Recap: Should you eat oats every morning? | Sarah Berry
2/24/202612 min
Today, we’re taking a closer look at one of the world’s favourite breakfasts - oats. Depending on who you ask, oats are either a superfood or source for concern. Either a great way to get fibre or a worrying blood sugar spiker. An all natural ally or pesticide riddled wrong’un. So what’s the truth? Are oats a smart start to your day or something to be cautious about? Professor Sarah Berry joins me to dig into the science. What does the literature say about oats? 🌱 Try our new plant based wholefood supplement - Daily30+ *Naturally high in copper which contributes to normal energy yielding metabolism and the normal function of the immune system 📚Books by our ZOE Scientists The Food For Life Cookbook Every Body Should Know This by Dr Federica Amati Food For Life by Prof. Tim Spector Ferment by Prof. Tim Spector Free resources from ZOE How to eat in 2026 - Discover ZOE’s 8 nutrition principles for long-term health Live Healthier: Top 10 Tips From ZOE Science & Nutrition Gut Guide - For a Healthier Microbiome in Weeks Better Breakfast Guide Have feedback or a topic you'd like us to cover? Let us know hereListen to the full episode here
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First 90 secondsJonathan Wolf· Host0:00
[upbeat music] Hello, and welcome to ZOE Recap, where each week we find the best bits from one of our podcast episodes to help you improve your health. Today, we're taking a closer look at one of the world's favorite breakfasts, oats. Depending on who you ask, oats are either a superfood or a source for concern, either a great way to get fiber or a worrying blood sugar spiker. So what's the truth? Are oats a smart start to your day or something to be cautious about? Professor Sarah Berry joins me to dig into the science. What does it really say about oats? [upbeat music] What are oats, and, like, what happens to them before they arrived in my bowl?
Sarah Berry· Guest0:44
Yeah, so oats are a type of seed or a whole grain that comes from the oat grass, and this is called the Avena sativa plant, and I hope I pronounced that correctly. They're very much like a wheat kind of plant, and the seed is encapsulated within this hull, which is like the kind of shell, and what happens is, is that is removed because you wouldn't be able to eat that shell, and what you're left behind is with the oat grain or the oat seed. And that consists of this outer bran layer, which is slightly brown, orangey, which is what you sometimes see in your oat flakes. You see a little specks, don't you, of this kind of brown and orange, and that's from this outer skin.