Ella Magers:

Lemme move me off of the screen. Cause nobody wants to look at me. Me. I don’t want to look at me.

Chef AJ:

I’d rather look at you than look at me. You’re pretty

Ella Magers:

Well. I love your blue today. It’s, sorry.

Chef AJ:

Yeah. For some reason I like to wear that color when I do things.

Ella Magers:

Interesting. Okay. Hey Chef aj. So glad to have you here.

Chef AJ:

Hey, thanks for having me. How you been? I’ve

Ella Magers:

Been great. I feel like I haven’t seen your face one-on-one in a while.

Chef AJ:

Well, you can see it every day on YouTube because I do it every single day.

Ella Magers:

Okay. I meant talking back and forth, but yeah,

Chef AJ:

I’m teasing you.

Ella Magers:

Yes. And I want to talk quite a bit about your YouTube show actually today. But first, I love my lightning rounds. Can we do another

Chef AJ:

One? Oh my gosh, I feel like I’m on a game show whenever I talk to you, but I love game shows. Do you know that I’ve been on about 20 of them in the last 40 years.

Ella Magers:

You’ve been on 20 game shows?

Chef AJ:

Probably I’d, it’s been a while because, well, gosh, I haven’t been on any since I left LA five years ago because it’s much harder because you have to, they’re all done in la. But yeah, I mean, since I started with Wheel of Fortune in 1984 and I just kept doing it. There was a rule at one point, I think it was a B, C, you could only do three for a lifetime. But then when Cable stations started the Game show network, as long as there was at least one year between shows Keep having you. So I love Cape Shows. I love watching them. I just love playing games. I love it.

Ella Magers:

No, you just blew my mind is Yeah. Another thing I did not know about you, which you

Chef AJ:

Probably don’t know about me and what probably none of your listeners or viewers know is that I didn’t mean I’m happy that to have this job as chef AJ or this persona, but that’s not what I wanted to be when I grew up. Actually, I mean, as a young child, I wanted to be a veterinarian my whole life. And my dream was to go to the University of Pennsylvania, which I did, but I didn’t graduate from there. I graduated from another college. But that is how I became vegan because I became a vegetarian the first day working for a veterinarian because I had to do animal research. I had to cut up one animal that was living, and I just said, this is not for me. Now, it’s probably different thanks to people like Dr. Neil Barnard and P C R M. There’s other ways to learn other than operating on live animals in humane fashion, but not back then.

And so when that dream was crushed, really what I really, really wanted to do my whole life. And because being raised Jewish and everybody in my family was a doctor, even being a veterinarian wasn’t good enough. I wanted to be a comedian and not a standup. Even though I’ve done standup, I like standup. Standup is hard because you have to write your own material usually, and it’s, and standup is scary because you’re the only one up there. I wanted to be on a sitcom, for example. I never dreamed about being Meryl Streep or a movie star because truthfully, when you go to a movie, the you’re so big that you see every little hair in your nose. And I’m like, I don’t. Back then we had small TVs, but now with the big screen TVs, it’s like being in a movie. But I always thought it would be really fun to be a supporting Second Banana, kind of like a Joe Peche and Lethal Weapon, or a Rhoda Morgan Stern in the Mary Tyler Moore show.

I didn’t want to be the star. I wanted to be the comedic relief, the best friend next door. And that’s exactly how my agent saw me, because as you know, up until about 12 years ago, I was obese and you wouldn’t really get a leading role, at least back then and not at that. And would’ve been very happy with that. I always wanted to work with a director who’s no longer with us named Gary Marshall because my understanding is that he took the actors off the script and you got to improvise because my first love, my first love is probably animals and my husband and my dog, but is improvisational comedy. And a lot of people don’t really know much about it except for recently thanks to a show called, whose Line is it? Anyway, but before that show came on the air, it has been around for a long time.

I mean, it’s been around much longer than even Second City in Chicago or the Groundlings in Los Angeles. And that was my favorite thing in the world to do was both perform improv comedy, take improv comedy classes or watch improv comedy. And there’s not as many opportunities for it because it’s not a format where you can really be good at it. But there’s not a lot of opportunities to really do it like there is film and television. But that is the greatest joy of my life, is to do that. And believe it or not, I am in seven classes a week right now, and I do three of them in person and four of them virtually, plus my standup class. So I got a whole nother life. I do chef AJ in the daytime and then at nighttime I bring out the funny because it’s what I love, because laughter really is the best medicine.

You can eat a nutrient rich diet and take all these supplements and exercise, but if you don’t laugh, that should be one of the pillars of nice style medicine. See, I would rewrite it to have this, I think there’s six pillars. The seventh pillar should be a pet, doesn’t have to be a dog. That’s just my choice. And the eighth pillar should be laughter. I mean, they do say connection in that you can open it up, but I’m telling you, laughter and pets are the two best things I think in the whole world. And they both make me happy.

Ella Magers:

Oh my gosh, I am loving this. I am loving this conversation already. At what point did you say, kind of say, okay, fine, I’ll do the Chef AJ thing and made that your primary

Chef AJ:

And I don’t want to sound like I’m unhappy about it. No, the thing is, there’s some with, what’s that saying with great Responsib, with I, there’s a saying, can’t think of an with great responsibility comes great or with, I don’t know. So what happened was is it’s not like I wanted, I’m happy being a chef. I worked in a restaurant for five years and it was fun being a pastry chef. But when you’re obese, it’s not the best job for you when you’re a food addict. You know what I mean? To be around all that stuff all the time. And I do love cooking even though people I eat so simply. And I’m guessing you do too. And it’s not because we to found the few meals that we love and we repeat them. But I had an easy bake oven when I was seven years old for Hanukkah.

And I always liked baking better than cooking. Becau, well, not mainly cause I was a sugar addict, but also because I’m a science nerd. I always like to go to the Museum of Science and Industry growing up in Chicago because I find science fascinating because a large part of science is predictable. There’s a lot of unknowns in the universe, but a lot of math and science, it’s like you can learn it and it’s predictable. And what was cool to me about the Easy Bake Oven, I didn’t understand at age seven how a light bulb could make a cake because that’s all it was. But what’s cool about baking, at least when you’re baking, not, I’m not talking about raw desserts, which you can be a little bit more loosey-goosey an actual science to baking. And if you follow it, you should be able to replicate it.

Whereas cooking, I find it’s more difficult because there’s more interpretation and it can also be easier for people that don’t like to follow recipes. So I, I’ve always liked to cook and I mean, I remember I gave my first formal dinner party at the age of 14 years old. And I remember the menu, it wasn’t vegan guys cause I didn’t become vegan till I was 17, but I had been raised with an aunt who was Swiss, and her mother owned a restaurant in Switzerland, a five star restaurant. She was a coron blue chef. And so at the age of 11, when I had to leave my parents in Chicago to move to California to live with an aunt and uncle, I mean, we ate things that most 11 year olds don’t eat. It wasn’t vegan, but man, it was rich French fruit. It was like sole, there was cheese souffle.

There was just all these classic French dishes that we would have. And the funny thing is none of them were overweight. So I mean, I know it’s partly genetics, but they didn’t eat processed food. Yes, they ate animal. This is what I remember is my aunt and her mother who were never overweight, they weren’t eating processed food. My aunt’s mother would go to the farmer’s market or the equivalent back then and just buy the vegetables and stuff. And she needed to make for the meal. And they weren’t eating processed food, but the food was just incredible Negro [inaudible] beef. And it was interesting though, because they ate their salad after dinner, which was different than I was raised. And it’s different than what we teach in terms of calorie density. And dessert was usually they would have cheese for dessert whi, which was kind of weird.

I never really liked cheese. But anyway, so I was always fascinated by cooking because I would watch, her name was Mei Mei, my aunt’s mother who made all the meals. She didn’t have a single recipe and people begged her to write ’em down so that they wouldn’t die with her. And it was so intuitive. And she would get pears and make a pair of golet and it’s like it was mine. It was arts and crafts, it was watching an artist. So I’ve always liked to cook. And they had a series of books in their home. It was Time Life, I believe it was these classic cookbooks from around the world. And when I was 14, I remember I sent out invitations and I did my first formal dinner party. And I, I’m trying to remember, I know I made, oh gosh, it was something, it I don’t remember exactly.

There was some kind of braised vegetable, like celery. There was some kind of, oh, I did make souffle granet for dessert because that was my uncle’s favorite dessert. It was some kind of stuffed cape on or so it was pretty fancy for a 14 year old, I got to tell you. And it was fun because people love to eat and people love to get together. But I never really aspired to be a chef. The funny thing is, is it all happened because I had gotten the beginning of colon cancer at the age of 43, and that’s when I weighed almost 200 pounds and was bleeding internally. And I had been a vegan already for 26 years, but I was a junk food vegan who had Coke Slurpees for breakfast and Dr. Pepper for lunch. And every kind of candy cake, cookie pie and ice cream, everything.

But fruits and vegetables, no fiber leads to ems, pre-cancerous polyps. And so what happened is when I went to the Optum Health Institute, and this is great because I am celebrating 20 years of being off processed food on July 1st of this year at Rancho Lato, Mexico. That would be the last time I would’ve had white sugar. And I went to the Optum Health Institute and I healed from the polyps. I hadn’t yet learned the calorie density piece to really slim down. But what happened was, is I the diet, if the Optum people say they like true north, they don’t like the food, I’m like, go to o h. I mean, O H I is great, and I actually want to go there again because I never completed my third week. But that’s even more austere because basically it’s like there’s no salad dressing true north.

There’s three dressings a day. It’s like plain salad. Few days you’re juicing. It’s pretty pretty, it’s a healing diet. And so when I got home from the Optum Health Institute, I stayed up a hundred that I’m in awe of people that can be raw because I couldn’t sustain it. I did it for two years while I was healing six months really strict because after that they repeated the colonoscopy and my polyps were gone. But the reason I went to culinary school is because if I was going to eat as healthy as I was told I need to eat to prevent future cancers because I have a strong family history of just about every cancer. I’m like, this has to be tastes better than the food at O H I, which was seed cheese. And it was, I mean, no offense, O h i, you’re a great place, but the food is not delicious.

So I went to culinary school just to learn how to make food tastes better. And I had to take a leave of absence because my job at the time was an activity director at a retirement home. And I still wasn’t aspiring really to be a chef or anything. My name, my name’s Abby, and I remember I used to go to Jamba Juice every morning before going to work because it was really close to my work, which was also close to a seven 11 because when I was getting off Coke Slurpees, before I learned about Green Slurpees, I was just having a fruit smoothie, which was an upgrade. And it was so noisy at Jamba Juice every day because there’ll be like six GLIs going and they’d go, what’s your name? Abby What? I’m like aj. So I became aj, and then when I became chef, it became chef aj. So that’s kind of the trajectory of what happened. And yeah, that’s my story basically.

Ella Magers:

This is fabulous. Every time we talk and we talk relatively often, I learn new things about you. So this is amazing. And I’m going to put in the show notes, our conversation from the Vegan Life Coach podcast, because that, I just listened to that today in preparation because I was like, let’s not cover the same things. And sure enough, already so many new things. So thank you for all of that

Chef AJ:

Multifaceted.

Ella Magers:

Yes, you certainly are. All right. But here’s the lightning round. And this is so funny because we were talking before the show, and this is not going to be the same song, but one song that gets you pumped while you’re working out.

Chef AJ:

Oh, while I’m working out, I’m not listening to music. So what you say, one song that gets me pumped. Pumped. Okay. Well, I hummed it to you at the beginning. It’s Jimmy Soul. If you want to be happy for the rest of your life, I’m not going to say the next couple words called two Days, day in age, they would find the song very offensive. But I just, those songs with a beat that goes over and over that.

Ella Magers:

So you don’t listen to music when you’re working out?

Chef AJ:

No, when I’m working out, I’m listening to a podcast. Podcast,

Ella Magers:

Yeah.

Chef AJ:

That’s what I do. So I don’t listen to music while I’m working out, but I do listen to music all throughout. I mean, I don’t want to say her name, but because I say her name, she’ll play stuff, but I listen to it all the time when I’m not working out.

Ella Magers:

Got it. Okay. What’s your life purpose in one sentence?

Chef AJ:

Just to teach people to be kind to animals. And then I consider humans, animals, guys. But I mean, and not eating them. It’s probably the kindest thing you can do.

Ella Magers:

You get to choose one person dead or alive, who you have not yet met or interviewed. Who do you choose to interview?

Chef AJ:

Oh my God, that’s so easy. I thought about this my whole life. Victor Frankl, who wrote Man’s Search For Meaning, because that is, if anybody feels helpless or hopeless, read that book because this guy survived the concentration camps after watching his whole family die before his eyes. And his premise is that it’s not what happens to you in life, it’s the meaning you make out of it. And I would love to just pick his brain on how he, because so many people crumble under such far less circumstance. I mean, let’s face it, life’s sad things, not all the time, hopefully for you, but things happen to all of us. It’s not what happens, it’s what we do with how we bounce back. And his is unparalleled. And the thing is, even in the camp, he helped people. So I would just lie, she just seems like an amazing human. So Victor, if you’re there, let’s get together.

Ella Magers:

Okay. What’s your biggest challenge when it comes to optimizing your own health and wellbeing holistically?

Chef AJ:

Okay, well, gosh, if I say I don’t have one, then it sound like Alan, I

Ella Magers:

Was curious if you were going to say that or not. Well, but

Chef AJ:

People have to understand that I had challenges for 52 years. But once I got into the groove of understanding it, but let me think. It’s not, oh my gosh, may I know. I know. Okay, I’m going to come up with something because it’s not the food. My food tastes great. I got it dialed in. It’s not exercise, you just got to do it. You don’t have to it, just get up and do it and sleep. You just have to make it a non-negotiable and tell people good night. It’s more like the, I don’t know how you want to say it, but Chris Wark talks about it like that forgiveness piece when people have hurt me and that whatever that is, that psycho, I don’t know what you call it, but that piece has always been the challenge for me, letting go of past her’s forgiveness. So that’s what I work on all the time, because that’s the one I haven’t nailed yet. It’s not as easy as cooking sweet potatoes.

Ella Magers:

No, it’s not good one. Okay. You are gifted a button that performs one action of your choice every time you push it. What action do you want your button to perform?

Chef AJ:

Now? Is this just an action on me or the whole world? Because

Ella Magers:

The whole world can, any action?

Chef AJ:

Well, of course, my first thought was maybe world peace, but then I thought of some selfish things just to keep every cell in my body. Well, it’s funny because there’s a song that I sing all the time. This is when you asked about that. But when I’m in the car, I sing this song all the time, and it’s every little cell in my body is happy. Every little cell in my body as well. Every little cell in my body is happy. Every little cell in my body is well, I’m so glad. Every little cell, every little cell in my body is, well, I sing that all the time, regardless of how I feel. Yeah, I mean, that sounds kind of world peace, but if I could be selfish, then I’d push it to, I don’t know, millions. I have millions of dogs. Just kidding.

Ella Magers:

All right, last one. You’re invited back to late night TV and are given a five minute segment to use as you wish. What would you do with your five minutes?

Chef AJ:

Wow. Gosh. Well, Johnny’s gone. I would somehow tie it into veganism this time. I mean, because those weren’t what I was hired for when I was on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, with Jay Leno or Letterman. So maybe I’d asked to do some kind of a cooking demo or something so that we could tie it into veganism and show them how delicious, make a dessert and talk about veganism somehow in a fun way that everybody would like.

Ella Magers:

Great. Awesome. I want to transition, I want to talk about your YouTube show a little bit. And it amazes me that you can go and do just doing a podcast a week for me. I mean, there’s a lot of preparation that goes into putting forth a great interview and asking ques great questions. And how do you do it? I mean, first talk a little bit about your show and when you decided to make that happen and make that commitment, that’s a huge commitment. Yeah. Talk about, talk the story of how that came to be.

Chef AJ:

So again, there’s a saying, life is what happens while you’re making plans. Almost everything in my life was not planned. And that surely it wasn’t planned for me to have a YouTube show or to do it daily. But what happened is when the pandemic started, and I don’t know the exact day it started, but I do know the date that our governor in California requested we shelter at home. That was March 20th, 2022. Nobody knew about how long or what it was going to be. I wanted to go, I had the time. I had a private membership group. I don’t haven’t in quite some time. So I was trying to go live to them like, Hey guys, let’s connect nobody. Let’s not be so scared. Let’s band together. And I had just gotten this new technology called Restream, which allows you to go live at Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube simultaneously.

Cause I had never done a YouTube live. I had a YouTube channel. I would do a video maybe once a week, and apparently I pushed the wrong button and I had gone live to every place. And there was at that time, like 600 people watching because at the beginning of the pandemic, first of all, almost everybody was home and people were really seeking community. So I did that and I’m like, gosh, there’s an interest in this. Well, I’ll just go live every day, just see how p check in what people are doing. And since it wasn’t just my group, I’m like, well, I’ll go live here too. But then I get bored of looking at my own face and hearing my own voice. So I remember contacting Dr. Nikki Davis, who’s a friend of mine. She’s a wonderful doctor. And at the time she was interning at True North.

And I said, I can just come on with me because it’s like a maybe answer some questions. And she was interning, so she couldn’t do it until 10 o’clock at night. And sure enough, people were watching. And so then what happened is people were writing me, can I be on your show? And I’m like, what show? Because the first few episodes, it’s not a show. So it became Chef AJ live, and it takes about six months to get a spot now because people want to come on. And also almost everybody that comes on wants to come on again and again. So it’s been a lot of fun. I’ve met people that I wouldn’t have met probably if I had continued my job, which was traveling every week to a different conference or spa or cruise and made a lot of friends and a lot of connections.

And I enjoy doing it. And I’m not on my show very much. If anybody, you guys watch that other than the Welcome, the Goodbye and then asking the questions I’m barely seen on my own show, which I don’t have a problem with at all, because I love learning from these wonderful guests and doctors. So I’ve gone every day, at least once a day, sometimes up to five times a day when we have our bundle. And I’ve done over 1500 shows. And so I was thinking, I don’t know if I could do it forever because I got to have a day off at some point, but I was thinking maybe I could do it for five years and then I’ll be 65 and I’m not going to retire retire. But I’m thinking five years would be a really good run of this. So we’ll see. It’s fun though. It really is. And also I don’t edit. So the other thing is if I had to do a really slick polished with music, edited with credits, I wouldn’t be able to do a show every day. It’s basically live, and as soon as it airs, it goes on iTunes so people can watch. If they don’t like the commercials on YouTube, they, you can listen on iTunes. And there’s kind of, so yeah, it’s fun. You’ve been on it several times and

Ella Magers:

I have. It’s super fun. How do you though handle the creating balance in your life? Because you’re got a lot on your plate.

Chef AJ:

Yeah. Well, one of the things is, well, I don’t have children. And I think when you don’t have children have a lot easier life and you used to want them. And I got pregnant many times, I could never have them. And now that I’m 63, it’s funny, we had some young children under the age of 10, three of them visiting. And at the end of the day, it was so funny because our house was just trashed, our toilets were broken. My husband and I said, boy, I’m glad we don’t have children, or at least I couldn’t have at this point in my life, have young children. So not having children or also not having parents. A lot of people are in that sandwich thing where not only they have children to take care of, but their parents are ailing. So fortunately or unfortunately, my parents, because they were so much older when I was born and suffered from so many lifestyle diseases, were both gone by the time I was 40.

So I don’t have anybody to worry about really. I, if you will, selfish, which I don’t think is selfish because there’s a old saying if you don’t put your oxygen mask on first. But because I don’t have anybody to take care of on either end, and my husband is pretty much, and we have one little dog, so I don’t have a lot of people that rely on me financially, emotionally. So that’s why. But I also make sure that my needs have to be met first. So in other words, I had a partner at one point, and we didn’t really get along well because his philosophy was you get all your work and then if you’re done, okay, and then if there’s time you exercise, and it’s like, no, I always take care of what I need to take care of first. I make exercise the non-negotiables.

So that’s why my show starts at 11 sometimes I started at nine, and so I make sure that all my habits are in place and I don’t compromise on exercise, sleep, or food for anyone. I’m disagreeable. I l I say no. And when you’re able to say no, it’s a lot easier because you don’t spend your life doing things that you don’t want to do for people that you don’t like. And I see, especially with the women I work with, not so much men. I really have not come across a man that really is a people pleaser the way that women are at. And so that’s the problem, is when you’re doing things that you don’t want to do, then you don’t have time to do the things you want to do. So that’s why you have to prioritize your life.

Ella Magers:

So what does your morning routine look like?

Chef AJ:

It’s boring. So I wake up, unless I have an appointment, I don’t know, a dentist appointment, I wake up naturally. And so that would be anywhere between five 30 and six, like the latest I think I’ve ever woken up, if I did a comedy show the night before is seven. So I wake up without an alarm clock, usually around that time. And so the first thing we do is walk Bailey the little dog, because we got in the habit when we lived in the desert that we had to walk her early. Now we could walk her later, but it’s our habit. We walk Bailey, and then I get on the bike, the spin bike. I have a Kaiser spin bike, nothing fancy like a Peloton, got it used. I spin for an hour standing, and then that’s when I do fun stuff. I’ll either listen to a podcast, I might watch something on Netflix.

I’ll play Words with Friends so that by linking it with something, I don’t love exercise, but by doing something else on the bike or return phone calls, it goes really, really quickly. So then it’s time to shower and get ready for my show, which sometimes is at night, sometimes is 11. Then n next thing you know, it’s 12 o’clock, which is my favorite hour because lunch is my first meal and I have a huge Hannah yam that weighs about one and a half pounds. It’s been roasted with a pound of broccoli. And then my belly is nice and full, and then often I have a bonus show or teach classes. But I don’t know, I like routine. I’m not one of these people that always has to have new, that some people are. And if you’re, that’s you. That’s okay, good to know that about yourself. But I kind of, I’m like a dog. I like the same thing every day and I just love it. But I just look forward to the, sometimes my comedy classes start as early as two. Usually they’re four or seven, but then I go and I feel like Batman, Bruce w by day, Batman by night chef aj by day comedy AJ by night. And then people in my other world, I mean, unless they’ve Googled me, they don’t know who I am. They don’t know me from Adam. So it’s kind of fun to being incognito.

Ella Magers:

So are you performing? Actually,

Chef AJ:

I did my first show as an improvisational comedian two weeks ago at the comedy spot in Sacramento. So I’m hoping to get good enough to be accepted into some kind of troop and perform regularly. But yeah.

Ella Magers:

Oh my gosh, I have to talk to you because I’m going out in that area in July and I want to see you perform.

Chef AJ:

Wow. Well, I hope I could get a show by then.

Ella Magers:

Okay, well let’s, let’s chat about that. Okay. Pin pin in all of this, because this is a random question that I don’t want to forget to ask. Nutritional yeast.

Chef AJ:

Yeah.

Ella Magers:

Okay. What’s the deal? I felt like a bad vegan for a long time because I mean, what vegan doesn’t like nutritional yeast, and I did not nutritional yeast. There was something about it I didn’t like until,

Chef AJ:

And lot of people got sick from it, get sick from it.

Ella Magers:

What about, so there’s the one that’s very yellow that is, and then there’s the kind that’s not fortified.

Chef AJ:

Not fortified is better, and not just because Dr. Ferman says it’s better, but as a chef, I think it tastes better to not have all those added vitamins and minerals. I am so sensi, I listen, I would love to be able to use it. It gives me such terrible stomach aches. And it does for a lot of people. They can’t really test if you’re allergic because it’s not in the repertoire of what the doctors can test for, but by how you feel. I wish somebody, I wish if there’s a chef out there listening to come up with an umami type cheesy flavor that doesn’t have nutritional yeast.

Ella Magers:

Okay, interesting. Because when I started using the non yes fortified, all of a sudden I liked it.

Chef AJ:

Yeah, it tastes, it tastes well. It tastes better. Yeah. The fortified almost tastes metal. You’re tasting the vitamins, the be the folic acid.

Ella Magers:

Yes. Okay. Yeah. Okay, good to know. All right. Question about the show. Now, do you, have you had guests having this platform and giving this platform to these people? That’s a pretty big responsibility, right? You’re spreading their message as well as your own. Do you ever have guests on that you really disagree with? They come out and say things, give advice that you’re like, ah, I really, okay.

Chef AJ:

So the thing is, you got to be careful who you let on. So if it happens, it’s my fault for letting them on because I try. It’s not that you have to be vegan to get on my show, although most guests are, there’s a few that’s not, but they are respectful enough to not promote animal products on my show, but they have something else going for them that I feel they’re a worthwhile ad. Or maybe somebody has a product, especially a non-food product. I’m not going to say you can’t be on my show if you sell a bowl. You know what I mean? Just, you know what I mean? But then yet the viewer’s like, what do they eat? Are they vegan? That’s kind of irrelevant here now. So I had one show, and if it didn’t have so many darn views, I would’ve deleted it right away.

I can talk about it. I’m sure she, she’s not going to see this. And anyway, so I had Judy Moskovitz on, and she was referred by her publisher. She was a lady that did the rice diet that Dr. McDougal talks about quite a bit that Dr. Walter Kaner did that reverses obesity and diabetes just by giving the patients basically rice, fruit juice, and actually sugar. And she had great success with it. She was on Oprah and maybe Phil Donahue. And so they republished her book The Rice Diet, and I believe Dr. McDougle either endorsed it or wrote the forward, and she’s like in her eighties now. So she comes on the show and it was like late women, women loses, I don’t know what she lose, 180 pounds or something eating rice or something. And so then when we start talking, I beg like, well, what do you eat?

Now? I’m assuming she’s vegan or whatever, and she’s on this ketogenic diet. And the thing is, she did lose that weight many, many years ago doing Keppner diet, but this time she didn’t. And I said, well, why didn’t you tell me then? And she goes, well, then you wouldn’t have had me on the show. So that was kind of rude, but she’s 80 years old, and her memory seemed to be failing, and I didn’t want to be in the word that starts with an A and ends with whole to a eight year old woman. So I just bit my tongue. And the people that were watching live that know me were saying, boy, you just did an Academy Award Women performance, because she basically was pretty disrespectful. But it got so many views that I kept it up. But then what it led to see, oh, there’s always a gift, is that Dr.

McDougle basically came on with Dr. Francis Neen, who worked for Kempner to kind of refute everything she said about animal. So it worked out, but for the most part, that’s why people get mad at me. And again, they’re not going to be watching this, but people that apply to me on the show that aren’t vegan, we have an intake form now which says, how long have you been vegan? So I know right away if somebody isn’t, hopefully they’re not going to lie. And they’re like, well, why don’t you let me on the show? And it’s like, I sometimes do, but it’s always the live audience. That is the number one question. It doesn’t even matter. I could have a guy selling a belt. What are you eat in a day that seems to, people seem to want to know what other people eat. So right now in the lineup, the regular lineup, I think all 28 guests, 27 of the 28, I’m looking at my lineup, 27 out of 28 are vegan. Yeah. So that’s pretty good. You ask me, well, actually, well maybe. Okay, maybe 26. But still that’s pretty good. But I don’t want to discriminate because the more non vegans hang around me, the more they might change their diet.

Ella Magers:

It’s true. It’s kind of like that double-edged sword of Yeah, what are we going to choose? All right, so when we were planning on this conversation, I said, what’s most inspiring to you right now? What topics? And you had mentioned food addiction and specifically sugar addiction. And last episode that we did together, we focused on dairy. So let’s talk about this sugar thing. What makes you at this moment still feeling feel really inspired by the whole sugar addiction thing?

Chef AJ:

Well, and here’s the thing. The longer I’m in this game, I’m not sure it’s just sugar. I think it’s sugar and fat or sugar and caffeine. I don’t think it’s people out there struggling with their weight because they eat Twizzlers. I think it’s sugar with something else that’s also addictive. You know what I mean? And the thing is, is it’s so darn tasty because we are desirous of sweet and salt because we have taste buds on our tip of our tongue for sweet and salt. And the first food that we’re supposed to get is our mother’s breast milk, which is sweet. It’s also fatty, and I think it’s fatty, isn’t it? I believe there’s some fat, and I don’t know, I wasn’t fed, what do I know? But I do know that we weren’t supposed to have fat and sugar, sugar and salt, salt and fat or sugar, fat and salt in the same mouthful that no food has that in it.

And I see people struggle so much with sugar because it potentiates the addictive effect of whatever is there. And if you’re eating processed food, whether it’s vegan or not, you’re not going to be able to get away from it. And the American Heart Association and the American Cancer Society says that we do not have any biological need for processed sugar, honey, a Gavi, it doesn’t matter what you call it. And that if we eat it, it should be no more than 5% of our calories. Well, if you’re the average woman, that would be five teaspoons a day. And I guess if you can use five teaspoons, you’d probably be okay, but most people aren’t. If you’re eating one regular dessert, you’re way over the five teaspoons and even a half a cup serving of marinara sauce. Like in a jar, a traditional brand has more sugar than two Oreos. So again, if you’re really not eating processed food and you want to do it the way Dr. McDougal says and put a teaspoon of brown sugar on your oatmeal, but are people really using that small amounts? I don’t think so. And just once you have it, you just want more. So

Ella Magers:

You’re 20 years.

Chef AJ:

20 years on July 1st. I’m so excited. That’s like an accomplishment actually, because most people can’t go 20 minutes or 20 days. So that’s amazing to me.

Ella Magers:

Congratulations. Thank you. If you are helping somebody who’s, are most people willing to go the route of, okay, let’s detox completely for sugar from sugar and cut it out. This is the way you recommend, right? Well,

Chef AJ:

That’s what I recommend if you’re an addict, because the only thing I harm reduction. Here’s the thing. If you’re a smoker, it’s going to be better to smoke one pack than two. But that doesn’t mean you still won’t get lung cancer and emphysema and die. So if you’re a sugar addict, is it better to cut down than to not keep the a dose here? Of course. But it depends what your goals are. Because if your goals is to have a calm, stable brain and to be out of the constant craving, the absence is the only thing that ever worked. It’s never not worked, but it’s just too hard for people because they socialize. They want to drink alcohol, they want to have rich desserts. I mean, you can make any rich dessert without sugar. I can do anything you can do with dates. But the thing is, is people are so into this concept of the pleasure trap.

It’s not their fault. We’re genetically hardwired to prefer it, but not in the form that you’re getting it in the form of fruit. So I find that abstinence always works, it’s just that most people either are unable or unwilling to do it. So I didn’t realize how hard this was going to be for people until I started having, that’s one of the reasons I don’t have programs anymore, is because people just fail so much. It’s not their fault, and it’s not your fault if you can’t do it. Just know that you are not set up to live in the environment you’re living in, especially your house right now with all the crap that you have in your pantry, refrigerator, and freezer.

Ella Magers:

Okay, so let’s talk about somebody trying to get off sugar. Obviously cutting out all refined sugars, and that includes stevia, that includes

Chef AJ:

Erythritol, monk, fruit, lohan, xylitol, eat the fruit, the whole fruit, and nothing but the whole fruit, not the fruit juice, not the dried fruit. Eat whole wet fruit.

Ella Magers:

Do you think that eating very concentrate like dates for example, does that still in that phase where somebody is going through that detoxing, does that, can a date trigger a refined sugar craving? Well,

Chef AJ:

That it’s going to depend on the individual. I think if you eat dates, you’re just going to want to eat more dates because they’re really, really delicious. But that said, I would still rather have people knock themselves out on dates than eat refined sugar, because at least with dates, at a certain point, you’re probably going to stop because of the water and fiber vitamin, neurals, phytochemicals, antioxidants, and micronutrients, you’re going to get full. I used dates 20 years ago to get off refined sugar. I used them as methadone, so I didn’t go from dates to vegetables for breakfast. I didn’t go from Coke Slurpees to vegetables for breakfast. There were lots of steps in between. So I just think if people just commit to not eating processed food for a while, that’s why I always tell people that losing weight and overcoming food addiction are two different processes.

It’s too difficult to try to do both at the same time, try to get a handle on your processed food addiction. And then eventually, once you get the food, which is whole vegan plant exclusive, not plant-based, plant exclusive processed food, in my opinion, without sos sugar, oil and salt, well for sure, without the oil and for sure, without the sugar. If you want to use a little salt, it’s an appetite stimulant. But I don’t think it’s necessarily the worst of the three For some people. Some people it’s a trigger. Then eventually you’ll start losing weight when you apply the principles of calorie density and not eat so many nuts, seeds, avocado and things like that. But I say get off the processed food first and sugar is a highly processed food, and it’s really more drug-like than food-like.

Ella Magers:

So how your fasting style for yourself, that’s like what time do you stop eating? And then you say you start around starting at 12.

Chef AJ:

Yeah. Well, I started, well, the only reason I started 12 is because my show is at 12, so I don’t want to be eating on the air. And there are times that I don’t get lunch till one, depending, but usually it’s 12 o’clock. And I really like early dinner. I love to be done with dinner by six. But I’ll be honest, there are nights that I’m not done by seven. So I guess you could say I have a six to eight hour eating window and the rest is not eating because I don’t think it’s good to eat at night, even if it’s low calorie dense food, I don’t sleep as well. And I have struggled with I B s throughout my life. So I like to have at least three hours before I lay down when I’m done eating. And I would eat in the morning if I was hungry because my new best friend, Dr.

John Sharpener, who’s a hundred year old physician, he has not eaten dinner most of his life. And he says that that’s the reason for his longevity. He follows the Adventist principles of breakfast, like a king lunch, like a prince dinner, like a popper, which means no dinner for him. He stops it too. But breakfast is not a social meal for the most part. And you know, miss out. I think when you don’t have dinner and you just sit there with a C glass of water, you kind of miss out on the social and the fun. So it lunch and dinner works for me. I’m still doing the two meals that seem to be more helpful for longevity or whatever, but I’m doing it in the better meals because breakfast, I don’t know, I’m not a breakfast person, just never was.

Ella Magers:

All right. So somebody is listening to this and are like, okay, I want to really start to fine tune my lifestyle, my eating habits. Talk about the resources that you have available and if there was a little roadmap for somebody to follow with your stuff. Well, it

Chef AJ:

Depends because if you’re 20 years old and 10 pounds overweight, it’s a whole different story than if you’re 70 pounds and about to go on dialysis. How quickly you have to make these changes and how bad do you want it is really going to be up to you. I mean, I think two of the best things anyone can do to really get a handle on their health and their weight is to do, one is virtual, one is in person. The in person one would be to go to the True North Health Center. People know it as a fasting center. But I went there and I didn’t fast. You don’t have to fast there. You have to be approved medically by a medical doctor to do a water fast. Almost anyone can do a juice fast there. But anybody can do what’s called an unrestricted feeder, which is like the funnest because you get to eat a lot and they have wonderful buffets.

And you learn so much in the daily, two or three daily classes from people like Dr. Ellen Goldhammer that it’s just, it’s mind blowing. And then you make C community while you’re there. And then the other is Dr. John McDougal has a 12 day online program usually every other month where he actually becomes your doctor and he basically tells you the truth about all of this. So those are two things I recommend. I do classes a few times a year, usually focused on weight loss and food addiction. So people join my mailing list@chefaj.com. We’ve got one coming up in July, and I just do it, I don’t know, maybe quarterly or something like that. But I recommend something where there’s a doctor attached, so people will get that the, it’ll have more, I guess the word is maybe validity. So when their family says, well, what are you doing this? And you’re like, well, doctor’s orders.

Ella Magers:

Got it. Got it. Okay. And then just from your opinion and how you see where we’re going with, let’s talk about plant forward thinking and the vegan movement, what’s your view on where we’re going and how it’s going and what we can all do?

Chef AJ:

I don’t know. Well, what we can all do is just stopping the animals, that’s for sure. But people ask me this a lot and I listen, if I had a crystal ball, I’d bet on the stock market or the lottery numbers, I don’t know where it’s coming going. I know that more people are becoming vegan for a reason that didn’t exist when I was growing up, which is the environment. Nobody talked about it. Nobody cared about it. A lot of people still don’t talk about it or care about it, but a lot of times with some of these really young people, they’re doing it really for that reason. And so they might be junk food vegans because of that, because their whole purpose is to save the environment, which is great. And I, I’ve seen a lot of changes in the last, really since 2011 when Forks Over Knives came out, that really changed a lot of things because people in general were only vegan for ethical reasons, or mostly vegan for ethical reasons, because nobody really knew that it was going to benefit their health in such a profound way.

And that’s when I started seeing a lot of people make the change. And then of course, once the door is open, more people started making more documentaries. So yeah, I think it’s getting, in 1977 when I became vegan, there wasn’t a word and there wasn’t anything on the menu anywhere. There wasn’t even plant milk in a box. I think you could get powdered soy milk at Loma Linda, maybe. But now everybody’s heard the word pretty much, almost every restaurant has either a vegan meal or a way to customize a vegan meal. So we have the internet now, and we got social media, so you know, can find your favorite influencer and find out what celebrity is going vegan. So it’s pretty mainstream right now. Even one of the awards shows, I can’t remember which one, when Joaquin Phoenix won his Oscar, he talked about not having dairy. So I think people get it now, whether they do it or not or agree with it. I think most people know what it is.

Ella Magers:

Well, chef, thank you for all that you do to promote the cause to make this a, a healthier planet. I appreciate you so much. Thanks for being here. Oh,

Chef AJ:

Thanks. Thank you, Ella. Best. So welcome. Best help to everyone.