The list starts with some TED Ed videos I have recently put together. TED Eds are short, animated videos. They are complimented by a set of questions, some for checking comprehension, some for further discussion. Besides being of high quality, TED Eds are also fairly short so that language learners can watch them repeatedly, until they gradually understand more and more of what is being said.
UPDATE March, 2025
Also interesting to check out is Marion Nestle
Bing Videos Food politics: who makes our food choices
How Healthy Is Vegetarianism…Really? | Marion Nestle | Big Think
Podcasts have become popular and I have been asked if I knew any. Below is one listed: Health Literacy.com. Another one I have listened to is ZOE Science & Nutrition Podcast. Their main website is www.zoe.com
Also worth looking at are Kimberly Wilson’s videos on BBC Food and Drink- BBC Reel. For instance: The harmful legacy of poor nutrition or The truth behind your favourite flavours. Kimberly Wilson is a British nutritionist who shares her insights and thoughts on BBC Reel. She speaks fairly clearly and slowly. The videos are short, so they are great for rewatching.
TED Eds
Lessons Worth Sharing | TED-Ed; Check keywords ‘health‘ or ‘body‘
Why are eating disorders so hard to treat? – Anees Bahji | TED-Ed
Is it possible to lose weight fast? – Hei Man Chan | TED-Ed
How to exercise when it’s the last thing you want to do | TED-Ed
Why we owe it to ourselves to spend quiet time alone every | TED-Ed
The thing in your kitchen most likely to kill you – George | TED-Ed
Do you really need to take 10,000 steps a day? – Shannon | TED-Ed
What would happen if everyone stopped eating meat tomorrow? – | TED-Ed
Which is better for you: “Real” meat or “fake” meat? – | TED-Ed
Myths you learned in health class | TED-Ed
Why do we eat popcorn at the movies? – Andrew Smith | TED-Ed
How to calm your anxiety, from a neuroscientist – Wendy | TED-Ed
Books
Note!
The authors whose books I have read or presentations I’ve listened to over the last years – Dr Jason Fung, Dr Mark Hyman, Gary Taubes, Dr Robert Lustig, Sarah Hallberg to name just a few – have come together and created the documentary Fat Fiction. It can be watched for free on You Tube. Highly recommended.
Tim Spector is Professor of Genetic Epidemiology. Check him out on Wikipedia.
Dr Mark Hyman goes beyond nutrition and health. He discusses food production and suggests a better way of farming, not taking sides in the debate between proponents of different dietary ideologies (vegan + paleo = pegan).
Kimberly Wilson, the British nutritionist mentioned above, has also written about her experiences and research.
We all know that as a nation our mental health is in crisis. But what most don’t know is that a critical ingredient in this debate, and a crucial part of the solution – what we eat – is being ignored.
Nutrition has more influence on what we feel, who we become and how we behave than we could ever have imagined. It affects everything from our decision-making to aggression and violence. Yet mental health disorders are overwhelmingly treated as ‘mind’ problems as if the physical brain – and how we feed it – is irrelevant. Someone suffering from depression is more likely to be asked about their relationship with their mother than their relationship with food.
In this eye-opening and impassioned book, Kimberley draws on startling new research – as well as her own work in prisons, schools and hospitals around the country – to reveal the role of food and nutrients in brain development and mental health: from how the food a woman eats during pregnancy influences the size of her baby’s brain, and hunger makes you mean; to how nutrient deficiencies change your personality. We must also recognise poor nutrition as a social injustice, with the poorest and most vulnerable being systematically ignored. We need to talk about what our food is doing to our brains. And we need decisive action, not over-rehearsed soundbites and empty promises, from those in power – because if we don’t, things can only get worse. (From: BOOKS — KIMBERLEY WILSON)
Jenkinson, Andrew, January 2020: Why We Eat (Too Much): The New Science of Appetite
In his book, Dr Jenkinson explains the complexities of our metabolism, introducing the term metaboly: an area of study he says is widely neglected in medical school. He demonstrates how eating and digesting is more than just an energy balance of calories in, calories out. He goes deep into evolutionary history to show how our bodies developed over the millennia. He shows how recent developments in our food environment have led to heavily unhealthy and obese bodies, explicitly explaining why we have to stop blaming the patients for their problems. He tackles the many ‘modern’ dietary myths that have, at least partly, been responsible for peoples’ struggle with weight and health problems.
He explains the concept of a body’s set-point and how difficult it is to change it once it has settled into a certain range – a range that under natural circumstances is just fine and protective. However, in an environment in which we are surrounded by a food landscape less favorable to the needs of our bodies, our set-points can be way off and lead to what so many obese people have been saying: we can’t get the weight off, no matter what we do.
Dr Jenkinson explains why calorie reducing diets fail and offers advice on how to successfully lower your set-point to a sustainably healthy level.
He also goes into the history of dietary advice against fat, starting in the 60ies, where the cholesterol battle began, instigated by Ancel Keyes. Very interesting if you like going into the sociology of knowledge: How scientific facts are created and sometimes take on a life of their own. And in the case of the demonization of dietary fat, one that caused a lot of suffering, but filled the pockets of many a food company.
You can find more information on the book and Dr Andrew Jenkinson on this blog.
Giles Yeo MBE is an American-British biologist. He is the professor of molecular neuroendocrinology at the Medical Research Council Metabolic Diseases Unit and scientific director of the Genomics/Transcriptomics Core at the University of Cambridge.[1]
You can listen to Giles Yeo here: How We Got the Science of Weight Loss Wrong
You can also listen on The Diary of a CEO podcast (e.g. on Spotify) also available on youtube) Your Brain HATES You Losing Weight, Here’s Why… : Giles Yeo
And Dr Yeo is also interviewed on ZOE. You can watch (youtube) or listen (podcast): Why calories don’t count! (youtube video).
The podcast you find on Spotify or whatever app you use. You find a transcript of the interview on ZOE, Prof. Giles Yeo on Weight Loss: Why Calories Don’t Count.
On Spotify, e.g., you can find more podcasts if you search the keywords food and health or nutrition.
More on the Internet (Pages and Presentations/Videos/Netflix/Games and Quizzes)
When You Starve Does Your Body Eat Fat or Muscle First | Repeat Replay
Katherine Saunders: Why your body fights weight loss | TED Talk (added 2025)
Dr Jason Fung on calories (The truth about calories (1), Stop counting calories (2)) – view together with Dr Sarah Aamodt’s TED talk Why dieting usually doesn’t work ). You can also just type in Jason Fung – Youtube into your browser and his videos pop up.
In this 13 minute video, Jason Fung summarizes the findings of a meta-study that went through a vast number of studies researching a link between saturated fats (SFAs) and heart disease: Saturated Fats and Health: A Reassessment and Proposal for Food-Based Recommendations
A Nutrition Questionaire for students at the University of Kennesaw (I can no longer find the questionaire, but I will keep the link to the University for the time being.)
Dr. Eric Berg Youtube Videos How Insulin Works 9 min 52, Understanding Insulin Resistance 11min 45
Jason Fung (on youtube) How to treat diabetes and weight loss 12:11 and A simplified explanation of weight loss
Food and cancer www.cancer.org.au (preventing cancer, the role of nutrition and physical activity)
Health Literacy.com You can subscribe to their podcasts for free or check out this list of 25 podcasts
Example of an online nutrition counselor:
Nutrition counselling – ZETHEG Ernährungstherapie Karen Nespethal
Food pictures Open Source
A study on Nutrition Counseling in Germany (pdf)
Youtube videos: Human Anatomy
5 Most Important Organs in the Human Body – Kenhub
TED ed How the Digestive System Works
CIZ Anatomy Zone – great source for practicing your knowledge of the human body, loads of quizzes
Documentaries and Netflix series
Ask the Doctors. A miniseries for the general public produced by a group of medical practioners. Great for listening practice as the single episodes are not so long – ca 20 minutes. Listening to things of interest is one of the best ways to improve your language skills. The practice of listening comprehension translates into improved speaking skills. (Similarly extensive reading transfers to improved writing.)
Netflix: Explained (check for special episodes on food and health)
Michael Pollan, 2016 Cooked (Netflix series)
That Sugar Film (Amazon Prime Video)
The Magic Pill (Netflix documentary)
Overfed and Undernourished (Amazon Prime Video)
History of Food: A Five Episodes Series
You can watch the single episodes on youtube or on the page below
The History of Food – watch free online documentaries – ihavenotv.com
Ted Talks
Dan Buettner, How to Live to a 100+
Intermittent Fasting:Transformational Technique, Cynthia Thurlow. TEDx Greenville
William Li: Can we eat to starve cancer?
Sarah Hellberg: Reversing Type 2 diabetes starts with ignoring the guidelines
Sarah Aamodt: Why dieting usually doesn’t work
Peter Attia: Is the obesity crisis hiding a bigger problem?
The longest study on happiness Robert Waldinger TEDx BeaconStreet PDF file of Harvard Study showing slides with interesting graphs and diagrams
Fun stuff (vocabulary practice)
Health and Diet (7) Technical terms
A Visit With The Word Doctor: Medical Terms Quiz (Merriam Webster dictionary quiz)
Body related quizzes
Name parts of digestive system
Match the body parts to the right category
Body parts starting with L (advanced)
16 Little Body Part Pictograms Quiz (a challenge)
Food sporcles
16 Little X Pictograms – these are a collection of various topical quizzes where you have to find out what word or expression is depicted by the pictograms. For example: 16 Little Food Pictograms
Name the fruit by pictures of its inside
Foods that are White, Red, Green, Yellow, Orange, Brown, Pink, Blue/Purple
Selected literature
Clear, James, 2018, Atomic Habits: An Easys and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones
Cummins, Ivor. Eat Rich, Live Long: Mastering the Low-Carb & Keto Spectrum for Weight Loss and Longevity . Victory Belt Publishing. Kindle-Version.
Duhigg, Charles, 2013, The Power of Habit: Why We do What We DO, and How to Change it
Fung, Jason, 2016, The Obesity Code
Fung, Jason, 2018, The Diebetes Code
Hartwig, Dallas and Melissa, 2014, It Starts with Food
Hirschberg, Ben, 2014, Traditional Nutrition
Le, Stephan, 2016, 100 Million Years of Food: What our Ancestors Ate and Why it Matters Today
Li, William, 2020, Eat to Beat Disease
Lustig, Robert, 2014, Fat Chance: The Hidden Truth About Sugar, Obesity and Disease
See also: Robert Lustig’s presentation 2020
Lustig, Robert, 2017, The Hacking of the American Mind: The Science Behind the Corporate Takeover of Our Bodies and Brains
Pollan, Michael, 2007, The Omnivores’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
Pollan, Michael, 2009, In Defense of Food
Silvertwon, Jonathan, Dinner with Darwin: Food, Drink and Evolution
Taubes, Gary, 2007, Good Calories, Bad Calories
Osborne, Helen, 2018, Health Literacy from A to Z: Practical Ways to Communicate Your Health Message see also related website
Registered Dietitian Exam Practice Questions (Second Set): Dietitian Practice Tests & Review for the Registered Dietitian Exam (English Edition) Kindle Ausgabe. This is a practice book for American students practising for their Dietician exam, so the questions relate to the full range of topics studied, including technical and scientifically detailed questions.
The Real Caveman Diet
Did people eat fruits and vegetables in prehistoric times?
By BRIAN PALMER
The real caveman diet: What did people eat in prehistoric times? (slate.com)