also ulcers in my mouth. My skin would break out eczema, starting to get hives sometimes. I couldn’t eat a lot of things, even some fruit and veg. And I just thought, enough is enough. But I think along the way it definitely happened for me, and it probably happens for some people, is I just got resigned. You see so many practitioners and you try so many things, juice cleansing, raw food, all this stuff that you think is the right thing to do for you. But yeah, it’s just social media’s a great thing because once you interact with one video, it starts to show you all these other videos. And that’s, I think, really what the turning point was for me. Is I was sick and vomiting on my 33rd birthday, and I’m like, I’ve got to do something. God, universe, whatever, just give me something to work with here.
Stu
(11:26)
Wow. Yeah, it is interesting. And oftentimes people with digestive issues like that, obviously you’re right at the end of the scale, you’ve had enough and everything’s reacting. But oftentimes people will jump in and go, right, you know what? I need to eat more vegetables. And if you have a compromised gut, that much fiber probably won’t help. It’s going to be tricky for your gut to manage. And I’ve spoken to a number of people that have typically come down to about five foods that they can manage. And it might be avocado, might be meat, might be sweet potato, and a few more. But, tell us about the carnivore diet, or the carnivore route that you took after going through veganism, plant-based, and everything else that you’ve just explained. Where did the idea for the carnivore diet come from?
Rory
(12:22)
Yeah, good question. Obviously I’d tried a few things before, and I was never really open to doing anything like this because of my ethos. But it actually, I was first turned onto the GAPS Diet by a friend. Gosh, she had, what’s it called? Crohn’s. She had Crohn’s.
Stu
(12:47)
Yeah, yeah.
Rory
(12:48)
Sorry, one second, we’ve got a barky guy.
Stu
(12:51)
Don’t worry about that. I’ve got my Doberman parked at my feet, and I’m expecting the same thing to happen when the door goes off. So that’s cool. I like this. Carry on, seriously. This is good.
Rory
(13:02)
Is it loud with the dog in the back?
Stu
(13:04)
No, no, it’s fine.
Rory
(13:05)
Oh, okay. Awesome. All right. Theo, buddy.
Stu
(13:10)
I’m expecting Max to do exactly the same.
Rory
(13:12)
All right, sorry, one sec. I’ve just to…
Stu
(13:15)
Okay.
Rory
(13:15)
One second.
Stu
(13:25)
I think for everyone that’s still listening, he’s just shot out of the room and I think he’s letting Theo the dog out of the door. And the dog’s still barking. That’s good. Here he comes.
(13:49)
Ah, all good.
Rory
(13:50)
My goodness.
Stu
(13:50)
No, it’s good.
Rory
(13:52)
No deliveries on podcast days.
Stu
(13:54)
I know, I’m fearing exactly the same thing. It’s all good.
Rory
(14:00)
Okay. Yeah, my friend had Crohn’s disease, and she was going to the toilet about 15 times a day, and had to get taken out of school all the time. And she was able to skip having a colostomy bag due to the GAPS Diet, which is huge. But I didn’t think anything of it, this was 2014. Again, 2018, a friend told me, that had similar symptoms as I did, she was on the GAPS Diet and it had helped quite a lot. So I had a look at that. And the GAPS Diet is, for those that don’t know, it’s called the Gut and Psychology Syndrome Diet. And it’s based heavily around… It’s a version of the specific carbohydrate diet. It’s been around a while, but you remove starches, you remove grains, all these sorts of things. It’s very heavy on meat stocks and fermented foods to basically heal and seal the gut as said.
(14:51)
And you slowly introduce foods that are allowed in this GAPS protocol until your body is good, but it’s very heavy on the meat stocks and the fermented foods. And so I started doing that, didn’t do anything because I fell off within a couple of weeks and just gave up. But then it come around again, 2022, last year, I kept seeing these videos on YouTube. I think mainly YouTube and Instagram, probably a bit of TikTok from Carnivore MD, Paul Saladino, from Mikhaila Peterson was the main one that really stood out. Jordan Peterson’s daughter. And she talked about how she did this diet called, what she called the Line Diet, to get rid of her autoimmune diseases, her arthritis, crippling depression, skin conditions for him, snoring, all these sorts of things. And they healed it through just eating meat. And I’m like, yeah, I don’t know about that. That just seems a bit much.
(15:58)
But it kept showing up. And for some reason when you’re suffering you become open to things that you wouldn’t normally be open to. Because your everyday person that doesn’t feel sick won’t think, oh, I’m going to wake up tomorrow and only eat meat. If you can eat everything, keep eating it, right? And you feel good. But when you’re desperate. And so I was like, okay, I’m open to this. I’m open to this. And I kept reading more about it. And for me it made a lot of sense because I couldn’t eat anything without reacting, and I didn’t want to react anymore. So I thought I might as well just wean myself off everything. It was basically meat, avocado, a little bit of dark chocolate was my only thing. And I think a little bit of fruits, sweet potato. And then I was like, you know what, I’m just going to just give it a go for 24 hours. Start there.
(16:54)
I felt really good. I’m like, okay, I think I want to try this for longer. And that’s when I decided to do that. And plus, part of the GAPS Diet, she wrote the book years ago, but she has this protocol within there called the No Plant GAPS. And the No Plant GAPS is about, some people are so sensitive in their gut that they are unable to tolerate fibers, like you said. And fiber isn’t bad at all, but when your gut is so sensitive, plant foods can be really bad for you. Which is crazy to think that, because we’re told vegetables and fruit are really healthy for you. But if your gut is so compromised, if you’re so inflamed like I was. And if I didn’t do anything it would’ve developed into full-blown autoimmune stuff.
(17:44)
It really affects you. So I took everything out. I started doing carnivore, started sharing it on social media. Which went a little crazy. But I had all these people that were really interested in knowing, how did I do with doing this carnivore thing to heal my gut? And that’s really how I found it was just through watching people on social media, being open and curious.
Stu
(18:11)
Was that before you started your 30-day carnivore challenge, or was that the carnivore challenge itself?
Rory
(18:21)
This was before. Timeline-wise, I think August this was starting to pop up a lot more in my feed. And I cut out seed oils, and then I was moving towards more meat based. I wouldn’t say animal based or whatever, but it was mostly meat. And then I was slowly removing the foods. And I was actually feeling a bit better because of it, which was really cool. I’m very lazy. I’m very much in front of my computer, I haven’t been very active for a long time except here and there, rollerblading, that kind of thing. But I noticed that when I went to the gym for the first time in months, I went and I just plowed through. I was unstoppable when I started eating more meat based, I cut out a lot of these things. It was incredible. And I thought that was really interesting.
(19:18)
And I thought, all right, well let’s just… After I’d been weaning myself off certain foods, particularly potatoes and sweet potatoes, they were my favorite thing. But I was like, let’s just see how good I feel after that. I started, did the 24-hour test in November or October last year. And then I started around the 16th or 17th of November just going full carnivore. And I set myself a challenge. It’s fun to do challenges, I like to challenge myself. 30 days seemed like a good number, and that’s what I went from. I prepared, I bought… Well, I was actually very under-prepared because I’m typically a very disorganized person. Which, I recommend being prepared going into it. But I figured I could at least have my meat for the wink and I could just start and just go for it. Yeah.
Stu
(20:13)
Okay. Did you eat eggs during that time?
Rory
(20:18)
No. What I was eating throughout the 30 days, and still very much to this day, but let’s just say the first 30 days was meat stock was the fundamentals, because meat stock is like bone broth but cooked shorter. Most people have bone broth for 24 to 48 hours that’s cooked. You get all those incredible minerals, gelatin, collagen, all this stuff that you can’t get anywhere else really. But it’s so good for you. However, people that are in the GAPS arena, people like myself or people that are histamine sensitive, can’t have bone broth. And the histamines our body can react to, which mine definitely does. It’s bone broth cooked for about three or so hours. And you chuck a whole chicken in, or you chuck chicken frames, chicken feet or beef bones, stuff that has meat on the bone as well, because that’s really collagenous. Joints.
(21:13)
Whatever you can, the good bony bits or lamb shanks. I had lamb shank broth last night. And that was the fundamentals, drinking about a liter of that a day because that’s really anti-inflammatory, soothing for the gut. I have a lot of that, which is different to a lot of people that are on carnivore, they don’t really focus on the meat to that concept because I feel like it’s a missing piece for a lot of people. So-
Stu
(21:36)
Sorry, just to interject. So your meat stock literally got slow cooker, meat of some sort, water, and then you’re cooking that for three and a half hours or so, did you say?
Rory
(21:45)
Yeah.
Stu
(21:45)
Now has that meat been cooked?
Rory
(21:49)
Yeah.
Stu
(21:50)
Oh, it has. So it’s going back in the slow cooker.
Rory
(21:54)
The exact process is, let’s just take a lamb shank, one I did last night. I put two kilos of lamb shanks plus about four liters of water into a pot. I brought it up to heat. And then from there you simmer it for about three hours, and it’s until it falls off the bone. And that’s typically when you know it’s cooked, which is about around three hours. So the meat is cooked, which means you also get that meat to eat. That’ll be my breaky a bit later. And that’s how it works. So you’ve got the meat and the bones. Which you separate the bones, chuck it in the bin or compost or whatever. But that’s how it works. And a bit of salt.
Stu
(22:36)
And a bit of salt. And how do you drink that? Do you put that in a container in the fridge and you drink it cold? Because as you mentioned, gelatinous, it’s going to solidify at some stage. Or I know you blast it in the microwave? Or how does that work with timing?
Rory
(22:50)
Yeah. I would typically drink most times stuff right there and then, because it’s super fresh and delicious. Most of the time though I will put it in the fridge, glass containers is best. And second best is BPA free, but glass is obviously better. You put it in the fridge. What I learned about, gosh, 50 days in from speaking to a naturopath who’s a gut health specialist. She said that meat stock, you should put it in the freezer straightaway in little containers, and only really have one to two days available that you’re going to drink. Because the longer it sits, the more histamines build up. Yeah, I basically make it, freeze a portion, and keep a portion for two days, and then I’ll drink that warm. Depending on the mix that you make, what bones or things you use, some will be really gelatinous and some will be… Which is the best stuff, I froth on that now.
(23:48)
And the lighter stuff that’s not as gelatinous, it’s not as healing for you. But I would just have that warm or then I would cook my breakfast, or then I would cook other meats in that mix. I mainly did chicken broth for that whole time, because I prefer the taste to beef broth. And then I would cook my beef mints or I’d cook lamb in there, or I’d cook Osso Buco or something in there that has either meat on the bone or meat end. And I didn’t grill. I think I fried stuff once or twice. A lot of people in the comments were like, “Bro, why aren’t you frying this? Why aren’t you grilling this? This looks disgusting.” I had a lot of comments on that because it was boiled meat and broth. But when your gut is so sensitive, I tested it, and it responds way better every single time to the boiled. Yeah, that’s how I had it. It was meat stock every day.
Stu
(24:43)
That’s brilliant. And the slow cooker is really, it’s the hero of the kitchen because it’s set and forget. And as you mentioned before, it just allows you to access all of the good stuff in the gelatinous cartilage, everything that we typically throw away. Because many of us favor these clean, lean muscle meats, which are great for protein but not so great for all of the really important connective stuff. But that’s a great tip. I think a lot of people are going to be experimenting with that. So meat stock, and then guide us into the other accompaniments.
Rory
(25:19)
Totally. It was meat stock, and then at the start, because I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into, I didn’t have all the knowledge that I have now. And you learn by just getting started. And I just figured, if I’m going to try and do this perfect, it’ll take me forever. So I jumped in, I’d have beef mints, so about probably… I think butchers are typically about 20% fat, 80% lean. And I would get the grass fed stuff. Don’t think the butcher I was getting up from was grass finished as well. But yeah, grass fed at least. And then I would have rump as well, and I’d cook those in the broth. So that’s what I was doing initially for a bit. I had chicken three times throughout the 30 days, and my body didn’t like it as much as it did as the beef.
(26:08)
I felt best having, I think it was the lamb shanks and also some of the beef strips cooked in the broth. Those are the things that my body responded to the best. But breakfast would be… I don’t know, I didn’t really didn’t track calories, I didn’t track macros, I didn’t track any of it, just I ate until I was full. But I would probably have about 250, 300 grams of meat at a time. I ran a kilo day for that whole time. So breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Some days it was breakfast, dinner. Some days I would eat four times, but it was typically two to four times. And I think that’s pretty much what I ate that whole time. I did have biltong as well, which is a South African way of processing jerky, because I found a brand that only had salt, white vinegar, and beef. And that was handy when I was out and about or felt lazy. And that was my cheat meal. I had to have something that felt normal. But yeah, that was it for the 30 days.
Stu
(27:12)
So no fruit, no vegetables. What about supplements, did you include any?
Rory
(27:19)
No, I wanted to give it a fair go and see what would happen if I literally just ate meat for that whole time. After the 30 days I started to try introducing foods. I think I’m at day 70, or something like that. I lost track now. Probably closer to 80 or something. And around after day 30 I tried reintroducing raw egg, and I had half a raw egg yolk in my broth and my skin started breaking out and I felt really tired. It wasn’t as intense as it was, but it was super dry. So I was not ready yet. I tried a little bit of avocado, I felt tired. I was like, okay, I just don’t want to mess with that. And then I tried electrolytes, a sodium, magnesium, potassium type blend, and that was really helpful and I didn’t react to that, so I stayed on that. I take electrolytes probably daily I’d say now. And sauerkraut juice was the other thing, because that’s part of the GAPS protocol. And my body loved that. It was incredible actually. It was like sweet heaven.
Stu
(28:29)
Yeah, no doubt. And so sauerkraut juice, but not the sauerkraut, right? Because you mentioned before the histamine. And that that’s very, very common to hear as well. People with gut issues immediately think, right, get me the kombucha, get me the sauerkraut, the kimchi, all of these fermentables. And react off the scale because of that histamine push as well. So very interesting. You said you were 70 days plus now of doing that protocol. Wow. And how do you feel then about timing to reintroduce these foods, if at all, if you want to take that route?
Rory
(29:08)
It’s a tricky one. Where I’m at with it is, I found a very comfortable place. I never waste money on vegetables that sit in the crisper and never get used, which is great. One thing I’ll add is I did start having liver as well, so beef liver on top of that, which my body absolutely loves. It was disgusting at first, but now it craves it and I enjoy the taste. For me, I’m being really slow on the reintroducing just because I’m feeling really good now. And why would I try and push until I feel really drawn? I’m not having troubles with cravings. I’m not wanting to binge on honey or fruits or potato.
(30:02)
It doesn’t occur to me as food anymore because it’s not part of this thing. I’ve had a lot of mental discipline that I’ve had to… When you’ve been suffering for so long you develop a certain discipline that I think a lot of people don’t really have. And you’re just like, right. But because I feel so good, I just don’t want to mess it up yet. And I’ve been working with a GAPS practitioner now, because that’s my goal is to move into GAPS. I don’t plan on being carnivore forever. I want to move into the full GAPS Diet because then I can have more stuff. But that might take months. It could take me a year or two. I’m really open. When I went into this, I wasn’t thinking 30 days is going to heal everything. I went into it thinking, okay, I’m going to give this a go for two years and we’ll see what happens.
(30:48)
And if something happens at the end of the two years, then that’s a win. But I was noticing benefits within the 30 days. But in terms of introducing foods, I was advised to do more meat on the bone and less fried stuff, because I fell into a pattern of having more meat fried in suet, or duck fat or tallow, which is incredibly delicious. But my body is sensitive and so it doesn’t respond to that as well. Yeah, I will keep doing this for a while. What I’m about to do next is I’m going to start doing coffee enemas and activated charcoal and bentonite clay, and stronger on the probiotics and more meat on the bone and less fried meat. I did try avocado again last night and I instantly felt, this doesn’t feel right. Which is crazy, because it’s only this much ever, but it just didn’t feel right. Yeah, the next phase is doing coffee enemas and things like that, which seems to be a controversial thing. I don’t know why, because it does a good trick for a lot of people, but well that’s the next phase.
Stu
(31:57)
No, that’s interesting. And I think it’s a journey, and we are learning about this. And your thoughts on food timing. Because of often times you can introduce certain foods in isolation on their own on an empty stomach, and they’ll behave radically different as if you then perhaps you’ve had your stock and you’ve had your meat and then maybe after that you might want to try quarter of an avocado or something. Different responses for blood glucose, insulin, all of the above, which could then send the wrong signals to your body. Do you mess with timing at all?
Rory
(32:35)
I used to a lot more. I used to be really strict with food timing and… What’s the word? I can’t remember what it is where you time certain things, digestion times. You don’t eat fruit after you eat meat. I was really strict on all that. But now with this, I have my baseline of what I don’t react to, which is meat, particularly lamb my body really likes at the moment. So I know that if I have something with that, that if I react it is because of that new thing I’ve tried to introduce. I haven’t tried introducing anything just on its own actually. It’s either been in broth or with a bit of meat, so that would be interesting. But yeah, it’s recommended to introduce it on its own in meat stock pretty much, that is the next phase [inaudible 00:33:31].
Stu
(33:31)
There’s the courier. There is the courier. No, that is fascinating. It’s funny as well because there’s such a psychological component to this. And I wonder how that plays into maybe the anxiety of the unknown. It’s like, oh, I’m going to try introducing some. I know I reacted to it before. And I read in a book, I think it was Aubrey Marcus’s book about Win the Day. And he said there’s so much psychology that can impact our biology just by thoughts that we can elicit stress hormones just based upon a thought. And you mentioned in the GAPS Diet psychology as well. Do you have any strategies or thoughts, or do you even care about that?
Rory
(34:29)
Yeah, very good question. I think something that needs to be talked about more, and something I’m learning a lot more about. But to give a little bit more context, I think to the psychology part of the GAPS as well, is she found that… She tested this diet on her son, who was very severely autistic. And it was affecting his daily life, as it does for a lot of people. And she noticed that when he had certain foods he would react more, versus if he was eating more like this he would react less. Basically, she helped a lot with the symptoms. I think to the point where he seemed “normal”. What is normal? But it didn’t have those things that were affecting him daily. So the food can definitely have an effect on the mental stuff massively, and she’s had hundreds of clients.
(35:27)
But also the other way around can happen where your state of mind, your emotional health and the way you feel can affect your gut strongly. Your nervous system, your vagus nerve, your polyvagal nerve, I can’t remember what it is. But also trauma in the body can actually severely affect. And this is, I want to say it’s new research, but it’s probably just research that’s been around that’s coming to light. But it’s coming out more and more where if people have trauma responses to things, and this doesn’t have to do with terrible things that happen in your childhood, but prolonged stress or situations that our body interprets as trauma, it actually can create inflammation in the body. And they’ve linked it with scientific studies.
(36:16)
So having stuff that goes on in your head, your emotions, and also trauma in the body can directly affect and create inflammation, intolerances, all these sorts of things. I absolutely believe 100% that our mindset and what’s going on can affect our body. And so I’m working more with both. I don’t think you can just do one and done and you’re good, it’s got to be a combination of my body, soul, as they say.
Stu
(36:46)
Absolutely. It’s fascinating. I had a conversation many years ago with a lady called the Histamine Chef, and she suffered histamine issues that were so life changing for her that she was literally down to five things that she could eat, and strawberries were one of her biggest triggers. And after a whole journey of understanding and workings and building community on histamine focused cooking, she just said, “I’m giving into myself, I’m not doing this anymore.” In terms of her internal battle and the anguish that it was producing within her. And so she went out and she bought a pint of strawberries and she said, “I don’t care anymore. I’m eating these.” And she ate them and she didn’t react. I was so fascinated to hear that.
Rory
(37:35)
Wow. That sounds good to me.
Stu
(37:38)
Well, and you hear about the gut-brain access and same, gut-skin. It’s all connected, it’s all a system. And I think our mind can be so powerful in terms of programming these little fear-based programs that send us down a route when the reality is maybe if we just release and let ourselves go, we won’t react to half as many things. And it may just be reactions on the street outside of food and diet. But yeah, definitely a lot of work to be done in that space as well.
Rory
(38:14)
I agree. Yeah, it’s not a blanket statement as well, I’ve learned. Because she could do that, but then she’s probably worked through a lot of things to be able to do that. Because some people might think, oh, they might listen and be like, okay cool, I’m going to give that a crack. Maybe it’s not a good idea for you. I know if I tried to do that I’m like, well, I’m just going to eat gluten. I’ve tried that so many times. It’s like, yeah.
Stu
(38:39)
I’m heading to the bakery. I’m getting that chocolate croissant. Pros and cons then. Obviously there were so many pros to this, and you’re feeling the best that you have felt, but what were the cons to this? What were the negative aspects, if there were any at all?
Rory
(39:02)
Yeah. There haven’t been many negative aspects, I would say it’s been more positive than not. I’ve got blood work done, before and after, not super elaborate. I wasn’t planning on doing it because it was about how I felt, so I didn’t care about the blood. Because I’ve had blood tests for years and it’s been fine. What is that a measurement for me? I mainly did that for social media. And I’m about to get it read by official blood work person, so I can’t really determine. But things like cholesterol went up a bit, naturally, but that doesn’t really [inaudible 00:39:39] necessarily mean anything either. And then liver went up quite a bit, but also my body was working really hard to basically process, apparently oxalate dumping can do that. There’s a lot of things that could happen.
(39:53)
And I got a little rash around where the liver was and then that died down. But it was like, those are really the only negative things that came out of it. There was a period there around day 17 or 19 where I felt like I was going to die. They call it the die off or keto flu, or oxalate dumping. And that’s where your body switches over into ketosis, or you dump oxalates that you’re eating from plants, or the GAPS die off. It’s this detox phase, and I felt like I was going to die. Headaches. I never get headaches, but I had strong headaches. Felt horrible, aching again, felt like I was going backwards.
(40:35)
It didn’t feel like the flu or COVID or anything like that, because I had that last year or the year before and it was completely different, so I knew that it was directly related. And I was a bit out of it for probably about a week. But then by week six I was feeling really good. Yeah, the first 30 days were really rocky. Also, I was getting very little sleep because the videos started to take off quite a lot in that time. And I had to do the videos outside of work, so I’d sleep like five hours a night, which was horrible. And I feel like that really impacted, but that wasn’t because of the diet, that was just because of my smart life choices. Those were the only downsides. It’s only been positive. Apart from that, I’m still adapting to just eating only meat and the snacking habits.
(41:26)
Because I was a big snacker, I’d love to reach and snack. Socially it’s not been a problem because socially my food situation has always been all over the place anyway. I have people in my life that for the most understand what I’m doing. Even though recently at Christmas and New Years I went with my broth. And I’m like, “Hey guys, I’m really sorry but I can’t do this because I’m doing a thing, and I’ve been severely compromised with my health.” They’re like, “But you eat organic, you eat really healthy. What’s the problem?” I’m like, oh, okay. I went into explaining, didn’t try and convince. Shared what was going on for me and how I was benefiting from it. And it was fine.
(42:03)
But no real negatives, it’s been more positives. And my body is stronger now as well. It’s so much easier to build muscle. And in terms of endurance, I’m not much of an endurance person, so I haven’t tested long distance running and stuff, and still been relatively sedentary. But overall I just feel better. And I actually want to move my body and actually want to get up and do stuff. Whereas before I didn’t, because if I’d run my knees would hurt or something like that. It was more positives than negatives, 100%.
Stu
(42:38)
Okay. And so if you were planning this, let’s say you’re going to plan a program and you’re going to build this out for people, take away all of the guesswork out of this journey for them. Would you do anything differently, or program anything that perhaps you didn’t do but wanted to try or have tried now?
Rory
(42:57)
Totally. I would’ve read the GAPS book properly. Yeah, I would-
Stu
(43:03)
Read the manual.
Rory
(43:04)
Yeah, I would have read the manual. I read part of it and I was like, that’s good enough for me. There’s two versions of the GAPS book. There’s called the Gut and Psychology Syndrome, which is the original one, it’s the yellow book. And that’s where it talks a lot about the mental things, ADHD, autism, dyspraxia, schizophrenia, depression, all these sorts of things. And then she wrote a second one called the Gut and Physiology Syndrome, which is heavily about the physical symptoms, autoimmune allergies, food intolerances, all those sorts of things. And that second book has the No Plant GAPS Diet in there. And I didn’t know, I didn’t have that book when I started. I would’ve gotten that book first and read all the way through that. So that’s the first thing I would’ve done. But if someone is wanting to get started and just they’re desperate, they want to do something tomorrow, what I would say is focus heavily on the meat stocks.
(43:56)
That is the number one thing, make sure you never run out. Make sure you have a liter at all times. If you can go grass fed organic, the quality is better for your body. There’s higher omega 3s in the beef and the lamb. Oh the beef, I don’t know, I’m not a good sciencey person, but you’ve got more nutrients in those, less inflammatory things. But some people have healed on just typical grain fed, normal conventional meat. They’ve had huge benefits. But it just fits in to what I believe even better. I’d have more on the bone, less focus on mints, less focus on rump, just focus on stuff that’s on the bone, like lamb shanks. If you can do chicken, some people just do ruminant meat, so some people only do beef and lamb, bison, that kind of thing. Yeah, lots of meat on the bone, and just do that.
(44:53)
Don’t try and add fried meat in, don’t try and add grilled meat in, don’t do biltong, don’t do jerky. Just literally go hard on meat on the bone and the stock, and just do that. And for me, I would’ve also added in electrolytes earlier because I feel like it would’ve helped with that process. I would suggest, I did Epsom salt baths quite a lot because they help with the detoxification process. Some people say you don’t need to do that, but it helped me incredibly a lot. And if you can help it along a bit, why wouldn’t you? I would also suggest enemas as well as part of it to just help the body. It’s not about trying to clear out the gut, because when you remove the things and you give it what it needs, it does what it needs. But it’s just helps with removing that waste while your body’s doing. Those would be the things that I would say do.
(45:47)
And just make sure you are prepared. Plan 30 days out, this is what I’m going to eat every day. Get the people around you onboard and tell them all what you’re doing, why you’re doing it. The important ones. If you are going to go out and eat, make sure that you are prepared as well. So when I would go out and about, I had a thermos and I would cook my broth that morning, I would pack the thermos with me. I would pack snacks. Just make sure you are prepared is the main thing. And not a lot of people are ready to do this particular type of carnivore. Normal carnivore would be so easy because you’re not doing all these broths and everything like that, meat stocks. But the GAPS is a lifestyle change too, because you got to get comfortable with that kitchen or get someone that can do that for you, because you’re spending a lot more time in there.
(46:34)
Which I love. This is not problem. Those would be my tips is meat on the bone, more meat stocks, read that book, be well. Just start. Just start removing things as early as possible, but just give it a crack. And then those other things I mentioned as well.
Stu
(46:51)
Brilliant. Yeah. Fantastic. Have you considered sauna as part of the toolkit to aid detoxification, et cetera?
Rory
(46:59)
100%. It’s more of an access issue with time and access. If I had a sauna here, I would 100% be doing that every day. Yeah, definitely. Yeah.
Stu
(47:11)
Okay. Where to from here? You’ve got a truckload of information, you’ve applied it to yourself, it’s made a difference. And there are a whole heap of people out there that are suffering what you are suffering. And as we mentioned before, a whole heap of people that don’t realize that there’s stuff going on really that could make them feel so much better than they do. Because we deserve to feel the best. What are you going to do with this?
Rory
(47:35)
Well, I think the main thing is I’m just going to keep going. Because this is literally, and I will keep saying this, this is the best I have felt in my whole adult life. I’m 33 now, I’ve been on this health journey for about 14 years. This is the best I’ve consistently felt, which is a huge thing. Firstly, I want to keep going and slowly introduce. The second thing that I’m going to do is I’m just going to keep sharing my journey. I don’t think I would’ve been able to do it as easy if I wasn’t sharing it with thousands of people on social media. I think the accountability really helped me anyway. I know it doesn’t always help people, but that really helped. But also the impact from me starting was not only has my health improved, but so many people that have been suffering with all the things that I’ve had, they were like, I’m going to take a leap.
(48:31)
I’m just going to give a crap, see what Rory’s doing, because I was showing what I was eating every day. So they’re like, I’ll at least start there. And I’ve seen other people within weeks actually reverse a lot of the things that I’ve had, reduce it dramatically. Some people it’s taken longer. But the impact this is now having is just huge. And so I can’t not continue sharing and I can’t not keep doing it. For me, it’s like to keep sharing my journey through social media, to do all those things, spend more time doing this. I’ll be going full-time into doing this come February, which would be really cool. And just really focusing on sharing my journey, pumping out lots of content. And just sharing the journey authentically bit by bit.
(49:18)
Because I think one of the cool things is I’m not a nutrition guru. I don’t have qualifications. I’m not trying to push any supplements. Not push, but you know what I mean, some people do things for that purpose. But it’s like, I’m just here, just share my journey. And it’s like, I think it had so much credibility for people to be like, I can do this. Rory’s a dude. I was like, maybe I should get a nutrition degree. It’s like, no, I think that I’d lose my credibility.
Stu
(49:49)
You would. You totally would. And I just think that it really highlights that it’s empowering. So we can empower ourselves, and there is real power in the food that we eat, or perhaps the food that we don’t eat. Because I’ve got a daughter with ulcerative colitis, and we were told by the gastro team, actually close to where you are, doesn’t matter what you eat, doesn’t matter. And inside of me I just said, I just don’t believe that’s true. And so I reached out to some really, really clued up people on the podcast and they said, “It totally matters what you eat.” And so she’s been on reasonably strict paleo for a long time now, and she is completely symptom free. And the guys were saying, “What are you doing?” And then we just said, “You know what, we just manage her diet.”
(50:39)
And so she’s grain free, she’s sugar free. She’s into the broths and the collagens and gelatins. And she loves her meat and she’s thriving. And so there’s stuff that we can do. And so that’s a huge driver for me just to communicate to everybody who has this issue who’s just frustrated to the hilt that they can’t get any answers. That there’s people like you that tried it, done it, and are thriving. Just to keep going. Fantastic. Mate, this has been an excellent conversation and I really enjoyed it. For all of our listeners that they want to find out more about you, they want to dial into your Instagram or your YouTube videos, where can we send them?
Rory
(51:26)
Cool. I am everywhere it seems. This year I’m very much focused on YouTube, so you just find me at Rory’s Kitchen, basically in everything. Just search for Rory’s Kitchen. My main platforms is YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, some videos to track up on Facebook too. But mainly YouTube and Instagram, TikTok, they seem to be the things. But I’ve also got a blog that I’m chucking up recipes on now as well, roryskitchen.net. I’ve got my meat stock recipe on there. And then also I’ve got a newsletter as well on my website now just to share the ins and outs. But that’s where you can find me.
Stu
(52:02)
Awesome. That’s brilliant. Mate, look, we’ll put those links in the show notes for our listeners as well. But I have thoroughly enjoyed this conversation and I know that this one will resonate way above in terms of what we’re putting out there, because this is a big issue for everybody. And so I really wanted to hear this story.
Rory
(52:26)
Me too. Yeah. My goal with what I’m doing on a bigger scale is I’m not sure if people listening are familiar with people like Mr. Beast or these big YouTubers that get a lot of views and millions of followers and subscribers and stuff like that. And I would like to blow this up as much as possible so I could reach as many people as possible. And just let people know that they don’t have to suffer and that there are solutions. Hey, maybe it might not be carnivore, maybe it might not be GAPS, but for them to not give up in their relentless search for health. And so I just want to reach as many people as possible and just get started. Each step on the journey will get you there. Maybe it might not be tomorrow, it might not be in a month, maybe it could be a year before you find your answers. But I found my answers doing this. And if you don’t have your health, then you literally have nothing to lose.
Stu
(53:17)
Exactly. Exactly right. Well yeah, health’s the number one currency for sure. Mate, best of luck. And I hope to touch in with you at some stage in the future, because I’m sure this is going to go bigger than Ben-Hur. Thank you so much for your time, much appreciated. And hopefully we’ll catch up in the future.
Rory
(53:35)
Sounds good, man. Thanks for having me on. Love what you’re doing. Keep rocking, man.
Stu
(53:39)
Thank you, mate. Bye-Bye.
