Bas Kast: 10 nutrition tips for a healthy soul

Some time ago, when I was struggling with a persistent low mood, I embarked on a research journey into the depths of the human psyche. In the end, it turned into an expedition full of surprises, including for me personally. I wanted to find out: What happens when we have a low in our mind and body? What does science know about this? And above all: What strategies are there to strengthen your own stress resilience and mental well-being? The result of my years of research and self-experiments is in my new book “Compass for the Soul”.

Since I had already dealt with the topic of healthy eating for my book “The Nutrition Compass”, it made sense for me to also pursue the question of how nutrition influences our psyche, our brain and our mood for the new book. Are there foods or nutrients that make us depressed or – vice versa – cheerful? Is it possible to eat yourself happy, and if so, how?

I was amazed to find that research on this has already brought numerous remarkable findings to light. They reveal that sometimes even small changes in everyday life can make a big difference.

10 nutrition tips for a better mood

Here are my top 10 tips for a mood-boosting diet:

1. Mediterranean diet as a basis

As a rough guide, I recommend the Mediterranean diet. Their key ingredients are:

• Plenty of vegetables
• Legumes (like lentils, chickpeas, peas, and soybeans)
• Fruit
• Whole grains (like whole wheat bread or oatmeal)
• A handful of nuts.
• A good four tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil a day (if it scratches your throat, it means lots of beneficial botanicals called “polyphenols”).
• Sometimes fermented milk products like yoghurt
• Fish several times a week, for example in the form of salmon or trout.
• Little meat, and if so, then white rather than red.
• Up to seven eggs a week.
• Very little candy.
• Sparing use of salt, but generous use of herbs and spices such as rosemary, thyme, sage or cinnamon.
• Moderate amounts of wine are allowed (although more on alcohol below).

The Mediterranean diet is so far the only one that has proven to be clearly mood-enhancing in various experiments and findings. In one experiment, an Australian researcher put a group of clinically depressed people on the Mediterranean diet. The effect after three months: In almost a third of the patients, the symptoms had receded to such an extent that it was hardly possible to speak of depression!

2. Even people who do not suffer from depression benefit from a healthy diet

New Zealand scientists gave a group of young people two extra portions of fruit and vegetables a day for two weeks, which they had to eat while maintaining their usual diet. The young people felt more and more alive, committed and motivated as the days went by.

Also, how healthy nutrition could unfold its mood-enhancing effect in the body is currently being discovered more and more. For example, it has been discovered that when people eat a lot of junk food, a brain region called the hippocampus literally shrinks. The hippocampus (from the Latin for seahorse, because the structure looks so similar to the shape of sea animals) plays, among other things, a significant role in stress resilience. Particularly interesting: the hippocampus is often noticeably smaller in depressive patients. Conversely, the brain structure of followers of the Mediterranean diet is rather intact, even relatively large.

The brain, or at least certain brain regions, is similar to a kind of muscle in this respect, and the strength of this muscle also depends on how well we supply our brain muscle with nutrients.

3. Depression may be related to chronic inflammation

According to current knowledge, a low mood such as depression is often caused by chronic inflammatory processes in our body, which penetrate into the brain and can thus also damage areas such as the hippocampus. Conversely, anti-inflammatory nutrients can improve our mood.

Omega-3 fatty acids, which are mainly found in salmon, herring, mackerel and trout, are probably the most famous example of an extremely anti-inflammatory nutrient. If you give older people – this is the result of several tests – daily fish oil capsules with omega-3, you can almost observe an increase in their hippocampus volume after a few months. Also, a recent meta-analysis (a study that combines multiple studies) of 26 studies involving more than 2,000 people found that omega-3 capsules may help relieve depression. If you don’t like fish, which is usually quite expensive anyway, you can alternatively simply take capsules, which are also available in vegan form as algae oil.

4. Spices as anti-inflammatory

In our culture, we often treat spices rather neglectfully, although they in particular have the strongest anti-inflammatory effect of all. Turmeric and saffron are particularly outstanding here. A saffron regimen, for example (typically 30 milligrams of saffron daily for a few weeks) can alleviate mild depression as much as standard medication. What’s more, even in non-depressed people, saffron lifts the mood. Very similar effects have been observed several times with curcumin cures. Curcumin is not only cheaper, but even a touch more potent.

Perhaps even more amazingly, both saffron and turmeric breathe new life into the brain region called the hippocampus, possibly due in part to their anti-inflammatory effects.

But maybe there is more to it than that. What is special about the hippocampus is that this region is one of the very few brain structures in which new nerve cells can still grow, even in adulthood. This new formation is referred to as “neurogenesis”, and it is not least this that is suspected of contributing significantly to stress resilience. The rejuvenation in the head leads to a certain extent that we do not petrify mentally, but remain “flexible”: In this way we are also better able to cope with the changing blows of fate in life. Saffron and curcumin seem to have the extraordinary power to boost neurogenesis in the hippocampus!

5. Stay away from inflammatory drivers

Other anti-inflammatory foods and nutrients include: tomatoes, carrots, apples, pears, berries, tangerines and oranges, but also coffee and tea (especially green tea and chamomile tea) and dietary fiber found in whole grains, vegetables and fruit. Ginger, garlic and onions also inhibit inflammatory processes. Conversely, the strongest drivers of inflammation include: saturated fatty acids, which are mainly found in red meat, butter, sausage and milk, and finally also sugar and (too much) alcohol.

6. The alcohol issue is so important

There are also some new insights. In the “Nutrition Compass” I was still quite generous with regard to alcohol due to the data available at the time. In recent years, however, the data on this has become increasingly critical. Recent studies suggest that alcohol is far more dangerous than we long thought, which is why I recently vigorously rewrote this section of The Diet Compass.

Currently, one can say: If you drink a maximum of one (woman) to two glasses (man) of beer or wine on a maximum of two to three days a week, your health risk is probably limited (possibly this amount even protects against cardiovascular diseases). However, it must be mentioned right away that the risk of cancer increases with practically every sip. My overall take on this is that alcohol should be exercised with restraint, and probably best not to drink at all (which, at least, I’ve been doing for a few months).

7. More energy in everyday life

I can now say that the biggest subjective effect of not drinking alcohol is that I feel more energy in everyday life. Perhaps this is also related to a slightly improved sleep. It is known, for example, that alcohol disrupts sleep architecture.

But there are other ways to get more energy in everyday life through nutrition. For a few months now, I’ve been experimenting with a supplement called creatine monohydrate, which is considered largely safe – it’s been used by athletes around the world for decades because it’s been shown to strengthen muscles (if you train for it, mind you).

However, creatine not only supplies the muscles with more energy, but also the brain, and obviously not least regions that are essential for mood regulation. There are first indications that creatine can lift the mood in depressed patients. Creatine also appears to have a beneficial effect on neurogenesis in the hippocampus.

My subjective impressions are also quite positive so far. Creatine is mainly found in meat and fish in food, so supplementation should be particularly interesting for vegetarians and vegans. Overall, however, the empirical results here are certainly not as solid as with the other recommendations. Usual dose: 3 grams of creatine monohydrate daily.

8. Vitamin D – especially in winter

As a further dietary supplement – this is supported by a lot of data – I recommend 1000 to 2000 international units of vitamin D3 daily, which, among other things, also has an anti-inflammatory effect and is hardly found in our food (as is well known, our body produces the vitamin itself when we go out in the sun , however, in our latitudes, in winter as well as not).

9. It also depends on how much we eat

Not only what, but also how much we eat can influence our mood. For example, many people report increased mental clarity and, yes, not infrequently, a better mood when fasting (to be honest, I don’t really see these effects until I’m finally allowed to eat again). The suspected mechanism of action that could be behind it: Even if we don’t eat for a few hours, the body increasingly switches from the usual sugar to fat burning. In the process, so-called ketone bodies are formed, which supply our upper body – which otherwise “runs on sugar” – with a kind of alternative energy.

These ketone bodies, in turn, have an anti-inflammatory effect and activate a nerve growth factor called BDNF (“Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor”), which protects our nerve cells and stimulates their growth. Neurogenesis in the hippocampus could also be stimulated in this way.

Whatever you personally think of fasting, one thing you can really say objectively: It is actually extremely unusual for our organism that in today’s affluent society we hardly feel anything like hunger – from a purely developmental point of view, this was once commonplace! My rule of thumb is therefore: Feeling hungry once a day is a good compromise. In any case, it makes you appreciate food – healthy, nutritious, “real” food – more again.

10. Food makes you happy

Of course, you can look at food purely through the lens of nutrients and neurogenesis, but we don’t want to be that narrow-minded. And of course we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that eating is and should be enjoyment.

In addition, food brings us together with other people. Food connects, makes people happy, especially when we eat in good company, with our friends, with colleagues, with our family. You really don’t need any studies for this, but they also underline that there is hardly anything that is as important for our well-being as good social contacts, closeness, love. And as is well known, it goes through the stomach.

With this in mind, I wish you the very best of appetite!