where world-leading scientists, explain how  their research can improve your health.  

Kanchan Koya grew up in a house  filled with wonderful fragrances  

from the spices simmering  on her grandmother's stove.  

In India, it was a common belief that  spices were more than just pleasant tastes.  

Ancient wisdom said they had medicinal properties  and it was common for household medicine cabinets  

to store dried spices and not pills. Kanchan  grew up to become a molecular biologist  

studying in the US at Harvard medical school. When her lab began to investigate turmeric's  

healing properties, the ancient wisdom  from her childhood met the scientific  

inquiry of her adult life beginning a lifelong  obsession with the health benefits of spice.  

In today's show, she helps us understand whether  there is any scientific evidence to support the  

health benefits of spices. The easiest way to add  spice to our diet and which ones to choose. We're  

also joined by regular guest, Tim Spector, one of  the world's top 100 most cited scientists, and my  

scientific co-founder at ZOE to help understand  why spices might be improving our health.  

Kanchan and Tim, thank you for joining me today.  

Why don't we start with our usual quickfire  round of questions from our listeners and start  

with can Kanchan? Kanchan, are there spices  that I can eat to improve my health?  

Yes. Should I be giving spices to my children?  

Yes. Is there any  

evidence that spices can help with menopause?  

I am not sure. Brilliant. We'll come  

back to all of those a bit later. And  Tim can spice reduce inflammation.  

Yes. Do spices affect my gut microbiome?  

Yes, definitely. Can spices count towards my  

target of 30 plants a week? Yes, they absolutely can.  

All right. That's a lot more yeses than  normal, but I think everyone's like, wow,  

this stuff actually does something. And, let's  go and sort of dig into that all in a bit more  

detail. And maybe we could just start right at  the beginning Kanchan, what is a spice?  

Right. Fantastic question. So I'm actually going  to summarize from a research paper because I  

knew that question was gonna come up, in the  international journal of molecular sciences,  

which basically says that the leaf, root,  bark, berry, bud, seed, and stigma of a  

plant or flower used for purposes of cooking are  commonly referred to as herbs and spices.  

So that's the formal, scientific  definition of an herb or a spice.  

Got it. And it sounds quite broad. So,  I think spinach is a leaf, isn't it? But  

I don't think my wife would accept that I was  adding spices if I added spinach to my meal.  

So I guess in day-to-day usage, is there  anything, that would identify, you know,  

when you are cooking, what defines that as... Maybe separating a herb and a spice?  

Yeah, definitely. So when I think of spices  versus herbs, I really do think of the root,  

the bark, the bud, the seed. And then  when you start talking about the leaves,  

I think more of herbs, either fresh or dried.  And so when you think of spices, the difference  

between them and other sort of plant foods that  we eat on a regular basis is really that they're  

often quite concentrated and traditionally  have been used to enhance the flavor of food.  

And of course, some ancient medical systems  also enhance the health properties of food.  

So that's kind of how I would think about spices  versus, you know, other foods that we eat.  

And somehow they always seem quite concentrated  when I think about spices, right? They're in a  

small little jar, as opposed to the quantities  of food I tend to eat for anything else to give  

me flavor. Is that universal across spices? Yes, they do tend to be concentrated and used in  

smaller amounts. And I think it's a really  good point because for a lot of people,  

that brings up the question, well, if they're  used in such small culinary amounts, how can  

they possibly really have benefits of meaning,  versus, eating a giant plate of sort of leafy  

greens or a huge plate of steam broccoli, you  do have to wonder would a sprinkling of this or  

that spice really make a difference? And I guess  that's what we're gonna talk about today.  

I think that is exactly the question.  And maybe I'd love to do it a little bit  

through your own story because we talked  before this call about your own passion  

for spices and how it began. How have you  ended up with your whole focus on spice?  

Yeah. So I grew up in India for the first 18 years  of my life. As several listeners might know, India  

is obsessed with spice, the spice box, or the  Dabba, it's called in India, is really an integral  

part of every Indian household's kitchen. But it's  also an integral part of every Indian family sort  

of pharmacy and by pharmacy, I mean the F-A-R-M,  farmacy, natural medicinal foods that we eat,  

the ancient Indian medical system of Ayurveda  has really revered spices and really put a lot of  

weight on their potential health benefits. So I grew up with a lot of that ancient  

wisdom just sort of passed down by my  family, my grandma, that sort of thing.  

And then, to be honest, didn't think much  of it. In fact, I thought it was a bunch of  

maybe woo-woo. Not really valid. I was sort of  a scientist, I wanted to do serious science.  

So I came to the US to study. I found myself at Harvard medical  

school doing my Ph.D. in molecular cancer  biology, and my lab at the Dana-Farber Cancer  

Institute actually started to study various  polyphenols and plant-based compounds in a screen  

against breast cancer in vitro in cells. And one  of the compounds on the screen was curcumin.  

And I was collaborating on this project with  a postdoc and he said: "oh, look! You know,  

turmeric is one of the compounds in the screen  or curcumin, the bioactive from turmeric." And  

it was definitely a real aha moment  for me because I think I had sort of  

discounted or not really paid attention to a  lot of this wisdom that I grew up with.  

And here I was at a research institution  that was starting to look at some of these  

polyphenols found in spices and it just planted a  seed for me that maybe there is something to these  

ancient components in food that is now being  validated by modern science and then fast forward  

to sort of when I became a mother. And started to  give my son spices in his baby food. And I had a  

lot of questions from my other mommy friends here  in New York City as to whether that was even legal  

or allowed. And it just got the wheels turning  in my mind about how maybe I could educate people  

about spices and really as a gateway into  this world of food for health and food for  

micronutrient enhancement. And that led to the  platform that is now a Spice Spice Baby.  

That's amazing. And so what do we know  about how spices affect our health?  

Right. That's the million-dollar question. So, you  know, for a long time, we had a lot of evidence,  

mostly in vitro, sometimes  dubious, not in the best journals,  

looking at the properties of these polyphenols  or phytochemicals found in spices.  

So these are individual compounds that  have been studied in different spices,  

and they're often looked at, for their properties  in a test tube on cells, and their antioxidant  

capacities, there was a growing body of evidence  that spices contained these compounds. These  

compounds seemed to have benefits in vitro, and  then there were small studies here and there.  

Not the best sort of done, not the largest sample  sizes, that were starting to show some benefits,  

like the ability to regulate blood sugar  in the case of cinnamon or, you know,  

some other anti-inflammatory spices, like  turmeric, their ability to block inflammation  

or at least reduce or regulate inflammation. And for a long time, I just told people. We  

have so much growing evidence in vitro that  these things can be helpful. There's really  

no downside to using them. We're waiting for  more human kind of control, randomized control  

data. So in the meanwhile, let's just enjoy them  because they make our food really delicious.  

And there's really no downside. And there  might be a health benefit, but I will say  

in the last few years, we have started to see  some better studies in humans that have given me  

a lot more sort of optimism about the true  benefit of these components in culinary  

amounts. So very often the studies in the past  looked at very concentrated doses of spices  

and things that would be hard to achieve in  culinary amounts. And now we have studies saying,  

you know, what, a teaspoon of a spice blend in  sort of a junky high fat high refined carbohydrate  

meal may actually be able to regulate inflammation  after that meal. And we can get into some of these  

studies, but I think now we're really starting to  see more evidence that in addition to the in vitro  

characteristics of these polyphenols, there might  actually be real benefits in culinary amounts.  

And Tim, you are normally the  first to be skeptical about a  

pervading view of food. So on spices? When you look at the studies in general,  

you do see lots of papers. You're getting  multiple papers from countries like Iran or  

Pakistan or places that aren't really high  up in the Western view of science that is  

looking after their own spices and perhaps paid  by the government to write these papers that are  

down 20 or 30 people that wouldn't normally meet  the quality you'd find in the top journals. So it  

is hard to assess these, they're often paid by the  manufacturers just like happens in other areas of  

food, like, you know, giant nut conglomerates,  et cetera, doing the same thing.  

So I think we do have to be skeptical about the  actual literature. But as Kanshan says, you know,  

we've got good theoretical reasons to believe it.  And what we do lack is really rigorous studies in  

large numbers of people. So we do need though,  a leap of faith to go from the fact that these  

spices and herbs are, are actually packed with the  things that we know are good for our bodies.  

From other experiments and take the few good  studies that we have got and, and extrapolate  

them. So we should maybe look at some of these  claims, some of the more extreme claims that  

you know, for example, you know, I took this  turmeric powder and was completely cured of cancer  

with a very large pinch of spices. But at the same time, realize that you know,  

these things might have a place in helping all  these things along. And that that's the middle  

ground between the extreme claims and they  don't work at all is, is where I think most  

food experts are seeing this. And luckily the  last few years, we have seen more rigorous studies  

in a few of these areas. And I think the fact that we can now  

start to measure things like the gut microbiome  effects gives us a way of looking, in short term  

at practical ways of doing these studies, rather  than waiting for people to do impossible studies,  

to do, you know, waiting to get cancer or heart  disease or whatever, and taking spices or not,  

which would take an impossible length of  time. So we are moving in that direction. And  

there are a few examples that I'm sure Kanchan and  I can come to discuss that we'll highlight.  

And I'll just add one thing, along the lines  of what Tim was saying, you know, I think  

many people look to spices or other  sort of superfoods, as these magic  

bullet solutions for health problems. And I think if you step back and look at the data  

from a sort of a larger lens, it really is about  certain dietary patterns. And I think this emerges  

for any healthy food. So it's not about, you know,  overloading on turmeric for inflammation control.  

It's about following a dietary pattern that we  know in an evidence-based way is gonna support  

healthy inflammation and then incorporating  a polyphenol-rich spice like turmeric.  

I really see that as the approach versus  the sort of like, what should I take  

every day in copious amounts to solve  my problem. And I think there's when the  

dubious claims really start to come in. So Kanchan, will you tell us a bit about the  

latest science, because it sounds like there  have been some really interesting papers  

just in the last few years that have really  lifted above what's been there in the past  

and I think it would be, without scaring  us away, with too much of the science,  

what has that actually been telling us? Yeah. So for a long time, we had a lot  

of evidence, as I was saying that spices  contain these anti-inflammatory compounds  

that seem to affect different players and  inflammation. So inflammation is a really  

complex kind of molecular symphony cascade and  the body with lots of different players.  

And the cool thing is. The different components  in different spices, at least in vitro seem to be  

hitting different components in inflammation. So  potentially having a synergistic effect, working  

together and a team at Penn state university just  last year actually said, Hey, since most people  

don't eat a single spice in isolation. Especially  in cultures that have traditionally used spices,  

they're often used as spice blends. And given  we know that different spices have different  

compounds that might work in concert. Why don't  we make a blend and test it in humans to see what  

it does to markers of inflammation? So this was a  blend and this is, you know, to Tim's point about  

this kind of reductionist view versus a more  holistic view, the blend contained, I'm gonna  

list the spices really quickly, just to give you  a sense of how many spices were in the blend.  

They were obviously trying to create a research  study that was likely gonna give them some  

results. And so the blend had turmeric,  ginger, cinnamon, coriander, cumin, red pepper,