This week, Jill answers a listener question about things kidney stone formers can eat for breakfast.
Jeff Sarris: Welcome back to the Kidney Stone Diet podcast, the show about reducing your kidney stone risk and living your best life. I’m your host and fellow student, Jeff Sarris.
Jill Harris: And I’m Jill Harris–and no, we’re not related–your kidney stone prevention nurse. Okay, so, last week, it was 20 degrees, not really, 40-50 and rain every day, this week already on Monday–today’s Monday–sometime in May. May 9. It’s 80, almost. You know, in Chicago, I don’t know why we continually talk about the weather because this is what it is. Anyway, what are we talking about today, Jeff? I just wanted to mention that at the beginning. We can still chat. I’m just wondering, what are we doing today?
Jeff Sarris: I mean, we were gonna go back to another listener question, but we were talking before about the giveaway that we’re doing for the channel and do you wanna talk about that for a second?
Jill Harris: Yeah! So, people are like, “Okay, Jill, you said that if we subscribe to the YouTube channel, and you get 5000 subscribers, you’re gonna pick two people out of a raffle and give free consults to!” And I am going to do that, but we didn’t get to 5000. But, man, you guys have been really rallying because we’re 210 members away from 5000. So, if you’re watching and enjoying Jeff and I ramble on about kidney stone prevention, please press that red subscribe button and tell me you did that at jill@kidneystonediet.com.
Email me and say, “Hey, old lady! I subscribed to the YouTube channel. Enter me in the free consult raffle!” And I will do that. So, subscribe. That helps us. That helps other people find us. And our goal is 5000. And then we’ll have another goal, which will be 10,000, but that’s after we get to 5000. So, anyway, subscribe and I can enter you into the raffle, and you’ll get a free consult with me. Email me at jill@kidneystonediet.com. It’s very exciting. People have been just so kind and so supportive of this channel and I’m like, “Okay, well, if you’re supportive, click the red button! Click it!”
Jeff Sarris: Yeah, it definitely helps. It helps to reach more people and everything, and it makes it easier on you the viewer/listeners. So you can get notified if you hit the little bell when there’s new episodes. But yeah, so–
Jill Harris: I was just gonna say because we have our own YouTube channel doing this, I’ve been watching dog training videos. And the channel I’ve been watching is McCann Training, something like that. Anyway, it’s a wonderful channel. I highly–go find them. And I subscribed right away now that I, you know, we have this channel. You know, don’t subscribe to just anything. I mean, subscribe to things that you like, but it’s just great.
Also, one other thing: we have a little thank you button. I actually got this from McCann training. And I think there’s a thank you button now under each video and a lot of people are like, “Jilly, I’d like to do something for you. You and Jeff are always giving out so much free information.” You can press that “Thanks!” button and buy us a coffee for two bucks, whatever you want. People donate money–and because it costs a lot of money to put this on, and we do it for free, of course. So if you want to do that, you can press the “Thank you” button. I think that’s what it’s called, Jeff. What do I know? I’m the worst person. I don’t know. It’s called something like that. It’s right under the video. You’ll see it.
Jeff Sarris: Yeah, I think that’s that’s awesome. And should we dive right into the question this week? So, this is coming from Mary.
Jill Harris: Mary!
Listener Voicemail: Hi, my name is Mary. I just started watching Jill and I really love her talks. And right now she’s talking about things to have for breakfast. I’m just running out of ideas I guess–I want to know if what I’m doing if that’s okay. I had some red pepper, some celery, some carrots, some cottage cheese, and a boiled egg. And I just don’t know if it’s got too much oxalate in it, or if it’s fine, or whatever. And my name is Mary–.
Jeff Sarris: I’m just gonna cut that, just because she does leave her number. So, I’m gonna chop it there, but thank you, Mary, for your call.
Don’t Let the Clock Dictate What You Eat!
Jill Harris: Mary, it’s a great question. And I think, look, this is the reason why we have the meal plan subscription. I get people all the time that say, “I’m so petrified because I’m eating these things, but I don’t have an oxalate count for these things.” So, there’s a meal plan subscription. It’s $19 a month! Do it one month and cancel if you don’t want any more. There’s over 100 recipes a month! And, in that, I have calculated the salt, the added sugar, the oxalate–so you never have to worry about that again. It’s done for breakfast, snack, lunch, and dinner.
So it’s ideas and inspiration. Like I said, do one month. You’ll have more recipes than you could ever dream of–all of the oxalate is figured out for you. And the reason we came up with that meal plan subscription–I had no idea she was going to ask this. I’m just telling you. I don’t feel bad about promoting this because it’s extremely cheap as all our products are, but it’s so helpful to patients because what I get coming to me is, “Jill, I’m petrified I am eating nothing all day long because I’m afraid I’m eating too much oxalate.” That’s number one. So people restrict themselves too much.
And not to be dramatic, but if you heard what I heard all day long, you’d understand people are anxious about this because kidney stones, boom! They just get you. You don’t know what’s going on and all of a sudden you get this pain, and you’re being sent to the ER, and it’s really scary. It’s that kind of pain. So when you hear the word “oxalate,” you’re freaking out. Not a judgement, a fact. I can’t tell you how many people come to me to gain weight after they’ve had a kidney stone because they’re so petrified.
I always feel so bad for people because they’re petrified in eating anything now, and that’s a problem. So, she listed all those things that she’s eating for breakfast. You know, celery tends to be a little high. How high, like you can’t have it high? Absolutely not. You can certainly have the things that you ate. It’s always going to depend on the portion size, and how many times you’re eating these things. I don’t want people eating the same breakfast every single day. That’s so boring. And I know people are like, “It’s easy for me!” But think about this machine. You think it wants oatmeal every day for the next 30 years? I mean, come on! Mix it up!
That’s another reason why I did the meal plan. You can see there’s a million different things you can have for breakfast. By the way, if you wanted a pot roast for breakfast, leftover dinner, I don’t know why we let the clock dictate what kind of food we eat. I’m just going off on a tangent, but you can eat all kinds of things. We’re very self-limiting sometimes in the way we think.
A Quick Way to Figure Out Your Oxalate Levels
So what I would suggest: we have at kidney stone diet.com, the “Help” page. There is a little section there that shows you how to put an oxalate app on your phone. It’s actually the Harvard list, but Jeff actually figured out how to make this a little app-like thing on your phone. So, you can figure out–I’m taping on my phone, so I can’t do it, but I just go to the little app on my phone and I can see how much oxalate is in celery. So, you can always find that on the oxalate list. Go to kidneystonediet.com The Help section and there’s instructions on how to put that app on your phone, so it’s always handy for you.
Here are My Top Low-Oxalate Breakfast Ideas!
So, what I would say to Mary is: ideas for breakfast, get the meal plan for $19. Maybe Mary doesn’t have $19, so I’m gonna give her some ideas. I love doing things like this. I will have leftover dinner, sometimes for breakfast. I love Greek yogurt. If you don’t do dairy, you can do coconut yogurt. Unsweetened, these things are. I like to put fruit in there. I don’t use any sweetener in it. I use the normal fruit–no added sugar, but puts some sweetness in there. Sometimes, get this–and people are gonna say, “She says, I can’t have no protein powder ever?” No, I have never said that. I’ll say that that should not be a meal replacement. Just protein powder and water. That’s not fun. You need to chew your food.
Sometimes, because I love vanilla so much and I’m so glad that’s not high oxalate, I like to put like half a scoop of my vanilla protein powder in my yogurt–because it’s plain, nonfat Greek yogurt–and it puts a little bit more protein in there for me. I love vanilla, so it adds that for me and it makes me more full so I have that. I do a lot of toast, a lot of gluten-free toast and I will put all kinds of things! Different berries, different fresh herbs, cheeses–of course, lower sodium cheeses. I will do oatmeal. I, sometimes, will do cereal with some fruit on top and my coconut milk.
Sometimes, I’ll do, like, a flat bread, and I’ll put stuff on there. I mean, I do all kinds of things. Sometimes I do–I can’t think off the top of my head because we all know I don’t prepare for these things. Buy the meal plan, there’s some stuff there. But sometimes I don’t have breakfast. Say I’m really busy in the morning and I’m really not that hungry, so I will move it back and have more of a brunch kind of thing. I definitely have eggs. I like to have egg sandwiches, sometimes with bread, sometimes with just lettuce, a tortilla. But eggs are a big deal for me, too. I love them. Sometimes I do egg white omelets with vegetables inside. So, all different kinds of things. Think of any food you like, forget about breakfast food. Think of any food you like, and have it for breakfast.
And at first it may be a little weird. There’s many people watching have tried this: “Paul, let’s have eggs for dinner.” “Really? We’re gonna have breakfast for dinner? How exciting!” Well, have dinner for breakfast. We’ve all done that. It’s fun to have things like scrambled eggs, and bacon or something–low sodium bacon. If you’re doing that, that’s fun. I also have in my meal plan service, too, I do have this: pumpkin pancakes. I like to use coconut flour or I have a no-carb pancake. Use a lot of egg whites with that one. All kinds of things in the meal plan you ain’t thinking about. So, lots of fun things.
But it’s a great question. And I heard the trepidation in her voice when she said, you know, “Is that okay?” Because I’m very in tune to hearing that concern and a little bit of anxiety when people are eating something, and they’re like, “God, I hope this isn’t going to give me–” It’s not about just the oxalate for them. They’re like, “I hope this isn’t going to land me in the ER.” That’s what they’re thinking really. That’s what their heart’s saying. It’s not about oxalate. So, what you had for breakfast is absolutely fine, but I don’t want you to have it every day because that would be terribly boring.
So, mix it up a little. So, think about getting the meal plan. If you don’t want to spend the $19 on the meal plan, there’s some recipes at kidney stone diet.com, you can go there. But, you know, just think outside of the box. You can google some different breakfasts, if you’d like to do that. But as far as the oxalate level, you’re never going to find that anywhere. So, the meal plan will have all the oxalate figured out for you. And, look, that’s the real benefit of the meal plan. Just the ideas and also all the education that I give with each recipe. It’s not just a recipe. It’s why I did what I did. Different things you can do to change it up. It’s very valuable. I’m very pleased with that service. And it’s helped a lot of people. So check that out there. What else did I miss there?
Jeff Sarris: Oh, yeah, absolutely! I wanted to just touch real quick. I throw it up on the screen. I’ll pop it up there one more time, but at kidneystone diet.com/recipes, you’ll see here that right at the top, you can filter by meal as well. There’s a handful of recipes–I mean, there’s a lot of recipes out there. There’s a handful specifically for breakfast. And like Jill said so many different options that you can have that aren’t necessarily breakfast first. But if you did want to dive into meal plans, I’m just gonna show you real quick just once you subscribe, you have a dashboard like this. You see my little face in the corner? You just click on meal plan: your meal plan and then you get a unique plan to you every week.
So, you have your breakfast, lunch, snack, and dinner that you see here and it will change it up every week for you for inspiration on what you can do. So, I just wanted to give you sort of an idea of what it looks like, but definitely. We have a bunch of free recipes on the site already. There’s so much free content out there that you can get that inspiration for that next meal and, like Jill said, I really like having like a dinner or a lunch for breakfast. I love that, like, savory and the protein. I feel better with protein than sweet, so I almost universally don’t have anything sweet until late in the day, just because that’s what works best for me. But that’s part of it, too, is figuring out how we each feel best in the morning. There are so many different options out there. It can be daunting, once we sort of realize how many options there are.
Jill Harris: Yeah, and I think the meal plan service is one thing. People have said, “Oh my God! There’s so many things! Who would ever think about this kind of stuff?” It’s not like I don’t like eating the same thing all the time. It’s not like I don’t get in my little rolls of things, you know. But, you know, it’s just fun for me to think of new things to eat and how I can put things together, and, especially, using fresh herbs when you’re on a low-salt diet. That’s really important, too. So for breakfast, lots of times I’ll do, like I said, I’ll do a toast and like ricotta cheese–a lower-sodium ricotta cheese–and all these fresh herbs.
So, I’m getting my calcium, but I’m getting the, you know, like blackberries and tarragon. I like really mixing it up that way. It’s so much fun and super easy. Here’s the thing about the meal plan: It’s simple, it’s safe, kidney stone safe, and it’s satisfying. So, it’s all of it. None of these recipes, because I don’t have time, are laborious. The breakfasts are like five minutes, so no joke. It’s not like anybody’s in the kitchen. I’m not doing that in the morning, I can assure you. So these are foods I eat and you’re like them. That’s the end of that story.
Jeff Sarris: So, thank you, Mary, for your question. If you have a question, and you want it answered on a future episode, that number again is 773-789-8763. And we’d love to have your voice on the show. I think this is a good spot to wrap. So, we have everything going on as as usual with the weekly email. You can find it on the website at kidneystonediet.com where Jill sends out a free weekly email sort of to keep you on track and all the free content there, the Facebook group. I like to just mention it just in case someone’s coming in new fresh to the podcast here, but tons of free resources along with the premium content.
I know we talked a little more about the meal plans this time. Again, you can find at kidneystonediet.com, but so much free stuff to to help you out. And for those of you who have subscribed and hit that little bell, thank you so much for for helping us reach our goal because we’re we’re getting really close!
Jill Harris: Yes! And also the comments have been so robust! Thank you! Thank you, Youtube community! Thank you for joining in the comments. I was going through all of them this morning. It’s like, “You guys!” I love having a robust community. Let’s stick together, keep together, and talk about stones, and make sure we’re getting them prevented. So, thanks for writing in the comments below. It’s wonderful. It’s good to see everyone.
Jeff Sarris: So, thanks again and we’ll see you next time.
Jill Harris: Bye bye!
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