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Food, We Need to Talk: The Science-Based, Humor-Laced Last Word on Eating, Diet, and Making Peace with Your Body
This is an unusual – and unusually interesting – exploration of diet, weight and health that touches on memoir but lands on practicality. It’s a cut-to-the-chase book that makes you realize that not everything you know about dieting and weight loss – no matter how much you've read or experienced before – is true, and that way too much of your brain, your time and your pocketbook has been taken up with the endless (and futile) quest. The authors’ two distinct voices thread and play off each other throughout the book as they cover these intensively-researched
–Metabolism
–Why Every Diet Works... and Then Doesn’t
–What Actually is “Healthy” Food?
–The (Almost) Magic Exercise
–Detox Teas, Juice Cleanses, Supplements, & Waist Trainers
–The Science of Fat Loss
–Sleep, Stress and Your Waistline
–Disordered Eating or Eating Disorder?
–The History of Dieting
–The Biggest Key to Success - A Manifesto on Body Image
–How to Make This Your Last Diet
–Becoming a Professional BS Detector
Food, We Need To Talk is a young woman’s look at the landscape of dieting, weight and health as it is right this moment–from the modern body-inclusivity movement to weight and dressing for social media instead of real life–as well as a very relatable doctor’s long view. Together, they’ve created a unique, information-rich book with a real voice that entertains as it pulls you through.
–Metabolism
–Why Every Diet Works... and Then Doesn’t
–What Actually is “Healthy” Food?
–The (Almost) Magic Exercise
–Detox Teas, Juice Cleanses, Supplements, & Waist Trainers
–The Science of Fat Loss
–Sleep, Stress and Your Waistline
–Disordered Eating or Eating Disorder?
–The History of Dieting
–The Biggest Key to Success - A Manifesto on Body Image
–How to Make This Your Last Diet
–Becoming a Professional BS Detector
Food, We Need To Talk is a young woman’s look at the landscape of dieting, weight and health as it is right this moment–from the modern body-inclusivity movement to weight and dressing for social media instead of real life–as well as a very relatable doctor’s long view. Together, they’ve created a unique, information-rich book with a real voice that entertains as it pulls you through.
368 pages, Hardcover
Published July 11, 2023
64 people are currently reading
3756 people want to read
About the author
Juna Gjata
1 book15 followersJuna Gjata graduated from Harvard College with a Bachelor's in Cognitive Neuroscience and Evolutionary Psychology and a minor in Music.
In a random plot twist, Juna actually aspired to be a concert pianist up until 2018, so she spent most of her late teens and early twenties in dark, cold practice rooms, plunking away at pieces by Chopin and Rachmaninoff. Her hours in these tiny rooms led her to some pretty cool opportunities playing at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. Ultimately however, she decided she loved people too much (and was far too unskilled) to make it as a concert pianist.
In 2018, she launched the hit podcast Food We Need to Talk with Boston's NPR station, WBUR. The podcast focuses on her other passion, health and fitness. She cohosts the show with Dr. Eddie Phillips, Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School. The podcast was also the catalyst for her first book, Food We Need to Talk: The Science-Based, Humor-Laced Last Word on Eating, Diet, and Making Peace with Your Body, published by St. Martin's Press.
Outside of the gym, the podcast, the book, and piano, Juna is obsessed with snowboarding, Starbucks, learning a backflip, and making videos on TikTok. (Note: The latter is mostly for the never-ending struggle of proving that she is in fact "cool" to her youngest sister.)
In a random plot twist, Juna actually aspired to be a concert pianist up until 2018, so she spent most of her late teens and early twenties in dark, cold practice rooms, plunking away at pieces by Chopin and Rachmaninoff. Her hours in these tiny rooms led her to some pretty cool opportunities playing at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. Ultimately however, she decided she loved people too much (and was far too unskilled) to make it as a concert pianist.
In 2018, she launched the hit podcast Food We Need to Talk with Boston's NPR station, WBUR. The podcast focuses on her other passion, health and fitness. She cohosts the show with Dr. Eddie Phillips, Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School. The podcast was also the catalyst for her first book, Food We Need to Talk: The Science-Based, Humor-Laced Last Word on Eating, Diet, and Making Peace with Your Body, published by St. Martin's Press.
Outside of the gym, the podcast, the book, and piano, Juna is obsessed with snowboarding, Starbucks, learning a backflip, and making videos on TikTok. (Note: The latter is mostly for the never-ending struggle of proving that she is in fact "cool" to her youngest sister.)
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 87 reviews
July 4, 2023
Please note that I received this book via NetGalley. This did not affect my rating or review.
Trigger warning: Discussion of disordered eating
I really enjoyed this book. Some topics do have trigger warnings (disordered eating discussion) but I really enjoyed the humor and easy way the authors broke down everything from diet culture, to why processed foods aren’t great, and yes why we need to exercise (yes walking is great!) to how sleep is really important.
Full Review: I really thought this was a great book. Some things I already know about, such as needing to add weights if you do want to lose weight and add muscle. About how it's generally not a great idea to just eat tons of red meat, and that sleep really is life changing.
The book is broken down into the following chapters:
-Introductions
-Chapter 1: From the Victorians to the Kardashians
-Chapter 2: Metabolism and the Physiology of Weight Loss
-Chapter 3: Why All Diets Work...Then Don't
-Chapter 4: Weight and Health
-Chapter 5: What to Eat
-Chapter 6: Exercise: The Magic Pill
-Chapter 7: A Love Letter to the Gym
-Chapter 8: Too "Fat" to Have an Eating Disorder
-Chapter 9: From a Dad
-Chapter 10: Stress, Eating, and Weight
-Chapter 11: Why You Shouldn't Sleep on Sleep
-Chapter 12: What Matters Most and Making Lasting Change
-Epilogue
I don't want to describe each chapter, but my favorites were Chapter 2, Chapter 3, and Chapter 8.
Chapter 2 really hit me because I have been hearing for years that I just have to jump start my metabolism to lose weight. This book is like, hahaha, that's BS. I definitely marked up this chapter and it did a great job of helping me think of food and working out differently. Pretty much the authors say, you need to exercise and not try to go into starvation mode when you are trying to lose weight. How many of us have gone on some terrible cabbage soup thing when we wanted to look slimmer? Also BMI is BS.
Chapter 3 was another good one. I lost over 20 pounds pre-pandemic because I really was eating and measuring my food since American servings are a mess LOL. I got back to that recently and just lost another 7. I got promoted last year and with the added stress and lack of time to work out, I put on weight. And I felt sluggish and awful. The past few months getting back to exercise (I love hiking) and just making my own food is what caused the weight to roll off again. This chapter just confirms everything I did and why I was able to keep weight off. It's not fun, but you track your food, I weigh myself at least once a week, I also don't do "flash diets". I do Mediterranean cook for most of my meals because it got recommended to me by my cardiologist and my doctor-generalist because of my father's side of the family and it's history of heart disease. No worries, my heart is great. They even took a look a year ago and said my calcium score meant I could eat fried food for a while if I wanted to (haha).
Chapter 8 was painful to read. I thought it was a very helpful and honest chapter though. Many people out there suffer from disordered eating and it's important to keep that in mind when you are trying to be healthy, to not go so over on the other side that you start to see your body and food as the enemy.
Trigger warning: Discussion of disordered eating
I really enjoyed this book. Some topics do have trigger warnings (disordered eating discussion) but I really enjoyed the humor and easy way the authors broke down everything from diet culture, to why processed foods aren’t great, and yes why we need to exercise (yes walking is great!) to how sleep is really important.
Full Review: I really thought this was a great book. Some things I already know about, such as needing to add weights if you do want to lose weight and add muscle. About how it's generally not a great idea to just eat tons of red meat, and that sleep really is life changing.
The book is broken down into the following chapters:
-Introductions
-Chapter 1: From the Victorians to the Kardashians
-Chapter 2: Metabolism and the Physiology of Weight Loss
-Chapter 3: Why All Diets Work...Then Don't
-Chapter 4: Weight and Health
-Chapter 5: What to Eat
-Chapter 6: Exercise: The Magic Pill
-Chapter 7: A Love Letter to the Gym
-Chapter 8: Too "Fat" to Have an Eating Disorder
-Chapter 9: From a Dad
-Chapter 10: Stress, Eating, and Weight
-Chapter 11: Why You Shouldn't Sleep on Sleep
-Chapter 12: What Matters Most and Making Lasting Change
-Epilogue
I don't want to describe each chapter, but my favorites were Chapter 2, Chapter 3, and Chapter 8.
Chapter 2 really hit me because I have been hearing for years that I just have to jump start my metabolism to lose weight. This book is like, hahaha, that's BS. I definitely marked up this chapter and it did a great job of helping me think of food and working out differently. Pretty much the authors say, you need to exercise and not try to go into starvation mode when you are trying to lose weight. How many of us have gone on some terrible cabbage soup thing when we wanted to look slimmer? Also BMI is BS.
Chapter 3 was another good one. I lost over 20 pounds pre-pandemic because I really was eating and measuring my food since American servings are a mess LOL. I got back to that recently and just lost another 7. I got promoted last year and with the added stress and lack of time to work out, I put on weight. And I felt sluggish and awful. The past few months getting back to exercise (I love hiking) and just making my own food is what caused the weight to roll off again. This chapter just confirms everything I did and why I was able to keep weight off. It's not fun, but you track your food, I weigh myself at least once a week, I also don't do "flash diets". I do Mediterranean cook for most of my meals because it got recommended to me by my cardiologist and my doctor-generalist because of my father's side of the family and it's history of heart disease. No worries, my heart is great. They even took a look a year ago and said my calcium score meant I could eat fried food for a while if I wanted to (haha).
Chapter 8 was painful to read. I thought it was a very helpful and honest chapter though. Many people out there suffer from disordered eating and it's important to keep that in mind when you are trying to be healthy, to not go so over on the other side that you start to see your body and food as the enemy.
July 21, 2023
Full review to come. But in the mean time, suffice it to say:
If you are a person who is struggling with disordered eating in any way, this is not a safe book for you.
If you are a person in a larger body, this is not a safe book for you.
If you are a person who is struggling with disordered eating in any way, this is not a safe book for you.
If you are a person in a larger body, this is not a safe book for you.
July 19, 2023
This is an informative resource that tells the truth about the many fad diets out there and why they don't work. If you are a veteran of many failed diets, this book is for you.
I received a free copy of this book from the publishers. My review is voluntary and the opinions expressed are my own.
I received a free copy of this book from the publishers. My review is voluntary and the opinions expressed are my own.
March 16, 2025
This was actually pretty good; it’s based on a podcast. Growing up, Juna was obsessed with her weight and body image (despite being mostly blind). This book uses scientific data to fight back against fad diet culture and the media’s obsession with thin bodies. It’s written with humor and compassion.
Weight is connected to calories—eat more than you need, you gain weight; eat less than you need and lose it. But low (or high) weight doesn’t necessarily mean healthy. And while food can be broken down to its nutrients, that’s not how we process it. The book covers dieting, exercise, stress management, sleep hygiene, and eating disorders with the goal of optimizing health, physical and mental. Your body is designed to be a certain shape and size, and when you focus on health and stop obsessing over weight, you’ll be happier overall and feel better.
*Reader’s Choice Nominee Spring 2025*
Language: Occasional strong language
Sexual Content: None
Violence/Gore: Descriptions of body functions that shouldn’t bother anyone
Harm to Animals:
Harm to Children:
Other (Triggers):
Weight is connected to calories—eat more than you need, you gain weight; eat less than you need and lose it. But low (or high) weight doesn’t necessarily mean healthy. And while food can be broken down to its nutrients, that’s not how we process it. The book covers dieting, exercise, stress management, sleep hygiene, and eating disorders with the goal of optimizing health, physical and mental. Your body is designed to be a certain shape and size, and when you focus on health and stop obsessing over weight, you’ll be happier overall and feel better.
*Reader’s Choice Nominee Spring 2025*
Language: Occasional strong language
Sexual Content: None
Violence/Gore: Descriptions of body functions that shouldn’t bother anyone
Harm to Animals:
Harm to Children:
Other (Triggers):
August 5, 2023
This is one of the few self help books I have read end to end. Did I learn anything, no. Nothing that I haven't heard over the years but it was a nice pat on the back after eating my way through the last couple of years. I was only skinny as a teen and sports playing and a friend who ran. I only ran playing soccer and badminton, she ran I rode my bike.
The last few years have been more stressful than those during kid 1's life to date especially puberty. Yes she's been elsewhere for over a year, yes you can hang up a phone. Toss in dh's crap and a few months ago standing on my mother's scale... enough.
I have managed 4 lbs of the initial 10 (I would like more but starting small), a lb a month. Better eating, less junk, more walking and stretching. Not the least bit perfect but rembering my previous Dr's advice (and this book) of doing something small and do it every day.
I deliberately allowed myself to have a few adult beverages, cheese and crackers at "tea" time and junk (my sugar intake is down not gone but cheezies are a no no I broke) and my gut has rebelled, which is a reminder why you weren't eating everything in the first place. Was at the parents for a break.
pg 238 "the women with more abdominal fat have much higher cortisol responses when exposed to a stressor"... Years ago talking to my previous Dr as my BP started to climb when I turned 40, I remember telling her I didn't feel stressed and her response was "I don't think you would know what stressed feels like anymore".
The book doesn't promise and doesn't preach. Just presents the information for you to do as you please with it.
The last few years have been more stressful than those during kid 1's life to date especially puberty. Yes she's been elsewhere for over a year, yes you can hang up a phone. Toss in dh's crap and a few months ago standing on my mother's scale... enough.
I have managed 4 lbs of the initial 10 (I would like more but starting small), a lb a month. Better eating, less junk, more walking and stretching. Not the least bit perfect but rembering my previous Dr's advice (and this book) of doing something small and do it every day.
I deliberately allowed myself to have a few adult beverages, cheese and crackers at "tea" time and junk (my sugar intake is down not gone but cheezies are a no no I broke) and my gut has rebelled, which is a reminder why you weren't eating everything in the first place. Was at the parents for a break.
pg 238 "the women with more abdominal fat have much higher cortisol responses when exposed to a stressor"... Years ago talking to my previous Dr as my BP started to climb when I turned 40, I remember telling her I didn't feel stressed and her response was "I don't think you would know what stressed feels like anymore".
The book doesn't promise and doesn't preach. Just presents the information for you to do as you please with it.
April 15, 2024
Palju head ja uut infot, aga üldistav. Oleks võinud rääkida rohkem nt veresuhkru tasakaalustamisest jne. Toitumishäirete osa oli äärmiselt silmiavav.
Loetud ingliskeelse audioraamatu ja eestikeelse raamatu kombona. Eestikeelne tõlge polnud parim.
Loetud ingliskeelse audioraamatu ja eestikeelse raamatu kombona. Eestikeelne tõlge polnud parim.
April 1, 2025
A Readers Choice book from the Library. No new or exciting information for me.
April 24, 2024
I’m a fan of the podcast, and I also enjoyed the book. It presents complicated topics with nuance and understanding that there’s no one right answer. It was a bit repetitive at times, but presented lots of good information. I’m in a pretty good place with my body, and food at the moment, but this book helped me realize that I definitely had disordered eating behaviors in the past. The conversation between Eddy and his daughter about her eating disorder was heartbreaking and honest.
Juna says that she wrote this for her younger self, and I think my younger self would have appreciated it too.
Juna says that she wrote this for her younger self, and I think my younger self would have appreciated it too.
May 28, 2024
I really liked this book! I found it to be both informative and entertaining. The authors used science, research, humor, and personal experiences to help the reader to understand what our bodies need to be healthy. They discuss how culture and history, as well as scientific advances, have shaped what we eat and how we feel about our bodies. Exercise, sleep, eating disorders, stress, and habits were also discussed. It was a fairly easy read and addressed questions I had about diet and how our bodies actually work and use nutrition. This is not a “diet” book, but rather a “best practices” book. I would highly recommend.
March 19, 2025
Very approachable. An invested layperson sharing what they've learned on the subject, supported by an expert that occasionally weighs in. In that way, very similar to How To Be Perfect by Mike Schur.
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-notes/spoilers-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Lifestyle medicine- 80% of the diseases killing us today can be prevented by changing our habits; nutrition, movement, stress, sleep, etc. Changing these things can be really hard. Lifestyle medicine seeks to help.
1863 diet book: "A letter on corpulence." William Banting. "Maybe first person to lose a ton of weight and never shut up about it." Low carb, low sweet, meat heavy diet. "Dieting was now seen as an activity for the 'striving middle-class,' a positive sign of ambition, not necessarily for the rich, but also no longer associated with being broke and hungry. It was now a way of showing the self restraint and mental fitness if the middle class white man, even in the face of available excess." At this time, the ideal female body was still soft.
Softness was for women, activity and fitness were for men. " It wasn't men, doctors, or even fashion designers who first gave women diet and exercise recommendations, but rather early women's rights activists." 1886, Anna Kingsford, published first ever brief diet program for women. Healthy diet and exercise, waking early, and a generally active lifestyle. Rachel Gleason, one of the first American women doctors, recommended women gain more muscle and spoke out against corsets. "Dieting started off as a way for women to show that they could exert the same level of control and ownership over their own bodies as men did."
Slender female body- associated with strength and self-restraint, and whiteness and middle-class. Plumpness- unkempt, uncontrollable body of the racial and ethnic other. Laziness, indulgence, lack of education, vulgarity, profanity. Black female body often portrayed as rotund and obese, "Mamie" and "Aunt Jemima." Being thin was seen as taking control, even being a little rebellious, or refined and worldly; being chubby was for motherhood and homemakers, man-catching.
Beauty ideal fluctuations over the decades- 1920s, boyish flapper girl. 1960s, Marilyn Monroe curvy. 1980s, exercise is in style. 1990s, heroin chic. 2010s, slim thick, Kim Kardashian.
Calorie is a measure of heat. First animal calorimeter, or calorie measurer. Antoine lavoisier, put a guinea pig in a bucket of ice, insulated by a bucket of snow, and measured the runoff of the ice that was melted by the guinea pig's body heat. Just like a fire, we take in oxygen and produce carbon dioxide and heat. Excess energy from food, caloric excess, gets stored in glycogen in your liver and muscles, and lipids in your fat tissue. Total daily energy expenditure.
Tdee. Scientific term for metabolism.
Bmr, basal metabolic rate, makes up the majority of tdee for most people. Minimum amount of energy your body needs in order to keep you alive. Can be largely predicted by your lean muscle mass. Muscle takes more calories to maintain than fat stores.
Tef, thermic effect of food. Energy you spend digesting your food. About 10% of your tdee.
Activity thermogenesis. Energy you use up through movement. Two subcategory is: exercise, and non-exercise. Eat, exercise activity. Thermogenesis. Purposeful exercise. As of 2015, only 23% of US adults met the Federal guidelines for physical activity. 150 minutes per week of moderate physical activity, or 75 minutes per week of vigorous physical activity and twice weekly resistance exercise. Even for those who exercise regularly, exercise only makes up about 5 to 10% of their tdee. Though exercise doesn't attribute a large portion of calorie burn. It is still immensely beneficial to your health, esp. vis-a-vis anxiety, sleep, quality of life, life expectancy, cognitive function. Etc. Exercise also appears to be crucial in resisting weight regain after weight loss.
Non-Exercise activity thermogenesis, neat. All the energy you spend that isn't purposeful exercise. A major contributor to discrepancies in different individuals metabolisms. Modern lifestyles require vastly lower activity levels than those of our ancestors. 1/3 of us adults are considered sedentary (less than 5,000 steps a day). Additional 47% are considered low somewhat active(5,000 to 10,000 steps a day ). Studies have shown that lean individuals maintain their movement patterns in the natural gaining weight. And individuals With obesity, maintain their more sedentary patterns Even after losing weight. Those who are predisposed to obesity May experience a lower biological drive to move.
Metabolic adaptation, adaptive thermogenesis. Your body is constantly making adjustments to your metabolic rate and behaviors in response to the information it receives about current energy availability. Its goal is homeostasis.
Someone who has lost a lot of weight will have a slower basal metabolic rate than someone of comparable size. Energy compensation. In an attempt to compensate for increased energy needs or lower energy availability, the body stops allocating resources to the processes it deems inessential, and prioritizes The things it thinks are essential. One of the first things to go are reproductive hormones and function.
Metabolism is highest in infancy, slowly slows down until age 20, where it plateaus for the next 40 years. Then another gradual decline throughout Old age.
Modern day environment is obesogenic- promoted reading in excess of energy needs. Food is calorie dense, delicious, and readily available. We don't have to move much throughout the day. Society doesn't promote good sleep habits, values work above all else contributing to constant low-level stress. Our biology has mechanisms in place to keep us from losing too much weight, which are much for efficient than our biology's mechanisms that keep us from gaining too much weight.
Dieting unconsciously decreases desire to move, either intentional or unintentional movement.
Body gets better at storing fat while in a weight loss phase.
Epigenetics - The way your genes are expressed is influenced by environment and external factors.
Fat cell hyperplasia- Creation of new fat cells after weight loss.
The more you diet, the more quickly you regain weight after you diet. And the harder it becomes to lose weight during subsequent diets.
National weight control registry, nwcr, 1993. What are people who are successful at long-term weight loss maintenance doing differently than the rest of us?
The body's ability to store fat is a defense mechanism against elevated (something) levels in the blood. Excess of fat on the body is an indicator of habitually consuming too many calories, which excessive consumption is bad for overall health.
Trans fat was developed to replace saturated fat as a" healthier option ", but it's much worse for you..
Study, replacing animal saturated fats with vegetable fats. Reduced risk of heart disease, but increased risk of other diseases.
As we age, our lean muscle mass slowly deteriorates and gets replaced by fat. Unless you do resistance training. Trained muscle burns 50% more calories than untrained muscle.
Resistance training increases MBR.
The greatest contributor to the metabolic slowdown attributed to shine: loss of muscle mass.
www.eat-26.com "Eating Attitudes Test": standardized self-report measure of eating disorder associated attitudes, symptoms, and concerns.
Stress and weight. Acute stress mobilizes energy for fast use, fight or flight. Chronic stress facilitates at storage and triggers you to eat more, especially ,calorie dents food, and move less.
Higher cortisone levels is linked with higher amounts of abdominal fat. Eating tasty comfort food when stressed has a biological foundation. You are getting a rush of neurotransmitters associated with reward.
21% of deadly car crashes involve a drowsy driver.
Brain undergoes self-cleaning during sleep: cerebral spinal fluid washes through brain during sleep, clearing out neurotoxins, particularly a protein called beta amyloid. These proteins can build up and firm plaques in the brain, which is a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease.
Guinness World records will no longer do sleep deprivation records because of how threatening it is to health.
Caffeine that you ingest has a 5-hour half-life.
"The depth of our social connection is closely related to positive health outcomes. While focusing on what really matters, also ask yourself who really matters."
"Aesthetics are often the byproduct of chasing health, but health is rarely a byproduct of chasing aesthetics." "Find a better reason, and you may find that you also make better goals."
It is easier to start new habits than to change/break old habits.
Friction- find a way to reduce the friction on habits you want to form, and produce friction on habits you want to discourage. ie: eat popcorn with left hand. Keep yummy snacks somewhere it's harder to get to. More challenging, less automatic.
Pair a new habit with a habit that's already established, it can hitchhike and benefit from the first habit's momentum.
-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-notes/spoilers-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Lifestyle medicine- 80% of the diseases killing us today can be prevented by changing our habits; nutrition, movement, stress, sleep, etc. Changing these things can be really hard. Lifestyle medicine seeks to help.
1863 diet book: "A letter on corpulence." William Banting. "Maybe first person to lose a ton of weight and never shut up about it." Low carb, low sweet, meat heavy diet. "Dieting was now seen as an activity for the 'striving middle-class,' a positive sign of ambition, not necessarily for the rich, but also no longer associated with being broke and hungry. It was now a way of showing the self restraint and mental fitness if the middle class white man, even in the face of available excess." At this time, the ideal female body was still soft.
Softness was for women, activity and fitness were for men. " It wasn't men, doctors, or even fashion designers who first gave women diet and exercise recommendations, but rather early women's rights activists." 1886, Anna Kingsford, published first ever brief diet program for women. Healthy diet and exercise, waking early, and a generally active lifestyle. Rachel Gleason, one of the first American women doctors, recommended women gain more muscle and spoke out against corsets. "Dieting started off as a way for women to show that they could exert the same level of control and ownership over their own bodies as men did."
Slender female body- associated with strength and self-restraint, and whiteness and middle-class. Plumpness- unkempt, uncontrollable body of the racial and ethnic other. Laziness, indulgence, lack of education, vulgarity, profanity. Black female body often portrayed as rotund and obese, "Mamie" and "Aunt Jemima." Being thin was seen as taking control, even being a little rebellious, or refined and worldly; being chubby was for motherhood and homemakers, man-catching.
Beauty ideal fluctuations over the decades- 1920s, boyish flapper girl. 1960s, Marilyn Monroe curvy. 1980s, exercise is in style. 1990s, heroin chic. 2010s, slim thick, Kim Kardashian.
Calorie is a measure of heat. First animal calorimeter, or calorie measurer. Antoine lavoisier, put a guinea pig in a bucket of ice, insulated by a bucket of snow, and measured the runoff of the ice that was melted by the guinea pig's body heat. Just like a fire, we take in oxygen and produce carbon dioxide and heat. Excess energy from food, caloric excess, gets stored in glycogen in your liver and muscles, and lipids in your fat tissue. Total daily energy expenditure.
Tdee. Scientific term for metabolism.
Bmr, basal metabolic rate, makes up the majority of tdee for most people. Minimum amount of energy your body needs in order to keep you alive. Can be largely predicted by your lean muscle mass. Muscle takes more calories to maintain than fat stores.
Tef, thermic effect of food. Energy you spend digesting your food. About 10% of your tdee.
Activity thermogenesis. Energy you use up through movement. Two subcategory is: exercise, and non-exercise. Eat, exercise activity. Thermogenesis. Purposeful exercise. As of 2015, only 23% of US adults met the Federal guidelines for physical activity. 150 minutes per week of moderate physical activity, or 75 minutes per week of vigorous physical activity and twice weekly resistance exercise. Even for those who exercise regularly, exercise only makes up about 5 to 10% of their tdee. Though exercise doesn't attribute a large portion of calorie burn. It is still immensely beneficial to your health, esp. vis-a-vis anxiety, sleep, quality of life, life expectancy, cognitive function. Etc. Exercise also appears to be crucial in resisting weight regain after weight loss.
Non-Exercise activity thermogenesis, neat. All the energy you spend that isn't purposeful exercise. A major contributor to discrepancies in different individuals metabolisms. Modern lifestyles require vastly lower activity levels than those of our ancestors. 1/3 of us adults are considered sedentary (less than 5,000 steps a day). Additional 47% are considered low somewhat active(5,000 to 10,000 steps a day ). Studies have shown that lean individuals maintain their movement patterns in the natural gaining weight. And individuals With obesity, maintain their more sedentary patterns Even after losing weight. Those who are predisposed to obesity May experience a lower biological drive to move.
Metabolic adaptation, adaptive thermogenesis. Your body is constantly making adjustments to your metabolic rate and behaviors in response to the information it receives about current energy availability. Its goal is homeostasis.
Someone who has lost a lot of weight will have a slower basal metabolic rate than someone of comparable size. Energy compensation. In an attempt to compensate for increased energy needs or lower energy availability, the body stops allocating resources to the processes it deems inessential, and prioritizes The things it thinks are essential. One of the first things to go are reproductive hormones and function.
Metabolism is highest in infancy, slowly slows down until age 20, where it plateaus for the next 40 years. Then another gradual decline throughout Old age.
Modern day environment is obesogenic- promoted reading in excess of energy needs. Food is calorie dense, delicious, and readily available. We don't have to move much throughout the day. Society doesn't promote good sleep habits, values work above all else contributing to constant low-level stress. Our biology has mechanisms in place to keep us from losing too much weight, which are much for efficient than our biology's mechanisms that keep us from gaining too much weight.
Dieting unconsciously decreases desire to move, either intentional or unintentional movement.
Body gets better at storing fat while in a weight loss phase.
Epigenetics - The way your genes are expressed is influenced by environment and external factors.
Fat cell hyperplasia- Creation of new fat cells after weight loss.
The more you diet, the more quickly you regain weight after you diet. And the harder it becomes to lose weight during subsequent diets.
National weight control registry, nwcr, 1993. What are people who are successful at long-term weight loss maintenance doing differently than the rest of us?
The body's ability to store fat is a defense mechanism against elevated (something) levels in the blood. Excess of fat on the body is an indicator of habitually consuming too many calories, which excessive consumption is bad for overall health.
Trans fat was developed to replace saturated fat as a" healthier option ", but it's much worse for you..
Study, replacing animal saturated fats with vegetable fats. Reduced risk of heart disease, but increased risk of other diseases.
As we age, our lean muscle mass slowly deteriorates and gets replaced by fat. Unless you do resistance training. Trained muscle burns 50% more calories than untrained muscle.
Resistance training increases MBR.
The greatest contributor to the metabolic slowdown attributed to shine: loss of muscle mass.
www.eat-26.com "Eating Attitudes Test": standardized self-report measure of eating disorder associated attitudes, symptoms, and concerns.
Stress and weight. Acute stress mobilizes energy for fast use, fight or flight. Chronic stress facilitates at storage and triggers you to eat more, especially ,calorie dents food, and move less.
Higher cortisone levels is linked with higher amounts of abdominal fat. Eating tasty comfort food when stressed has a biological foundation. You are getting a rush of neurotransmitters associated with reward.
21% of deadly car crashes involve a drowsy driver.
Brain undergoes self-cleaning during sleep: cerebral spinal fluid washes through brain during sleep, clearing out neurotoxins, particularly a protein called beta amyloid. These proteins can build up and firm plaques in the brain, which is a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease.
Guinness World records will no longer do sleep deprivation records because of how threatening it is to health.
Caffeine that you ingest has a 5-hour half-life.
"The depth of our social connection is closely related to positive health outcomes. While focusing on what really matters, also ask yourself who really matters."
"Aesthetics are often the byproduct of chasing health, but health is rarely a byproduct of chasing aesthetics." "Find a better reason, and you may find that you also make better goals."
It is easier to start new habits than to change/break old habits.
Friction- find a way to reduce the friction on habits you want to form, and produce friction on habits you want to discourage. ie: eat popcorn with left hand. Keep yummy snacks somewhere it's harder to get to. More challenging, less automatic.
Pair a new habit with a habit that's already established, it can hitchhike and benefit from the first habit's momentum.
April 28, 2024
I am going to reference the book's description as given as I cannot word it as well as they can.
Synopsis:
************
This is an unusual – and unusually interesting – exploration of diet, weight and health that touches on memoir but lands on practicality. It’s a cut-to-the-chase book that makes you realize that not everything you know about dieting and weight loss – no matter how much you've read or experienced before – is true, and that way too much of your brain, your time and your pocketbook has been taken up with the endless (and futile) quest. The authors’ two distinct voices thread and play off each other throughout the book as they cover these intensively-researched topics:
–Metabolism
–Why Every Diet Works... and Then Doesn’t
–What Actually is “Healthy” Food?
–The (Almost) Magic Pill: Exercise
–Detox Teas, Juice Cleanses, Supplements, & Waist Trainers
–The Science of Fat Loss
–Sleep, Stress and Your Waistline
–Disordered Eating or Eating Disorder?
–The History of Dieting
–The Biggest Key to Success - A Manifesto on Body Image
–How to Make This Your Last Diet
–Becoming a Professional BS Detector
Diet is not just about food - it is about so many different things...I have been eating 1000 calories a day for three months and I have lost ... 2 pounds. But at least I am not gaining. (Okay, I hate exercising so that is probably part of it!)
Don't listen to "influencers" or pay for their product$$$...they don't work. And those Kardashians and Kardashian-wanna-bes are only after your money. Read this book and truly understand weight loss and food's part of it. Remember that Ozempic averages 18 pounds lost OVER SIXTEEN MONTHS and realize that that is not the answer..plus one should not take a diabetes drug when they are not diabetic. Become a Professional BS detector with this book and lose some weight...or at least live a bit more healthily.
I will recommend this book far and wide...especially to those whose New Year resolutions stalled in mid-January.
Maybe I can make peace with my body...or at least learn to not hate, loathe and abhor it!
Synopsis:
************
This is an unusual – and unusually interesting – exploration of diet, weight and health that touches on memoir but lands on practicality. It’s a cut-to-the-chase book that makes you realize that not everything you know about dieting and weight loss – no matter how much you've read or experienced before – is true, and that way too much of your brain, your time and your pocketbook has been taken up with the endless (and futile) quest. The authors’ two distinct voices thread and play off each other throughout the book as they cover these intensively-researched topics:
–Metabolism
–Why Every Diet Works... and Then Doesn’t
–What Actually is “Healthy” Food?
–The (Almost) Magic Pill: Exercise
–Detox Teas, Juice Cleanses, Supplements, & Waist Trainers
–The Science of Fat Loss
–Sleep, Stress and Your Waistline
–Disordered Eating or Eating Disorder?
–The History of Dieting
–The Biggest Key to Success - A Manifesto on Body Image
–How to Make This Your Last Diet
–Becoming a Professional BS Detector
Diet is not just about food - it is about so many different things...I have been eating 1000 calories a day for three months and I have lost ... 2 pounds. But at least I am not gaining. (Okay, I hate exercising so that is probably part of it!)
Don't listen to "influencers" or pay for their product$$$...they don't work. And those Kardashians and Kardashian-wanna-bes are only after your money. Read this book and truly understand weight loss and food's part of it. Remember that Ozempic averages 18 pounds lost OVER SIXTEEN MONTHS and realize that that is not the answer..plus one should not take a diabetes drug when they are not diabetic. Become a Professional BS detector with this book and lose some weight...or at least live a bit more healthily.
I will recommend this book far and wide...especially to those whose New Year resolutions stalled in mid-January.
Maybe I can make peace with my body...or at least learn to not hate, loathe and abhor it!
August 24, 2023
Book Review:
Food, We Need to Talk
The Science-Based, Humor-Laced Last Word on Eating, Diet, and Making Peace with Your Body
Author: Juna Gjata and Edward M. Phillips, M.D.
Food, We Need To Talk is a practical and fact based approach to eating and exercise. It is NOT a “diet book” but instead looks at the history, politics and culture of food and exercise. Juna Gjata uses humor and her own experiences with self-image and disordered eating alongside of Dr. Edward M. Phillips who brings the credentials of a medical doctor and assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation at Harvard. Although some of the information won’t be brand new to readers that keep up with the latest in nutrition and exercise there were a few things I hadn’t heard before and it busted some common myths.
It would be a helpful guide to food and fitness for readers that aren’t looking for the hot new weight loss trend or workout craze and instead want an overview of how the body works and why some approaches work/don’t work.
🎧 audiobook notes: this is well narrated by both authors. Although they aren’t professional voice actors their experience as podcasters bring a conversational style to the audiobook.
4 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Food, We Need to Talk
The Science-Based, Humor-Laced Last Word on Eating, Diet, and Making Peace with Your Body
Author: Juna Gjata and Edward M. Phillips, M.D.
Food, We Need To Talk is a practical and fact based approach to eating and exercise. It is NOT a “diet book” but instead looks at the history, politics and culture of food and exercise. Juna Gjata uses humor and her own experiences with self-image and disordered eating alongside of Dr. Edward M. Phillips who brings the credentials of a medical doctor and assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation at Harvard. Although some of the information won’t be brand new to readers that keep up with the latest in nutrition and exercise there were a few things I hadn’t heard before and it busted some common myths.
It would be a helpful guide to food and fitness for readers that aren’t looking for the hot new weight loss trend or workout craze and instead want an overview of how the body works and why some approaches work/don’t work.
🎧 audiobook notes: this is well narrated by both authors. Although they aren’t professional voice actors their experience as podcasters bring a conversational style to the audiobook.
4 stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
January 23, 2023
Thank you Netgalley and publishers for the opportunity to read and review! As someone who struggled with body image, diet cultural and an E.D. this book was a fantastic insight into the relationship with food, we as a society have today. There are many, many topics this book discusses surrounding food, diet culture, our body's function, debunking myths, and much more! A great read in all honesty, and personally if you are someone struggling with your relationship with food, I would definitely recommend taking at least a look at this book. One thing I will say it is information-dense, so personally instead of reading it in one sitting as I did, I would recommend reading a chapter or subsection and slowly digesting the information before moving forward to the next section.
November 2, 2023
I really enjoyed this book! Juna is a legend and the way she and the doctor wrote this book is so refreshing and nice.
Lots of science, exactly how I like it! It talks about everything metabolism, weight, exercise, and more about the body. This book is neither pro nor anti-diet. It makes a good scientific case for either side and answers questions that most of us must have had during our lives about wellbeing.
This is a nonfiction book, but I got so emotional when the doc and her daughter had a conversation about disordered eating and societal expectations towards women. It healed something in me, I did not know needed healing.
Juna is my new role model, I want to be like her. She can do pull-ups!
Lots of science, exactly how I like it! It talks about everything metabolism, weight, exercise, and more about the body. This book is neither pro nor anti-diet. It makes a good scientific case for either side and answers questions that most of us must have had during our lives about wellbeing.
This is a nonfiction book, but I got so emotional when the doc and her daughter had a conversation about disordered eating and societal expectations towards women. It healed something in me, I did not know needed healing.
Juna is my new role model, I want to be like her. She can do pull-ups!
November 13, 2023
It’s very seldom I find myself engrossed in a nonfiction book (long history with nonfiction books being forced on me in my academic past), but this was one that I was sitting there laughing and writing notes the whole time.
I’ve learned so much, there’s so much I’ve taken away and so much I look forward to implementing.
I’ll be encouraging so many people to take a look at this book going forward <3
I’ve learned so much, there’s so much I’ve taken away and so much I look forward to implementing.
I’ll be encouraging so many people to take a look at this book going forward <3
December 17, 2023
I have a history of being exceptionally hard on myself in December. This was a great reminder as to why that’s so counterproductive, and it gave me some good insight into how I want to improve my health and habits in 2024, with the right mindset.
February 28, 2025
After thinking on this for a while, I’m changing my review and adding a star. Overall, I liked this and I think I learned some things AND was convinced about making some changes. The sections on exercise, particularly resistance training (weights), and sleep, and even what to eat were great. While not all of the information was new to me, it was mostly presented in a way that got my attention.
There were some things I didn’t care for:
The first 42 pages felt like 100 to me. Lots of acronyms. Gjata does a decent job of making scientific studies understandable; it was simply a lot.
And, while there actually isn’t a lot, the snark felt a bit much after a while.
And Eddie (Dr. Phillips)…. In the section with his daughter discussing her anorexia, he seemed, well, detached or something. Maybe TOO clinical for what was being discussed? I don’t know. It was just off for me.
The reading became easier at page 43.
They cover the main ingredients for a healthy life and are convincing about the elements needed.
Content: strong profanity, which was a surprise; disordered eating and eating disorders explained and described
Things I marked:
Choosing to eat more nutrient-dense foods, moving your body, cultivating a healthier mindset, nurturing better relationships, getting a better night's sleep, reducing stress - all impact short- and long-term health. Sometimes weight loss is a by-product of developing better lifestyle habits. Sometimes it's not, and that's okay.
...people who tend to successfully maintain a meaningful amount of weight loss also tend to eat in moderation, exercise regularly, sleep well, eat breakfast, and monitor themselves and their behaviors.
...exercise may be the closest thing we have to a magic wand in regard to visceral fat. ...even with NO CHANGES in overall body weight, exercise has been shown to lower visceral, abdominal, and subcutaneous fat (the fat you can feel).
Excess fat may be a physical manifestation of the real cause of poorer health outcomes: excess calorie intake, which puts a lot of metabolic strain on your body.
Repeating a behavior that causes negative side effects (post-movie-theater sugar crash), even though you cognitively WANT to stop, is a behavior pattern quite consistent with those that characterize substance addiction.
Ultra-processed food has some interesting similarities to drugs of abuse. For example, addictive substances are usually altered from their natural state - grapes turned into wine, poppies are turned into opium - and it is only in this altered state that they become problematic.
The reward deficit (diminished response to food in the brain) seen in the rats persisted for two weeks after their access to hyper-palatable foods was taken away. (Interestingly, similar reward deficits after rats self-administer cocaine goes away after forty-eight hours.) When the rats went back to eating their standard laboratory chow, they ate substantially less, almost as if they would prefer to starve than eat regular food. Just some hyper-palatable food for thought.
EAT REAL FOOD. It's not that complicated: we need to eat real food, not creations of food science. Real foods are usually on the perimeters on the grocery store. They go bad: they are minimally processed or unprocessed: they don't have health claims on the packaging; they would have been recognized a hundred years ago. Focus less on nutrients and more on where those nutrients come from.
...we should get the following:
150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical exercise per week, OR
75 minutes of vigorous physical activity in bouts of any length, OR an equivalent combination.
For sedentary individuals (performing neither moderate nor vigorous physical activity), adoption of light-intensity activity is beneficial.
(Light-intensity: able to talk in full sentences and sing; moderate-intensity: talk but not sing; vigorous-intensity: not longer able to talk in full sentences without stopping to take a breath.)
I don't spend a lot of time thinking about my behaviors ..... but when I write about them or speak about them, I feel how deeply they impacted me. Those periods of my life are difficult to revisit, and putting them down for others to read, particularly people I love, is scary and uncomfortable. I don't feel shame or regret about sharing my experiences, but I feel anxious at the thought of my friends, my family, and other people who care about me reading this. For some reason, it's easier to let those you don't know witness your lowest moments.
As with many psychiatric disorders, genes load the gun, but the environment ultimately pulls the trigger. [Talking specifically about eating disorders. But, yeah.]
There were some things I didn’t care for:
The first 42 pages felt like 100 to me. Lots of acronyms. Gjata does a decent job of making scientific studies understandable; it was simply a lot.
And, while there actually isn’t a lot, the snark felt a bit much after a while.
And Eddie (Dr. Phillips)…. In the section with his daughter discussing her anorexia, he seemed, well, detached or something. Maybe TOO clinical for what was being discussed? I don’t know. It was just off for me.
The reading became easier at page 43.
They cover the main ingredients for a healthy life and are convincing about the elements needed.
Content: strong profanity, which was a surprise; disordered eating and eating disorders explained and described
Things I marked:
Choosing to eat more nutrient-dense foods, moving your body, cultivating a healthier mindset, nurturing better relationships, getting a better night's sleep, reducing stress - all impact short- and long-term health. Sometimes weight loss is a by-product of developing better lifestyle habits. Sometimes it's not, and that's okay.
...people who tend to successfully maintain a meaningful amount of weight loss also tend to eat in moderation, exercise regularly, sleep well, eat breakfast, and monitor themselves and their behaviors.
...exercise may be the closest thing we have to a magic wand in regard to visceral fat. ...even with NO CHANGES in overall body weight, exercise has been shown to lower visceral, abdominal, and subcutaneous fat (the fat you can feel).
Excess fat may be a physical manifestation of the real cause of poorer health outcomes: excess calorie intake, which puts a lot of metabolic strain on your body.
Repeating a behavior that causes negative side effects (post-movie-theater sugar crash), even though you cognitively WANT to stop, is a behavior pattern quite consistent with those that characterize substance addiction.
Ultra-processed food has some interesting similarities to drugs of abuse. For example, addictive substances are usually altered from their natural state - grapes turned into wine, poppies are turned into opium - and it is only in this altered state that they become problematic.
The reward deficit (diminished response to food in the brain) seen in the rats persisted for two weeks after their access to hyper-palatable foods was taken away. (Interestingly, similar reward deficits after rats self-administer cocaine goes away after forty-eight hours.) When the rats went back to eating their standard laboratory chow, they ate substantially less, almost as if they would prefer to starve than eat regular food. Just some hyper-palatable food for thought.
EAT REAL FOOD. It's not that complicated: we need to eat real food, not creations of food science. Real foods are usually on the perimeters on the grocery store. They go bad: they are minimally processed or unprocessed: they don't have health claims on the packaging; they would have been recognized a hundred years ago. Focus less on nutrients and more on where those nutrients come from.
...we should get the following:
150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical exercise per week, OR
75 minutes of vigorous physical activity in bouts of any length, OR an equivalent combination.
For sedentary individuals (performing neither moderate nor vigorous physical activity), adoption of light-intensity activity is beneficial.
(Light-intensity: able to talk in full sentences and sing; moderate-intensity: talk but not sing; vigorous-intensity: not longer able to talk in full sentences without stopping to take a breath.)
I don't spend a lot of time thinking about my behaviors ..... but when I write about them or speak about them, I feel how deeply they impacted me. Those periods of my life are difficult to revisit, and putting them down for others to read, particularly people I love, is scary and uncomfortable. I don't feel shame or regret about sharing my experiences, but I feel anxious at the thought of my friends, my family, and other people who care about me reading this. For some reason, it's easier to let those you don't know witness your lowest moments.
As with many psychiatric disorders, genes load the gun, but the environment ultimately pulls the trigger. [Talking specifically about eating disorders. But, yeah.]
January 23, 2025
Clearly, I started this new year committed to eliminating the word diet from my vocabulary. In my quest, wanting to understand how the diet culture has monopolized my mind , traumatized my soul, and wounded my heart, from the age of 12, I decided to look to those experts who seem to have found another, more healthful way. That's how I found Food, We Need to Talk. It's not enough to be "body positive." I'vetied that approach. Without feeling relatively fit, I've discovered, I cannot talk myself into feeling body positive. So, I wanted to uncover what this author refers to as The Last Word on Eating, Diet, and Making Peace with Your Body.
This is a non-fiction book, packed with good information, that reads like a memoir. In that respect, it covers a good deal of valuable info in a way that is entertaining. That's a plus for me, as anything too dry and scientific would turn me off in a heartbeat. In it, the author reveals her own struggles with variously hating and accepting her body, disordered eating, exercise, along with the science of weight loss and fat loss, metabolism, sleep as it pertains to weight, and a whole host of other issues one might not immediately consider when wondering, Why am I not losing? or Why is trhis taking so long? or Why am I not getting the results I expected? I related to this young woman in so many ways. I also gained some important insights. And the fact that her co-writer is a doctor, one whose own daughter has struggled with body issues and an eating disorder, made the message presented that much more palatable. If you are looking for a helpful resource for conquering your own issues with food and dieting, Food, We Need to Talk is a good one.
This is a non-fiction book, packed with good information, that reads like a memoir. In that respect, it covers a good deal of valuable info in a way that is entertaining. That's a plus for me, as anything too dry and scientific would turn me off in a heartbeat. In it, the author reveals her own struggles with variously hating and accepting her body, disordered eating, exercise, along with the science of weight loss and fat loss, metabolism, sleep as it pertains to weight, and a whole host of other issues one might not immediately consider when wondering, Why am I not losing? or Why is trhis taking so long? or Why am I not getting the results I expected? I related to this young woman in so many ways. I also gained some important insights. And the fact that her co-writer is a doctor, one whose own daughter has struggled with body issues and an eating disorder, made the message presented that much more palatable. If you are looking for a helpful resource for conquering your own issues with food and dieting, Food, We Need to Talk is a good one.
October 8, 2024
"Food, we need to talk" is an incredibly charming no-nonsense book full of high-quality information and cheeky humor. I have been looking at this book for MONTHS wanting to read it and, when I finally did, I instantly wished I had done it earlier.
Food- and health-oriented books always seemed like a minefield to me—how do I get informed about healthy eating and movement without creating a dangerous relationship with food and exercise?—but I had a feeling I could trust Juna and Eddie with this.
I was absolutely right.
The authors don't shy away from things that have to be said while still managing to create a hopeful atmosphere for their readers and implant the idea that maybe—maaybe—I can actually do something about my relationship with food and be happier and healthier by the end of it.
This book is truly a masterpiece, and I would recommend it to anyone who isn't quite sure where they're at with food and movement. It's a gentle giant holding your hand while you navigate the insanely complicated world of health and wellbeing.
TW: The book does cover topics related to disordered eating and eating disorders. Please take care of yourself first and foremost.
Conflict of interest: I have received a copy of the book directly from the authors, but the thoughts outlined in this review are mine and mine alone and have not been influenced or modified by any third parties.
Food- and health-oriented books always seemed like a minefield to me—how do I get informed about healthy eating and movement without creating a dangerous relationship with food and exercise?—but I had a feeling I could trust Juna and Eddie with this.
I was absolutely right.
The authors don't shy away from things that have to be said while still managing to create a hopeful atmosphere for their readers and implant the idea that maybe—maaybe—I can actually do something about my relationship with food and be happier and healthier by the end of it.
This book is truly a masterpiece, and I would recommend it to anyone who isn't quite sure where they're at with food and movement. It's a gentle giant holding your hand while you navigate the insanely complicated world of health and wellbeing.
TW: The book does cover topics related to disordered eating and eating disorders. Please take care of yourself first and foremost.
Conflict of interest: I have received a copy of the book directly from the authors, but the thoughts outlined in this review are mine and mine alone and have not been influenced or modified by any third parties.
February 6, 2024
I strive each year to get healthier in some way. This year, my health journey takes a new direction. It's all about building strength, both inside and out. Starting with this book, inspired by the podcasts that sparked my curiosity. 2024 is my Strength Training Era!
●The book is packed with evidence-based information on nutrition, health, and weight management.
●Authors consult top researchers in the field to provide accurate and up-to-date information.
●Covers a wide range of topics, including dieting trends, body image, social media influence, and practical tips for making healthy choices.
●The book promotes body positivity and encourages readers to develop a healthy relationship with food and their bodies.
●Provides actionable steps readers can take to improve their eating habits and overall health.
●The authors also have a great podcast titled Food, We Need to Talk. I really enjoy it because the episodes are short and sweet and they give me a good dose of motivation. You can also visit their IG page @foodweneedtotalk
●I highly recommend this book if you are open to rethinking what you know about health because not everything we've been told about diet and exercise are true!!
🎧The author's engaging style and use of humor made the book enjoyable and easy to listen to.
●The book is packed with evidence-based information on nutrition, health, and weight management.
●Authors consult top researchers in the field to provide accurate and up-to-date information.
●Covers a wide range of topics, including dieting trends, body image, social media influence, and practical tips for making healthy choices.
●The book promotes body positivity and encourages readers to develop a healthy relationship with food and their bodies.
●Provides actionable steps readers can take to improve their eating habits and overall health.
●The authors also have a great podcast titled Food, We Need to Talk. I really enjoy it because the episodes are short and sweet and they give me a good dose of motivation. You can also visit their IG page @foodweneedtotalk
●I highly recommend this book if you are open to rethinking what you know about health because not everything we've been told about diet and exercise are true!!
🎧The author's engaging style and use of humor made the book enjoyable and easy to listen to.
July 9, 2023
Food, We Need to Talk is the latest diet book I’ve read but it is completely different than most diet books. Instead of a diet plan full of restrictions with recipes at the end, this book is full of refreshing ideas about how, and why, plans like that don’t work long-term. According to the book, the last big diet craze, keto, carries too high a risk of causing major medical issues. Also, Ozempic, the current fashionable diet of choice, doesn’t work too well either. Eighteen pounds average weight loss in sixteen weeks is worse than the WW promise and infinitely more expensive.
The book’s conclusion is something you probably already know: there are no quick solutions and exercise is almost always mandatory for good health. However, the fun is watching the authors, a podcaster and a Harvard professor/medical doctor, tear into popular diet strategies. I have done almost everything gored in this book from detox teas to keto. Some do work for awhile but here I sit at pretty much the same weight I’ve been for years. It is nice to know it wasn’t my lack of willpower but a flaw in the strategy itself. 5 stars!
Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.
The book’s conclusion is something you probably already know: there are no quick solutions and exercise is almost always mandatory for good health. However, the fun is watching the authors, a podcaster and a Harvard professor/medical doctor, tear into popular diet strategies. I have done almost everything gored in this book from detox teas to keto. Some do work for awhile but here I sit at pretty much the same weight I’ve been for years. It is nice to know it wasn’t my lack of willpower but a flaw in the strategy itself. 5 stars!
Thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.
July 5, 2025
Start writing reviews to keep track of the highlights from each book after returning them to the library.
“Food, We Need to Talk” is a functional and practical book.
Chapter 2 explains how metabolism works and how surprisingly little daily exercise contributes to it—compared to the impact of simple lifestyle habits, like taking more walks instead of sitting around. The takeaway: only commit to a healthier lifestyle if it’s one you can realistically sustain for the long term. The people who successfully maintain a healthy lifestyle and goal weight are those who consistently track their nutrition, workouts, and progress. And the metabolism doesn’t shift much between the ages of 30–60—what affects the BMR is the muscle mass percentage. The only way to build that is to have consistent resistance or weight training. Zone 2 training can effectively help with fat loss. After this chapter, I know how to build training programs better.
Chapter 8 was a bit stress-inducing while reading, due to I suffered from disordered eating a couple of years back, so it brought back the memory. It was great to know that binge and purge always come hand in hand. And after knowing that, it helps for people to not go on crash diets, because it will just further reinforce the vicious cycle of unhealthy relationships with food. Try to pause before the act of binge eating and pick up other coping mechanisms of reaction to stressors.
Other highlights I picked up from the book include building more protein into your diet, and the importance of sleep and managing stress:
• Nutrition: Transition gradually from unhealthy eating to whole foods. Start with small changes, like switching from red to white meat, and increasing fiber and protein intake based on your body weight, to nourish your body.
• Sleep: Getting 7–9 hours of quality sleep is crucial to your training and body transition. Lack of sleep increases stress hormones, which work in the contrary to the progress of your training and lifestyle.
• Stress: It’s good to build meditation into your lifestyle, since stress doesn’t come from less adversity—it’s from our coping mechanism.
Overall, it’s a solid and approachable book with science-backed advice and realistic lifestyle guidance.
“Food, We Need to Talk” is a functional and practical book.
Chapter 2 explains how metabolism works and how surprisingly little daily exercise contributes to it—compared to the impact of simple lifestyle habits, like taking more walks instead of sitting around. The takeaway: only commit to a healthier lifestyle if it’s one you can realistically sustain for the long term. The people who successfully maintain a healthy lifestyle and goal weight are those who consistently track their nutrition, workouts, and progress. And the metabolism doesn’t shift much between the ages of 30–60—what affects the BMR is the muscle mass percentage. The only way to build that is to have consistent resistance or weight training. Zone 2 training can effectively help with fat loss. After this chapter, I know how to build training programs better.
Chapter 8 was a bit stress-inducing while reading, due to I suffered from disordered eating a couple of years back, so it brought back the memory. It was great to know that binge and purge always come hand in hand. And after knowing that, it helps for people to not go on crash diets, because it will just further reinforce the vicious cycle of unhealthy relationships with food. Try to pause before the act of binge eating and pick up other coping mechanisms of reaction to stressors.
Other highlights I picked up from the book include building more protein into your diet, and the importance of sleep and managing stress:
• Nutrition: Transition gradually from unhealthy eating to whole foods. Start with small changes, like switching from red to white meat, and increasing fiber and protein intake based on your body weight, to nourish your body.
• Sleep: Getting 7–9 hours of quality sleep is crucial to your training and body transition. Lack of sleep increases stress hormones, which work in the contrary to the progress of your training and lifestyle.
• Stress: It’s good to build meditation into your lifestyle, since stress doesn’t come from less adversity—it’s from our coping mechanism.
Overall, it’s a solid and approachable book with science-backed advice and realistic lifestyle guidance.
October 24, 2023
This book, which I consumed as an audiobook, is full of helpful, science-based advice about food and exercise as well as insight about disordered eating. The discussion of animal products, eggs, and saturated fat is a disappointing, as the authors downplay their dangers, which are well-established by sound science. In particular, Chapter 5, titled "What to Eat," is under-sourced, citing a handful of articles and relying excessively on one over 20-year-old article. For more accurate nutrition information, read How Not to Die: Discover the Foods Scientifically Proven to Prevent and Reverse Disease, by Michael Greger, or check out his website, nutritionfacts.org. Overall, however, this book is a good starting point for folks to learn more about health-promoting habits.
July 30, 2023
I've loved the podcast and was excited to read the book. It covered a lot of the same topics from the podcast with more personal experience and stories from the authors. I would have liked even more personal stories, but memoir is my favorite genre and maybe I wanted this book to bend more that way. Either way, I love the book and wish I had read it ten plus years ago. The book attempts to challenge diet culture while not ignoring the science around health. The title only mentions food but it delves into exercise, sleep, meditation, and more. I will say, if you're struggling with disordered eating, recovering from an eating disorder, or prefer not to have any prescriptions/guidance around food, this book might be triggering. There is a chapter about eating disorders where both authors share their personal experiences with them. I really love Juna's voice and enjoyed hearing her and Eddie read the audio book.
September 1, 2024
I have mixed feelings about this book. I think some of the science and myth debunking was interesting and in line with other books I’ve read on these topics. There weren’t major new revelations, but it was interesting to read more about metabolism, nutrition, sleep, etc.
I liked the humor and realness of Juna’s chapters. It felt like I was talking to a friend vs reading a textbook.
Unfortunately, I think that this book could be problematic for anyone with experience with disordered eating or an eating disorder. Both topics are addressed in the book in different ways. At times this felt thoughtful and hopefully helpful to some readers. At other times, I think some of the content could be difficult. The doctor repeatedly condemns “junk” food. I’d hoped that a person writing this book, especially since his daughter had an eating disorder, would be more cautious about moralizing food.
I felt like this book sometimes critiqued diet culture while simultaneously upholding it.
I liked the humor and realness of Juna’s chapters. It felt like I was talking to a friend vs reading a textbook.
Unfortunately, I think that this book could be problematic for anyone with experience with disordered eating or an eating disorder. Both topics are addressed in the book in different ways. At times this felt thoughtful and hopefully helpful to some readers. At other times, I think some of the content could be difficult. The doctor repeatedly condemns “junk” food. I’d hoped that a person writing this book, especially since his daughter had an eating disorder, would be more cautious about moralizing food.
I felt like this book sometimes critiqued diet culture while simultaneously upholding it.
May 28, 2025
this started out really proactive but then took a turn. seems very counterproductive for the author, who says she is recovered from her ed, to argue that one should never skip their workouts. she went as far as saying no matter how busy you are, you should NEVER skip it! do 15 pushups everytime you use the bathroom, anything you need to do to workout! i’m sorry but you cannot be recovered and believe that is healthy behavior. life is more than working out so religiously you turn it into a ritual, and anyone “recovered” from an ed would have had that drilled into their brains and know how vastly irresponsible it is to recommend to others to do it. you also cannot be recovered and genuinely telling readers that processed foods are the devil??? v disappointed in the author tbh but i digress!!! 🥲
rating: 2.5
rating: 2.5
January 15, 2024
As a Health Coach I help people get healthy with an emphasis on making peace with food and ending restriction and the constant body battle. I highly recommend reading or listening to this book if you want to be informed, (but also understood!) so you can find your health-forward/non-restricrive path to longevity. I love how this book merges the science of longevity from a lifestyle medicine physician with the down to earth understanding that society's expectations of what healthy "should look" like is problematic and causes harm. This book is so needed and I also highly recommend the podcast. Thank you, Dr. Eddie and Juna for this important work.
May 23, 2023
Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this fun and informative book.
This reads like an amalgam of medical text and memoir, written with humor and warmth. It is NOT a diet book; instead, it provides an overview of current and past obesity research and diet culture. It explains how our bodies use fuel; the role of exercise in weight loss and weight loss maintenance; how sleep affects health and weight; why all diets work at first, why all diets ultimately fail; why dieting isn't the answer to achieving good health.
This reads like an amalgam of medical text and memoir, written with humor and warmth. It is NOT a diet book; instead, it provides an overview of current and past obesity research and diet culture. It explains how our bodies use fuel; the role of exercise in weight loss and weight loss maintenance; how sleep affects health and weight; why all diets work at first, why all diets ultimately fail; why dieting isn't the answer to achieving good health.
July 17, 2025
The subtitle warned me there would be loads of science in this book, and early on the writers give a sort of trigger warning for various manifestations of disordered eating, body image, etc.
But - it was a LOT, and maybe not an approach that speaks to me. I got a few takeaways, mainly reinforcement that loads of diet, exercise, and body culture is crap and to reframe all of it in the joy of having a body that's a pretty good machine when it's treated with caring attention. *In case you've forgotten, and you probably have.
But - it was a LOT, and maybe not an approach that speaks to me. I got a few takeaways, mainly reinforcement that loads of diet, exercise, and body culture is crap and to reframe all of it in the joy of having a body that's a pretty good machine when it's treated with caring attention. *In case you've forgotten, and you probably have.
August 7, 2025
Really great book about all things health: food, exercise, sleep, stress. I learned a lot about all those subjects + disordered eating. It was fascinating to learn how the line of healthy eating can be blurred into disordered eating. That you don’t have to be anorexic to have a problem. Insightful, funny and I really loved Juna’s exuberance reading the book and her vulnerability to share her own eating disorder journey. I also loved the last chapter which I know from experience is the way to incorporate new consistent habits in life (thanks Atomic Habits!)
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