Expert Interview: The Role of Food in Healing Tooth Decay

Healthy Mouth World Summit
Guest: Ramiel Nagel
The Role of Food in Healing Tooth Decay

Will: The next expert to join us here on the Healthy Mouth World Summit is Ramiel Nagel. Ramiel is an internationally recognized author, writer, and speaker on the subject of health. His books include Healing Our Children that he co- authored with Sally Fallon, as well as his now-famous Cure Tooth Decay.

Ramiel’s background includes a bachelor’s degree from the University of California. He has extensive training as an awareness facilitator, and is an avid yoga practitioner.

Ramiel rediscovered the lost cure for tooth cavities while searching for the cause and solution of his daughter’s tooth decay. He is now helping to create a world free from dental disease.

Ramiel Nagel, welcome to the Healthy Mouth Summit!

Ramiel: Thank you for having me!

Will: Thank you for coming! We really appreciate the input here that you have. So, let’s just jump right into this. Why did you start researching the field of curing tooth decay, anyway?

Ramiel: Well, when my daughter was around the age of one, she had a little white spot on her tooth. And then, as she got a little older, the spot turned darker. And then that tooth that had just a little spot on it before just kind of crumbled into a little piece. And she was just left with a little tooth stub.

And, of course, as parents, we were very worried about her teeth and kind of shocked that it happened. She was given only organic food as a child and no processed sugar, no processed flour. She was breastfed and never had a bottle. And they call it children’s cavities baby bottle tooth decay. But the whole thing didn’t make sense to me because she never even had a bottle.

And then we called dentists up and asked them, “Well, what can you do for this?” And on the phone, they’d say, “Stop breastfeeding. And we might have to do this, might have to do that.” It just sounded horrible.

So, I started researching to find what was really going on with the idea that maybe this was an understandable biological process that I could do something about.

Will: Wow! So, just from your own personal experience, really, and as a parent, particularly, how distressing. So, going on with your daughter, we’ll get into the details of what your research uncovered…But what eventually happened to your daughter’s teeth?

Ramiel: Well, it got worse and worse. [Laughs] That’s first what happened! And so I had more and more stress and put more and more energy into researching about health. And eventually I found the work of Weston Price and got his book and started trying butter oil and cod liver oil. We just tried a bunch of different things. And we eventually established a couple principles. And her cavities stopped progressing so quickly. And then they stopped progressing. And we also noted that her attitude and mood changed. And, so, it looked like we really got a handle on the problem. She didn’t have any tooth infections. She didn’t have any tooth pain. So, things got better. And then I felt like, “Well, I need to share how we did it with other people.”

Will: Yeah. And thank you for doing so. Absolutely.

So what did your research uncover about teeth remineralizing? In other words, can you explain, please, your understanding of the concept of teeth being able to remineralize? I mean, a lot of people haven’t heard of this idea.

Ramiel: Yeah, and what’s pretty amazing and what I’ve discovered on my own slow track over the last seven years is the same thing that dentist Weston Price and other dentists that you probably have never heard of like Charles Brodecker discovered in the 1930s and 1920s on what is actually going in our mouth.

What happens is that after every meal or everything you take into your body, your body will go into a process of demineralization where minerals are pulled from your teeth or bones, or a process of remineralization. And if you have a period of demineralization that’s consistent that happens day after day, week after week, month after month, then you’ll get a spot on your tooth. That’s a sign of the lost minerals, which is what a dentist will identify as a cavity.

And, there’s certain things that can slow down the process. And certain people are more or less affected by the process. Some people will have stronger teeth than other people. But the bottom line is that cavities are caused primarily by diet. And cavities can be stopped by changing our diet.

Will: Well put. So, what is your take on the theory, then, that bacteria in the mouth… Like almost every dentist in the world will tell you that bacteria in the mouth, namely strep mutans, are the cause of tooth decay. How do you address that?

Ramiel: [Laughs] Well, just another new piece of information is that up until the 1940s, most dentists did not think that bacteria was the primary cause of tooth decay. In a study of dentists in Ohio, the average dentist put bacteria as number six on the list of causes of tooth cavities. And higher up on the list is body chemistry, sugar intake, and, of course, the intake of fat-soluble vitamins and minerals.

So, the main thing, I think, to think about with bacteria is that as long as we blame bacteria for the problem of tooth decay and as long as we focus on what bacteria are eating, then the problem doesn’t get better. In other words, we see that tooth decay gets worse as people age. And you guys have a whole business. I have a whole business. There’s a hundred billion dollar industry to deal with tooth decay because people’s teeth get cavities.

So, if the theory was correct that it’s just bacteria causing cavities, then why can’t we just eliminate the cavities by removing the bacteria?

Will: Right.

Ramiel: So, it’s wishful thinking that isn’t grounded in science. And we have a lot of science that shows — of course, it’s not all the science, but a lot of science in the field studies of Weston Price and other dentists — have shown that it’s what we eat that has a direct effect on whether we have cavities or not, and not the presence of bacteria.

It’s sort of a way that people can give up their responsibility for their health problem and let a dentist fix it. And, I don’t think that’s originally what dentistry was about. It wasn’t about preventing cavities. It was just about taking care of an inflamed or painful tooth.

Will: So, then, from you perspective, what role does bacteria play in this puzzle? Is it a part of it? Is it just a red herring? How do you see that?

Ramiel: I’m not totally clear on exactly what the bacteria is doing in the process. And the reason is is because I haven’t focused on it. And the reason why I haven’t focused on it is because I like to think the perspective of “I don’t have to know what the food is doing in my body to know that the food is good for me.” And my book would probably be twice as thick if I had to explain all the science and technicalities. And maybe I would have never even finished the book to sort of explain the reasoning.

But, there’s two things that bacteria could be doing. One possibility — and, again, I’m sure the answer exists in the scientific literature. But it takes careful study. And you have to know what to look for. So, one thing bacteria could be doing is

they could be just a symptom, sort of the pleomorphic theory that when your body is out of balance, then the bacteria come and respond to the imbalance. So, if there’s more sugar in your diet, then you’ll get more sugar-loving bacteria just as a response. Now, the bacteria aren’t there to hurt us. They’re there to try to create an equilibrium. That’s one theory.

The other theory is that our body actually is designed to work with bacteria and that we actually may trigger, or something in us purposefully activates bacteria, and we use them in this purposeful and deliberate process of demineralization.

And that’s what dentist Ralph Simon from Loma Linda University, he spent his whole life studying how our body instructs itself to remineralize or demineralize teeth based on its analysis of blood chemistry. So, bacteria might be a deliberate part of the process. And it wouldn’t make sense to attack them because they’re just going along for the ride.

Will: I see.

Ramiel: It’s better to address why your body has initiated the process of demineralization to stop the cavities.

Will: Right. Go to the cause. Yeah.

So, from your perspective, then, do you commonly recognize practices like brushing one’s teeth or flossing or any oral hygiene habit help someone to maintain greater oral health or not? Or are we just kidding ourselves in the bathroom?

Ramiel: [Laughs] Well, I think the kidding yourself is a really important point because the field of dentistry promotes this idea that if you just keep your teeth clean, it won’t decay. A clean tooth will not decay.

And, I can show you this great chart. And it’s the same chart I came up with from dentist Charles Bodecker. And what he found is that when you’re in a state where you can call it…I can’t think of the name right now. But, when you’re in this intermediary state, when there’s a possibility that your teeth could decay, you’re in this middle zone, then the oral hygiene helps. You’re in the mediocre state of health. Things aren’t going so well. And then you can add oral hygiene.

Or you can use oral hygiene to speed up your recovery process. So, if someone went to the mirror and just said, “Hey, I’m going to brush my teeth and be healthy and I don’t have to worry it out,” they’re kidding themselves.

But, I think it’s a beneficial practice for people to clean their teeth because most of us, our body is not that healthy where we can just let our mouth be how it is. Just sort of like taking a shower, brushing your teeth could be like showering for the mouth.

I still do it. But there might be some people who are healthy enough that they feel like they don’t need to do it. But I still recommend people brush their teeth. But they shouldn’t be thinking that they’re killing bacteria, maybe thinking like, “I’m giving my mouth nutrients. I’m giving it massage. I’m giving it stimulation.”

I know you guys have a different name for the gum technique. What do you call that?

Will: Bass brushing technique.

Ramiel: Bass brushing technique. It’s simulating massaging the gums. Will: Absolutely.

Ramiel: So, that kind of practice helps our body heal, just like if you have an injury. If you rest or rehabilitate the injury, it helps it. So, certain things can rehabilitate the injury of our mouth. And, of course, I recommend people be really careful with the products that they use. I definitely believe your product fits into the healthy product category, as it’s not abrasive and it just has natural ingredients.

But, a lot of toothpastes and even some powders are overly abrasive. And you weren’t supposed to have all this abrasive stuff on your teeth all the time. So, people who just use regular toothpaste, and they go in there looking in the mirror, they’re thinking they’re getting healthier, they could be rubbing away their tooth enamel for all we know.

Will: Yeah, truly. Or damaging the gum tissue. That’s been our study. Our focus has been on gum disease. And brushing too hard is the number two cause of receding gums. People are torturing their gums.

Okay, so, do you have something else to add there?

Ramiel: No, it’s just amazing to really think about how this practice that everyone is being advised to do is damaging their gums.

Will: Yeah. Well, I think a lot of it has to do with the awareness that we bring into the activity. And that, I think, is a pretty broad scale thing. That’s the difference between harming and healing almost anything. Massage too hard can be torturous. Right?

Ramiel: Yeah.

Will: So, obviously you studied the work of Weston A. Price. Who else did you study their findings?

Ramiel: Well, I studied Royal Lee. I’ve read various interesting articles from other dentists. But the main other dentist that I talk about in my book is dentist Melvin Page. And what’s great about dentist Melvin Page, other than he had two books that are very clear about what he did and how he worked with patients, is that he was a follower of Dr. Price. And what he did is he analyzed people’s blood chemistry using technology that was maybe a little less available at Price’s time. And he was able to bring the disease of tooth decay and gum disease and able to quantify it in terms of blood chemistry.

And, of course, our blood chemistry is affected by what we’re eating. So, I try not to go too far into the chemistry realm because I don’t get it and people have to do tests and they have to have it evaluated and it’s all too complicated for me to deal with, at least right now.

He brought forth a system that helps me more pinpoint what people need to do to really make the changes. And when people aren’t making the changes, aren’t feeling successful in their fight against cavities, it gives some pointers on what you can do to get extra help.

Will: Wow! Blood chemistry. So he would study their blood. He would do a blood draw and then analyze that based on what minerals? Can you go into that further?

Ramiel: Well, there’s two things he emphasized at least in his book. One was the calcium and phosphorus ratio. For Melvin Page, this was the key of healing cavities or gum disease. And what’s really interesting is Weston Price was very, very interested, a little more in calcium, but he was also very interested in the use of the minerals calcium and phosphorus.

So, what Melvin Page found is when calcium and phosphorus have a certain ratio in your blood — it’s like 1:4 or 2:10 or something like that; I can’t remember the exact ratio — and when your blood sugar is stable, which some people are saying, I think, should be around 75 whatever per 100 milliliters, when you have those two factors, cavities and gum disease usually stop just with that.

And what Melvin Page took as a conclusion from that, which is Page’s fundamental diet, was that every meal we should have enough protein. It doesn’t need to be a lot of protein, but that we should have enough protein. That keeps our blood sugar stable. So, I try to give people that little piece of the puzzle to have protein. You don’t need a lot. Just a few ounces per meal of protein is enough to keep the blood sugar stable all day and a low amount of sugar in your diet.

But Melvin Page didn’t focus on the fats. It’s the fat-soluble vitamins. And that’s what Weston Price discovered. It’s the fat-soluble vitamins that helps our body utilize the calcium and phosphorus. And that’s why the biggest secret is simply just adding the fat-soluble vitamins back into our diet, particularly vitamin D.

Will: That’s fascinating. Did you find an overlap? Obviously, you mentioned Melvin Page has kind of followed in the footsteps of Weston Price. What was the common ground that you found with their findings?

Okay, Page was focusing on minerals. Dr. Price obviously on fat-soluble vitamins. Where’s the distillation? What did you get from this? What’s the common ground?

Ramiel: Well, I just kind of put it together into a program, a daily guide that’s in the book. So, I took what I thought was important from Melvin Page’s work, which was adequate calcium, adequate phosphorus in your diet. So, it makes me think, “Okay. We need to have calcium. We need to have phosphorus. And they need to be in balance.”

Well, how do you get calcium and phosphorus into balance? It’s the fat-soluble vitamins. So, really, I kind of just looked at it like they were saying the same thing, just from different perspectives.

Will: I see.

Ramiel: But, the simple guidelines are you want to have raw dairy products — that’s the easiest way to get your calcium — and plenty of phosphorus. You want to have enough protein. The more wild the protein, the better. And you want to have enough fat-soluble vitamins from grass-fed butter. And fermented cod liver oil is usually the easiest way to get vitamin D unless you have fish livers or animal blood in your diet.

Will: So, from your perspective, is curing tooth decay able to occur by optimizing one’s diet alone, or are there other factors involved?

Ramiel: There can be other factors. I would say 80%-90% of the people can heal their cavities just with diet. I like to remind people that most of the information that I come up with is not [me] just saying this stuff. Dentists like Weston Price, like Melvin Page, Charles Bodecker, Royal Lee, all these different dentists, researchers, Dr. Edward Mellamby and his wife, they studied these things for decades. And I just read the summaries of what they studied and we can save a lot of time.

Will: Right. Just, cut to the chase! You don’t need to know the details. Like, if they’re finding something that works, what are they doing? Right?

Ramiel: Well, they did feeding studies. So, they might have spent a couple years feeding kids different kinds of diets in orphanages to see what worked. But I don’t need to wait for several years and do a feeding study and wait [to see] what works. They did the feeding study already. We can look at the evidence. And they looked at the teeth that fell out. And they saw what worked. And you see all these things repeated over and over again. And then people who follow the program in my book, it works for them.

In one quote, Price said 90%, in another quote 95%, “Nutrition alone is 90%-95% effective.” Now, that doesn’t mean you should just rely on nutrition because obviously, when you’re in the compromised zone, brushing and oral cleanliness helps, if done mindfully with non-toxic products. Exercise can help. Chiropractic work can help.

And another big piece of the puzzle that might relate to about 15% of cavities is that people’s bite may be out of balance, [those] that especially don’t have tiny cavities, but the bigger, more notorious cavities that get inflamed. And when the teeth get infected, usually there’s a component of the person’s bite being out of alignment. So, just sort of the structure and the physiology of the teeth can make a difference.

But, again, diet is the key principle of bringing someone to health. And even Melvin Page used to say, “T.D.I.E.,” which stands for the diet is everything.

Will: That makes sense. So, if you could distill your study and your findings and all the research that you’ve done down to offer our listeners here some gems, what three foods would you say are out, and why? How would you justify three foods that you’re like, “Look, you’ve got to have these out of your diet if you want to create greater oral health through diet.”

Ramiel: Well, first it depends on who’s listening. People already know the junk food. That’s the food that is horrible for people’s teeth and health. High fructose corn syrup and MSG are up there with the worst things that just destroy the internal body chemistry and system of the body.

Second to avoid, I’ll just say, is sugar. Sugar diabetes — if I’m understanding it correctly, which is what it used to be called — people knew that if you ate 60 pounds of sugar per year, you would get sugar diabetes. Even some of your listeners, they might be eating organic sugar or not even any sugar but just a whole bunch of fruit. It’s important to understand that if you eat too much and don’t have a really strong constitution, if you eat too much sweet food, you’re going to get cavities.

There’s no way around it. There’s no cheating. There’s no fake sugar. Stevia is not going to resolve the problem. You just have to eat less sweet foods because sweet foods aren’t good for us. So, people are using sugar as sort of a medicinal, addictive substance, but not in a positive way, in a negative way. And the sugar habit is causing havoc to people’s teeth.

It’s so bad that even conventional dentists know you shouldn’t eat too much sugar. But they confuse things because they think all carbohydrates are sugar. And I would say that different carbohydrates affect the body differently. So, processed sugar and also very sweet fruit — dried fruit and so forth — are things people need to be very cautious of, and especially cautious if you’re in that middle zone where you could get cavities. You can’t just eat a bunch of fruit all day. If you’re in the safe zone, well, maybe you can eat some extra fruit.

And, the number three, the biggest shocker on the list, of course, is whole grain products, particularly — not all whole grains — but particularly oatmeal and whole rye, spelt, kamut, barley, and possibly corn, too. When you eat the bran and the germ of those products, it has what Edward Mellanby called a baneful effect on the teeth. So that’s a big mistake. And a lot of people buy sprouted grain bread that has the whole grain. Or, let’s say breakfast cereals and crackers that contain the bran or bran additives or wheat germ. And there’s something really toxic about those products to the body.

So, that’s what I teach people, to avoid the whole grains, or, at least, reduce it if that sounds too crazy. That’s the part of the whole grain project that I’m working on is to really dig in where I can tell people an exact safe way to eat each particular grain that’s commonly eaten.

But, the overall survey of the results is when you remove the bran and the germ of the grain, it makes it safe. But it doesn’t mean you should eat white flour because white flour is toxic for other purposes — because it’s milled too fine, because it could be too hybridized because of the chemicals and fumigants and because it’s potentially rancid from how it’s stored.

Will: That’s fascinating. It sounds like you’re not coming from the angle of, shall we say, the simplistic chemical or chemistry angle and nutritional angle that white flour is just converted into sugar in the body.

Ramiel: Right. I don’t think of it that way. To me, it’s very clear that each food affects the body a little differently. I do advise people that, if you have a grain product, that you need to combine it with some other foods. So we shouldn’t just eat bread by itself.

In the Swiss Alps, where Weston Price went and he found people where only one in three people had only one small cavity, they ate all their bread with cheese. There’s a balance. Now, when you eat the bread with the cheese, it’s different than just eating cheese and it’s different than just eating bread. So, the food combining with the grains is very important.

Will: Right. In other words, if we fall victim to the oversimplification or the overcompartmentalization of modern science, then we’re setting ourselves up for trouble, it sounds like.

Ramiel: Yeah. And I think the other place where people get stuck… And this is where a lot of scientists have gotten lost, especially in the more modern time, is they just look at sort of the analytical world, like, “Oh, phytic acid could be good for you.” Or, the study says, “Oh, this grain has more minerals, so it’s good for you,” and not taking that scientific information and adding to that, “Well, how did indigenous cultures eat the food,” and not adding to that how you feel.

So, with the bran, I don’t know if you’ve tried eating a whole bran muffin. I know when I was younger, I tried to eat these bran muffins [inaudible] said is healthy, and they taste horrible! I had to spit it out. And maybe there’s something wrong when something tastes that horrible…

Will: [Laughs]

Ramiel: But that simple idea, that’s where we got lost. The dentist has the patient brush their teeth, and the patient comes back six months later and still has cavities! And if the dentist doesn’t think brushing the teeth is the problem, he thinks the patient didn’t brush the teeth enough.

Will: Right.

But, not checking in with the cause and effect of the material world that we live in leads people to make false assumptions. And I’ve learned this the hard way. I’ve made many false assumptions. I used to eat whole grains. And now, whenever I hear something new, I just go, “Oh! Okay, really? Well, I’m open to that being true. But I also want to experience that to be true or see evidence where I’m very convinced that that’s true.”

And at this point I assume that in general humans don’t know very much about the world they live in. And the indigenous cultures that came before us knew a whole lot more about how to live, at least, in a healthy way than we do. We might have better technology. But we don’t know how to live. Or even many people don’t even know just how to have a good quality of life where things that are important — family, values, taking care of your neighbor, making sure you’re healthy — a lot of people have forgotten to pay attention to that. That’s why a lot of people are overweight and unhealthy.

Will: And are lonely amidst neighbors all around them in big cities.

Ramiel: Yeah, exactly! People don’t know their neighbors, and everyone just watches TV or plays video games or plays with their iPhone.

Will: [Laughs] Okay, so, let’s go to the positive side. On the flip side here, what foods do you consider crucial? I mean, I know you’ve touched on this a little bit through the talk here. But what foods do you consider crucial for optimizing health, and why?

Ramiel: Well, I’ll just add that, to me, looking at the negative or looking at the mistakes is positivity. Where things have gone wrong. Like, dentistry has got to be like, “Oh, my gosh! This thing isn’t working! What are we doing?!” They have to look at that.

And a lot of us are challenged to look at the dark side. But, it’s so important to look at the dark side so that we can let go of it and see where we’re making mistakes. And then, of course, focus on the light side which is what foods do you get to eat that make you happy and healthy?

Now, one thing that’s important to know that I haven’t emphasized in the book, but we’ll talk about some new information that’s important, is that different people have different body types based on their personality and based on are you skinny? Are you kind of thick? Are you fast? Are you slow? Are you a big person? Are you muscular? Do you just sit around all day? What climate do you live in? Are you in Hawaii? You have one climate. In northern Canada, you have another climate. And your body is highly affected by this.

With every good guideline, each individual needs to kind of take it into the diet that feels comfortable for them and that feels right for their living situation. So, the two and a half most important foods come from animal products because that’s what Weston Price found is that we’re missing the fat-soluble vitamins from animal fats, not from vegetables. So, coconut oil is a good oil. But it doesn’t have the key to healing teeth. So, our modern diet got rid of the animal fat. And, now the modern diet says animal fat is bad. When you watch TV, they say, “Oh, look at that terrible butter,” or “Look at that terrible grilled pork chop you’re eating.”

Well, that person’s mouth is watering. They know they want to eat it. But they’re being told that it’s poison. So, healthy fat is what we’re missing in our diet. And you don’t necessarily need to have a lot, although some people do really well on a high-fat diet.

I just read from Ayurvedic doctors that said 60% or 70% of their patients have a clogged bile. So they’re not going to digest fat and protein very well because of the clogged bile.

So, if you have a clogged digestive system, if you have heartburn or indigestion or skin problems, that’s a sign your liver is clogged. So you may not be able to eat as much fat as would be ideal, or have as much dairy. These are the people that have dairy allergies, too.

So, you want grass-fed butter. And the better the grass, the more free-range, the more wild the diet of the cow, the better. And the cow, the butter, has the special fat that we need. And when it grazed on rapidly-growing grass that has the special nutrients that make our teeth really hard and helps our body make use of calcium and phosphorus, and also helps balance that calcium and phosphorus ratio.

So, I think that’s where I try to make Melvin Page’s theory simple. If you have really good quality butter, for the most part, I think it’s going to balance people’s calcium and phosphorus ratio. And we don’t have to try to figure out what’s wrong with it.

So, one tablespoon a day of grass-fed butter or ghee is acceptable, too — the yellow kind from the spring and summer. So, there’s winter grass-fed butter, which is not as potent in healing the teeth. So, we need the yellow grass-fed butter, one tablespoon per day.

The second thing is fermented cod liver oil. And the reason why I recommend the fermented kind is because it has the fat-soluble vitamin D in it. Now, if, for some reason people can’t afford it or they don’t like the taste, because it does have a strong flavor, you might be able to find a store-bought cod liver oil that doesn’t have any synthetic vitamins added. But it’s hard to find those. Most of the have synthetic vitamins put back in. So, the vitamin D is the most important missing fat-soluble vitamin.

Now, if you eat animal livers like beef liver or chicken liver, those don’t have very high amounts of vitamin D. So, cod liver oil is not the same as land animal livers, at least not the kind that we normally eat.

Fish livers, that will give you the vitamin D. So that’s two and a half foods — the liver, fish liver. Liver is one of the most healing foods. And you can eat that liver raw or cooked, depending on what kind of liver. But, raw beef or bison liver is really medicinal. Cooking it will give you different benefits, but still excellent benefits.

I should just mention, if you just have those two, if you just put in fermented cod liver oil and grass-fed butter or use the butter oil concentrate from Green Pastures, you are going to have a dramatic, at least 40% reduction in the rate of cavities. And it could be much higher than that. I have some new research that I’m going through to kind of pinpoint how much the fat-soluble vitamins prevent cavities. But it drastically reduces the rate of cavities.

And then, number three is the raw milk, grass-fed milk. And it can be cow or goat or sheep or horse, whatever you’ve got. And it can be cheese. And our bodies need at least a gram of calcium per day. That’s three cups of milk or about 6 ounces of hard cheese.

So, a significant portion of us don’t get enough calcium. And I personally don’t like calcium supplements because you can get free calcium in your system, which can be really toxic to your body. But, calcium supplements are going to be better than no calcium, I think, for a lot of people. But my preference is to get calcium from raw dairy.

Now, if there’s some people that dairy is really a struggle, then eating a lot of cooked green vegetables, leafy greens like collard greens and kale. You need to have about four cups of cooked vegetables. So, that’s when it’s all cooked and mushed together, four cups of that per day. That’ll give you about a gram of calcium.

Will: Wow. Anybody who cooks greens knows that four cups of cooked greens is like mowing your garden every day for your greens.

Ramiel: It’s a lot. And that’s the best I have right now.

Will: Yeah.

Ramiel: Working on getting a little more clear, like nettles are really dense in calcium. So, maybe you could just have one or two cups of cooked nettles. And, what happened is in a lot of the cultures where they don’t have dairy, they eat a ton of vegetables. Every meal, they have lots and lots of different kinds of vegetables. So, that’s how they keep their calcium adequate.

And, also, if you think of some Asian countries where they don’t have dairy, usually the people are very short. The reason why they’re shorter is because their bodies are adapted to using less calcium. And so their bones just don’t grow as big. And they don’t need as much calcium.

Will: Wow. That makes a lot of sense. It makes me think of the Maasai with their cattle and how huge they are.

Ramiel: Right. They have a surplus of calcium, so they have giant bones. And they get gigantic.

Will: Wow. So, if you would, share with us what an average day’s food intake is like for you and your family, just so people can really see how you guys apply this personally?

Ramiel: Okay. So, I like the question. But, I will just give the disclaimer that it’s not ideal. And the reason is because myself and my partner have, from eating too much sugar — my lifetime’s worth of sugar — and taking certain prescription medications when I thought they were safe and healthy really destroyed myself and my partner, for other reasons, our ability to eat all the foods that we want to eat.

Examples of some good meals that we have, we will do homemade cheesecake, but we won’t use much sweetener. So, it’s almost like just a couple berries on there. And we’ll do a nut crust or a rice crust. And, you’re just getting tons of calcium. And, again, we don’t hardly use any sweeteners at all.

Will: Right.

Ramiel: Let’s see, what do we do? Ceviche is a really good one. So, we’ll take some white fish, or you could do it with tuna. And you marinate the tuna for like half an hour or a couple hours in the refrigerator. And then you have that raw fish.

My older daughter, she’s [inaudible], but she also likes sugar. So, she’ll do bison burgers. And, we’ll take the local bison and just add some spices and make some patties with that. And, when we’re feeling more inspired, and the digestion is at a high level, then we’ll do meatloaf. And, we’ll do bison. And, we’ll also throw in the kidney fat and the organ. Liver doesn’t taste that good in the bison loaf or the meat loaf. But if you have the other organs, like the kidneys or kidney fat, that stuff tastes amazing. And then you cook that in beef broth. But, because of our restricted diet, we don’t do as much broths as we would like or as it would be healthy.

Will: I see. In other words, there’s no one diet. There’s no getting away from the fact that each of us is unique and different and we have to explore on our own. We can get guidance from other people, from people out of the past, but we still have to do the work.

Ramiel: Well, I think in a healthy state, our bodies are really adaptable. But, you’re right. There isn’t, “This is a healthy diet.” But, what I teach in the book is there’s principles of the healthy diet. And I can summarize them as enough high- quality animal fat, at least a modest intake of protein, and plenty of green vegetables.

And then, for the carbohydrate intake, it needs to be a safe use of grain or starch. And it’s up to the individual how much carbohydrates they want to have because we have some indigenous groups that have a very high carbohydrate diet. And they eat like sweet potatoes and taro root. And we have other places that have a very low-carbohydrate diet, like the Eskimos where you just eat meat and fat.

For me, personally, for my special diet, I end up eating a lot of tuna, green vegetables, cooked green vegetables, and white rice. That’s my diet, pretty much all the time just because that’s what my body needs to heal. Sometimes we’ll do panir. I have a similar recipe in my book where we’ll do a lot of green vegetables. And we’ll puree it. And we’ll cook the really good quality milk and make the cheese curds in it. And it’s really easy to digest and tastes really yummy. And we’ll have that with rice.

Quiches have also been really fun. So, really good quality eggs. And you can make a nut crust, or we use white rice to make our crust for the quiche. Or you could do a no-crust quiche. And then you put in some vegetables. And right there, in a couple pieces, you’re getting 4, 5, or 6 eggs. That’s some examples.

Will: Yeah, that sounds like a common brunch for us. It’s what we call a frittata. That’s like a quiche without a crust.

Ramiel: Yes! Frittatas are excellent!

Will: Right on! One more question, if you will. Talk a little bit more about fat- soluble vitamins. What’s the big deal? You hear about them. You hear, “Okay, vitamin A, vitamin D.” What do they do for us, from your understanding?

Ramiel: Oh, and I just want to add. In the diet that I mentioned, there isn’t as much special foods as traditional cultures we’re eating. And that’s just temporary, what we need to do for a variety of reasons. But, the way we make up for that is by taking cod liver oil, skate liver oil. We’ve tried the Rosita — what do they call it? — rat fish oil. It tastes really good. It’s expensive, but it’s a nice oil. And the Green Pastures Butter Oil concentrate. And we’ll use ghee.

So, we make sure that we’re getting enough fat-soluble vitamins with every meal, although we don’t have as much organ meats as probably would be in an ideal diet.

Now, what makes them special? I don’t know. In the end, its like why were we created in this way where we have to eat animal fats? I don’t know. Now, they have all the science where they studied, and say, “Well, you need vitamin A for reproduction. You need vitamin A for your nervous system. You need vitamin A for your vision. You need vitamin A to create hormones.” And the fat-soluble vitamin A from liver, in particular, is the most concentrated form. It’s a form that our body can use really easily.

So, the animals, they eat plants. And a lot of plants we can’t eat because we don’t have two stomachs and we don’t chew our food four times or whatever cows and other grazing animals do. And their bodies process these nutrients into forms that are really easy for us to use. So, vitamin A, there’s cell growth and division.

Vitamin D, it’s very well-known that vitamin D helps with the absorption of minerals and calcium. So, how does that all play together? There’s the article though Chris Masterjohn and the Wise Traditions where he really spells out all the science, and all these little bone-building cells take the vitamins. And our body goes through all these complex chemistry that’s probably infathomable of what’s all happening when you get a good vitamin in pure form.

I like to really think about the fat-soluble vitamins in terms of food. So, the indigenous cultures, a lot of them think that they need to eat organ meats. So, the Canadian Indians said, “In order to be healthy, they need to eat every part of the animal, at least a little bit, every day.”

And, if you look at other cultures that are not as modern, like in South America, they eat all the different organs of the cow. They eat the intestine. They eat the brain. And those are considered delicacies, the sweet breads.

And, for some reason, in our modern culture, at least in expensive restaurants, they say that some of the organs are delicacies. But for some reason, in our modern culture, we think the organs are waste.

In Africa, the native people there, they watch the lion. And the lion, after it kills its prey, goes after the liver. So, they think, “Wow. The liver, that’s what the lion eats. And the lion’s the king. Maybe the liver is the most healthy and sacred food that there is.”

So, the organ meats are the storage place of the fat-soluble vitamins. And so is the fat, like old animals have the fat backs, and the dairy has the cream. That’s where the yummy stuff is. [Laughs]

The reason why they’re important is because that’s what makes your mouth water and that’s what tastes so good. Ice cream. That’s why people like putting butter on their food and on their toast. There’s just some that taste really good. That’s why people like french fries and other stuff that’s cooked in the fat of the animal. The body craves it and knows that that’s what it needs to be healthy.

Will: Makes sense. The bottom line is empirically, we don’t need to know why. It’s just that, your body craves it, so listen to that.

Ramiel: Honor it. That’s something important.

Will: Yeah. What about the sugar in raw dairy and milk? Do you think that that can be overdone? Or is it because it’s coming in a whole food form, it’s mitigated?

Ramiel: I think it could be overdone. And that’s why I recommend people to not just drink raw dairy, but I try not to make it too narrow-minded because, for some people, they might be drinking a gallon of milk every day, feeling amazing, and be so happy that they have the milk and they can digest it and have a food that makes them healthy.

But, dentist George Heard who was observing how people in Dan Smith county, Texas didn’t have cavities. And when they moved to Texas, they had cavities, but then they went away. He observed that they drank really good raw milk from native pastures and that a lot of the milk drinkers who didn’t have cavities didn’t just eat their milk fresh.

So, they used to call it, I think, fresh milk or sweet milk because people didn’t have refrigerators. So, as soon as that milk was left out for a little while, it’s going to start turning sour. And our cave man body wasn’t developed with a refrigerator in mind.

Will: Right!

Ramiel: [Inaudible] …where it sat out and became soured milk. And that’s why all these cultures all over the planet have cheese and kefir and other fermented yogurt drinks because that was their way to preserve the milk without refrigeration. And that milk, the soured milk, of course, is, I think, safer to have in terms of the milk sugar. And also, I think the calcium is probably more absorbable than the calcium from the fresh milk.

Will: Makes sense. Wow! Lots of gems here! I appreciate it! So, do you have any closing comments or suggestions that you want to offer up here?

Ramiel: Well, I think of the words of Weston Price when he was really pioneering this, he said, “Tooth decay is not only unnecessary, but an indication of our divergence from health and life.” There’s something that’s happened where we’ve become disconnected. And in that disconnected state, we get sick. And one of the first sicknesses that we see in our body is tooth decay or gum disease.

And there’s a great disservice being done when someone goes to the dentist, and the dentist sees this sign of illness and imbalance and they advise the person to brush or floss more and use more chemicals when really the dentist should be saying, “Hey, your body is out of balance and you’re showing the preliminary signs of physical poor health and degeneration. And you need to change how you’re eating and living.”

So, my advice or inspiration for writing the book is just to really inform people that the power is in their hands. And it’s not about just brushing. Or it’s not about just giving your responsibility away to the dentist or the dental industry. But it’s really about being responsible for your health. And when you act responsibly and live more responsibly, and get food that’s responsibly raised and promote a more responsible and mindful way of living, your teeth will get healthier.

And it’s just cleaner and it feels better. So, I really hope that anyone who’s listening will feel inspired to do something a little bit better for their health, whatever that is — to pay more attention to what they’re eating, to get a copy of my book, to try some of the stuff that the other people in the seminar are recommending, just to do something, to give it a try. Don’t be afraid to try.

And, also, thank you for putting together what I think is a really unique and well- thought out list of speakers. So, thank you, guys. Also, just a thank you for putting all this package together. And also, thank you for making a product that is meant to benefit people and that’s very well-thought-out and that has helped you guys and has helped many other people.

Will: Yeah, thank you! Wise words there! So, Ramiel, where can listeners find out more about you and your work?

Ramiel: My website is CureToothDecay.com. And, if you’re not feeling inspired to buy my book, that’s okay. I would recommend you sign up for my email list and get a bunch of helpful information. And that’s a way we can stay connected. And you can also just browse through the website and browse through some of the research that I have collected and put online for free.

Will: Yeah, I’ve spent plenty of time on your site. And you have a boatload of information there. So, anyone listening to this, if you don’t have the funds for whatever the reason, to purchase Cure Tooth Decay, then, at least spend some time on CureToothDecay.com because there’s just tons of information there for you.

Right on, sir! Hey, I really appreciate your time! It’s been a really awesome interview! I really appreciate it, my man!

Ramiel: Thank you for inviting me on!

Will: Thank you!