Thom King: Fooding Your Way to Productivity with Keto?

Disclaimer: Transcripts were generated automatically and may contain inaccuracies and errors.

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Tom King, how are you doing? I’m doing terrific. Daymond. Thanks for having me on your podcast is a real honor. I can’t wait to dig in. Yeah, I appreciate you jumping on and I got to thank you for the package you sent. Um, this has been, um, I’m going to guess, like two months in the making for us to connect.

And so I’ve had, I see your face nearly every day, just sitting on the pantry, lucky you. So, you know, we’ll tell, we’ll talk about what what’s, the contents of that package are here in a bit. So let’s start with the. The usual two questions. So question number one is why are we talking to you today? What are you an expert at and what are we going to go over?

Um, well, I wouldn’t, I would actually have to say that I’m probably not an expert at, at anything. I sort of consider myself a work in progress and about, just about everything that I do. Um, some of the things that I would say that I’m working on, on trying to be come better, uh, would be probably. Time management, um, innovation and the big one for me that might not resonate with everybody in your audience, but hopefully it will is self care.

Yeah, I think that’s the path they’re going to head down. Um, because it’s, it’s, uh, obviously your background, but you know, for whiskey right before we hit record, I was telling you a lot of our listeners are entrepreneurs and business owners. And I think the majority of us will admit that there’s definitely the windows throughout the year where we kind of neglect our personal time and healthcare.

So I think it’s an important topic. That’s um, Probably overlooked on a lot of podcasts, business, business podcasts, but I think it makes sense to talk about, alright, before we do that, what question? Number two, what do you suck at? Um, I think I suck at delegating and that is something that we continually try to get better at because I think I have a certain level of guilt, um, by giving my work to other people.

So, um, You feel bad that you’re paying well? So, yeah, I started, I started this, my business basically in my garage back in California. And so I’ve always sort of, um, built my pride around me being able to do everything at the company, meaning like I can go down into the production area and work. I can work on equipment, you know, uh, Working in accounting.

So I I’ve had this sort of philosophy of like, there’s no job here too, you know, too small, um, that I won’t knock out. But what I found is that that makes me super inefficient. Um, but it’s still, like when I hand something off to somebody like, Hey, can you go load that in a truck or something like that? I still sort of feel, you know, I S I still feel like a little twinge of guilt, like.

Yeah. You know, I could probably do that myself. It’s getting less, it’s getting less, particularly if it’s something that’s pretty heavy. It’s interesting to me that is such a frequent answer. And it’s, it’s interesting because you know, you have these entrepreneurs and business owners that have accomplished great things and there’s this underlying common denominator that your type of answer comes up.

Probably more than the listeners would expect, but at the same time, it’s, it’s, it’s um, comforting because it’s like, Hey, you know, the guys that have accomplished great things still have the same little quirks that I do. So it’s interesting to get that replay. Um, all right. So let’s talk about, you know, your area of expertise and, and I’ll explain to the listeners what the package was.

So Tom was kind enough to send this package that had all sorts of goodies, um, largely on the KIDO side. And, you know, what’s super interesting is, um, I haven’t talked about it a lot, but I probably touched on it a little bit here and there. So I have like an autoimmune condition called eosinophilic esophogitis, um, it’s EOE for short.

And so I’ve had to like figure out what the thing that the abbreviated version of what that is is like, things hurt my throat. Like food hurts my throat. And so I’ve had to like do this dance where I try these different diets and these different things to figure out, like, how do I get in my proper nutrients without eating cardboard every day?

And so, um, Just recently, probably like 10 days ago. And you know, a couple days before we were finally, you know, we’ve been on the schedule to chat for awhile, but I didn’t realize it was like this week. And it’s ironic because about 10 days ago I started doing Kita. Oh. And so now we got, now we’re talking Quito and I got to tell you it’s actually helped out quite a bit on some of those straggler issues I was running into with, with my unique condition.

So. Interesting. Ours have aligned. Evidently they have. That’s awesome. I love hearing stories about that. Yeah. Quito is a, I mean, you look like you’re in pretty good shape and the, you know, weight loss is probably not something that you’re, you know, that you’re seeking it, but it’s like Quito, you know, for me, it, I, I carried about 35 pounds of extra weight.

Um, which isn’t, it’s not a ton of weight, but I also had like a lot of, um, I just had a lot of bad habits. Like one of them was red wine and the other one was pizza. And so I love to drink a bottle of wine and eat a pizza. And that’s just not really, uh, I, I, it doesn’t align well with keto and it doesn’t align well with, uh, longevity either.

So, um, You know, I just had some really bad habits carrying some extra weight, have a lot of problems with energy in the afternoon, you know, or you know, about two o’clock I’d start feeling a crash. Um, yeah, and I just, about five years ago started making a deep dive into Quito. Um, Which was really, it was an amazing experience on so many different levels because, um, I noticed that, you know, clarity wise, energy wise, um, you know, that was the biggest effect that I had was this, I had so much more energy.

I was able to think more clearly. Um, but another benefit of it as well was it opened up, opened me up to a community of really amazing people. So my, I started, you know, when I wrote my book, I got Kito. Um, you know, I got introduced to a lot of people that were sort of the OGs of, of Quito and just listening to their stories and listening to their experiences and, and getting in, making deep dives into the science.

Um, it shifted, I would say that it shifted my circle of people that I surrounded myself with, um, and really leveled up my entire life. So it was, it was beneficial on. A bunch of different ways. Yeah. Um, before we get too deep into this in case somebody doesn’t know what Quito is, let’s start with the basic explanation.

Um, basic explanation is that, um, you basically starve your body from, uh, carbohydrates and sugars and force your body to burn fats as energy. So your, your liver has the ability to metabolize, fructose and fructose happens to be one of the saccharides that’s in. Table sugar. So if you need table sugar, table sugar is basically half fructose and half glucose.

And so when it, it gets metabolized in your stomach, your glucose, the glucose divides off and is metabolized by your Oh your stomach. And then the fructose gets moved into your liver and your liver metabolizes fructose into lipids, which means fat. So your body immediately turns fructose into fat that just stored on your body.

Um, So when you starve your body of fructose and glucose, and you increase the amount of fats that you’re taking in, um, like coconut oil, avocado salmon, and stuff like that, your, your liver, which I think is one of the most fascinating organs in your body, um, your liver actually is able to take that fat and convert it to ketones, um, which your brain can either function on glucose or ketones.

And so now your body is burning like really high quality fuel instead of taking spikes, like big spikes from getting stuff that’s super fast burning. Um, so in a nutshell, the diet would be 70% fat. That you’d get from avocados nuts. Um, coconut oil. So 70, 70% fat, 20 20% protein, 10% carbohydrates. But the carbohydrates that you take in our low-glycemic, uh, carbohydrates, they’re like cruciferous vegetables, like cauliflower.

Broccoli lettuces, um, you know, things like that. Like you can have just about any vegetable you can think of, as long as it doesn’t grow underground, like tubers, which are potatoes or, you know, pretty high glycaemic. So I would limit the amount of that, that you take in, um, that ingrains. Yeah, I’m glad you kind of touched on fats examples, because I think a lot of listeners would say, well, fat sounds bad and scary.

And so it’s like, no, not fat it’s fats with an S and they’re healthy foods within that. Um, so before we continue too far down the health path, um, you know, this audience is largely people in the business world and entrepreneurs. So from, from an entrepreneurial spirit, Why do I care? Like, obviously this is healthy for me.

Um, and I think you started to touch on it for your personal journey. Was it helped with energy and mental clarity? Um, so is that why our listeners care is, is gonna make them more productive potentially? Um, from my perspective, it made me a lot more productive. Um, you know, like if you’re dependent on caffeine in the morning, you know, you wake up in the morning and, you know, you’re slugging down, uh, a bent a latte with a

You know, some sort of a donut or a cookie or a bagel or something like that. I mean, you’re, that’s not sustained energy. So you’re going to burn the caffeine quickly. You’re going to burn through the, uh, through your bagel quickly. And what’s going to happen is that your blood sugar levels are going to start to drop.

And then you’re going to need to pick those back up again. And you create this big cycle, this up. Up and down and up and down thing, and that can really affect your productivity. And particularly if you have like, say pasta for lunch, you know, by the time two o’clock rolls around, you’re going to need to take a nap or you’re going to be hitting coffee again.

And so if you’re hitting coffee at two o’clock, you know, in the afternoon noon, and you know, you’re going to try to get eight hours worth of sleep.

This is tea. So for those that get, see, I’m raising my coffee cup and he’s he’s he’s he’s beating me with his tea. Yeah. So, I mean, I still drink coffee, like that’s that’s. Yeah, I guess that’s a vice, but I’ll have a shot of it. So, uh, in the morning it would be that’s the extent of my coffee. And then after that, I just, usually I drink green tea, which has some caffeine in it, but, you know, I dilute it down quite a bit, but you know, back to productivity, um, I feel absolutely a lot more productive, but it’s not that it’s not that super unproductive energy that you get when you’ve had too much coffee, it’s real focused, deep energy.

And that really helps. Yeah. Is, is caffeine. I know like caffeine is, or coffee is like, Pretty much non nutritional at any level, as far as like, know micronutrients, things like that. Um, so I’m assuming there’s no carbs. So is the, is caffeine in its coffee in itself negative to the Quito lifestyle or is it all the other things that come with it?

Like the sugars and the donuts and the bagels? Like what if you don’t have black coffee, is, does that still contribute to. You know, a negative, um, element to this lifestyle. I don’t think so. I mean, there, I have read studies, these, that show that, um, that caffeine can cause insulin spikes, right? Not huge spikes, it spikes in insulin.

So you could end up getting some ups and downs from it, but say by and large, on a metabolic level, it doesn’t mean affect you. Um, but it is the other things that you add to it. Um, you know, like sweeteners. I mean, sweeteners are definitely gonna, unless you’re using like a non-nutritive or a non caloric sweetener in your coffee, and you can also sort of use that coffee, um, you know, as a vehicle, uh, or carrier, if you will, for other things, like if you add MCT oil or some sort of fats to your coffee, um, you know, it will also sort of deep than deepen the.

The level of ketosis that you’re experiencing. So like in the morning, um, with my shot of coffee, I usually add like either some MCT oil or some geek and some Stevia, and that’s kind of like rocket fuel. Yeah. How, how are you exposed to, so I get that once you’re exposed to it, you embraced it, but how did you even get to that point?

How were you introduced to it? Um, well that’s another great question. So, um, I actually. My main hustle. Isn’t my sauces, you know, my books and stuff like that. My main hustle is that I, I own an ingredient company, a food ingredient company. So we supply sweeteners. Um, we supply sweeteners to a lot of non-nutritive sweeteners to companies that manufacture, um, Bars cookies, beverages, frozen desserts and stuff like that.

So I did, I had a, um, one of my customers, who’s the founder of quest quest nutrition, one of the founders of quest bar and his name’s Ron Penna. And I actually accredit Ron Kenna for getting me into, um, getting me into Quito because he was way, way into keto before keto was cool. And, um, I used to always ask him out for dinner.

And he’s like, no, I don’t eat. And so it took me a long time until I was like, Hey, this dude doesn’t want to go to dinner with me. You know, want to just say it, I can take it. Um, but it wasn’t, you know, the thing that came up for me is that his thing was, you know, eat to live. Don’t live, to eat. You know, and, and a lot of people are just waiting for their next meal or planning out their next meal.

Like, Oh, I can’t wait to have that deep dish pizza. His thing was like, you know, he, he ate to live, meaning that, you know, he had the right amount of nutrients in his body and frankly, he’s a, he’s a maniac. So every time I get into a conversation with him, it’s four hours deep. And it’s always, there’s some science in there and, and you know, and he’s like, you should try the steak and eggs.

Um, steak and eggs diet and let’s see. And then the last time, last time I saw him, he said, hold up your hand. And I held up my hand and he’s like, see your ring finger. He’s like your ring finger is a little too short. That means you’re more women than you are a man. And I’m like, Oh wow. Who are you? Who are you?

But he’s, you kind of got, got me into it because I kind of hit. Sorta hit a bottom, a plateau, if you will. I was in Vegas and for a trip show and Ida, uh, one of our vendors take me out to dinner and I just laid over dead. It had cake and a potato and steak and a bottle of wine. And I got back into the room and I, I just, I looked at myself in the mirror and I’m like, okay, you know what?

This is. Yeah. This is a, you have to turn it around. And that was sort of the, the, I would say the catalyst or the Genesis of the book, because. I’m a big journaler and I just started journaling like, you know, and a lot of it wasn’t very, very nice. A lot of it was like, Hey, you fat PISA. To do to get skinnier.

And it’s like, look how you screwed up yesterday and getting on keto. It’s like, all right. So I’m going to do Quito five days a week and I’m going to cheat like hell two days a week. So I’d go five days in Quito and then Saturday beers and pizza and Sunday and, you know, burgers and more beer and stuff like that.

And then everything I lost all week, you know, just sort of right back on. And that was even worse. And then that’s when things really that’s. When I think that I had that moment of clarity where it’s like, you know, um, Diets suck and diets don’t work, lifestyle changes do, and that’s then I embraced it, but it wasn’t easy, you know, it was, it was tough in the beginning.

Yeah. Uh, you know, let’s, let’s do another definition thing. Uh, explain ketosis and then I have a follow up question to that. Okay, perfect. Ketosis is where your body is burning ketones instead of carbon hydrates. So when your body is in Quito, you’re starved for your star for carbohydrates. You start for glucose.

Okay. And your, your body starts metabolizing fats. Okay. Meaning your liver starts metabolizing fats and converting those into ketones. And then your brain function, your, your brain starts to metabolizing. Those ketones is energy. Okay. And then when you say starving, like that also sounds scary. Right? So, so that’s on scarify it for the listeners.

Is this okay? So this starving is more like, is it fair to say a transition where your body’s going? Hey, um, I’m not. I’m I’m starting from carbs because I’m used to them, but, and, and I’m transitioning out of that habit and then yeah, things are now normal. It’s just now I’m burning fats instead. Yeah, you can.

Yeah. And I know starvation is a hard, a hard one. Um, I just got really used to using it. So think of it this way. Let’s say you’ve got, let’s say you have a car, right? Let’s say you’ve got a car that runs both on, let’s say it runs on diesel. Um, and it runs on electricity. And so once you’ve run your vehicle out of electricity, you just turn a switch.

And now you’re, and now your vehicle starts running on, on diesel. So that’s how I would look at, you know, at the human body. I would look at it. It actually is like your body generally runs on gasoline, super fast, burning gasoline. And then once you’ve depleted all the gasoline, you’re out of gas, you’re simply turning a switch.

And now your body’s running on fats. You know, like a car would be running on diesel. Okay. And then the diesel is more efficient and slow burning and, and that’s the equivalent of the cutoff. Yeah. Cause I mean, fat is, and fat also creates a sanity, meaning that you feel full. So if you eat something that’s a high fat meal, you’re going to be satiated.

You’re going to be full for a lot longer. Um, you know, if you eat something that’s like a high carbs, uh, I would say that the, sort of the stereotypical definition of that is going to a Chinese restaurant. And you just you’re super stopped. It’s like, I can’t eat another thing. And 15 minutes later you’re like, Oh man, I can do some right now as you’re getting your cars, like at barbecue smells good.

Why don’t we stop in there? So that’s kind of how it is. How, how long. Okay. So the, the ideal of it, yeah. Active is to get into ketosis and I’ve heard, and as I’ve been getting into this the last week or two, I’ve read different things, not wildly different, but what I’ve read is like, okay. To get into ketosis.

Um, I guess my two, two things that you could potentially clarify are one is the daily carb intake to get there. And then to. How many days of that daily carb intake until I get there. Yeah. That’s called fat adaption. Like how fast does it take you to get fat adapted? I think that varies with a lot of people.

Like when, when I first started, um, when I first started like down this sort of ketogenic. Path, um, used to take me about three days and also I’ve heard people say, Oh, I’ve got the Quito, you know, where your body starts. Like, you know, where you’re, you’re depleting it of all the carbs. And it’s like, I need carbs.

I need carbs. I never had that. Like, and I, and I’ve talked to people, had it. And I’m like, well, just drink water, have a little bit of water with some salt in it and eat some fat. You know, eat an avocado. You’re not going to be hungry. Um, so I’ve heard of heard of keto flu, but I haven’t, I haven’t personally experienced it, but generally you’re looking at three days before your body depletes, uh, depletes all your stored carbohydrates that you’ve got.

Um, most of it’s going to be stored in your muscles. This is as glycogens. So what’s interesting is you’d notice that on the ketogenic diet, that your, even your proteins are sort of limited, you know, only 20% of what you’re going to be eating is going to be proteins. And the reason for that is if you eat too much, if you eat more than 20% proteins, those proteins actually convert, it will convert to glycogens in your body.

And your body will store that as sugar. Hmm. So what happens in, in, okay. So my case, like, so I had that, uh, autoimmune issue a couple years. Yeah. So I lost 30 pounds in six months in pounds that I did not want to lose. Cause I had just spent two years gaining 20 of them working out. So, um, you know, with building muscle mass protein is an important part of that.

So, um, What do you do in that scenario where you follow the ketogenic diet, but you need protein would, and you may not know the answer would, um, Being in workout mode, help your body consume those proteins properly. So you can still intake a higher amount to build the muscle mass or like where’s the given a take to follow a ketogenic diet, but still intake proteins.

Um, I would, and, and everybody’s different. So this is one thing that, I mean, everybody’s, body’s different. I mean it blood type. And metabolism. I mean, when you look at each, each person, their physiology is going to be different. So really tailoring it to what works for you. Like if you find that you’re on a ketogenic diet and you’re doing 20% protein and you’re losing a lot of weight, And you’re losing muscle mass.

If you start seeing that you’re losing muscle mass, I would most definitely look at increasing your, uh, increasing your protein intake and the best way that you can sort of gauge whether your a you’re having too much protein and you want to stay light. I would monitor your blood sugar levels. You know, like if you start seeing a spike or a dip in blood sugar levels, that could be a good indicator to, you know, if you see a spike in, in, and you’re staying off sugars and you’re staying off carbs, but you still see a spike in blood sugar levels and you don’t have diabetes.

I would say, take a look at, you know, maybe you’re eating too much protein at that point in time. If you’re seeing low blood sugar and you’re seeing staying on keto, you know, increase your proteins. So a lot of people follow the macros, but those macros don’t need to be, you know, don’t need to be cast in stone.

Like you can adjust it to your body. Like you might be more comfortable eating more protein, or you might be comfortable adding more carbohydrates. You know, like if you’re, if you have a lot of what’s called metabolic flexibility, you should be able to bounce in and out of keto and you should be able to regulate how many, uh, how much protein you take in and notice it.

So if you’re losing muscle mass, they definitely take a look at adding more protein. Yeah. That’s one of the other things I was going to ask you, as you say, in bouncing in and out. So like how, how, and I know it varies per person, but like generally speaking, how flexible is your. Carbon take. Um, you know, if, if I go the three days and I, and I start getting into ketosis and I do that for a week, and then you have your pizza and red wine night and, and you go from your daily, you know, 30 grams of intake of carbs to 150, like, are you starting that whole three day window again to get back there?

That’s a good question. That also really at that point, hands on your metabolic flexibility. Okay. I, I ran into a situation where I went probably a year and a half straight of like hardcore Kita where I was not, you know, I was continually. Pulling like two to two and a half up to four millimoles of, of ketones, which is pretty high.

You start key ketosis at, uh, at like 0.5. That’s where it begins. So I was in deep ketosis and I stayed that way for about a year and a half. I was in great shape. Um, lost a lot of weight, had a lot of energy, but. I, I really noticed that I had terrible, uh, metabolic flexibility. And that means that if I went off Quito, that let’s say I had a couple of days where I was having some carbs that I would notice it, like I would put on an easy five to seven pounds of waterway, um, and have a really hard time getting back into, um, In taquito.

And so a friend of mine, Mark Sisson, he, you know, I, I went to him, I’m like, I’m having some terrible metabolic flexibility. And he actually recommended wind sprints and high intensity training. Um, that helps quite a bit. So if you couple it with that, you can really create better metabolic flexibility within yourself.

Um, from my perspective, I would say I now will not go any longer than maybe a month and a half on strict Quito, um, without adding, you know, without adding a carb day. And I’m not saying that I go pizza, hamburgers, French fries, but maybe adding like a sweet potato or some keenwah. Or something like that on one day.

Just so I’ve got that metabolic flexibility. Yeah, let’s talk about your, um, your ingredient business a little bit, um, is clarify the types of ingredients you provide. It was there, is there a conflict in, you know, the business that you’ve had and the products that they provide? Versus later adopting the keto lifestyle.

Is there anything that you sell that you’re like me personally? I, I don’t want nothing to do with, you know what, that’s a really, that’s an excellent question. And the answer to that question is yes, fructose. So we still sell fruit toast because there’s a lot of companies that manufacture. Like a pharmaceutical products that buy fructose from us.

And that’s one thing that I won’t touch. Like I just want to touch fructose because fructose will completely knock you out of keto. We also carry a Gavi and Gavi is mostly, um, is mostly fructose. So yes, some of the stuff that we carry, uh, is, um, Doesn’t fall into Quito. Do we still sell it? Yeah. Is it a conflict?

Probably. Is it probably conflict? And it’s something that I have to sort of reconcile. Like when I see a shipment of coconut Palm, sugar go out and I’m like, wow, that’s, that’s a nice, you know, you see a nice profit from it. Um, I still think about it and it’s like, all right, well, Should I just stop selling it?

I don’t know. Probably not because this is where you, this is where like now I’ve got this responsibility. It’s like, okay, so I’ve got, you know, 30 employees and it’s like, okay. So if all of a sudden I start pushing my, my stuff on them and saying, Hey, I’m not carrying anything anymore. That. You know, that, that I don’t think is good for you.

And it’s like, we’re gonna carry any Brown sugar. We’re not going to be carrying any, you know, any coconut Palm sugar, no fruit toast and no, a Gabi actor. It’s not really fair to them. Um, So that’s where I have to sort of split off. And it’s like, as a consumer, I don’t consume it as, you know, as a, uh, a responsible, or is it responsible as I can be?

Um, business owner? Yeah, I carry it. It helps keep my business going and. Yeah. Yeah. That’s a really good question. Thanks for throwing that one out there. I appreciate it. I love the gotcha ones. Cause it really helps me self reflect. It’s like, you know, and I don’t mind owning my crap. Yeah, no, there’s nothing wrong with it.

Like it wasn’t like, you know, uh, your, your contradictory, hearing your shit, your business model. Like I was just really curious, like. What does Tom think about the situation? Not Tom, the business owner. It’s two different, it’s two different tops. Yeah, it is like, yeah, like the consumer side of me. And then also, I mean, like I do a lot of formulation.

Um, and so a hundred, the formulation that I do for other customers is clean label sugar reduction. So I won’t develop a product that is not keto friendly. So when I get into the lab, that’s where the that’s where sort of the differentiation comes in. You know, somebody will ask for a cereal or a frozen dessert or something like that.

All they’re getting is Quito. And if they say, yeah, we just want to have something in this. Delicious and full of sugar. I’ll send them somewhere else. Cause I just, cause I can’t taste it anyway. Cause it’s like here, you guys wanna try this. And so yeah, when it comes to, when it comes to food science end of things.

I I’m, yeah, I I’m a purist. Yeah, no. Cool. I think, I think I’m sure that we could have all whole other discussion on all the interesting things that you do that you get into with science. Um, so I’m going to give you the, uh, as we wrap up, I’m going to give you the floor for the last little bit and tell our listeners how they can find out more either, you know, about whatever your, your brands, your ingredients, your book, keep tell us, um, Thank you.

Thank you very much. Uh, actually, if you want to know, like the KIDO side of me, this is the more personal side you can go to. Geigen Quito and guy gone. Keto is the title of the book. You can find it on Amazon.com, you can see the line of condiments we have. Um, we’re going to be expanding those in the next three weeks.

Having a caramel syrup, a spicy ketchup. So I’m constantly working on those things. Cause there are things that I eat myself, so I sort of selfishly create, um, so hit up Geigen Quito. If you want to see the mad science of things and the ingredient, uh, you can go to icon foods.com, um, and you can see what we’re working on in the lab and stuff like that.

Super cool. It’s it’s been really interesting. Um, just because of the timing of this was great because I know we’ve had some encounter for awhile and, uh, I was excited to talk to you in general cause I can tell you’re passionate about it. Um, but it’s been even, even more beneficial to me. Um, just being more personally familiar with it.

So I appreciate your time. Thanks, Damon. I appreciate it. I really appreciate you having me on your, on your show. And I love the questions and I love the challenge. Yeah. Thanks so much. All right, Tom King, everybody.