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How Soylent Works · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from how Stuff Works
0:04
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
0:13
Speaker 1: and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there,
0:18
Speaker 1: which means it's time for stuff you should know. He's
0:23
Speaker 1: the He's the DJ, I'm the rapper. Who's the DJ?
0:28
Speaker 1: Don't you remember? That was the first, first or second
0:31
Speaker 1: d J Jazz Jeff and the Fresh Prince album. Now
0:34
Speaker 1: wouldn't need them. Everybody was totally confused as to who
0:37
Speaker 1: was who, so they actually named their album He's the DJ,
0:41
Speaker 1: I'm the rapper, and like Will Smith is pointing at
0:44
Speaker 1: himself and pointing at Jazz Jeff. And then their newest
0:47
Speaker 1: album is called He's the movie Star. I'm the one
0:51
Speaker 1: who asked you if you want fries with that soda?
0:53
Speaker 1: Poor jay Z Jeff. That's so mean. I'll bet he's
0:56
Speaker 1: a like a successful producer. I bet he is totally
0:59
Speaker 1: successful and probably way more successful than me. And I'm
1:03
Speaker 1: just a jerk. It's a little late now, I know.
1:05
Speaker 1: I thought it would be funny. And I also insulted
1:08
Speaker 1: fast food industry workers too. It's like that that one
1:18
Speaker 1: Simpsons where somebody I think was calling Homer a chicken,
1:22
Speaker 1: and some giant chicken walks over and goes he's insulting
1:25
Speaker 1: the both of us. This show just gave and gave
1:30
Speaker 1: and gave for decades. I think DJ Jazzy Jeff, I'm
1:33
Speaker 1: looking right now. I think he's still uh a DJ
1:37
Speaker 1: record producer and still a DJ called like DJ DJ. Yeah, yeah,
1:44
Speaker 1: I'm just mean. Sorry, Jazzy Jeff. You know who's not mean? You? No,
1:52
Speaker 1: I'm pretty mean? Okay. Um, A kid named well, I
1:56
Speaker 1: don't want to call him a kid. I want to
1:57
Speaker 1: call him a kid because he's younger than me. But
1:59
Speaker 1: he's a dude now. Yeah, his name is Rob Brian Hart. Yeah,
2:03
Speaker 1: not Rob Reiner, No, no, no, no adult Rob Brian Hart.
2:09
Speaker 1: Although he had a movie called When Harry Met Soilent.
2:12
Speaker 1: That's pretty good. That was good. And you know what
2:16
Speaker 1: I'm ashamed to say, I didn't even see that coming.
2:19
Speaker 1: Was so bad. Emily always laughs when I left. She
2:22
Speaker 1: always like, you really cracked yourself up, didn't you. Like,
2:24
Speaker 1: I'll just be walking down the hall laughing at myself
2:27
Speaker 1: and she that's a way to say, Chuck's drunk. Chucks drunk,
2:31
Speaker 1: and you're not as funny as you think you are. Oh,
2:35
Speaker 1: I see what you mean. Yeah, you really crack yourself up.
2:38
Speaker 1: Sometimes you should say, somebody's got to alright, Soilent, this
2:44
Speaker 1: is not a paid promotion for soiling Let's go ahead
2:48
Speaker 1: and just get that out of the way. No, but
2:50
Speaker 1: it's they're they're it's gonna pay off for him big time. Well,
2:53
Speaker 1: I mean, we're gonna talk a lot about a specific brand,
2:56
Speaker 1: but um, I think it's worthwhile because it is the
3:00
Speaker 1: innuine I think it's a genuine revolutionary product in a
3:04
Speaker 1: lot of ways. And it's not an endorsement. I'm just
3:07
Speaker 1: saying it's really super unique. Yeah, it's not not to
3:12
Speaker 1: endorse or whatever, but it's probably the single greatest thing
3:14
Speaker 1: humans have ever invented. Have you ever had it? Have I?
3:18
Speaker 1: You know? I have not. Actually I wanted to try
3:20
Speaker 1: it today. But you can't just go down to the
3:22
Speaker 1: corner store and get it. No, you can't. You have
3:24
Speaker 1: to order Soilent from their website, soilent dot com or Amazon.
3:28
Speaker 1: Of course, I didn't know you could get it on Amazon. Yeah,
3:31
Speaker 1: they you can get it there. Now, that's good. The
3:34
Speaker 1: prices have come down from so we're working from an
3:36
Speaker 1: article we should say from probably two fourteen in tech
3:42
Speaker 1: industry years, that's like ten years ago. And this is
3:47
Speaker 1: definitely a cornerstone of the tech industry. And what we're
3:51
Speaker 1: talking about is, is well a food replacement UM called
3:56
Speaker 1: soilent or not a food replacement? Well, yeah, originally it
4:01
Speaker 1: was intended to be a food replacement or a meal
4:04
Speaker 1: replacement or no, I guess it was originally intended to
4:07
Speaker 1: be a food replacement where you could just live off
4:09
Speaker 1: of this stuff you didn't need other food. And then
4:13
Speaker 1: now it's intended to be a meal replacement where you
4:16
Speaker 1: would eat other food, but you could say, have this
4:19
Speaker 1: instead for lunch or whatever. Yeah, or you could eat
4:22
Speaker 1: it along with your meal. Sure, Like let's just call
4:26
Speaker 1: it beige food. Yeah, my liquid state, Yeah, pretty much
4:34
Speaker 1: entirely liquid. It's like pancake batters. That what I kept
4:39
Speaker 1: running across the consistency, And I mean, doesn't everyone I
4:43
Speaker 1: want to drink pancake batter. I've been known to take
4:47
Speaker 1: a sip of pancake battery. It sounds really gross. Um,
4:52
Speaker 1: we haven't tried it, and I really wanted to, like
4:53
Speaker 1: I said, for this, but um, we may or may
4:56
Speaker 1: not get Um. Our colleague Jonathan Strickling here. It just
4:59
Speaker 1: depends on if we can find him. Uh, he's been
5:03
Speaker 1: he was being tattooed by NASA the other day. Oh
5:07
Speaker 1: that happened. Huh, not by NASA, but sort of with
5:11
Speaker 1: NASA for NASA, under NASA's supervision. Maybe. I mean he
5:17
Speaker 1: got a tattoo for work via NASA. Yep. Um. So
5:23
Speaker 1: I haven't seen him since then, But if we can
5:24
Speaker 1: get him in here, he did the soilent thing for
5:26
Speaker 1: a while. Uh, and he loves to talk, so he
5:29
Speaker 1: would be good. As a matter of fact, let's just
5:33
Speaker 1: add a thirty minute silent part here, but we can
5:37
Speaker 1: insert what he'll say after we introduced him. But anyway,
5:42
Speaker 1: I did not get to taste it, but it has
5:44
Speaker 1: been likened to everything from pancake batter two um, meta
5:48
Speaker 1: musel or cream of wheat or a tasteless milkshake. Um,
5:53
Speaker 1: although they do have flavors out now, which we'll get to.
5:56
Speaker 1: But um. What the original intent of soilent taste wise
6:00
Speaker 1: was that it was just really just neutral and bland
6:06
Speaker 1: for the purposes of we don't want people to get
6:08
Speaker 1: sick of eating this. Yeah, and probably the best meat. Yeah, right,
6:14
Speaker 1: exactly that if you don't have a taste, you can't
6:17
Speaker 1: really get sick of a taste, right, But I disagree.
6:19
Speaker 1: I'm sure he could totally get sick of this. Sure,
6:22
Speaker 1: but it also is something of a blank slate that
6:25
Speaker 1: people can add their own tastes and flavors to, like
6:28
Speaker 1: maple syrup or fruit or peanut butter or something. Yeah,
6:30
Speaker 1: which I didn't think about. That's a great idea, right,
6:33
Speaker 1: So they specifically wanted to create this product for a
6:37
Speaker 1: number of reasons. And like I said, that guy who
6:39
Speaker 1: I said was nice, he actually is nice. From the
6:43
Speaker 1: Broad a New Yorker profile of him, SAME's Rob Brian
6:46
Speaker 1: Hart And um, he actually he went to tech. He's
6:49
Speaker 1: in Atlanta, boy, Yeah, And he was in San Francisco
6:53
Speaker 1: working at a tech startup out of his house with
6:56
Speaker 1: some of his roommates. And he decided that um, eating
7:03
Speaker 1: was taking up way too much of his time and money, time, money, effort. Um.
7:10
Speaker 1: It was just something he wasn't very interested in. And
7:12
Speaker 1: he also was, um, I think concerned with exactly what
7:16
Speaker 1: he was eating. I think he was just basically living
7:18
Speaker 1: off a ram And he said, which is not the
7:20
Speaker 1: healthiest thing you can possibly eat sure. So he decided
7:24
Speaker 1: to take a little time and research nutrition and how
7:28
Speaker 1: it relates to human physiology. And he had this idea
7:32
Speaker 1: that if you could get rid of the unnecessary parts
7:38
Speaker 1: of food, like food is kind of a clunky, inefficient
7:42
Speaker 1: vehicle for delivering nutrients. If you could get rid of
7:46
Speaker 1: the clunky part and just have the nutrients, you could
7:50
Speaker 1: you could live fairly healthily on just the raw materials
7:55
Speaker 1: of food that we need from food, right, just the nutrients. Yeah,
7:59
Speaker 1: Like I can save money, I can save time, um
8:04
Speaker 1: from going to the grocery store and cooking and cleaning,
8:06
Speaker 1: and I can get everything I really need to have
8:09
Speaker 1: a genuinely healthy diet um right here in this. I mean,
8:15
Speaker 1: I guess i'll call it a drink. I mean it
8:18
Speaker 1: goes down like a drink, right, Yeah, okay, so we'll
8:21
Speaker 1: call it a drink. But it's not to be confused with.
8:24
Speaker 1: I mean, there have been all kinds of meal replacement
8:27
Speaker 1: drinks over the years, uh, from like insurer to slim
8:30
Speaker 1: Fast and muscle milk, Yeah, protein shakes and stuff like that.
8:34
Speaker 1: This is not that this is supposed to give you
8:36
Speaker 1: everything you need in your body for a meal. Yeah, nutritionally.
8:42
Speaker 1: Other meal replacement drinks are meant to be meal replacements, right,
8:46
Speaker 1: Like if you couldn't get enough nutrients from your food
8:49
Speaker 1: because you're recovering from surgery, you need an extra bit.
8:52
Speaker 1: Your doctor may say, like drink and ensure every day whatever.
8:57
Speaker 1: Or like you said, protein chakes like muscle milk. If
9:00
Speaker 1: you're a weightlifter, you need uh hit a protein after
9:04
Speaker 1: you work out, you you will probably drink some sort
9:07
Speaker 1: of protein shake afterwards. Right, So there's very specific um
9:12
Speaker 1: reasons for the meal replacements or supplements that have been
9:16
Speaker 1: invented up to soiling. What's that soiling apart was that
9:20
Speaker 1: it was created intentionally to be a replacement for food,
9:25
Speaker 1: Like this was all you needed. You never needed to
9:28
Speaker 1: eat food again. All you had to do was eat
9:31
Speaker 1: soiling every day, every day, and and ingeniously, and I
9:35
Speaker 1: don't think he intended to even he was just looking
9:38
Speaker 1: for something for himself. He wasn't looking to change the
9:42
Speaker 1: food industry or to start a company. I don't think,
9:44
Speaker 1: not of a food company. But he very ingeniously started
9:47
Speaker 1: a blog against when thirteen called how I Stopped Eating Food,
9:51
Speaker 1: which is super grabby on the internet. Title wise, like
9:55
Speaker 1: someone's going to see that and go, well, what in
9:57
Speaker 1: the world is this all about? And that's what happened.
10:01
Speaker 1: It went viral, it blew up. He detailed on there
10:05
Speaker 1: that he lost weight. He said his intellectual and athletic
10:08
Speaker 1: performance improved. He said he spent a lot less money
10:12
Speaker 1: on groceries, but he put he put athletic and scare quotes.
10:17
Speaker 1: He's like, if you know what I mean, because he
10:18
Speaker 1: did go to tech and he was a software engineer,
10:22
Speaker 1: I meant sex. But yeah, yeah, the other way that
10:26
Speaker 1: joke worked. He said he spent a lot less money
10:29
Speaker 1: on groceries and he only spent about five minutes a
10:32
Speaker 1: day making this stuff. And he described it as a
10:36
Speaker 1: quote sweet succulent, hearty meal in a glass end quote,
10:40
Speaker 1: and people were all over it. He said, like after
10:43
Speaker 1: a week he would see ads for food and it
10:46
Speaker 1: would just be nauseated by him. He any that he
10:49
Speaker 1: came to crave um the soiling, which wasn't called soilent
10:53
Speaker 1: at that time. No, he did call it soilent. Oh,
10:56
Speaker 1: I thought he didn't call it until he like got
10:59
Speaker 1: the Kickstarter. Going from what I saw, I actually saw
11:02
Speaker 1: that blog post, and I believe he calls it Soilent
11:04
Speaker 1: in it. Okay, well whenever he got it, he got it.
11:07
Speaker 1: Spoiler alert by the way, upcoming. There was a movie
11:11
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy three called Soilent Green, very famous, uh,
11:15
Speaker 1: kind of classic cult classic sci fi movie with Chuck
11:19
Speaker 1: Heston and the big reveal and soil it's about this, uh,
11:24
Speaker 1: this future world, this dystopian society where um, these people
11:29
Speaker 1: are fed these rations and in the end you realize
11:32
Speaker 1: that's it's revealed that people are eating other people. Soilent
11:35
Speaker 1: Green is people people, right, so um. And for that reason,
11:40
Speaker 1: because that was just such a famous ending, Like if
11:43
Speaker 1: that actually spoiled the movie for you, like, let us know,
11:46
Speaker 1: so Chuck can come hit you with a hammer because
11:50
Speaker 1: everybody knows the ending of the twist and Soiling Green. Yeah,
11:54
Speaker 1: I'm just you know, but he he yeah, I know.
11:56
Speaker 1: That was nice of you. See you're not a mean person,
11:58
Speaker 1: You're nice. Um. The he he was lobbied by investors, friends, family,
12:05
Speaker 1: Everybody's like, you gotta change the name of Soilon. But
12:08
Speaker 1: he would explain to him, it's actually not based on
12:11
Speaker 1: the movie. He's based it on the book that was
12:15
Speaker 1: the source for the movie Soiling Green. The book was
12:17
Speaker 1: called Make Room, Make Room, and it was written by
12:21
Speaker 1: a guy named Harry Harrison, and it's it was basically
12:23
Speaker 1: about overpopulation and in the book that people are fed soilent,
12:28
Speaker 1: which is a food made of soy and lentils, And
12:32
Speaker 1: that's what he based it on, was that book, not
12:35
Speaker 1: the the food being made from people, which apparently the
12:39
Speaker 1: makers of the movie used some pretty deep artistic license
12:43
Speaker 1: to totally alter it at the end. Yeah, So it
12:48
Speaker 1: started out nerdy, and it got nerdier because he was like,
12:50
Speaker 1: it's actually a deep cut right exactly from make Room,
12:54
Speaker 1: Make Room exclamation points. But he he um, he did
13:02
Speaker 1: detail in this blog post, and I'm pretty sure he
13:04
Speaker 1: did call it soiling in it, and he thinks very clever.
13:07
Speaker 1: I think it was a really kind of a funny
13:09
Speaker 1: wink to call it that. Sure, but he um. He
13:13
Speaker 1: posted the recipe that he went by in a follow
13:17
Speaker 1: up post and it's still up there. You can go
13:19
Speaker 1: see how to make soilent yourself, And as a matter
13:22
Speaker 1: of fact, a lot of people do. There's this um
13:26
Speaker 1: subculture of d i y soilent enthusiasts, people who are
13:30
Speaker 1: like so into it that they're creating their own blend
13:34
Speaker 1: for themselves from scratch self soil enters, yep, soilent preppers.
13:40
Speaker 1: So he started that Kickstarter got about three million bucks.
13:44
Speaker 1: Uh because people thought it was a cool idea. UM,
13:48
Speaker 1: submitted it to the f D A right, yeah, and
13:52
Speaker 1: that went whatever, but they classified it interesting instead of
13:57
Speaker 1: a dietary supplement. They said, now this is a food
14:00
Speaker 1: like knock yourself out, NERD go get sued. We don't care.
14:05
Speaker 1: And then he got a co packer, Rosa Labs in
14:07
Speaker 1: l A and um, they produce it for him still
14:12
Speaker 1: and people started eating or drinking this stuff up. Yeah,
14:16
Speaker 1: I mean especially other um people who work twenty three
14:21
Speaker 1: hours a day um and didn't want to be bothered
14:24
Speaker 1: with having to eat because they didn't really care about
14:27
Speaker 1: food and or they were like, all I'm eating is
14:30
Speaker 1: mac and cheese, Like what what am I doing? Like?
14:32
Speaker 1: If I'm gonna care that little about food, then I
14:36
Speaker 1: might as well eat something that's healthy that takes even
14:39
Speaker 1: less time to make them mac and cheese and just
14:41
Speaker 1: the whole um. Uh. The mentality behind soil it really
14:45
Speaker 1: like tapped a nerve and that stuff took off like
14:48
Speaker 1: very quickly. Um. They started selling like thirty thousand units
14:52
Speaker 1: of it a month. I guess packets a month by
14:55
Speaker 1: two thousand fourteen, and it was it debuted. The first
14:58
Speaker 1: shipments sold. They're shipped in May of two thousand fourteen,
15:03
Speaker 1: so like within seven months they were selling thirty thousand
15:07
Speaker 1: units a month. Yeah, it went gold right away. Uh,
15:10
Speaker 1: it's like round and round by. We'll take a break
15:13
Speaker 1: here and um I'll see if I go find Strickland
15:17
Speaker 1: and we'll be right back. No, no Strickland yet. Oh yeah,
15:43
Speaker 1: he has not appeared since the New year. You know,
15:45
Speaker 1: he's in Las Vegas right now? Right? Oh was he
15:47
Speaker 1: at c E S. Well, that makes sense. I didn't
15:52
Speaker 1: read my company blog. Uh yeah I did. Actually I
15:57
Speaker 1: did see that on our internal blog, right that we
16:00
Speaker 1: all post our daily goings on and last each other
16:04
Speaker 1: so silent. Uh. Again, we said that the taste isn't
16:08
Speaker 1: the big thing. Um, but they really aim to just say, hey,
16:13
Speaker 1: it's convenient, you're gonna save some money. And if you're
16:17
Speaker 1: you know, like you said, if you're someone who doesn't
16:19
Speaker 1: put so much care into what you're making for yourself,
16:24
Speaker 1: like you could like you said, you could eat nothing
16:26
Speaker 1: but this, but even the owner said, like you could
16:29
Speaker 1: but like, what do you want to food is great? Yeah,
16:32
Speaker 1: And they've walked that back tremendously. I think the more invested. Yeah,
16:38
Speaker 1: the more they've walked that back. So originally it was
16:42
Speaker 1: and he would give interviews and just tell everybody like, yeah, man,
16:45
Speaker 1: you can you can just live off of this indefinitely
16:48
Speaker 1: if you want. Now they say it's not intended to
16:52
Speaker 1: replace every meal, but it can replace any meal. Yeah.
16:56
Speaker 1: I think it's a really good I don't know if
17:00
Speaker 1: they've if they've tapped into the doomsday prepper segment, but
17:05
Speaker 1: like this seems to be the kind of thing that
17:07
Speaker 1: somebody could and should have, like in the trunk of
17:11
Speaker 1: their car or along with their canned goods and roll
17:15
Speaker 1: of masking tape. Yeah, you know, I mean I literally
17:18
Speaker 1: when I read this, I was like, you know, I
17:20
Speaker 1: wouldn't mind having a case of this in my trunk.
17:27
Speaker 1: Be a disaster, Yeah, pick up check that doesn't work,
17:30
Speaker 1: but you never know. I mean, I doubt if I'm
17:32
Speaker 1: ever gonna be like lost in the wilderness, but if
17:35
Speaker 1: i was, it'd be nice to have food for a week. Yeah,
17:39
Speaker 1: you know, for food for a week. I mean, these
17:41
Speaker 1: the sealed packets, unopened apparently last for a year. Al right,
17:46
Speaker 1: so I'd have to on day three sixty four every year,
17:49
Speaker 1: I'd have to drink them and get some new ones.
17:52
Speaker 1: You'd have to drink nine months worth of food on
17:56
Speaker 1: one day if you're a heck of a New Year's Eve.
17:59
Speaker 1: So we are officially on version one point seven. Yeah,
18:03
Speaker 1: that as of about two weeks from this recording ago,
18:08
Speaker 1: they issued one point seven And as of a couple
18:10
Speaker 1: of days ago, they introduced two new flavors um Yeah,
18:14
Speaker 1: and that's soilent two point oh. Oh is that official? Yeah,
18:19
Speaker 1: that's like um as technically a separate product. It's like
18:22
Speaker 1: pre mixed soilent drinks. All they have. They've had those
18:27
Speaker 1: in in the natural flavor since the beginning though, Oh
18:31
Speaker 1: is there right? I thought they just started with powder
18:33
Speaker 1: and then came and added the drink, and then now
18:35
Speaker 1: they added those two flavors to the drink. I think
18:38
Speaker 1: the new flavors are new. They've had the drink for
18:40
Speaker 1: a while. And they also now have a bar, a
18:43
Speaker 1: soilent bar that's unavailable right now. And about why in
18:47
Speaker 1: a little bit, because it's quite interesting. I did not
18:50
Speaker 1: know that um do they have the coffee ist is that. Yeah,
18:53
Speaker 1: that's out. So that's soilent in a bottle with caffeine. Yeah,
18:57
Speaker 1: so that's your morning. Well, I guess whenever you want
18:59
Speaker 1: the calf angeled, I would say morning, but you never
19:02
Speaker 1: know what your schedule is. That that sounds dangerous because
19:05
Speaker 1: I mean, like this is food, right, and people have
19:08
Speaker 1: a tendency to pound coffee. You don't want to pound
19:11
Speaker 1: the stuff like you'll gain weight. I mean, I guess
19:13
Speaker 1: if you're trying to gain weight, sure do it, but
19:16
Speaker 1: like this is this is the stuff is engineered to
19:20
Speaker 1: be just what you need to sustain you or maintain
19:24
Speaker 1: your weight. Or I guess if you wanted to gain weight,
19:25
Speaker 1: you just drink more of it pounded, you know, supposedly
19:29
Speaker 1: lose a little weight if you go like a soiling
19:31
Speaker 1: only for a few weeks. But it's all anecdotal. I
19:34
Speaker 1: don't think they make any claims. No, I don't think
19:37
Speaker 1: so either. So they're on one point seven now and
19:39
Speaker 1: each version supposedly they just you know, they're tweaking the recipe.
19:43
Speaker 1: They're listening to people, which sounds like the right thing
19:46
Speaker 1: to do, Like it sounds like they're really listening to people,
19:49
Speaker 1: and people are saying, oh, it's um, it's too thick,
19:53
Speaker 1: Like I don't like one point six, So they'll say,
19:56
Speaker 1: all right, a little xanthem gum take that out. Uh.
19:59
Speaker 1: They switch the primary source of fatty acids from fish
20:02
Speaker 1: oil to algible oil. But now I think the algae
20:06
Speaker 1: oils out now right, No, no, so the alga oils in.
20:10
Speaker 1: And they actually the reason why they switched out of
20:12
Speaker 1: fishal well two reasons. It made it vegan when they
20:15
Speaker 1: change from fish oil to algible but they also like
20:19
Speaker 1: it it um has far less of an environmental impact
20:23
Speaker 1: algae um farming does, but they even took it a
20:26
Speaker 1: step further, and they're not using oil from farmed algae.
20:30
Speaker 1: They're using oil from bioreactors, which take up even less
20:33
Speaker 1: space and use less energy for algible oil production than
20:37
Speaker 1: farming does. Right, So they're really like trying to narrow
20:40
Speaker 1: the impact environmentally that this stuff has. Yes, And the
20:46
Speaker 1: reason why is it is very much linked to our
20:50
Speaker 1: artificial sweetener episode. Somebody introduced whole algile flower to the market.
20:58
Speaker 1: UM as I think a thickener. I think it also
21:01
Speaker 1: is an emulsifier UM, and it just creates a pleasant
21:05
Speaker 1: mouth feel. I think um. And it's also somewhat nutritious supposedly,
21:10
Speaker 1: but it also can make people violently ill. And so
21:14
Speaker 1: all of soilent one point six had to be suspended,
21:18
Speaker 1: including the bar. That's why the bar is not available
21:20
Speaker 1: any longer. Um because it all contained this whole algile flower.
21:25
Speaker 1: They had to basically stop selling it, and then they
21:27
Speaker 1: tinkered with it, and that's why one point seven came out. Uh, Well,
21:32
Speaker 1: if if you're if you don't know much about soilent
21:34
Speaker 1: and you're literally screaming at your at your car radio
21:39
Speaker 1: right now or wherever you're listening, but what is it really?
21:43
Speaker 1: Then tell them what it's mainly derived from. Oh, it
21:47
Speaker 1: is soy protein. They replaced the brown rice and the
21:50
Speaker 1: oat flour and potato starch, and rice starts with basically
21:54
Speaker 1: just soy soy protein, another a couple other carbohydrates, So
21:57
Speaker 1: it's mainly soy, just a soy based meal, soy algeil
22:02
Speaker 1: oil um, something called um I so malt malte loose.
22:09
Speaker 1: It's a which they synthesize from beats. It's a carbohydrate
22:12
Speaker 1: but also a bit of a sweetener, canola oil. I
22:15
Speaker 1: think they took it. I think they took that out
22:19
Speaker 1: and the reason. Okay, so there is rice starching it.
22:24
Speaker 1: They definitely took the brown rice, the oat flower, and
22:27
Speaker 1: the potato starch out. Because if you go to their website,
22:30
Speaker 1: it's so cool. At the very bottom the bottom navigation,
22:35
Speaker 1: they'll they'll say release notes, and it will bring up
22:38
Speaker 1: PDFs of the notes about what they changed and why.
22:44
Speaker 1: UM for every single version of UM soiling, so it'll
22:49
Speaker 1: say we took this out because we found that this
22:52
Speaker 1: is actually better for the environment, or that this delivers
22:55
Speaker 1: the vitamin that we're trying to get better, or UM
22:59
Speaker 1: for whole algile flower. They said that they removed it
23:03
Speaker 1: to improve customer experience, which means not making you violently. Yeah,
23:10
Speaker 1: it's I mean, like I said, it sounds like they're
23:12
Speaker 1: they're continually striving to get it right. Yeah, but they're
23:16
Speaker 1: also more than that, they're also sharing what they're doing
23:21
Speaker 1: because the whole thing was kind of based out of
23:23
Speaker 1: that open source tech ethos, and so they've kind of
23:27
Speaker 1: maintained that open source thing ever since. They're just very
23:30
Speaker 1: transparent as a company. Yeah, looking at the as of
23:33
Speaker 1: January third, nutritional facts and one bottle fo calories one
23:41
Speaker 1: grams of total fat two grams of saturated fat. And
23:44
Speaker 1: this is for the the regular natural, right, so I
23:49
Speaker 1: keep calling natural? Is that what they call it? Uh? Original?
23:53
Speaker 1: Let's just say non flavored yet original a ridge. How's that? Uh?
23:59
Speaker 1: Cholesterol nocles are all which they've had from the beginning,
24:02
Speaker 1: ugrams of sodium, thirty six grams total carbs, three grams
24:08
Speaker 1: dietary fiber, nine grams of total sugars, nine grams of
24:12
Speaker 1: added sugars, and then uhs of protein, and a whole
24:17
Speaker 1: host of vitamins and minerals. Yeah, and those vitamins and
24:22
Speaker 1: minerals are important. That the essential nutrients UM, which are
24:27
Speaker 1: nutrients like vitamins and minerals that our bodies need but
24:31
Speaker 1: can't make. UM. They apparently went to the n I
24:35
Speaker 1: H and the FDA and several other UM groups and said,
24:39
Speaker 1: you know, what does the human body need to function
24:42
Speaker 1: and thrive? And they that's what they put in there.
24:45
Speaker 1: They have this blend of vitamins and nutrients that they
24:48
Speaker 1: include as part of the recipe for soilent. One of
24:53
Speaker 1: the things that soilents I don't want to I guess
24:56
Speaker 1: criticized for, I guess, but more one of the concerns
24:59
Speaker 1: that people who are skeptical about it have is that
25:03
Speaker 1: it um it doesn't have any non essential nutrients, which
25:08
Speaker 1: are nutrients that your body can make itself, like cholesterol
25:11
Speaker 1: that has zero cholesterol, but your body can make its
25:14
Speaker 1: own cholesterol. And that was a deliberate move on Reinhardt
25:18
Speaker 1: and his his UM co founders parts that they decided
25:23
Speaker 1: that they didn't need non essential nutrients, that it was
25:26
Speaker 1: UM something that our bodies already make and so therefore
25:30
Speaker 1: it was UM redundant basically to add this stuff in,
25:34
Speaker 1: because this is just the basic bear minimum that you
25:38
Speaker 1: need for to to be healthy and thrive. But some
25:41
Speaker 1: people are saying, well, these things are also found in
25:43
Speaker 1: nature in our food, and we take them in and
25:46
Speaker 1: we don't really know enough about nutrition and how it
25:49
Speaker 1: affects the human body to say you don't really need
25:52
Speaker 1: to take in from the outside any non essential nutrients.
25:56
Speaker 1: So people are saying, we're gonna have to see over
25:59
Speaker 1: the course of year is what kind of effects this
26:01
Speaker 1: has on people UM who are just eating soil, and
26:05
Speaker 1: if those people do exist, you know, five ten years
26:08
Speaker 1: from now. Yeah, and especially if that's something that you
26:10
Speaker 1: kind of touted or not you. But he touted to
26:13
Speaker 1: begin with, which is, hey, man, theoretically you could just
26:15
Speaker 1: eat only this. Yeah, but I mean he was like this,
26:19
Speaker 1: this twenty something dude who had a really great idea,
26:21
Speaker 1: and I didn't care about what the investors were saying,
26:24
Speaker 1: and and he cared about people's health. He wasn't doing
26:28
Speaker 1: it to be like a huckster or snake oil sales
26:31
Speaker 1: or anything like that. You know, he was just not
26:33
Speaker 1: watching his p's and ques like somebody who was from
26:36
Speaker 1: a PR department might ask him to. All right, well,
26:39
Speaker 1: let's take another break and I'm gonna We're gonna walk
26:41
Speaker 1: to Las Vegas. Get them. I'm gonna see if Strickland's
26:45
Speaker 1: up for this. Go get that guy, and I'll be
26:47
Speaker 1: right back in about ten days. Hey, and put twenty
26:50
Speaker 1: on black for me. M alright, good news, bad news.
27:17
Speaker 1: I owe you forty dollars man. No wait, no, that's good. Yeah,
27:23
Speaker 1: I thought you were paying me back with interest. Bad
27:27
Speaker 1: news is I couldn't find Strickland in Vegas. Actually, if
27:30
Speaker 1: we can't find Strickland, this is just hot off the
27:33
Speaker 1: presses our buddy Joe ran dazz oh yeah, currently uh
27:37
Speaker 1: of at midnight Fame he drank soil it for a
27:41
Speaker 1: little while, yeah, and asked him. I texted him for
27:44
Speaker 1: a description, and this just came in and he said, uh,
27:49
Speaker 1: it tasted like the devil's chalk. But some reptilian part
27:53
Speaker 1: of me appreciated obtaining sustenance without having to worry about
27:57
Speaker 1: flavor or preparation. Basically, space stationed serial killers should like it,
28:02
Speaker 1: and no one else. That's our that's our Joe, all right.
28:07
Speaker 1: So if you want to buy someone, like I said,
28:09
Speaker 1: you can get on Amazon. Now. I think it's only
28:12
Speaker 1: available in the USA and Canada still though, unless that's changed,
28:17
Speaker 1: I did not see that. But what what you can
28:21
Speaker 1: do is you can buy the pouches of powder and
28:25
Speaker 1: mix it where you can buy the bottles um and
28:28
Speaker 1: you can get subscriptions that cut a little of the
28:31
Speaker 1: price off depending on how much of this you want
28:34
Speaker 1: to drink, and that is up to you, as a
28:37
Speaker 1: human being to decide how much of this kind of
28:40
Speaker 1: nasty stuff. And I've heard our buddy Joe Randazza had
28:45
Speaker 1: some of this too, and I tried to get a
28:46
Speaker 1: quote from him on what he would describe the taste,
28:50
Speaker 1: and he hasn't replied yet, but I've heard some people
28:53
Speaker 1: say like, oh, it's really not that bad, and I've
28:55
Speaker 1: had heard other people say like it's disgusting and you'd
28:58
Speaker 1: really have to choke it down. So I guess there's
29:01
Speaker 1: a spectrum. I I mean, I guess I saw a
29:04
Speaker 1: couple of quotes like that, But for the most part,
29:08
Speaker 1: it seemed like people were surprised by how either neutral
29:13
Speaker 1: or strangely yeah, strange, strangely um alluring the taste was. Yeah,
29:20
Speaker 1: I didn't heard that. There's this. There's a great New
29:23
Speaker 1: Yorker article that profile I mentioned earlier UM called I
29:26
Speaker 1: think it's called the End of Food. It's from two
29:28
Speaker 1: thousand before team when this was like at the peak
29:29
Speaker 1: of its buzz um and Lizzie Wincombe, who wrote the thing,
29:35
Speaker 1: try soiling herself and it's weird. I think she actually
29:40
Speaker 1: says she starts to crave the taste after a while,
29:43
Speaker 1: but then some of her colleagues give these pithy quotes
29:46
Speaker 1: about what it actually tastes like, but they weren't actually
29:48
Speaker 1: trying it, you know what I mean. She she was
29:51
Speaker 1: actually trying to like, subsist on it for a little while.
29:54
Speaker 1: She apparently came to like it interesting I'm curious about
29:57
Speaker 1: its longevity. Like, when something like this comes out, I
30:00
Speaker 1: definitely see the allure of it becoming the rage for
30:04
Speaker 1: a while. But and and I think one of them
30:07
Speaker 1: we'll talk about what a dietitians think. But um, one
30:12
Speaker 1: of the allures of food is is food and sit
30:15
Speaker 1: and making it and sitting with friends and the wonderful
30:18
Speaker 1: taste that you get any experience you get of breaking
30:21
Speaker 1: bread with one another. And this really throws all that
30:24
Speaker 1: out the window. Um, you can't romanticize sitting down with
30:28
Speaker 1: a soilent shake and your friends, even if they all
30:31
Speaker 1: have one on their plate, it's just not the same.
30:34
Speaker 1: And nor do nor do they say it is the same. Um.
30:39
Speaker 1: But it makes me wonder like, once this initial fad
30:41
Speaker 1: wears off, what will it become? You know, it's bizarre.
30:45
Speaker 1: I just realized something. Well, you were saying that that
30:49
Speaker 1: this is the opposite of what we were saying. One
30:51
Speaker 1: of the problems with artificial sweeteners is so instead of
30:55
Speaker 1: exciting the gustatory response of your reward pathway for meeting food,
31:00
Speaker 1: all this does is um create satiation. So you're you're
31:05
Speaker 1: full from it, but you're not enjoying tasting it or
31:08
Speaker 1: eating it or smelling it or looking at it or
31:11
Speaker 1: thinking about it. So it's the exact opposite where artificial
31:15
Speaker 1: sweeteners excite that that um, that gustatory sensor um, but
31:20
Speaker 1: don't fill you up. This does the exact opposite well,
31:23
Speaker 1: And then I wonder what kind of effect that can
31:25
Speaker 1: have on your body, Like it does it dull that
31:29
Speaker 1: and kill that gustatory response, or does it make it
31:31
Speaker 1: so that when you do eat something, it's just like, wow,
31:35
Speaker 1: I can't believe the taste of the strawberry, and I
31:38
Speaker 1: don't know I um I that I've read about this
31:42
Speaker 1: this guy um, his name's Angus Barbieri and he's a
31:46
Speaker 1: Scotsman from nineteen sixty six. I think he was in
31:50
Speaker 1: his early twenties, and he went three hundred and eighty
31:56
Speaker 1: two days without eating a thing. He was under the
32:00
Speaker 1: supervision of some mad scientist doctor who was giving him
32:03
Speaker 1: like vitamin supplements and monitoring him. But he survived just
32:07
Speaker 1: on these vitamin supplements and coffee, tea and water for
32:11
Speaker 1: more than a year. And the reason he did it
32:13
Speaker 1: was he weighed four hundred and fifty six pounds and
32:15
Speaker 1: he was like, I'm tired of it I want to
32:17
Speaker 1: get down to one eighty and he did. Um. But
32:20
Speaker 1: he on the day he he broke that two day fast,
32:25
Speaker 1: he had a boiled egg, I think a piece of
32:28
Speaker 1: buttered toast, and I think some coffee, and he said,
32:32
Speaker 1: I enjoyed the egg very very much. So I would
32:35
Speaker 1: guess that that you if you did eat soiling, if
32:38
Speaker 1: you ate like a whole food, you would find it
32:41
Speaker 1: pretty rewarding, whereas if you ate like a synthetic food
32:45
Speaker 1: like junk food or whatever, you'd probably be like, oh
32:47
Speaker 1: my god, this is terrible, you know, but I'll bet
32:49
Speaker 1: that strawberry would taste pretty good. Well if you ask
32:53
Speaker 1: a dietician. And we didn't do a pole, but um,
32:57
Speaker 1: I think this one. Dr joy Do Boast, spokesman for
33:00
Speaker 1: the Academy of Nutrition and diet Tetics, Um not tnatics.
33:09
Speaker 1: I saw her quotes from this article, but then I
33:11
Speaker 1: saw a lot of other ones, and they have kind
33:13
Speaker 1: of all been in line, which is basically like, yeah,
33:16
Speaker 1: I mean, sure this stuff is okay and you can
33:20
Speaker 1: use it to a certain degree, but we don't. There
33:24
Speaker 1: just aren't studies like no one's gonna come out, No
33:27
Speaker 1: scientists is gonna come out and say yeah, you could
33:30
Speaker 1: live on this stuff for a year, because they just
33:32
Speaker 1: haven't done these peer reviewed studies and these long term
33:37
Speaker 1: risk and benefit analyzes don't exist. So no, no scientists
33:41
Speaker 1: is gonna come out like and put their name behind
33:44
Speaker 1: it in that kind of way, right exactly. But it's
33:46
Speaker 1: like you said, like even if they would, even if
33:48
Speaker 1: they were like, you know what, this is, fine, go
33:50
Speaker 1: ahead and do it forget food, there's something missing, Like
33:53
Speaker 1: there's that communal experience like you were saying, there's that
33:56
Speaker 1: the relaxing act of cooking. Um. Like I I understand
34:03
Speaker 1: feeling like it's your burdened with it sometimes when you're
34:05
Speaker 1: under the gun and you you have to eat, but
34:09
Speaker 1: just getting everything ready and cooking it and then cleaning
34:12
Speaker 1: up afterwards is it can be a total pain. So
34:15
Speaker 1: I understand the sentiment behind it. But I also would
34:18
Speaker 1: never replace food entirely ever. Never. Yeah, well of course not, um,
34:24
Speaker 1: because we're normal people. Um. But the other thing Dr
34:28
Speaker 1: Doubos says, which I think is a very huge point,
34:31
Speaker 1: is that what they've done is, I mean, there aren't
34:35
Speaker 1: a hundred different types of soilent depending on what kind
34:37
Speaker 1: of person you are. They basically said, this is just
34:41
Speaker 1: your basic nutrition for your average person. It's one size
34:45
Speaker 1: fits all and nutrition she said, they're making nutrition on
34:49
Speaker 1: one size fits all approach. The nutrition just doesn't work
34:51
Speaker 1: that way. So depending on your age, your lifestyle, how
34:55
Speaker 1: active you are, what kind of like you know, maladies
35:00
Speaker 1: you have in your life. Um, it's and and again
35:03
Speaker 1: they're not claiming to do that. Like all they're claiming
35:06
Speaker 1: is to do what it is, which is, Hey, we're
35:08
Speaker 1: gonna make this thing. It might be good for some
35:11
Speaker 1: people to use. Sometimes we'll probably keep you alive. I thought,
35:17
Speaker 1: there's so. I also remember I was talking about the
35:19
Speaker 1: non essential nutrients that aren't in there, and people are
35:22
Speaker 1: wondering what effect that might have. There's also another um
35:25
Speaker 1: thing that that's missing that's kind of subtle, but it
35:28
Speaker 1: might have an impact. This Japanese study found that it
35:31
Speaker 1: seems the art or not the art, but the act
35:35
Speaker 1: of chewing has some sort of benefits. So like it
35:38
Speaker 1: has a stress reduction and um, it also probably controls
35:45
Speaker 1: the amount of glucose entering your blood by just kind
35:48
Speaker 1: of unlocking food slowly by chewing it into smaller and
35:52
Speaker 1: smaller pieces. And you don't do that with drinks like soilent.
35:56
Speaker 1: You just get hit with it all at once, so
35:59
Speaker 1: there's a big flood of your of nutrients into your bloodstream.
36:03
Speaker 1: And fortunately with that stuff, it's it's good stuff. But um,
36:07
Speaker 1: like if if they were saying like, the sugar probably
36:11
Speaker 1: has a greater impact on you than the same amount
36:13
Speaker 1: of sugar delivered through solid food because it just hits
36:17
Speaker 1: you faster and so your your levels increased. Quicker about that.
36:22
Speaker 1: Either I'm gonna get some, are you going to? Yeah,
36:25
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get some and just have it on hand.
36:28
Speaker 1: And I mean it beats driving to McDonald's If I
36:31
Speaker 1: don't have any food. Sure, you know you should hide
36:34
Speaker 1: it in the wheel well or your spare tire. Well.
36:37
Speaker 1: I do have a pickup truck, so I have no trunk,
36:39
Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying. Uh, I guess it's underneath. I
36:45
Speaker 1: gave away your hiding place. Now my hiding place is
36:47
Speaker 1: actually behind the rear seat. Oh gotcha. That's a good one.
36:50
Speaker 1: No one will ever find anything there, and there you
36:53
Speaker 1: will find. It's pretty salacious, but you'll find bungee cords
36:57
Speaker 1: and jumper cables in John Strickling. Yes, have you got
37:02
Speaker 1: anything else? No? Unless we insert Strickland, which would go
37:05
Speaker 1: right here. But if not, um, we'll just end it. Well,
37:08
Speaker 1: let's find out right now. Nope, we didn't. Oh well, um,
37:14
Speaker 1: I should probably say chuck. And we probably should have
37:16
Speaker 1: said this fairly early on. We have like no um
37:21
Speaker 1: uh financial interests in soilent whatsoever? We even backing on Kickstarter, No,
37:27
Speaker 1: I got I got no interest other than wanting to
37:30
Speaker 1: taste this, uh this junk. Yeah, all right, if you
37:34
Speaker 1: want to know more about soilent, type that word into
37:37
Speaker 1: the search bar how stuff works dot com. And since
37:39
Speaker 1: I said search bar, it's time for a listener mail. Uh.
37:45
Speaker 1: You know, it wouldn't surprise me if Reinhardt listens to
37:47
Speaker 1: the show. Oh well, if he does, what's up, dude? Yeah,
37:51
Speaker 1: so at the very least we might get a case
37:52
Speaker 1: of this stuff at the office. Oh boy. And UM,
38:00
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call this, well, I'm gonna call this one
38:03
Speaker 1: of what maybe several breastfeeding email replies. Uh. First of all,
38:08
Speaker 1: we did a show, two parter on feeding babies. First
38:10
Speaker 1: part was on breastfeeding, and we were both nervous, and
38:14
Speaker 1: I have to say it went great, and we've been
38:17
Speaker 1: getting great feedback and I'm super proud of these episodes. Yeah,
38:21
Speaker 1: they're good. Based on the feedback we've been getting very supportive,
38:25
Speaker 1: which makes us feel good. Yeah, we were pretty tense alright,
38:29
Speaker 1: So this is one of those Hey guys. Uh. Plus
38:31
Speaker 1: she has a great name. I know you're worried about
38:33
Speaker 1: getting tons of attack emails for doing an episode and breastfeeding,
38:36
Speaker 1: but our promises isn't mean smiley face. I listened to
38:39
Speaker 1: the episode right after I got home from breastfeeding Glass.
38:42
Speaker 1: I'm currently pregnant do on February. Uh so, man, this
38:46
Speaker 1: is gonna come out probably about a month before that.
38:50
Speaker 1: And she does a big scream and anticipation. I took
38:54
Speaker 1: a class through my local hospital on breastfeeding to prepare you. Guys. Uh,
38:59
Speaker 1: you had really great thing to say about breastfeeding, and
39:01
Speaker 1: it pretty much lined up with what the lactation consultant
39:04
Speaker 1: running the class had to say. I'm so glad that
39:06
Speaker 1: you tackled tackle the issue, especially because you are men
39:10
Speaker 1: um even though I know it scared you. The lactation
39:12
Speaker 1: consultant said, the biggest barrier to women breastfeeding is not
39:15
Speaker 1: having a supportive partner, uh, which I don't get that
39:18
Speaker 1: at all. Um. Hopefully with your podcast you read some
39:21
Speaker 1: partners out there who will now be more informed and
39:25
Speaker 1: better able to support the new mother in their lives.
39:28
Speaker 1: I hope so too. I was so glad that you
39:30
Speaker 1: mentioned the war over feeding currently going on as well.
39:32
Speaker 1: Formula is also a great option for feeding babies. No
39:35
Speaker 1: matter what militant moms have to say, just feed your baby.
39:41
Speaker 1: Keep up the great podcasting. And her name is Claire Victory,
39:47
Speaker 1: and boy, she's so close to being named declare Victory.
39:52
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I hadn't thought about that, and she said
39:55
Speaker 1: ps and never offended. By the way when you say guys,
39:58
Speaker 1: I hope others aren't either. I feel like you've have
40:00
Speaker 1: gotten to the point where guys is gender neutral. Sure
40:02
Speaker 1: we're making that our mission in life, I hope. So. Yeah.
40:05
Speaker 1: Well thanks a lot, Claire, Yeah. Uh, we appreciate a
40:11
Speaker 1: big time. And thanks to everybody who sent us notes
40:13
Speaker 1: of support for that one, because they are very well
40:16
Speaker 1: received by us and clear good luck yeah yeah, best
40:19
Speaker 1: wishes to you, Yes, good luck how it goes well. Uh.
40:23
Speaker 1: If you want to get in touch with us, like
40:25
Speaker 1: Claire Victory did, you can tweet to us. I'm at
40:29
Speaker 1: Josham Clark, and there's also s Y s K podcast
40:32
Speaker 1: where you can find both of us. You can also
40:34
Speaker 1: find us on Facebook at Facebook dot com slash Stuff
40:37
Speaker 1: you Should Know, and Chuck is at Charles W. Chuck Bryant.
40:40
Speaker 1: You can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at
40:42
Speaker 1: how stuff Works dot com and has always joined us
40:45
Speaker 1: at our home on the web, Stuff you Should Know
40:47
Speaker 1: dot com. For more on this and thousands of other topics,
40:56
Speaker 1: is it how stuff Works dot com