What fermentation shows us about our own insides
We sat down with Professor Tim Spector to talk about the gut microbiome, why fermented foods matter, and how a jar of kombucha makes the invisible visible.
Professor of epidemiology, King's College London, and co-founder of Zoe
I'm Tim Spector. I'm a professor of epidemiology at King's College London and co-founder of Zoe.
What I love about fermentation is that it's showing really on the outside what's happening to you on the inside. It's so hard to visualise your own gut microbiome, how that's dealing with food. But if you take a ferment, a kombucha, and you put the mother in, you add some tea and some sugar, you can see in real time what's going on inside all of our bodies all the time.
So our gut microbes need to be thought of as pharmacies. The chemicals they produce have effects all over our body.
They impact our immune system, which is key for ageing and cancer and fighting disease. They influence our metabolism, so controlling our weight and our chances of getting diabetes. And they also control our brain through our nervous system, having a big influence on things like mental disorders and dementia.
So our gut health is very important.
In my book, there's a lot of research telling us that we should be having lots of different types of fermented foods regularly. Drinks like kombucha play a vital part in that, because we know that kombuchas contain over 20 different species of microbe, which is a really great way to make sure you're getting all the good probiotics.
It's a perfect example of how we can understand our bodies by looking at how these foods are fermented.
I think everybody should learn, and teach their kids, how to do it. Fermentation is a great example for life.
