In this episode, I break down the pros and cons of the popular practice of consuming energy bars as a supposedly nutritious snack on the go.

The inspiration for this show was an exciting spicy battle between health experts Dr. Layne Norton and Gary Brecka on Instagram, where they debated the merits of the new David High Protein bar. I talk about the ingredients in these bars, the processing methods, and the overall sketchy nature of the energy bar industry, even when the bars are touted as super healthy.

I also reflect on the history of energy bars, my personal experience as one of the first PowerBar-sponsored athletes, and how the original idea of energy bars was for elite athletes, not for snacking during your workday. I challenge the whole premise of needing energy bars and advocate for metabolic flexibility, fasting, and focusing on nutritious meals instead. I share my go-to snacks, why I’m such a fan of dark chocolate, and why even the so-called cleanest protein bars are not a nutritional centerpiece.

Let’s rethink our approach to energy bars and focus on fueling and recovering the right way!

TIMESTAMPS:

Are energy bars as nutritious as we think? [01:10]

Most of these bars are processed in giant factories using highly processed dairy products. [06:15]

If a person has problems digesting whey, it is probably because they’ve used the less expensive,
less pure sources of whey protein. [08:14]

To make the bars palatable, the manufacturers need to make them sweet and there are many other
ingredients used to make the basr keep their shape and to have a long shelf life. [13:10]

The oils used promote cellular stress. Many of the oils are offensive to ingest. [15:13]

Be careful of labels that say “Natural Flavor.” [16:10]

Just because a bar is labeled with whey protein, it doesn’t mean it is good for you. [18:12]

How does one objectively define gut health? Many of the flavors offered on these bars are
terribly unhealthy. [21:45]

There is much confusion as to the validity of the bar industry podcasts. [25:38]

Brad was one of the first sponsored athletes by Power Bar. [27:45]

It is believed that HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) is strongly associated with obesitiy. [30:24]

Brad looks at labels carefully. Here he has example of marketing where a well-meaning
consumer can be thrown. [38:29]

If you don’t have any calories around, you can easily and gracefully turn to stored body fat.
[41:23]

What is best to consume after a workout to speed recovery? [43:14]

A bar is simply not a great delivery system for protein, nor is a liquid beverage. [50:41]

Brad explains the characteristics of good dark chocolate. [55:35]

If you enjoy energy bars from time to time, choose the least ofensive ones that are made with
whole foods and minimal ingredients.[59:34]

Brad lets you know all about dark chocolate, his favorite snack. [01:01:42]

LINKS:

• Brad Kearns.com
• BradNutrition.com
• B.rad Whey Protein Superfuel – The Best Protein on The Planet!
• Brad’s Shopping Page
• BornToWalkBook.com
• B.rad Podcast – All Episodes
• Peluva Five-Toe Minimalist Shoes
• Layne Norton-Gary Brecka Instagram
• B.rad Nutrition Guide
• DIAAS Score
• Brad’s Guide to Dark Chocolate
• Podcast with Sean Askinosie

LISTEN:
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TRANSCRIPT:

Brad (00:00:00):
Welcome to the B.rad podcast, where we explore ways to pursue peak performance with passion throughout life without taking ourselves too seriously. I’m Brad Kearns, New York Times bestselling author, former number three world ranked professional triathlete and Guinness World Record Masters athlete. I connect with experts in diet, fitness, and personal growth, and deliver short breather shows where you get simple actionable tips to improve your life right away. Let’s explore beyond the hype hacks, shortcuts, and science talk to laugh, have fun and appreciate the journey. It’s time to B.rad.

Brad (00:00:51):
I wouldn’t say this is the worst treat on the planet. If you want to choose between a Snicker bar and a cake batter, are you getting any extra points for cake batter? I doubt it. Okay, that’s, that’s all I’m gonna say. And a Snicker bar’s not gonna kill you either, but

Brad (00:01:10):
Energy bars, yes or no? In this video, I am going to break down the pros and cons of the popular practice of consuming energy bars for a supposedly nutritious snack on the go. And the inspiration for doing this show right now was this exciting spicy battle between health experts. Don’t you love that stuff? This time I saw on Instagram it was Dr. Layne Norton, challenging Gary Brecka on the topic of energy bars. I think you may have heard of these people. They’re leading health, fitness, healthy living, biohacking, influencers. Gary Brecka. I haven’t really heard his name until recently, but a lot of people started mentioning him and asking me about him. It seems like he’s blown up, as they say in recent times. He has 2.5, 2.6 million followers on Instagram. Seems like a pretty sharp guy. He’s really enthusiastic and emphatic with his content.

Brad (00:02:15):
Puts out a ton of content. Seems like he’s into all kinds of wild biohacking stuff. But he also has some interesting and sensible big picture insights. It seems like he’s involved with the governmental effort, uh, with Robert Kennedy to challenge the food industry. So exciting things happening there. And Dr. Layne Norton, popular and very demonstrative, big personality guy. He’s kind of become the, uh, the professional contrarian for health and fitness research and claims, and is constantly going up and challenging people left and right with his content. Very sharp guy. He has a PhD in nutritional science. He’s also a professional, uh, world champion level powerlifter in his weight and age class. So his content is a mix of super athletic stuff where he is lifting these heavy bars and grunting and screaming, and then he’ll turn around and show with extensive research backing him.

Brad (00:03:14):
Always a counter opinion to what’s going on out there with other influencers. Uh, I appreciate a lot of his content. I think it’s great for people who speak the truth and are bold and daring to go up and challenge big time health, fitness, thought leaders of society. I think he’s probably, we’d be considered a pretty controversial guy because his takes are very, very aggressive and he seems very emphatic that he’s correct and the other person’s wrong, which is a great way to gather up a million followers like he has, but also can leave you open to a little bit of exposure. And on this exchange between these two titans, I feel like Layne has gone a little bit overboard in challenging. Gary Brecka, who made a very thoughtful argument criticizing the new David High Protein bar product.

Brad (00:04:14):
If you haven’t heard of this product called David, there’s some heavy hitters behind it. Investors like Dr. Peter Attia, Andrew Huberman, and Layne Norton himself. So, it’s touted as the cleanest, healthiest source of it, really high protein energy bar with very low sugar. So it sounds great on the surface, uh, but it really got me thinking about doing a show questioning the whole premise of the energy bar industry, which is that quick nutritious snack on the go. So let’s jump right into it and go to the Instagram post in question where this is Layne’s post, challenging the posts made by Gary Brecka, who was criticizing the ingredients in the David Bar. And I didn’t really look into this until now. ’cause I don’t consume energy bars hardly at all. Sometimes I will, and I’ll tell you when and why. Uh, but boy, there’s some alarming, heavily processed ingredients in this highly touted bar where

Brad (00:05:19):
Dr. Peter Attia is their health and science authority or some official position where he’s front and center. The guy who never took advertising revenue from everybody and wanted to be above the fray is now putting all his chips behind this David Energy bar as an awesome high protein bar. But Gary Brecka took the time to make a thoughtful commentary on each of the ingredients, and I don’t think it comes out good for David Bar. Let’s have you be the judge and also see what the very highly informed Gary Brecka has to say about the bar. So now we see Layne’s Instagram landing page, showing that PhD in nutritional sciences, two time world champ in the 93 kilogram category. And maybe a quick scroll, we’ll show you, uh, some of the stuff he does. This makes me cringe. <laugh>, oh, Mindy Pelz, my pal Mindy Pelz had a great show, very popular podcaster.

Brad (00:06:15):
He says, Mindy Pelz is back on her BS. Oh Mercy. So watch out people. If you’re out there spreading a message with thoughtfulness, you never know when Layne, Layne Norton might go on the attack. The post we want to discussion question today is a repost from Gary Brecka account 2.6 million followers. So here’s Gary saying in his post, this is on Layne Norton’s account lane’s gonna come back with some counter punches. Hundreds of you asked, says, Gary, so let’s break down the David Bar. Here’s what you’re really eating. Milk protein isolate, whey protein concentrate. These are highly processed dairy products. Not real whole food stripped of nutrients spiked with industrial processing agents. I want to take a side note here to compare and contrast to a whey protein isolate product in powdered form. So the whey protein that B.rad Nutrition sells in the Super Fuel and the whey protein isolate products.

Brad (00:07:16):
This is a byproduct of cheese making in a cheese-making plant. Generational family cheese makers are the ones where I get my whey protein isolate from. And that is a very minimally processed product by comparison to having to put something through. They call it the “extruding machine.” It’s an extruded bar when it comes in that nice final format. Or there’s also bars that are baked or unprocessed, like a Lara Bar is a fruit and nuts without any other treatment, such as the extruding machine where you’re packing all the ingredients in, maybe they started in powdered or liquid form, and you’re heating them and, and processing them further and coming out. So, whey protein concentrate, as I’ve talked about a lot, is the cheaper, less pure form of whey protein. It’s typically around 70 to 85% pure with milk fat and lactose leftover.

Brad (00:08:14):
Yes, that’s right, lactose as in lactose intolerant. So a lot of people who say, I have problems digesting whey, I better not take your product. It’s because they’ve used less expensive, less pure sources of whey protein, namely whey protein concentrate. And the reason they’re choosing these inferior sources of protein is because they have to go through the rounds. They have to go through a pretty challenging processing method and stay intact and not degrade and not sketch out, get moldy or get smelly or whatever. And this is the bar industry in a nutshell. And interestingly, there are major processing plants located around America and around the world where most bars are made in the same place, right? There’s not, there’s not a thousand of these places. And when you go to the store and look at all the bar choices, these people are not making them in their warehouse factory in their town.

Brad (00:09:18):
They’re doing contract manufacturing is what it’s called. So they give their recipe to these major bar manufacturers, and these guys know how to produce a reliable bar that has shelf life and stability and consistency, and they get their ingredients in a large part on the commodity market. So when David Bar same giant factories, buying the stuff from wherever the brokers are getting them from around the world, uh, oftentimes of undetermined origin. And I’m not saying this specifically about David, I’m talking about the bar industry now, where the bars are made in factory, uh, food processing, just like we criticize with the poor animals in factory farming and all the other processed foods, the potato chip plants, and the on and on the candy bars and so forth.

Brad (00:10:09):
Who knows, maybe the candy bars are being made right after your production run of the healthy, expensive energy bar. So, Gary gives a thumbs down, a red a circle with a slash through it, uh, for their use of milk protein isolate and whey protein concentrate. And I’m spending a lot of time on that first ingredient here because the key selling feature of the David Bar is that it’s a very high protein bar. Peter’s video on their homepage talks about how their protein to total calorie ratio, let’s see if I can jump over there really quickly. Our product philosophy, we wanna have more protein and less sugar, and that is indeed they have a high score here. It says, David achieves these three goals with a 75% CFP score that equals calories from protein divided by total calories. In other words, you’re getting a lot of protein calories with minimal sugar.

Brad (00:11:05):
That’s because they use, as Gary will describe shortly with his post, forms of sweeteners that are touted as low in net carbohydrate count. And back in the days when keto was really popular, you probably heard this term, net carbs, how many net carbs does my product have? As opposed to gross carbohydrate count, like we’re used to thinking about. Hey, there’s 20 grams of carbs in a banana, but net carbs factors out fiber and things that mute the glycemic response. And also in that gram count of carbohydrate, some of that stuff is indigestible fiber. And so it decreases the net carbohydrate count. Allulose poly dextrose malitol and glycerin. These are, uh, Gary writing now sugar alcohols, and synthetic sweeteners, and he claims Layne’s gonna take him down or take him to task on this. But, Gary says, these are known for wrecking gut health, causing bloating and triggering insulin confusion.

Brad (00:12:13):
Your gut microbiome deserves better. In general, what we’re talking about here is a way to make the bar palatable without dumping a bunch of sugar-type calories into the bar. And most bars are putting some form of processed carbohydrate in there. In the old days, as I’m gonna get to it, was high fructose corn syrup, and then trying to clean up their act. We see a lot of things like brown rice syrup or tapioca starch, or things that have a significant carbohydrate count. And you can read those right on the label. Your bar has to taste palatable. So you’re gonna generally be getting some sugar in there. In this case, they’re trying to tone down that sugar count that they slap onto the label, get that touted 75% protein score to total calories by using these sweetener type products, allulose, poly, dextrose malitol, and glycerin.

Brad (00:13:10):
Okay, then we go down to Gary talking again, going over the ingredients in the bar, soy and cetin. This is an emulsifier usually derived from genetically modified soy. It’s linked to gut permeability as well as inflammation in some individuals. This is commonly used in small amounts in a lot of products. And the dose is the thing in question here. So when you’re buying a processed product, they need to do something to keep it in its stable form. Maybe you’ve tried to make energy bars at home in your oven and they get melted or misshapen or whatever. They get hardened up, uh, in different weather patterns. So, uh, we’re putting things in like that as part of, as part of the food processing industry standard practices. Then on the list of ingredients is palm kernel oil. He calls it highly refined, often oxidized inflammatory fat.

Brad (00:14:07):
Unlike cold pressed oils, this one promotes cellular stress. So this palm kernel oil is up there with things like coconut oil, where it’s actually highly saturated in its natural state, much more saturated than the refined industrial seed oils. Dr. Cate Shanahan calls them the hateful eight things like canola, corn, soybean, sunflower, safflower, those kind of oils, which have to go through extreme heat and high temperature processing, often using chemical solvents to become the single most offensive agent that we ingest in the modern food supply. But the attempt to minimize that with an oil that is more saturated in its natural state is what they’re trying to do here. So, again, we’ll see what lane has to say about this, but palm kernel oil on a label, uh, it’s not great. It’s not coming right off the palm tree in its natural, natural state.

Brad (00:15:13):
But they’re making an attempt here to use something besides let’s say, uh, canola oil or something nasty. Okay, next on the list, natural flavors. This is industry code for chemical cocktails up to 100 plus undisclosed chemicals can hide under this label, and you’re, you’ll never know what you’re eating. Uh, I’ve talked about this as well in the realm of protein supplements because almost all protein supplements on the market are sweetened and flavored with, uh, chemical additives and artificial ingredients, and they can indeed hide under the term natural flavors. So I did some other commentary about this a while back, but the natural flavor it’s not complete BS because you do have to have some extract or some form of vanilla in that vanilla flavoring, but you can also use a bunch of other stuff. This is definitely a concern for me.

Brad (00:16:10):
That’s why we sweeten our protein with sugar or real roasted peanuts or real south American cacao, uh, the sugar, and also a bit of stevia, which is a more natural product where you can put that on the label and say, Stevia leaf extract from the Stevia plant is very, very sweet, but it is closer to natural, as is the very popular sweetener called monk fruit sweetener. These are minimally processed, and you know what you’re getting if you see a label that says Stevia and monk fruit, versus a label that says natural flavoring. So again, a worthy strike against the product to throw that on the label while turning around and saying, this is the healthiest, cleanest, purest bar on the planet.

Brad (00:16:56):
Okay, next. Esterified Pro-Oxalated glycerol a synthetic fat replacement that is banned or heavily restricted in many countries linked to liver and kidney damage in high doses, in animal studies. Well, again, not excited to ingest that. But again, as Gary writes here high doses. Okay, so what about low doses? Definitely not doing yourself a health favor. Maybe not the biggest thing to worry about, because I don’t think there’s many, many grams of that in the bar, but it, it is starting to paint a very distressing picture when this is the stuff you put in the bar. And it’s going back to my big picture insight here that I want to convey on this show that even the best and most thoughtfully produced bars are certainly not a nutritional centerpiece. And these process ingredients do have a tendency to mess up your metabolic health. We know that leaky gut is the single most exploding field in, science and medical research where we’re tracing a lot of health conditions to this leaky gut syndrome, that words were never uttered 10 or 15 years ago.

Brad (00:18:12):
So, we gotta take care of our gut. My previous podcast guest, Dr. Robert Lustig, said, you can score your foods, by the simple notion that they protect the liver and feed the gut. Feeding the gut mainly. We’re familiar with how fiber is healthy for our gut function, and so we want to consume high fiber foods. And then protecting the liver are avoiding things like concentrated sources of sugar, processed sugar, things like that. Finally we get down to the last of Gary’s comments on the ingredient list, cocoa powder process with alkali. This is Dutched process, Dutch processed cocoa, which removes 60 to 90% of the antioxidants cacao is known for. Isn’t that interesting? And a little history on where the chocolate bar, uh, came to be. The chocolate was discovered in, uh, early civilization times, and it was a very potent, and still is a very, very potent plant source of plants with all kinds of antioxidants and micronutrients in it.

Brad (00:19:17):
The cacao plant I’m referring to. And then the Dutch figured out how to Dutch a chocolate. The Dutch processing method was where they were able to melt it and add sugar and make something that could be a delicious, palatable beverage like the first chocolate milk of all time, or the first hot chocolate, or the first chocolate bar. However, in the process of Dutch processing the original, uh, cocoa or cacao plant, indeed you are removing a lot of the nutrients because of the aggressive high temperature processing methods. Here’s Gary’s final comments. This isn’t a protein bar. This is an ultra processed lab engineered Franken food wearing a quote, high protein badge. It’s gut wrecking, it’s inflammatory. If you wouldn’t cook it in your kitchen, don’t fuel your cells with it. Okay? Now we get to take a deep breath, some pretty aggressive commentary from Gary.

Brad (00:20:17):
And then Layne says, Hey, Gary, I have a few questions. You say, way is inflammatory. Then why do studies show the exact opposite? So, Layne’s really good at making a statement and then throwing in a study, and that’s great. That’s better than a gun slinger, I suppose. But again, if we search PubMed long enough, if we, uh, give an assignment to our grad students, we can find a study showing anything. So, in this case Layne’s general contention that whe is known for reducing inflammation and boosting immune function is highly validated in the research. And I think what’s going on with this first point of contention is that Gary’s talking about heavily processed sources of whey that are in this David Bar, namely of sources of, uh, protein milk, protein isolate, and whey protein concentrate versus the nutritious source of whey, such as in a powdered form, minimally processed whey protein isolate can give you these anti-inflammatory benefits.

Brad (00:21:19):
So it’s the same food, right, when we say the word whey, but probably both these guys have a very salient point here. You can’t blanket condemnation whey, but you also can’t, uh, tell this bar and say, Hey, it’s got whey protein. So it’s really good, just like a very premium grass-fed whey protein isolate, uh, supplement in powdered form.

Brad (00:21:45):
Next Layne says, you say these sugar alcohols and synthetic sweeteners wreck gut health and cause insulin confusion. Please explain how you objectively define gut health and insulin confusion and provide citations to support your claims. Alright, Layne, I mean a good point. We have to without bringing in the science in on every single thing that comes out of our mouth. But this is a funny paragraph if you isolate it, especially for Layne Norton, the world’s arbiter of truth in nutrition <laugh>, he starts the paragraph saying, sugar alcohols and synthetic sweeteners.

Brad (00:22:25):
So he’s arguing, he’s defending sugar alcohols and synthetic sweeteners. Not impressed would be my 2 cents there. Next, he says, to back to Gary Brecka, you say, palm kernel oil misspelled is inflammatory, but there is no human data to support this. In fact, the human studies tend to show no effect on inflammation. The animal data is mix. Okay, again, perhaps there was a little bit of over aggression on slamming palm kernel oil. But, uh, an agent like that, which has been processed and included in this final product of an extruded bar. The word extruded meanings coming outta the machines, the raw materials coming in and, and being formed into a bar that you can put a wrapper on. Okay. further you say it promotes cellular stress. What do you mean by that? Mm, okay. I mean, splitting hairs here, but what these guys did was they brought to light a very important topic that I’m going to continue with the ball and run.

Brad (00:23:33):
Here’s a quick look at, I can’t believe I’m promoting David’s website, but this stuff is objectionable to me. I don’t know about you, but these top, top, most respected, most highly trained health influencers are now promoting a product with a flavor name of red velvet fudge brownie, salted peanut butter, blueberry pie, perhaps the most offensive cake batter. And I’m gonna have to hit the explicit button now and say, are you kidding me? Peter, who sat on the sidelines, he could have taken all that advertising revenue from whomever he wanted, like a lot of top podcasters, but no, he said, our show is brought to you for free with no commercial interruptions. And now he’s putting his chips behind cake batter. I do have to say, um, sorry. And I object. It’s just, it’s a little strange to me. And I’m dedicating my life to finding the most nutrient dense diet.

Brad (00:24:32):
I tout my B.rad nutrition guide, that’s for free download brad kearns.com, where I have a tiered ranking system of the world’s most nutrient dense foods, and we have our pastured eggs, and we have our grass fed beef and our oil cold water fish. But I don’t have any fricking cake batter on my B.rad Nutrition guide. So, uh, I wouldn’t say this is the worst treat on the planet. If you wanna choose between a snicker bar and a cake batter, are you getting any, uh, extra points for cake batter? I, I doubt it. Okay. That’s, that’s all I’m gonna say. And a Snicker bar’s not gonna kill you either. But when we have the marketing and the health vibe behind products like David, it can be harmful to the consumer because they’re being led to believe that these products are extremely clean and health boosting, when in fact, it’s just another extruded bar with some objectionable ingredients in there, no matter how loud Layne Norton defends them.

Brad (00:25:38):
The other reason that I got a little triggered by Layne’s post is the preface, the starting words where he says,full disclosure, I’m an investor in David Protein. I believe in this product, and I think it’s a great option for a lot of people. This is getting to be a bit much these days. You know what I mean? When everyone says full disclosure, I’m an investor. I seems like the influencer expert who uses that term then goes on to defend or promote a product. It seems like they’re insinuating or asking the audience for a free pass, because after all, wait, I said full disclosure. Full disclosure, I shorted David Stock <laugh>. No, it, full disclosure is full disclosure. So it means you’re biased. You understand? I’m not giving you a free pass just because you say full disclosure.

Brad (00:26:40):
When we go to the car dealer to buy a car, does the salesman say, full disclosure, I’m on commission and I’m gonna earn a good sum of money if you buy this car. It’s like yeah, too much enough of this full disclosure. Of course, you have to do full disclosure but you’re, you’re all of a sudden, uh, bias for anything else you say. And that includes Peter’s video where he is proudly touting the 75% protein to calorie ratio. I know the guy has high moral standards and is very thoughtful, and he deeply believes in this bar and deeply believes that it’s superior to the competition. So he thinks he’s making a world a better place, as does Huberman, as does Layne Norton, as does all the other investors, executives, and people that are behind this David launch. I am standing here saying, look, lets second guess the entire premise that needing energy bars as a quick convenient snack and thinking that is health promoting in any way.

Brad (00:27:45):
Okay, speaking of full disclosure, I was one of the first sponsored athletes by Power Bar back when the, pretty much, the first energy bar that really took off was released back in 1988. So a little energy bar history here. The Power Bar was invented by elite Marathon runner, the late Brian Maxwell. He ran for Canadian national team. He was about a two 14 marathoner. He was a coach at uc, Berkeley for a long time, and a, uh, an athlete, uh, at Cal and had a, a great career as a long distance runner. But he bonked in a critical event. He ran out of energy at Mile 22 or something, because back in those days, they didn’t have energy gels. They didn’t have bars, so they didn’t have energy drinks, really. And so the marathon runner would be, uh, drinking water, maybe getting some, uh, calories in the form of, they used to have Defi Coke, probably still do at eight stations, or maybe Gatorade made its way out there, uh, by the time Brian was racing in the eighties. But he went home and realized that if he could figure out a way to ingest some onboard, easy, easy process fuel, that it could help ’em in the latter stages of the marathon. So Power Bar was invented on the authentic holistic premise that this could help athletes who were running out of energy during exercise to get that boost they needed to finish the workout strong. Do you know how hard it is to run out of glycogen to drain your tank during a workout? We are talking about an extreme effort that perhaps lasts for an hour, like a really grueling CrossFit session, or a tough class at the gym, like I just observed my wife participate in, and she’s like, you gotta come next time.

Brad (00:29:31):
I’m like, that looks too hard. Delore’s class looks too hard for me. I did it once a few years ago, and I couldn’t believe how tough it was. So those tough gym classes where you are, uh, getting that heart rate up at a high rate for a long time, and you’re asking your muscles for a lot of quick, explosive power on a prolonged basis, and you’re gonna be draining your glycogen tank, and that’s when you can reward yourself with a nice smoothie after and just be replenishing that lost glycogen. But most people throughout the day, and the vast majority of energy bar consumption these days is by the general audience slamming these things during the workday or during their, uh, long drive or, uh, before their workout, after their workout whatever it is, it’s not for guys running outta gas at the end of the marathon, but it was a cool and authentic start to the energy bar scene.

Brad (00:30:24):
I consumed a lot of these bars over my time. I sold bars on my website this is about 25 years ago now. So I get to stand here and reflect on, uh, the big picture. And I’m gonna say that, uh, the modern energy bar that’s in the energy bar section of the store is maybe, maybe marginally better than a granola bar made with seed oils and processed sugar. In fact, in the earliest days of energy bar, high fructose corn syrup was the most prominent sweetening ingredient that included Power Bar. They changed their way because of all the negative publicity that high fructose corn syrup has received in recent years. But if you haven’t heard of HFCS, this is a modern product that many experts believe is strongly associated with the obesity epidemic. And a great point was made about this recently.

Brad (00:31:20):
I was listening to a podcast, I can’t remember who, but they were making the conjecture that, look back in the seventies in America when the obesity rate was under 10%, and now it is 38% with 66% of Americans having some type of metabolic health, health condition. Boy, that’s a big difference, right? And what has changed? Well, we weren’t going to the gym and exercising like crazy back then. We’re probably doing more of that now. We’re probably trying to get more into fitness now than we were in the seventies, and we were also eating hot fudge sundaes and french fries and drinking cokes and all those things. But one change that’s occurred is the increased processing of our food supply with more chemicals, more preservatives, more additives, more things, frankly, like Gary Brecka mentioned, that are contained in the David Bar.

Brad (00:32:21):
And some experts contend that it’s the chemicals and the processing and the preservatives and the additives that are the thing that are, that is the disturbing factor to our internal metabolic function, our ability to burn stored body fat with ease. Instead, because of all these chemicals, we’re inhibiting the burning of body fat and we’re driving toward these increased rates of obesity. For example, the old time, hot fudge sundae that didn’t have the dyes and the colors and the, uh, artificial sweeteners and whatever’s in that carmel sauce that’s not just melted, uh, sugar, uh, cooked to browning temperature. Uh, big difference. So the hot fudge sundae of 1970 versus whatever’s going down the pipe with all these, uh, packaged box frozen treats today is the factor, not just the calories. We weren’t burning that many calories back then. We were eating too much back then, but things were, uh, much better than they are today.

Brad (00:33:21):
And high fructose corn syrup has come into the spotlight for sure. You can google a graph where you have the, rate of obesity and then the rate of inclusion of high fructose corn syrup into the food supply. And that, like these two grafts kind of spike together. High fructose corn syrup is also believed to encourage the liver to produce and store more fat and develop the condition known as fatty liver disease because of its unnatural and heavily processed nature. It’s not fructose from the blueberry. It’s a processed form of fructose. It’s also blamed as contributing to insulin resistance, high triglycerides, increased production of uric acid. There’s entire books about that where, um, some people get the flawed takeaway that you shouldn’t be eating fruit anymore because it makes you produce too much uric acid, which damages your heart, kidneys, pancreas.

Brad (00:34:17):
But I’m gonna call extreme BS on that. And what we’re actually looking at is a massive overconsumption of processed carbohydrates and total carbohydrates such that the blueberries and the natural forms of carbs stacked on top of your liter of soda are all being contributory to the problem. But if we just eliminate the processed foods, we would be in much, much better shape, even if we had a hot food sundae once in a while, that was made from scratch, theoretically, or going to a artisan ice cream store where they’re only putting cream and sugar in the ice cream. I remember Jay Feldman saying that on one of our four shows together, where he is like, look, ice cream, it’s cream and sugar, a good ice cream. There’s nothing objectional about either one of sugar is burned in the cell for energy. Don’t forget that people, and cream is a form of saturated fat that has some, you know, health, health benefits in there.

Brad (00:35:13):
It’s not poison, it’s not a disaster. Like everyone might lump that in with something that comes in a box like the, Entemann’s breakfast cakes that you bring to the meeting in the conference room. Okay, so high fructose corn syrup, really bad deal. Let’s go look at Mark Hyman’s article. You can read more there. But he says Five reasons why high fructose corn syrup will kill you. And he goes into detail about the corn industry and how the subsidies are supporting all this corn being grown and then turned with chemical high fructose corn syrup and cane sugar are not biochemically identical or processed in the same way by the body. He goes into detail and cites some books that high fructose corn syrup can be more lipo fructose goes right to the liver and triggers the conversion of the carbohydrate into fat more easily than foods that are not high in fructose.

Brad (00:36:18):
Hyman also says that high fructose scorn syrup can contain contaminants like mercury. Um, independent medical and nutrition experts don’t support this inclusion of it in our diet at all. David Ludwig, Harvard Medical School, high fructose corn syrup is one of the most vendors misunderstood products in the food industry. High fructose corn syrup is almost always a marker of poor quality nutrient poor disease, creating industrial food products or quote, food like substances, Michael Pollin’s epic quote. So that’s pretty strong words against high fructose corn syrup. And again, most of it, most of the energy bars that are being touted as health bars have cleaned up their act a bit, but not that much. When you’re talking about the sweetening agents, you’ll see stuff on the label, and I want you to read labels very carefully. Now, for whatever energy bar you’re thinking of consuming and think twice or three times, you’ll see stuff like brown rice syrup or tapioca syrup.

Brad (00:37:20):
Those are, uh, they might even have marketing commentary saying that, uh, you know, these are way better than high fructose corn syrup. But there’s a large body of evidence and expert thinking that all these forms of sugar have a similar effect on the body, except for perhaps honey being, you know, if you have raw honey, you have all these other co-factors in there where research has shown that it doesn’t spike blood sugar to consume a teaspoonful of honey as opposed to consuming, let’s say, a teaspoonful of table sugar or let alone high fructose corn syrup. Same with dates. Dates have been found with continuous glucose monitor data from a lot of people that they don’t spike blood sugar because there are so many other nutritional benefits in your consuming the date in its whole form, just as you’re consuming honey that came straight from the bees and has high scores of antioxidants, phytonutrients that help your body digest it more easily than something that is processed such as brown rice syrup, tapioca syrup, or other of the designer sweeteners that can be found in today’s energy bar.

Brad (00:38:29):
Here’s a view of a popular bar called kind. Um, I want to compare and contrast their marketing copy with their ingredient lists because it’s a little disturbing because a well-meaning consumer who does have some scrutiny or does have some concern about what they’re putting in their body might be deluded into thinking this is a nutritional centerpiece that can, for example, take the place of a meal. I’m gonna point the finger at a lot of, uh, diet minded people that are trying to mind their calorie consumption and drop excess body fat. And they’re swapping in products like these instead of a wholesome nutrient dense sit down meal that is enjoyed and easily digested and processed. So Kind says the dark chocolate nuts and sea salt bars are satisfying gluten-free. Oh, if you say gluten-free, of course, it’s healthy now, packed with nuts and the taste of dark chocolate, you can take the bar anywhere.

Brad (00:39:31):
They lead with heart-healthy almonds as the number one ingredient and combines almonds, dark chocolate and sea salt to deliver a delicious taste with a little crunch. They’re convenient options, individually packed snacks. You can also get they have five grams of sugar, six grams of protein, and a very good source of fiber, reminding you again at the end, they’re also gluten-free and they have a low glycemic index and are made without genetically engineered ingredients. Okay, here’s the ingredients. Almonds, peanuts. We know peanuts have a lot of health objections for many people, especially if they’re not sourced from a quality processing history. And undoubtedly, again, as I talked about the bar industry, they are getting their commodity barrels full of almonds and peanuts to dump into the extrusion machine and make the bar chicory root fiber. That’s a source of fiber they’re trying to throw in there.

Brad (00:40:24):
Honey, palm kernel oil, as Gary Brecka talked about and Layne Norton shot back. Uh, the next ingredient after our good stuff, almonds, peanuts, chicory root fiber, honey and palm kernel oil, cane sugar, glucose syrup, rice flour, unsweetened chocolate. Remember the comments about Dutch processing? So that’s a chocolate that’s been stripped of any original nutritional value. Alkalize cocoa, same thing. So the touting of dark chocolate in the bar, makes the consumer jump to any information they’ve heard about dark chocolate, dark chocolate, having health benefits, including full length shows and interviews on the B.rad Podcast and thinking, oh, okay. So the kind bar is, uh, almonds and dark chocolate. So, uh, this is good. I’m gonna reach for this one. But again, the type of chocolate, not much nutrition there. Finishing up the ingredient list, sea salt, soy and cetin, natural flavors and cocoa butter.

Brad (00:41:23):
Isn’t that interesting? Very similar lineup to the David Bar. Maybe we can drive around to suburban Salt Lake City and walk into the factory and see them both produce back to back. So I am going to set the record straight here, with my concluding comments for the show. And what I wanna start with is this foundational premise going back decades that’s been programmed into our brain that if you need a snack on the go when you’re too busy for a meal, or you need some energy before or perhaps after your workout, the whole thing is feeling a little sketch to me these days. And I would contend in general that we’d all be better off fasting during those times when we think about reaching for an energy bar. This will help you develop metabolic flexibility. Mark Sisson has been using this term, coin this term many years ago and has been using it nonstop.

Brad (00:42:21):
And that is the ability to burn a variety of fuel sources on demand for optimal metabolic function and energetic function. In other words, if you don’t have any calories around, you can easily and gracefully turn to stored body fat, perhaps manufacturing ketones when things get a little extreme, like you’re practicing time restricted feeding or fasting, and of course, burning the glucose that’s stored in the form of glycogen when you do go out there and do a workout. So a lot of people ask me like, Hey, what’s your pre-workout? What’s your recommended calories before a workout? I’m like, I don’t consume any calories before a workout. I don’t need them. I’m walking around with 165 pounds of body weight. A lot of that’s fat. And, my glycogen stores are hopefully pretty close to full after my last evening meal.

Brad (00:43:14):
And so, we can talk about things to consume after the workout to speed recovery. But I think we need to reset a lot of our notions, our fundamental notions about diet, nutrition energy needs during the day, and put more emphasis on metabolic flexibility. That means that you, you should not have to need an energy bar to get through your busy, stressful day at the office or your long drive or whatever, unless, of course, going back to that original, invention by Brian Maxwell. If you’re a high performance athlete, then we can sit down and have a talk about how you’re going to get certain calories in that you need to perform. My friend and former podcast guest, Shari Hawkins, she is an Olympic heptathlete. She finally realized her lifelong dream in 2024 making the United States Olympic Team in the grueling event of the heptathlon.

Brad (00:44:14):
That’s seven events for females. The males participate in the decathlon. I was there watching in Eugene. She was collapsed on the track after the last event. I raced down to Trackside and high fived her. And it was so amazing to see the look on the face of an athlete who had given every ounce of energy for years and years training so hard, arguably the hardest of any track and field athlete, because you have to build competency in seven events. And we have been talking for a few years about her diet. She asked me for some guidance a while back as she was having some trouble with recovery and with feeling her best. She told me that she experimented with the ketogenic diet. And I’m like, what the Shari, who the hell got you into the mindset that a seven-event Olympic heathly needs to restrict their carbs in the name of health benefits of keto. Keto is for people.

Brad (00:45:08):
The by far the biggest benefits come from people who have metabolic damage or excess body weight to lose. And I said, look, as a high performing Olympic athlete, your main focus is fueling to perform and recover. And you might’ve heard me say that that is my mantra as well as a master’s track and field athlete with good metabolic health, uh, optimal body composition and blood work. So I’m no longer, engaged or implementing such tools and techniques as fasting or ketogenic eating because I don’t need them. And instead, my entire focus is on my new, longevity and performance mantra, perform, recover, perform, recover. So I’m doing everything I can to recover and to minimize all other aspects of life stress besides the putting the stress toward my workout and trying to get better as an athlete. So I will immediately come home and begin the refueling and the recovery process with a B.rad Super Fuel smoothie with a bunch of other ingredients thrown in there.

Brad (00:46:12):
And that’s what I got to talking with Shari about, is trying to be optimally fueled so that she could recover and do better workouts. In the seven events, Shari’s schedule was basically seven hour training day. Anna Hall, who just rose up the rankings to become the number two heptathlete of all time behind Jackie Joyner Kersee, an amazing performance by the young American from Florida. Her nickname at the University of Florida was nine to five because that was her training day as a Heptathlete. Look her up on YouTube. She’s an incredible athlete that competes at a world class level in some of those individual events. So you saw her in Grand Slam track running the 400 meter hurdles. She ran a, I believe it was a 2 0 2 800 meters at the end of her grueling heptathlon, where she just scored 7,000 points. 2 0 2 is right there at the Olympic level.

Brad (00:47:06):
And under two is basically an Olympic finalist or a true elite. And this is like a throw in event at the end. If you’ve watched the Olympic decathlon with the men, they appear to be jogging ’cause they’re so exhausted and they’re big guys with a lot of muscle, but they do have to run the 1500 at the end as the females have to run the 800 meters. And here’s this chick flying around the track at the last event of the Heptathlon running a world class time of 2 0 2, a, a true athletic specimen. I would give her votes as the greatest female athlete on the planet right now. Jackie Joyner Kersee, the legend from the eighties, who still has the world record in the Heptathlon. And as a mentor to Anna Hall, specifically, she was called the World’s Greatest athlete, uh, for good reason. She was also an Olympic level long jumper.

Brad (00:47:53):
I believe she has some global medals in the long jump with the best of 24 feet. But Jackie still has that record in the seven events. And she was indeed the greatest athlete in the world. She also played varsity basketball at UCLA, and she was just a complete legend. And now we have a modern day legend, uh, Anna Hall and right there up in the, uh, in the peer group, Shari, who I’m talking about. So she was trying to figure out during that seven hour training day, how am I gonna fuel this and get through these workouts? So she was doing things like liquid calories and protein smoothies, and having breakfast like oatmeal and things that could go down easy and pack in a significant number of calories, as well as the performance products such as the cleanest, most palatable energy bars for her, and things that were in her bag in between throwing the javelin and then heading over to the high jump bar for another practice session.

Brad (00:48:45):
So, boy, just keep in the back of your mind that these energy bars that are beautifully presented at the store and their colorful labels are for elite athletes. They were designed for elite athletes originally, at still probably the best use of them. I’m thinking of my cactus to Clouds day, where I inhaled a whole bunch of processed high performance food in order to get through this 15 hour extreme endurance hike on the single most difficult hiking trail in America, maybe the world, with the beginning being a climb of 8,400 vertical feet in the first 9.3 miles. And the entire day is 22 miles. 15 hours, like I said, or my quip was that we hiked from four to seven that day, from four to seven <laugh> in indeed. Uh, but I had to throw down anything I could to keep that sugar going in my bloodstream because I was really pushing myself beyond what I was prepared for.

Brad (00:49:46):
I did take notes because I would be prepared for ensuing hikes. So I wanted to do the same crazy thing which I plan to on an annual basis because it’s such a wonderful day out there with friends on the trail and challenging yourself. But I had like 24 single individual licorice candies. I had probably five or six different energy bars. I had a half peanut butter sandwich that my friend Dr. Stevie shared with me. I had a fig salami, which I found in, uh, healthy grocery, uh, was so it was, it was made outta fig, but it was in, it looked like a salami stick, but it was mostly fruit. I was tresting out my new B.rad Super Electrolite Drink. i had some calories from that. Overall, I consumed about 2000 calories on the trail that day, almost entirely in processed high performance food.

Brad (00:50:41):
I got through the hike. I felt fine, except for my digestive tract had extreme stress in the latter hours of the day. So a lot of pit stops, a lot of discomfort and a lot of trouble digesting and processing these very, very clean, well chosen energy bars. I’m relating this story because I think it’s important to realize what you’re consuming here. And like one of the commenters on the Layne versus Gary Instagram post, uh, the guy said, uh, thanks for defending the David Bar, Layne. ‘Cause I consume, uh, several of these every single day. Well, dude, um, if you consumed as many as I did and kept going for 15 hours, I would show you what would happen with to your digestive tract. It would not be pretty. And that’s the kind of things that we really need to rethink that we have a free pass into chowing these things instead of real food. In particular, in particular, anybody who’s claiming to be a high protein bar, that really lights up my sketch meter because a bar is simply not a great delivery system for protein, nor is a liquid beverage because you have to have all these different stabilizing ingredients, processing methods to get the bar on the shelf with the protein in there.

Brad (00:52:05):
There’s such a thing as the DIAAS score, that’s the dispensable ingestible amino acid score. And it’s basically the quality purity and how well the protein is absorbed and assimilated by the body. Boy, I don’t know who’s can some of these protein bars. I don’t think they’d be bragging about their DIAAS score. It, it’s, it’s just a tough way to get protein into the body. That’s why protein is, you know, needs to be your dietary centerpiece. It needs to be the focal point of your meals. A lot of people today, probably especially healthy, active, energetic, athletic type people are getting insufficient protein. Females, I’m talking to you directly. ’cause if you have any notion of, uh, controlling portions trying to reduce excess body fat, or especially if you’re trending toward a plant-based approach to eating, systematically eliminating most of the nutrient powerhouses of the human diet, as well as the best protein sources being the animal sourced protein vastly superior to a plant-based source of protein, uh, then we’re gonna have real trouble.

Brad (00:53:10):
And you’re not gonna claw your way back by consuming a protein bar with however many grams of protein listed on the label. It’s just like saying, um, a 200 calorie Twinkee is the same to the body as 200 calories, uh, in the form of an egg breakfast. They behave totally differently in the body. And I don’t think I’m gonna be terribly exposed by saying that a bar is not the greatest protein delivery source. Even the experts who are backing this bar would probably agree that a steak or a plate of eggs would be a much better way to get more protein, more nutrition, easy to assimilate. There’s also plenty of other whole foods that might work as a much better source of snack. If you need snack, if you’re away from sit down meals or you’re too busy or whatever your reason is, hardboiled eggs come to mind.

Brad (00:54:02):
A trail mix with natural ingredients and a lot of good ones are made right off the shelf. You can go to Trader Joe’s and find some good stuff. Nut butter, I’m sorry, I don’t sell the macadamia nut butter anymore, but I still consume that as needed, had a whole can of that on the trail. I forgot to mention that. Cactus to clouds, a true high quality, minimally processed beef jerky. So not the stuff that you find in the gas station during your drive, uh, but there are some good products. I’ve seen some like at a big box store in Costco where you can pick up the label and look and see that they’re just minimal ingredients. The minimal needed to stabilize the meat source. I think Paul Saladino is now pitching some beef jerky.

Brad (00:54:46):
I remember him doing an Instagram video where he had a, a raw steak in his pocket. And he says, rather than carry this around for a snack, I made some beef jerky. Um, for, for true snack without worrying about the nutritional value, you just need to munch on something. I am enjoying these new chips made with beef tallow. So in the potato chip category, finally there’s something that’s not extremely disastrous health destructive. Uh, so we’re talking about, uh, the blue corn chips from Masa. No commercial break there. No, no affiliation, but they do make a good product. Blue corn chips made with tallow. Um, so snacks at the time you need ’em. Uh, my wife,

Brad (00:55:26):
Mia Moore powerhouse driving, she’ll just pull the whole the whole session. She doesn’t complain, but sometimes when she’s feeling a little dragging in the car, she will ask me to serve her her favorite kind of chips, Siete chips, I think they’re made with avocado oil. So supposedly less objectionable than regular or she’ll munch on some nuts and that’ll help keep her awake. So that’s a darn good reason to reach for a snack. I can’t think of too many others above that. And I’ll get to Brad’s favorite snack list shortly. Of course, you’ll probably guess my favorite snack by far. And the only thing I would actually say on a, a regular basis fits into that category of calories that I consume between meals. That’s right, you guessed it. High cacao percentage, artisan bean-to-bar dark chocolate, 80% or higher. Generally, this is a fantastically delicious, easily convenient except for the melting factor, if that’s a concern for you. And it has a great nutritional profile. It’s got all the antioxidants, they’re called flavonoids, micronutrients.

Brad (00:56:26):
And, you’ve probably heard of ethyl amine toxic.They call it the love chemical because it’s known to stimulate dopamine and elicit feelings of pleasure and reward. One reason why some experts think why chocolate is so popular, but there’s a huge contrast from the processed cocoa ingredients listed on the energy bar that we talked about earlier, and a true high quality bean-to-bar dark chocolate. You’ve heard me record entire shows about this before, but you really wanna source bean-to-bar products only, and you want to be over that threshold of, uh, cacao content. So it’s a truly dark chocolate. Maybe 70% would be your checkpoint instead of 80, but definitely getting over 70%. The more you trend down the, the rankings, you’re going into the milk chocolate category, where of course, more sugar and, and dairy product is added in there.

Brad (00:57:23):
and oftentimes these are not artisan bars that have been, uh, prepared properly. Uh, quick recap of some of my dark chocolate commentary. And you can also download the free PDF, connoisseur’s guide to dark chocolate from brad kearns.com. Fill out the form. You get the PDF, it has all the guidelines that you’ll need. But you wanna look for cacao beans as the first ingredient on the label. This confirms that the maker of the bar got the beans in their original form source. The beans from origin in the equatorial country where the cacao beans are grown, they’re only grown inside the tropics. And then they do the whole processing in-house. One of the terms roasted ConEd. Then it goes to the next process. I’ve been on the tours, I forgot. But, there’s a very elaborate process to starting with the beans.

Brad (00:58:15):
Just like you’re making coffee, you’re gonna roast ’em first, then you’re gonna get the shells off, and pretty soon they’re gonna turn into liquid form. Then you can mold them into bars and add the other ingredients. So generally a high quality bean-to-bar chocolate bar will start with cacao beans on the label, and it’ll have very few ingredients. Typically, sugar. That’s why anything under a hundred percent, dark chocolate bar, you’ve maybe tried those a hundred percent bars. They’re a little tougher. A lot of people, I like ’em once in a while, I mix ’em in, sometimes very bitter and not at all sweet. So if you’re going down to 90 or down to 80, that’s the amount of sugar that is added to the bar to make it an end result of an 80% bar. You might see cocoa butter on the label, and that’s for texture mouthfeel, you know, for bulk or something, and maybe whatever flavoring like a little vanilla.

Brad (00:59:06):
And right now, right off camera, I’m looking on my shelf of some of my favorite bars, like Askinosie Chocolate USean Askinosie , former podcast guest, and on the label is cacao beans, sugar, cocoa butter, and vanilla. Same with Lily Bell Chocolate. The poor guy retired and moved to the Cook Islands to go fishing for the rest of his life. So I’m sad that that bar no longer is available. But I’m gonna give you a list of some of my favorite in a bit.

Brad (00:59:34):
Now, if you enjoy energy bars from time to time, you choose the least offensive ones that are made with whole foods and minimal ingredients, and you get your protein sourced elsewhere from whole foods, like eggs and meat., We’re not talking about a big health crisis here. If you want to enjoy a David Bar from time to time because you enjoy the taste of cake batter or you’re running around town and you forgot to eat and now you have a workout and you need some energy, that’s fine.

Brad (00:59:59):
Just like I mentioned my go-to on Cactus to Clouds, of course, I’m gonna pack a bunch of bars because I’m looking at 15 hours and the top of a mountain that’s so high. It’s unimaginable when we start in the morning that we’re gonna do this thing, but we’re gonna do it. Okay, so now let’s finish with an orderly list of my recommended snacks. I talked about fasting. I did a special shout out to people who have a, a snacking habit right now and can’t imagine living without those few energy bars that you eat or whatever other snacks I’m going to recommend eating bigger portions at meal times of the good stuff. Dr. Tommy Wood, one of my favorite podcast guests, he’s been on three times. It’s been a while, but his advice still rings in my head every day. And one thing he mentioned that he counsels his athletic clients who send them, uh, food diaries.

Brad (01:00:51):
And he’ll, he said this on the show, he’s like, I read these diaries and someone will write breakfast, two eggs and half an avocado, and I’ll write back to that athletic person. Why don’t you have a real breakfast like six eggs and a full avocado? Hey, you wanna dispute that right now? Let me talk about this. Of course, not stuffing your face if six eggs and a full avocado sounds like a lot, which it does. But do you know, or can you imagine what will happen downstream to someone that has a snacking habit or a sweet tooth at night? Or other indications that you are not fully cellularly energized like Jay Feldman talks about? So emphatically, those are the symptoms of feeling a little bit bombed out and burned out at the end of the day because you’ve been fasting too much, you’ve been restricting too many carbs and trying to do your CrossFit workouts or whatever the case may be.

Brad (01:01:42):
So, starting your day with a really robust, extra nutritious breakfast more than you might ordinarily eat. ’cause you’re thinking in your mind, oh, I don’t want to, you know, I don’t wanna stuff my face and be a pig. I’m not gonna go back to the omelet bar for a second omelet. Uh, that’s the kind of stuff that will maybe come back to bite you in the form of your energy bar consumption over time. So, um, I’m sneaking in there under number one, fasting is my recommendation. And number one A is to have larger portions at your nutritious meals. How about that? I also mentioned that, if you wanna have bars once in a while, that’s great, and let’s see if I can go screen share and show you Lara bar. One of my old favorites. I met Lara Merriken, oh 25 years ago when she first started this company in the year 2000.

Brad (01:02:36):
And their mission was to have the most pure and simple product. And there’s my favorite all time flavor. It was one of her original ones. If you’re listening, not watching, I’m showing the distinctive orange wrapper for the cashew cookie bar. And right there on the front of the label, it says two ingredients, cashews, and dates. That’s it. And not cooked. It’s in raw form. So it’s very nutritious, comparably, easier to digest than something like a David Bar with all those other aforementioned in there. So I’m giving a strong thumbs up to Lara Bar here, still going strong 25 years later, maintaining that commitment to minimal ingredients, generally fruit and nuts and flavoring if you look across all of their bars. So number one was fasting. Number one A was eating bigger portions at meals. Number two on my list is high cacao percentage bean-to-bar dark chocolate.

Brad (01:03:35):
You can download my free PDF guide. I mentioned Askinosie chocolate, A-S-K-I-N-O-S-I-E. They’re outta Missouri. They make a fantastic product. They’re 88% dark chocolate bar is, uh, my number one or two or three favorite in the world. There’s also a company called Ranger Chocolate out of Oregon that makes a fantastic dark chocolate sea salt bar. Creo chocolate also from Oregon, makes many great bars. I also like Dick Taylor Bar. They have the, one of ’em with fig bits of fig on the back of the bar. Really good. And there’s a website called cocoarunner.com based in United Kingdom, but they ship very efficiently to United States, and they have dozens of artisan bean-to- bar dark chocolate makers from around the world. And you can sample up to your heart’s content and try seven different kinds to try to get the go-to there.

Brad (01:04:27):
Okay, speaking of dark chocolate, there’s a lot of confusion and hype in the product area. And so I want you to be aware, even if you’re at a healthy natural food grocer, many, if not, most of the bars that I find at these chain stores, like Whole Foods Market, are not adhering to my quality standard of having it be a bean-to-bar artisan dark chocolate maker. And you can tell the difference not from the fancy label that has beautiful writing about their sustainability. And we donate a portion of our profits to save the rainforest. And you know, we’re all with you here with the healthiest chocolate. And then you look on the ingredient list, and if you see things at the start, such as cacao mask, cacao butter, chocolate, chocolate liquier, dark chocolate as the first ingredient, you’ll know that these ingredients were purchased on the commodity market in their already processed form.

Brad (01:05:27):
And the manufacturer simply put a stamp and slapped their label on it. So they didn’t process the product from origin, from the beans to the finish line. The problem with this, as Sean Askinosie describes in detail on his show, that the beans are from an uncertain origin, and there’s a lot of indiscriminate harvesting methods where they will harvest in a lazy manner without the proper scrutiny. And that means a lot of rotten beans will get into it, but they’ll burn them so bad that the flavor will be cooked out. And then they’ll add generally, in the chocolate industry, they’re adding enough sugar and flavoring like in a Hershey’s bar or a Milky Way where you don’t know, you can’t taste the quality of the original cacao bean. It’s just been burnt to a crisp and thrown in there with all the processed additional ingredients.

Brad (01:06:19):
And so that’s a real problem, the quality of the cacao bean and the, uh, sourcing it to origin. And secondly, um, because of the poor regulation in the equatorial nations of Africa, if you buy a commodity, uh, dark chocolate bar or milk chocolate bar, or popular brand bar, you know, a snicker bar, Hershey, Nestle’s Crunch, Sean says that you are, most certainly, you could be sure that you are supporting child slave labor in Africa because of the poor treatment of the farmers, the lack of a fair wage, all the things that we’re concerned about using the children without, you know, their free will. And that is indicated by the price point on the bar. It’s as simple as that. So expect to pay for a high quality bean-to-bar dark chocolate bar around $3 an ounce. That means a small bar is gonna be 9, 10, 11, or $12, as opposed to the, you know, commodity bars might be three 50.

Brad (01:07:19):
There’s some of those at Trader Joe’s. There’s a lot of those at Whole Foods. Maybe $4, maybe $5, maybe two 50. This is your, your, uh, shopping dollar supporting, um, the worst of global, uh, farming economy and also, uh, extremely poor quality and objectionable processing methods. So that is your key looking for those term, that term cocoa beans as number one ingredient. Cacao beans, cocoa beans. Okay. Oh, also one last comment about chocolate before I finish my list of recommended snacks. The proper way for dark chocolate connoisseur to consume the product is to take a square and let it dissolve on your tongue, rather than biting into chocolate. Biting into chocolate is for amateurs. I know there’s probably some wine connoisseurs out there that’s like slugging down your tasting flute of wine rather than enjoying it and smelling it and swirling it and doing all the things that wine connoisseurs do.

Brad (01:08:19):
So consume dark chocolate the right way by letting it dissolve on your tongue and pick up the flavor notes. They call it terroir in in wine, right, as well as dark chocolate. You can, uh, and they’ll, they’ll say on the label, you might taste some fruity, type of product like dates and strawberries in there because, uh, that’s what’s grown nearby from the farmer. That’s, uh, we’re, we’re talking about with these exotic bars. Okay, so fasting number one, dark chocolate number two. I mentioned, um, there are some really high quality natural energy bars out there. I’ll give lar bar a plug there. And then, um, I hard boiled eggs. I mentioned that that’s also on the list ’cause that is a great source of protein and it’s convenient and it’s travel able. What I do is I’ll make a, I’ll put the eggs in a container and then I’ll have a little Ziploc, uh, with some squirts of extra virgin olive oil and sea salt.

Brad (01:09:16):
And I’ll just throw all that in the Ziploc, the oil and the salt. And then when I peel the egg, when it’s time to eat, such as at the airport gate or wherever I am, I’ll dump the egg into the Ziploc, roll it around, and then I’ll have a really flavorful egg rather than eating a hard boiled egg without any, without any taste. Okay. I also can put macadamia nuts, macadamia nut butter that’s widely regarded as the most, uh, nutritional nut, 84% monounsaturated fat. The nut butter is delicious. It’s a pretty gourmet product, difficult to find. Um, you can, if you enjoy, uh, high quality fresh ground peanut butter or almond butter or another nut butter, that’s another good snack. And I suppose I could wrap up giving you 10 more ideas. Oh, uh, you know, Fuji apples are also very transportable, carrots, things like that.

Brad (01:10:06):
But rather than go on and on with suggested snacks, I’m gonna just close this show up by pointing you back to number one and figure out a way to organize your life so that you eat fantastic nutritious meals. You build that metabolic flexibility between meals and you don’t have to rely, especially on a heavily processed product like an energy bar. There you go, Gary. There you go. Layne. Brad weighing in on it. Thanks for the inspiration and thank you guys for listening, watching. I would love to know your comments and your thoughts about energy bars in general and the, the whole content of the show. So share podcast@bradventures.com.

Brad (01:10:51):
Thank you so much for listening to the B.rad Podcast. We appreciate all feedback and suggestions. Email podcast@bradventures.com and visit brad kearns.com to download five free eBooks and learn some great long cuts to a longer life. How to optimize testosterone naturally, become a dark chocolate connoisseur and transition to a barefoot and minimalist shoe lifestyle.