Friday Favorites: What Are the Health Benefits of Sorghum?
How does sorghum compare with other grains in terms of protein, antioxidants, and micronutrients? Learn why sorghum is one of my favorite new grains, and the benefits of red sorghum compared to black and white varieties.
Should we all be seeking gluten-free grains? See:
• Is Gluten Sensitivity Real? ( )
• Gluten-Free Diets: Separating the Wheat from the Chat ( )
• How to Diagnose Gluten Intolerance ( )
You might also be interested in my videos on millet. Studies on Millet: Is It a Healthy Grain? ( ) and The Benefits of Millet for Diabetes ( ).
The How Not to Diet Cookbook is full of delicious and healthful grain recipes. Check out the recipes ( ).
“Resistant starch?” Learn more in Resistant Starch and Colon Cancer ( ) and Getting Starch to Take the Path of Most Resistance ( ).
For more on the benefits of different grains, see:
• Gut Microbiome: Strike It Rich with Whole Grains ( )
• Benefits of a Macrobiotic Diet for Diabetes ( )
• Which Is a Better Breakfast: Cereal or Oatmeal? ( )
• Are Ancient Grains Healthier? ( ?)
• Benefits of Quinoa for Lowering Triglycerides ( )
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-Michael Greger, MD FACLM
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Sorghum. Super yummy. I enjoy it every day. 💚🌱🇨🇦
I just bought some sorghum on clearance at my local health food store and I’m looking forward to trying it.
Eating oatmeal and watching Dr. Greger talk about sorghum.
I love this channel!
Из сорго тоже делают веники, но это не просо- пшено.
Сорго и амарант нейтральные крупы, в любые блюда можно добавить.
For IBS patients. It doesn’t bloat.
Barley is my favorite grain. It has a lower glycemic index than any other grain I’m aware of and it’s high in beta glucan, the stuff that activates the immune system. Nice to hear that it comes in colored, high antioxidant versions too.
Growing my own sorghum varieties!
What kind of yield and how big an area?
Food as medicine.
8:34 “Which is a good thing in the age of epidemic obesity”: This is a potentially misleading overgeneralization, and is a common misleading fallacy in the nutrition world.
It’s not a good thing for many individuals. For most obese people, probably yes; but for many of us, not at all.
Generalizations from studies that apply to large populations often get misrepresented as applicable to the receiver of the information. But population studies often do not apply at all to the individual listener or receiver of the information — the generalized conclusion doesn’t apply to many individuals in a population.
This type of fallacy is very common in the nutrition space.
In the west, many people are significantly overweight, including children, to a degree that has been clinically shown to be disadvantageous to health; this is not a controversial statement and it isn’t a fallacy. Further, making generalizations is valid when talking about statistics.
@tamcon72 No, the generalizations do not apply to many individuals — in some cases, most individuals.
In California, for example, the public health policies are such that anything causing one extra early death in a million people (per year) is deemed worthy of taking action about. Why? Because it “saves” lives, or prevents about forty early deaths per year (because the current population of California is about forty million people).
On the level of a large population, this makes sense. For public health officials, this kind of thinking makes sense.
But does it really make sense for a given individual listener if there is a 99.9999% chance that it does not apply at all in their individual case?
Two specific examples might help in making it clearer:
(1) Arsenic levels in tap water.
(2) Incorporating sorghum into my diet.
I spent many hours researching and analyzing the data, history and policies (in California) in relation to arsenic in drinking water. I had long discussions with someone who is in charge of managing a municipal water supply. Much of the information can be found online, more from experts and toxicologist. The main takeaway: there are multiple fallacies going on, and much non-critical and misleading thinking.
In the case of sorghum: After listening to this video, the immediate takeaway and tendency (or the perceived message) is that including sorghum in one’s diet is a good idea. I even searched for sources and made some phone calls.
But when I stepped back and questioned it, and did a little more critical thinking on the subject, it is not clear _AT ALL_ that this would do any good whatsoever, for a variety of reasons.
The exact same thing is true of the vast majority of nutrition advice and information I see — for foods, vitamins and supplements, water, etc.
I already have a very healthy diet and lifestyle. None of this information and advice is helping at all. It is not worth taking action or worrying about or spending time on. It does not apply to me at all.
And yet it is presented as if it applies to me and is important to me, when it is not.
The underlying message, throughout most of the nutrition-information space, or nutrition-advice space, is that what they are presenting is important or worthwhile. Incorporating their advice would have benefits (or even “INSANE BENEFITS,” as a certain Gundry says it in his videos).
But the benefits just are not there, they aren’t real. In many cases (mine and many others’) they do not apply at all.
Not only that, but the worry, trouble, money, energy, time, and — importantly — opportunity costs can make the net result actually harmful. Less than zero.
Here in India it is available. It reduces uric acid in the body. So I take sorghum or Jowhar.
Yeah… we’re so privileged to have these foods.. aren’t we?
But what so we focus… Cheap junky funky trashy stuff.. why eat that when we can have it all.. like sorghum , ragi , barley , a plethora of millets …just to name a few..
The benefit of sorghum is that it lightens the soil and helps in water retention to keep your plants healthy. It’s also good for putting over grass seed.
I get sorghum from Bob’s Red Mill. I cook it in a pan like rice; takes one hour. Keep it in the fridge and spoon half a cup over frozen blueberries, and kefir in the morning. Easy and nutritious breakfast.
I use sorghum as part of my multigrain porridge. Barley, oats, rye, mixed millets, red/yellow lentils and sorghum. It’s good ‘sweet’ (flax, walnuts, berries, plant milk) or savory (turmeric, pepper, garlic powder, cumin, nigella, flax).
Woah…that sounds incredible… Gonna have to take a screenshot 😁
Do you just throw it all together and cook it? It sounds like something I’m really going to have to try!
I once found a plant in my Chicago garden, and it turned out to be a sorghum plant. We are near farms so birds can “plant” these. Dr. Greger, Amazon has Bob’s Red Mill sorghum grain.
Barley has the best stats
Found some red sorghum on Amazon in Spain just now 🙂 Canadian here that left North America for a better lifestyle = at the beach right now with an ‘everything smoothie’, taking in some sun and watching a selection of your videos haha life is good
Going to buy some sorghum flour for healthy breakfast muffins, dusted with cacao powder after baking to retain its health benefits 🎉
My mum would feed me a slurry made out of sorghum and barley when i had loose motion or when my stomach upset..
And it helped.. and now i see why ..
Loved the ending!