What happens when you start eating healthy?

What really happens when you stop dieting and start eating healthy? In this episode, we hear from two people who spent years trying to “do the right thing” with food and still felt stuck.

The results? Truly remarkable - ZOE became such an important part of their lives that, alongside 18,000 other members of our community, they became ZOE owners through our crowdfunding. So what changed, and did it last?

Alongside Professors Tim Spector and Sarah Berry, we explore how Becky and Mark stay motivated and on track, the lessons they have learned, and the strategies they have used to feel more in control and more confident in their everyday choices. As well as some unexpected shifts along the way.

It’s a conversation about long-term change, not quick fixes, and you’ll leave it with real-life examples of how to make healthy eating a part of your everyday life.

If healthy eating wasn’t about willpower or perfection, what small change would you start with? And what would help you take that first step this week?

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Jonathan: As we move into 2026, we’re doing something we haven’t tried before. I’m excited to welcome two individuals who’ve been living by Zoe’s Nutrition principles for over two years. And the question is, did following Zoe make a tangible difference to their lives?

Becky: I struggled with my weight and I wanted to do something about that, trying lots and lots of programs, and I lived off of a diet of artificial sweeteners because that gave me the little bit of pleasure in the tiny amount of food that I was allowed to eat. But. You can’t enjoy life and live off of 1200 calories a day.

Mark: For me, the Zoe journey was less about weight and more about health. I’ve never snacked, I don’t eat cakes, biscuits, etc. However, I started getting unhealthy. And I couldn’t understand why I was so upset ‘cause I was looking at a life where I wouldn’t be able to eat bread, pasta, and bacon.

Sarah: I think absolutely nothing should be off limits if you want to have bacon have it. But alongside that, we have to think of what you are adding to your plate because by adding in healthy foods, you are naturally going to displace the less healthy foods. Part of what Zoe gives you, I think, is that I am not restricted.

Becky: I eat exactly what I want, when I want, and still maintain the weight that I’ve done for over two years.

Mark: I’ve eaten incredibly healthfully. Following Zoe, my doctor said, Mark, what this Zoe thing is keep doing it. It doubled my energy and I’m a high energy person anyway.

Tim: The first thing we notice is the mood and energy levels improving and that just shows you how what you’re eating has this big effect on you.

Jonathan: If you were able to go back in time three years ago, what’s the one bit of advice you would give yourself?

Jonathan: Becky and Mark, happy New Year and thank you both for joining me today.

Becky: Thank you.

Mark: Pleasure to be here.

Jonathan: And Sarah and Tim, thanks for being here, and I hope you didn’t overindulge last night.

Sarah: Oh, I’m such a good girl, Jonathan. It’s Tim that was on the tequilas. Far too many

Tim: Shouldn’t be telling secrets.

Jonathan: So Becky and Mark, I think you know this, but we have a tradition here at Zoe on the podcast where we always start with a quick fire round of questions, and we ask you to give us a yes or a no, or a one sentence answer if you have to. You willing to give it a go?

Becky: Definitely.

Jonathan: Sure. All right. Becky, in your experience, do diet plans work?

Becky: Yes and no. They work in the short term and then they absolutely do not

Jonathan: Mark. Can you transform how you feel by changing what you eat? 

Mar: Yes, 

Jonathan: Tim? To lose weight, should you count calories? 

Tim: Absolutely not. 

Jonathan: Sarah, can food affect your mood?

Sarah: Absolutely, yes.

Jonathan: Mark. Is it possible to eat healthily without feeling restricted?

Mark: Yes. 

Jonathan: Mark and Becky to both of you, what’s one belief about health or food you no longer hold?

Becky: I previously thought that what we were being told by big food companies was correct, and I no longer believe that.

Mark: I would say that fat is not bad. Some is, some is good. Some’s in the middle. That was a big revelation for me.

Jonathan: Becky and Mark, thank you both so much for coming in. We always have all of these scientists on the show, but we thought it would be great on New Year’s Day to do something a little different and almost turn it around because so many listeners today are embarking on like a change. They’ve made some sort of resolution. This is like day one of trying to do it, and we thought it would be really great actually to have two people who. Been on a health journey with changing their diet that you’ve sustained for a few years now, to share what works and the pitfalls, and also to recognize that it’s not an easy thing to make these habit changes, and you’ve both tried a lot of things in the past as well.

So first of all, Becky, would you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Becky: Yeah, sure. So I’m Becky and I live in Poole in Dorset. Nice, sunny location, right by the beach, which is really lovely, too. Good. Good for wellbeing, good for health. And on January the first, 2023, I joined the queue to become a Zoe member at that time that you had to kind of put your name down and get your space.

And so I waited and on the 6th of March, 2023, it is a sliding door moment in my life. I did my testing. I guess what took me to that point was, a very, very long journey of trying lots and lots of other programs and diets because I struggled with my weight. My weight fluctuated right from having my son at 17 through to 2023, I guess.

And that is, you know, a journey through lots of diet plans that didn’t work for me. My quickfire round question when I said, yes, there are diets that work. Yes, there are. You can absolutely lose weight. Can you maintain that weight? Absolutely not. It’s really, really difficult. I lived off of a diet of artificial sweeteners because that gave me the little bit of pleasure in the tiny amount of food that I was allowed to eat, which actually fought against everything that worked for me. I later found out as part of Zoe.

Jonathan: When did you first try this first start plan you’re talking about?

Becky: I started my life trying Weight Watchers and I was 18. I just had my son and I had put on that normal kind of pregnancy, post pregnancy weight, and was struggling to get it off. I’d seen my mum actually do Weight Watchers for almost all of her life as well, up and down, with, with weight.

Becky: Alright, when you are on it, ‘cause you can do it in real life, you can’t maintain it and you’re eating rubbish essentially to, to be able to have a little tiny bit of pleasure from life. And by that it probably isn’t pleasure, like I know it today. In terms of food, because I’ve always enjoyed food and I still enjoy food. That’s really, you know, part of what Zoe gives you, I think, is that sense that you can eat food and you can eat real food. And still, you know, maintain the weight that I’ve done for over two years. So, from my perspective, yes, I’ve tried Weight Watchers, I’ve tried Slimming, I’ve tried calorie counting all of those.

Jonathan: Becky, I’m gonna ask a question that my mum would tell me I’m definitely not allowed to ask. Would you be able to share how old you are today?

Becky: Yes, absolutely. I’m 51.

Jonathan: So that’s a long journey. Are you saying like throughout this period was just a constant cycle of going onto a diet plan and coming off without it working?

Becky: Yeah, absolutely. At the starting point of Zoe, to now, I very quickly realized that it was. A natural byproduct. The losing weight. Actually I didn’t do it to lose weight at that point. I did it because I’d recently read some books that had kind of made me think, oh, actually there’s, there’s more to diet than just what calories you eat.

Jonathan: And Mark, could you tell us a bit about your story?

Mark: So my name is Mark. I’m a property lawyer. I’ve always been interested in food and felt that it’s important to your health. My mother was a nurse and brought us up that way. I’ve never had a sweet tooth. I’ve never snacked. I don’t eat cakes, biscuits, etc.

I also felt a little bit overweight. For me, the Zoe journey was less about weight and more about health. The other thing that happened was I read Tim’s book Spoonfed and found it really fascinating and this point about, you know, never knowing what’s really healthy or isn’t. Is salt healthy or isn’t it, is coffee healthy or isn’t it?

It can drive you mad if you care about that. And then Zoe came along, I was a bit later than you and I had to go on the waiting list to join Zoe and do the tests. I got the results in August, 2023. So what really shocked me was the blood fat, bad reading. And I was so upset ‘cause I was looking at a life where I wouldn’t be able to eat bread, pasta, red meat, all these things I loved, like bacon and steak and things, fish and chips.

It seemed to me as though three quarters of my diet was really unhealthy for me now. But at the same time, part of me realized I had to do this. So I started on the journey and, and I, I’m not someone who does things by halves. If I’m going to, if I’m going to do this thing, I’m gonna do it properly, and I’ve done it ever since.

Now, the first two months were fascinating because, first of all, I lost seven kilos. Which was helpful ‘cause I was a bit overweight. I have stayed that same way ever since because I feel I’ve eaten incredibly healthily following Zoe for over two years. Since then. It was quite amazing. But I got far more energy.

My skin’s better. I felt transformed actually. And, and I was quite skeptical by the way I was wanting to see evidence and it, and it was really for me, the other way round the, the evidence was, was bombarding me. It was obvious this thing was working and that’s why I’ve kept it ever since.

Jonathan: Sarah, do these sorts of stories sound familiar to you? You know, before even coming to Zoe.

Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, starting with Becky first, this cycle of losing weight, putting it back on, losing weight, going through these processes of calorie restricted diets that work exactly like she said in the short term, but not in the long term. We know that there’s very clear evidence that 50% of people who go on calorie restricted diets put all the weight back on within a few years, 70% within five years.

It’s not a sustainable method of weight loss and it’s not healthy method of weight loss either. Our bodies work so hard to maintain the weight that you are at, you know, as soon as you restrict your calories, increasing your desire for food, increasing your appetite, reducing your metabolic rate, and so that’s why we really focus at Zoe on the quality of the calories and not the quantity of calories.

And why weight loss, just like with Mark tends to be a byproduct of that, and what I loved is what Mark said about how he felt, because this is something that I think is great through changing our diet, how people feel better. So not only has some of his clinical measures potentially improved. It’s the fact that you said you feel even more energy.

Yeah. You feel better mood, etc. And I think that’s a story with hearing more and more from people following the Zoe program who when they were consuming their previous diet, it was just the normal way of feeling on their diet. They didn’t realize there’s a better way to feel.

Jonathan: And Tim, why? Why have we been told for decades and decades that the, the key thing is, you know, energy in compared to energy out, just focus on calories. That’s definitely been government advised sort of all around the world.

Tim: We were always looking for a very simple explanation for people gaining weight or losing too much weight. And so it, it came after the war, it was all about deprivation and kids’, babies weren’t getting enough general energy in, they couldn’t grow and maintain their weight, so.

It was a sort of logical thing to say, well, it’s very complicated, but let’s just reduce it to something that we can approximately measure and give some guidelines to people. And it, it came about like that. It was a simple concept to sell to people, although it was based on flawed. Science and evidence, when it turned out to the practicalities of people’s individual experiences.

But, you know, overall it was a simple thing to say yes. You know, women need 2000 calories, men, 2,500. One size fits all nice and easy. Guidelines done move on. And you blame people if they go over it and you’ll reward them if they stay under it, but it, it never worked. And essentially it was missing this huge complexity of human metabolism and the complexity of food.

And of course it missed the complexity of gut health, you know, which. A recent discovery is this sort of missing link between, you know, why just basing on calories didn’t work.

Sarah: I think as well, Jonathan, the concept of energy and energy out is compounded by the food landscape we now live in. And so we are in a surrounded by very different types of food that just encourage this over consumption and have a different kind of calorie effect than the kind of foods that we were consuming a hundred or more years ago.

Jonathan: I did actually want to ask about Mark’s story, which is obviously focusing on health. Are you surprised to hear that this isn’t just about weight, but this is, you know, very much about health?

Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. And something that I picked up on that Mark said quite proudly, you don’t snack, you don’t eat cakes and biscuits, but actually there’s all the other foods that you could be eating that we now have in our current food environment.

That could be really bad for you because of the way many foods are processed. So it would be interesting to know what kinds of foods you were having, even though you didn’t snack and you didn’t have a sweet tooth.

Mark: Yeah. Yes. I mean things like bacon. I didn’t eat a huge amount, but I did like it quite a lot.

I tended to like meat a lot. And eat plenty of meat. I, of course, I always eat vegetables, but not enough. Not in the right balance. I know that now. I loved fish. Always. The cutting out the fruit was obviously a mistake. I was doing it to keep the sugar down.

Tim: Did you eat low fat foods at all or low calorie foods? Did they sort of attract you?

Mark: No, I never, I never believed that. Actually the low fat thing. And I, and I always tried to shy away from things that I could see clearly were processed. So take bacon, and maybe I was completely wrong, but I assumed bacon wasn’t very processed. I assumed it was just a bit of meat.

I knew there were nitrates in it, and that was probably completely wrong. You’ll tell me, but I thought that wasn’t too bad. And the same with red meats. And I bought good quality ones and I always tried to buy organic. So I, I did all the things I thought were good for me and healthy, and you know, sometimes I was right and often I wasn’t.

Becky: I think conversely for me, I didn’t do any of those things. I was driven by a, a diet program that said, for these many points per day, Becky, you can have whatever you want and whatever you want was. Mostly ultra processed. Now I reflect back on that. So in in the UK we have the Mars bar, and I can remember working out that on my points for a day on Weight Watchers, I could have three, I could live and, and that would be okay. That would be okay. And you know what? I’d lose weight.

Jonathan: And looking back on that, how do you, how do you feel?

Becky: Horrified, actually. Makes me feel quite emotional because the reality of that at the time. It was almost a, well, do you know what I’m, I’m addicted to that. So, yeah, and I will use that word addicted. Beause I was addicted to sugars in all the wrong way. And I think that’s sad that, you know, the information that I was given at that time, I didn’t realize A, that I was addicted to those things and that actually all that made me do is make life really difficult for myself. ’cause you know, you could have three Mars bars, but then, oh, I could have another one now then. And so on and so forth. And that’s what happened. And that’s, you know, you fall off the, fall off the wagon again, and until you put on loads of weight and then you’re back on it again.

Sarah: But also, even if you were to manage to keep the weight off. The food that you are eating, the Mars bar that you are eating will cause serious long-term health effects.

And so, again, this is why we have to move beyond calorie counting. We have to think of the overall quality of the food.

Mark: Do you mind if I mention something that I think might help people? Because it, it’s one of the things that’s helped me the most. I mentioned that at the start I was really. You know, really demoralized about all the things I’d have to cut outta my diet, and it felt awful.

The key, the key to that has been displacement. A concept that, that you’ve explained to me, which is actually that, as that, as long as you can eat enough to be satisfied, you don’t feel deprived and you can choose so many foods that I like. And if you eat those, you don’t miss the bacon rolls. Why?

Because I’m satisfied. I’m happy. I love the food I eat. I love. Beetroot and preserved lemons and all sorts of healthy stuff. You just can’t buy the convenience quick foods anymore. Sometimes you don’t have enough time to eat properly. So you’d buy a sandwich previously and now I really can’t. So it takes a bit of time to adjust practically to that, like make a little lunchbox of healthy food that you can eat quickly at your desk for 10 minutes, you know, have a little nut pot that I take to the theater and that keeps you going till you can eat a proper healthy plate.

Becky: I think that’s a fair point. It’s planning ahead and that’s what Zoe teaches you to do. I travel a lot for work also and mainly, you know, in, in a car.

So if you imagine driving on a three, four hour drive from, from where I live in Dorset to, you know, Birmingham or, wherever, the only options you’ve got along the way are service station.

Have you looked at what’s on offer in a service station shop? Because there is nothing for me. There actually nothing, and I think that’s horrifying. It’s, as Mark says, it’s planning ahead. Yes. I’ve got my obligatory pot of nuts as well.

Jonathan: So Sarah, how do you think about things being forbidden?

Sarah: So I think absolutely nothing should be off limits. So if you want to have bacon, have it, but very, very, very occasionally is about what you are adding to your plate because exactly like you said, by adding in healthy foods, you are naturally going to displace the less healthy foods. The more you deny yourself things, whether it’s calories, whether it’s specific foods, the more you’re going to crave it.

And so don’t totally. Take everything away. Cut down the foods that are bad, replace them with the healthy foods, and let yourself have the odd treat. You know, a little bit of what’s bad for you. Occasionally can be good for you.

Jonathan: Bacon’s come up a number of times. A lot of listeners may be saying, what is it about? Bacon that it’s been given all the hard rap. After all. It’s January the first. Quite a few of us have probably been having some bacon over the last month. What’s the story there?

Sarah: Oh, a bacon sarnie after a hangover. Jonathan, nothing beats it with loads of butter, but we know processed red meat, like bacon, like ham, increases our risk of many chronic diseases,

Tim: particularly cancer is, you know, clearly linked with increased rates of cancer, and we are not sure exactly why. It could be a lot of the chemicals in there as well as. As well as some of the unhealthy fats, but if you are having that regularly. Several times a week, then that gives you this extra risk.

Jonathan: Okay. So this is, it’s genuinely, this is like really a high risk food.

Tim: Yeah. It, it across the board, it, it comes out in all the studies as being a high risk processed food that you really want to be avoiding having regularly having it once a month or having tiny sprinkles of it, you know, as you do, if you. Go to Italy or, or Spain where you can’t avoid a little bit of this. It is probably fine, but having it in, in the amounts that we have in the UK and the US, I think, definitely bad for you.

Sarah: And also thinking the overall quality of how you’re having that. So imagine the traditional British or, or American way of having that bacon. It was probably with some white bread. It’s probably with some tomato ketchup, with some butter. That’s not very healthy. Or you can have the more Mediterranean way that they do include some red meat in a small amount. But alongside that you’ll have beans, pulses, vegetables, extra virgin olive oil. So that’s something else that you know, I hope you found through the science that we try and, you know, distill down is it’s about thinking about the overall meal again and not demonizing or denying yourself one specific part of

Becky: It’s really interesting to hear the, the kind of meat discussion because I accidentally became vegetarian when I went on Zoe and I mean accidentally because I ate less and less and less meat. Not through choice, but because there were other things that I wanted to eat more of. And that has just been revolutionary for me.

I think that I didn’t intend to be vegetarian, but I’d go weeks without having, you know, chicken or. Steak or you know, any of those things. So much so that in the end, I just thought. Well, I just as well go the whole way and, and, you know, and, and, and not eat meat anymore.

And I chose to do that because I can then eat more of the things that bring me joy. Those, you know, a plate of vegetables and nuts and seeds and, you know, my Daily 30, I’m gonna get that in because. I have that every single day. All of those things give me more pleasure than meat does. So I choose not to.

Tim: When I transitioned to a plant-based, I sort of said, oh, well, you know, I can have meat when I want it, but I found I was wanting it less. Because you, you’ve sort of perhaps changed your pal. You know, as you, as you’ve gone on and it, the idea of eating, some enormous steak, which people, you know, listening might say, oh, I could never do without it. But actually, once you, you do start to have all this range of other plants. Someone offers you a bite, you might, that’s great, but I find I can’t have much more than that. Now it’s interesting how you do change.

Mark: I mean, for me, I, I still love meat and I concentrate my efforts now on venison, which I know is really healthy and, and Turkey and chicken and then fish I love and eggs and cheese and all of these things.

So I definitely haven’t turned into a vegetarian, but it’s true. I eat far more plants. And one of the things that struck me recently is how in the old days, the way I had before and maybe how most people eat, you tend to have maybe three things on your plate.

If you think about it, fish and chips, and you know, you’ve gotta have something green. So you put peas in as well, let’s say, or steak and chips, and again, perhaps a green thing. Three things.

My plates almost never have only three things anymore. I mean, when I’m making up a plate of salad or whatever, it’s got 15 things on it. It’s got beetroot and maybe three herbs chucked on top, and tomatoes and so on and so forth.

There will be protein there too, but smaller amounts, a bit like you said, Tim, but it’s actually more fun now. The food’s more interesting, much more varied.

You know, you’ve got this thing where you’ve gotta eat lots of different types of plants. I find that a great game. So lastly, I think I had 81, believe it or not.

Sarah: No way.

Mark: Honestly.

Jonathan: That’s better than Tim. I think 81, you know? 

Tim: Yeah. Beats me.

Jonathan: So thank you for sharing all of those stories and I think there are gonna be a lot of people listening for whom those stories resonate and looking for inspiration as we begin the new year. So I’d like to talk maybe about those first few months, and some of our listeners may know that one of the first things you do as a member is to take a microbiome test, and we talk a lot about the science and the results of the microbiome test, but has to be said that we don’t tend to talk a lot about the process of the microbiome test.

Jonathan: Mark. Can you guess why that might be?

Mark: Because it’s all about testing your poo, isn’t it?

Jonathan: Do you wanna talk us through what you have to do?

Mark: Yes. Okay. So you have to collect a little bit of your poo, which isn’t so hard actually. Tiny little bit. Pop it in a little tube and send it off in the post. It’s actually very easy.

Tim: It didn’t put you off when you first did it or thought about it? 

Mark: No, not at all.

Sarah: We make it really nice though. We give you a little hammock that you put on the toilet.

Jonathan: How did it go for you, Becky?

Becky: It was fine. You pop it up in the post and it took about two weeks, I think, to come back the results. And, and you get a very comprehensive report of lots of, very long names that I can’t pronounce, which I’ll leave to these guys.

Jonathan: I was gonna say, Tim, can you explain a little bit about that gut microbiome test and like what’s going on from the point you put it in the mail to the results coming back?

Tim: Yes, so. We, we pioneered this over 10 years ago. This poo in the post concept, you know, a little bit of poo, which is a tiny quarter of a teaspoon, goes into this liquid, which preserves it and stops it degrading.

You get it in the lab. And then essentially we extract the DNA from the rest of the stuff and the rest of the stuff actually is dead microbes, most of it.

The DNA from that is then goes into our analyzers. Every single microbe has its own DNA and that goes into this big puzzle basically when our computers then link those DNA structures to the database and work out what the microbes are in, in your particular, sample.

And that’s a huge computational. Exercise. We’re trying to work out every gene and every microbe, you know, what it’s called and which one is then associated with.

So we sort of reconstruct your, your gut microbiome. It’s, it’s really clever. Many gut tests still only look at one gene and every microbe, but we do every single gene and so it’s very comprehensive.

And then from that, we then work out now, how many good bugs you’ve got and how many bad bugs. This is based on our study which we published in Nature 50 Good Bugs, 50 Bad Bugs, and we look at the ratios and that is now the best way of looking at, your. Gut microbiome.

It used to be, I can’t remember whether you did the test. It was diversity and, number of different species. Do you remember what your results were?

Mark: Yes, I do. My first ones were, were 630 and then 535, and then 550.

Tim: What, what was yours like?

Becky: I remember getting my. The overall gut health score, which was the first time I did it before retesting, 12 months later, I think was 44 out of a hundred, and then when I retested it was 88 and I was like jumping for joy.

Becky: You know the difference between that in 12 months. That’s amazing. I doubled, you know, my gut health and I just thought, wow, that’s just incredible.

Jonathan: What was that experience in the first month or two if you can think back? ’cause you were describing, coming from this world where as long as you only ate three chocolate bars a day and nothing else, this was fine. So I think probably the advice that you were suddenly getting from Zoe being pretty radically different.

Becky: The magic began for me when I got my results back ‘cause it was astounding. So I hadn’t realized at all that I was very poor at processing sugar. And yet lived off of a diet of artificial sweeteners. So it was no surprise I was struggling, and really good scoring and ability to be able to deal with the fats. So already I was looking at some figures that were the complete opposite of my diet. So everything that I was doing basically would’ve scored horrendously for me when I was scanning it on the app. So it took a little while for me to kind of get my head around that. To look at the consequences of, if I get that. My score would plummet versus if I had that and it would shoot through the roof. So it was a learning process and I always say to my grandchildren, if you try something 10 times, you’ll get to like it.

But I had to live by that myself at that time because it did take a, a few weeks, I would say, to actually kind of turn around what I wanted to eat and how I wanted to eat it.

I did it. And actually it was surprisingly easy, but at the time it was quite a, you know, stand on the edge of a cliff moment going, this is going to be hard.

Tim: Did you eat more fatty foods then?

Becky: I did. So a bit like Mark said earlier on was my understanding of what fatty foods did to me. I’d avoided fat at all cost ever. Absolutely avoided it because I knew that A, it was hiring calories and b. It, it didn’t score well on my Weight Watchers program.

Jonathan: So if you were cooking food, for example, that involved anything needing to be, fried or whatever, would you have done?

Becky: I wouldn’t have done it.

Jonathan: Oh, you wouldn’t even have done it.

Becky: No. And today, no. Absolutely. And today I use olive oil every day of my life. And so it’s about educating yourself, isn’t it? It’s about, you know, we are told that. Fats are bad for us, and it’s not true. It’s simply just not true.

On the contrary, in fact, for me, it’s good for me. It actually is what my body processes well, and I’ve proven that to myself over and over again, day in, day out.

But at that time, no, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t have done it. I would’ve, I would’ve just avoided all costs, anything fried was just not on my agenda.

Jonathan: And did you figure this all out on day one? Like there was like a, a list of information somehow, and therefore you just magically turned the dial on 30 years of eating in a, in a different way?

Becky: No. So I think the, the value of Zoe is, is it takes you through that journey. So on my Zoe app, every day you’d have a new lesson to learn something new. And I was soaking it up at that point. You know, I’d. Got this interest in what I was doing and how it was impacting on me. And so those lessons were just fantastic.

But it opens up a whole new world, doesn’t it? Suddenly you wanna know more, you know, you realize you’re feeling better suddenly, and oh, by the way, you are losing weight naturally without having to worry about, you know, whether I can fit a Mars bar in at the end of the day or not.

And so I think it’s just about learning and about, you know, being open to learning and not being scared by it.

Mark: Yeah, I mean, I think you put that really well. It, it was a journey and it took a couple of months to, you know, change, change the way you eat. But it was a lot of fun from the beginning, I found, and I started to see the positive benefits quite quickly as well. So I, I found it. I, I, in a way, I didn’t find it hard.

Because I was getting so much positive reinforcement and learning so much and basically feeling better from really quite early on.

Jonathan: And Mark, if I know it’s a couple of years, but if you can imagine thinking back, yeah, could you maybe talk us through a little bit like what that experience. Was like, like, like you got your results, you had this app.

Mark:  I had this shock as I explained earlier, I was really down about it, thinking, oh my goodness, I’m gonna have to change the way I eat completely.

And so many things I thought were healthy, it really aren’t going to be, and I’d look on the app and you know, rice is zero and bacon is zero, and all these things are zero. But I set off on this journey and I started realizing that there were tons of things I did like that were scoring a hundred. Like avocados, I love avocados.

So whereas before, a little bit of you might have thought, oh, that I know they’re very high fat, so maybe I shouldn’t have too many. Now, you, you, you, you know, in the hundred category, 75 to a hundred, eat as much as you want. I like that. Eat as much as you want.

So I started eating more of the eat as much as you want things and a lot less of the, you know, things I could see now you shouldn’t, you should only have occasionally, and so on and so forth.

I found that actually, I found that description of the foods helpful. You know, the 25. To 50 and so on, have it regularly and so on. I found that helpful.

And then at the supermarket, you know, I still like bread though. I don’t, I eat a lot less of it now. So with the app, you can pick the bread that scores 46 the best I ever found, instead of a lot of bread scoring zero and, and have fat and put, have a avocado on it. And then the mixture gives you 80 points. Great. And, and so actually I found it liberating. I felt a lot less hungry, less often on it. And, and then I was feeling all these physical benefits, like more energy and you know, not feeling constipated anymore and all of these things, which put in a really good positive feedback loop.

Take a recent example until I know your new book on Ferment and I, and the, one of the podcasts I watched was all about fermented foods and I thought, that sounds fun. Let’s try that.

I honestly think my energy levels have had another 20% boost. From it, making sure that every meal I have, you know, a, a reasonable amount, not too much of fermented foods, of various types.

Sarah: I think what I love hearing is how you use the app to build the meals. Yes. Because we don’t eat foods in isolation. We don’t eat nutrients in isolation. You know, we eat a dietary pattern and we meals, and that’s something that’s quite hard from a science point of view to think about, well, how do you modify.

A score based on combining different foods and it’s something ‘cause a science team we’ve worked really hard on over the The last few years. Yeah.

Where you take an element like the bread, although you’re choosing a healthy bread, so you’re still having that bread. But then how do you make it even better by overlaying with healthy.

Other foods like avocado, like olive oil, and so it’s lovely hearing that that actually play out in real life.

Mark: It does, it works really well.

Becky: It took a while for me to get my head around that though, that that food combining thing, I was always looking at the scores in isolation, so I’d scan something and if it scored over 75 yep. It was good for me.

I was okay with that if it, if I went and scored. Bread at 46, there’s no way I would’ve bought that loaf of bread. Absolutely no way at all until I started to realize that actually put some avocado on it or some smashed peas.

And suddenly you’ve got, you know, a meal that actually is good from a fiber perspective, good from a fats perspective. And so the score creeps up.

Jonathan: And it sounds like in those first few months you were very engaged with this app and you were doing what we would call now sort of mindful eating and you were sort of really tracking all of these meals in the day.

Will you talk a little bit, ’cause I heard you talk about this score for the day, what I think we would now call the diet score and you probably call the day score at the time. Could you just explain for a moment what that was and whether it was useful in any way?

Becky: Oh gosh. It was definitely useful. I don’t think I could have done it without it personally because it enabled me to learn as I went. It’s simple, isn’t it? If you know that you are aiming as a minimum for 75 per day, so you get a score of a hundred.

Each item you, you can scan in the supermarket, it gives you a score out of that a hundred, and you know that if your day is 75 or above, then it’s a good score and you’re in a healthy range and keep going and doing what you’re doing.

Without that, I think it would’ve been really difficult to navigate. How do you know what is good and what is not?

When you know you definitely can’t read the packaging of something to know whether it’s good or not, because all packaging tells you it’s good, despite the fact it’s absolutely not.

Jonathan: I’d like to come back to present day because we’re talking about something that is, you know, a couple of years ago, and I think all of us around the table have had the same experience as I think many of our listeners, which is you try something for a while, you have very high motivation. You keep it up, but it’s really hard. And then you give up and you go back to your old. Habits, and in the end, sometimes you’re actually worse off than, than the beginning.

So I think the million dollar question is sort of how are you feeling now and does it feel sustainable? And how have these changes influenced your health and your weight and how you feel after a, a couple of years, maybe I can start with Becky and then go on to Mark.

So what’s been the impact after? If you compare yourself now with, you know, the day that you sent off the test.

Becky: I think definitely I feel like a different person in many ways. I think that my sense of wellbeing has really been impacted.

So at that time I was probably not very, kind on myself. In terms of, you know, I, I felt uncomfortable.

I felt like I wasn’t the right way, and I was constantly questioning why that was the case and not really knowing, because, you know, I tried really hard to lose weight and it wasn’t.

Even just about the weight at that point, it was just about my, my health, the way I felt, and then I realized it was actually the diet that I was having then the impacted on my health.

There was no going back for me at that point because I realized that this wasn’t just about weight. This was actually about how healthy I wanted to be doing the things that I love to do.

So I can’t go back to not being a Zoe advocate, if you like. For me, I really like the app. I like scanning. It’s easy. It’s just part of what you do every day now. So it’s just my life. It’s just what I do. And I think it’s not hard because you just kind of, you know, you ingrain it in part of what you do on a day to day.

Jonathan: I think that’s amazing. A lot of people will will be asking, but what about the the weight, Becky? ‘cause they’re gonna be skeptical because after all, this is always a short term shift and then it all comes back, doesn’t it?

Becky: Nope. Absolutely not. No, no. I’ve been the same weight for two years, and I’ve never done that in my entire life, ever.

That’s just not a thing for me. I’d literally be up a stone down to stone up three stone all the time. So on a, on a Weight Watcher, to give you an example, I would. Be okay between sort of six months and nine months and then I’d be back to where I was again, very quickly as well. The minute you stop, calorie restriction, all that weight just comes piling back on again. So I, I don’t want to, you know, kind of make it sound like a weight loss program ‘cause I don’t feel like that about it anymore, but. The way I eat now, I am not restricted. I eat exactly what I want when I want, but the types of food that you eat mean that you don’t want to binge eat.

And I would binge eat in brutal honesty. I would binge eat beforehand.

Being on a diet that was calorie restricted lead you to that. So it’s a lifelong style for me now. It’s not a, it’s not a, a diet or a program or any of those things. It’s just the way I am.

Jonathan: That’s amazing. And so when you look at your life now, mark. Like, you’ve also sustained this for a couple of years. Yep. How do you feel today when you contrast that with, you know, the day that you decided to start Zoe?

Mark: I feel different too. I, as I say, I’ve got more energy. I feel really healthy. I don’t crave food at all anymore. It’s brought so many lovely changes to my life that I’d never want to stop.

And people say to me, but Mark, by now you, you know, all the foods that are healthy and you know, the ones that aren’t. Is it still worth doing this app thing?

You know? And, and I think, well, yes, ’cause food is complex and always changing too. So I wanna know what that new thing at Waitrose scores, for example. And also the combinations, your algorithm gives the answers. I can’t remember all that I can remember. You know, these things are healthy and those less so, but that’s only part of the picture. Also, I find the, the time element, the, the cost really apart from a very modest sum every month in money. But, but the other cost is time. And I find actually I probably don’t spend any more than maximum 15 minutes a day maximum logging everything. And I’ve logged, you know, pretty religiously everything I’ve eaten and drank since, you know, for two years plus, from the beginning. ‘cause I didn’t see the point in lying to myself. About 15 minutes a day maximum. The new, the new photo snapping as well is even quicker, which I really like.

Jonathan: Tim, what are your thoughts as you’re listening to these two stories?

Tim: Well, I think that they should be sort of inspiring for, for many people, and it’s mirroring a lot of the people who come up to me after I’m be giving a, a talk, saying how this different way of thinking about food has changed people’s lives.

And I think this is really what it’s, it’s about, you know, both these stories about how. Previous beliefs were suddenly changed by, you know, what we’re doing at Zoe.

So it’s not just a program or whatever, but it is a whole different way of thinking about food, which then has this amazing impact on health. And that is, is what I think is so inspiring for people.

So it means that it’s not about people’s. Weaknesses or failures or whatever it is, just people were told the wrong things and were, were trying to do the right thing and they were just being misled by, you know, big food companies by out of date guidelines, by the medical establishment who don’t know enough about this stuff.

So I think this is really all about people. You know, taking back the initiative themselves. And I think what lot of you’re talking about is empowerment.

Mark: Yes. It’s

Tim: the ability that, you know, we are giving you some of these tools, but the rest of it’s up to you and you are deciding what to do with it, and you want to change your lives and do it.

So for me, as a scientist and a doctor, it’s the time, my career when I realizing that we were helping so many people through the, you know, amazing science that we are doing and can have these, these results. It’s. Yeah. It, it’s, it’s just fantastic. Makes me feel great.

Jonathan: And how do you understand like these stories about energy? Because I think that remains one of the things that seems most surprising to me Yeah. Is that changing what you eat might affect things like your energy and your mood.

Tim: Both of these guys, giving the similar and. Endless people coming up to me saying, yeah, one of the first things we noticed was a change in my mood and my energy.

You know, I didn’t have that fatigue that I was always fighting before, and in medicine we’re not trained to ask people about energy levels or fatigue. It’s like a no-no subject ‘cause oh no, they’re just gonna grumble at me. I must mustn’t mention it. Your GP's worst nightmare is to ask about fatigue levels.

But we now know that fatigue is, is linked to something that’s happening in our immune, in our immune system and inflammation levels.

And I think this is relatively new science, but all these things that stress and fatigue are related to blood levels of inflammation that are just too high. In, in the Western world, whereas they used to be much lower and a lot of that is driven by the foods that we’re eating.

So our body doesn’t process them well. It causes stress in the body. The immune system is just switched on all the time, dealing with a lot of these highly risk processed foods, things that we weren’t naturally eating.

And so these levels are one of the first things that drop. When we, we get these blood sugar spikes under control when we get the fat spikes under control, when we cut out all these additives.

And that’s why in all our studies, whether it’s, you know, giving people daily 30 in a trial, whether it’s just doing the standard Zoe plan, the first thing we notice is the mood and energy levels, improving.

And these guys are great witnesses to it, how important it is. And that just shows you how. The link between the body and the mind

Sarah: And something else we consistently see as well as mood and energy improving. We see hunger levels improving that. Yeah. Consistently people say I feel less hungry. And that’s something that both of you that have said that although you have naturally, it’s kind of byproduct of doing Zoe lost weight, you are actually feeling less hungry.

Tim: Yes. Yeah. I mean, you say it’s a byproduct, but it might be the, the reason just by switching what you’re eating makes you less hungry. You’re not craving stuff. Therefore you’re not gonna be snacking. Yeah. On the rubbish food you were before.

Jonathan: Mark and Becky, you both mentioned sort of the learning curve that you’ve been on to eat the way that you now do, and I would love to share any tips that either of you have for the audience that sort of makes it easier to eat, this way. You know, I think, mark, you mentioned a lunchbox, for example.

Mark: Yeah, so the nut box is a good one. You just a little pot. You put a mixture of roast, chickpeas, perhaps dry roast peanuts, whatever nuts you like in there. Take an apple and, and have that to eat at the interval, at the theater, for example, if you can’t get a meal or just tide you over if you, if you can’t sit down and have a healthy meal for whatever reason.

Can I mention soft drinks? So one of the problems with drinks is that they’re nearly all incredibly unhealthy. I was left drinking water and black coffee and black tea pretty much maybe with a bit of milk in. That’s about it. It gets very boring.

So I wrote to to Zoe’s nutrition coach back then saying other, tell me what the soft drinks are that are the most healthy for me.

And back came Momo Kombucha and Agua de Madre, and my fridge has rows of them. They’re brilliant.

Jonathan: The first one was, there’s a kombucha. The second one was…

Mark: Agua de Madre.

Tim: That’s a water kefir. Yeah, TBIs. So it’s not very well known yet, but it’s a growing market and it’s, it’s lovely, really delicious flavors. And if people haven’t tried it, do go out and and, and try some. Becky,

Becky: I agree with everything Mark said that all of those things I follow. I think don’t be afraid to ask when you’re out as well. So if you’re in a restaurant, very rarely will I choose something standard from a menu anymore, I’ll say. You do that with that, kind of have some of that with some of that. And you know, nine times out of 10, most restaurants are really happy to kind of, you know, switch things up.

So I think the message is go prepared. Don’t expect to be able to find things that, soup the way you want to eat in your local high street. ‘cause it’s, it’s tricky. Preparation is key is the way that you make it integrate into your life really.

Jonathan: And tell me about breakfast, both of you. What does breakfast look like today?

Mark: I try to vary it actually, but, but my, my staple one is a live unsweetened yogurt plus kefir. Always chia seeds, always a daily 30 almonds, pistachios, ‘cause they’re gut boosters, mixed nuts. Some seeds, probably cocoa nibs, which I love. And berries on top for sweetness.

Jonathan: Sounds beautiful. You mentioned their gut boosters. Could you explain to listeners what that means?

Mark: Yes. So one of the really nice things about Zoe is that they give you a list of, I think it’s 20, ish for me anyway. Gut boosters, meaning things that are, are good for the microbes in me that need to grow. I need more of them. Or, or to get some that I haven’t got. And so I try and incorporate those in, into my diet and it’s good fun actually. Gut suppressors are that 10 or so bad things I should, I should avoid unless I wanna feed my bad microbes. And I basically, I just do not eat them.

Jonathan: You are much better behaved than I am. It’s very impressive. Becky, what does your breakfast look like?

Becky: It doesn’t, I don’t eat breakfast. So I continue to do 16:8, which is really interesting actually, because I just like the way that makes me feel. For those that don’t know, means that I only eat in an eight hour window. So my first meal of the day is usually at about one o’clock.

And that’s usually a savory offering. So that might be, you know, some vegetables or a salad, with, you know, maybe some. Some lentils or chickpeas, sprinkled over with some nuts and seeds. Of course, it’s tricky, I guess, in the way that, you need to kind of get in more meaningful protein.

So being vegetarian, you need to think more carefully about that. And eating in a shorter window, meaning kind of two main meals a day, means that I also have to think more intentionally about. Replacing that protein content that I would’ve had with, with meat, with things like, you know, nuts and seeds and pulses and lentils and chickpeas and all of those things that are really high. So in, in protein, you just have to be a bit more intentional about that.

Jonathan: Final question, if you were able to like, go back in time and talk to yourself, let’s say three years ago before you’d even heard of Zoe, what’s the one bit of advice? If you would give yourself, given what you know today, Becky, why don’t you go first?

Becky: That’s a challenging question. I think the, if I had to narrow it down to one thing, it would be, don’t believe what the packaging tells you. That actually what you need to eat is, whole foods, that you know what’s in the product rather than what the packaging is telling you. So avoid ultra processed foods, I suppose, would be my kind of key takeaway.

Mark: Avoiding ultra processed foods is probably one of them, and, and also just not believing the fat story. The messages you get in general about health and what’s healthy food are so baffling. And one of the things I find most valuable about Zoe is your honesty and that you follow the science. In other words, you, you tell us if there’s something you think probably is healthy, but you don’t know, you can’t prove it yet, there isn’t a good experiment.

And, and so one of the things I really love about Zoe is it’s one source of truth in this that cuts through all the confusion and, and that’s in some ways the most valuable thing about it for me. So if you guys say coffee is healthy, I believe you, one source of truth.

Jonathan: Brilliant. Thank you so much. I think this has been really fun. Very different from the sort of podcast that we normally do, and I think really powerful.

You know, if I think back about what I take away, one is Sarah explaining that nothing should be off limits. But that if you start to add all of these new things into your diet, you just naturally shift.

And I thought, Becky, it was really interesting you were saying I sort of accidentally became a vegetarian ‘cause I’m just adding in all of these plants and they’re tasting so good.

So I’m sort of squeezing the meat and squeezing the meat and you’ve ended up not eating at all.

And Mark’s saying, well I really love meat, but now again, I’m shifting to a lot of this stuff that’s good for me, like the venison.

And again though, total amount is less ‘cause there’s suddenly just all this other stuff that I like, which has definitely been my own. Journey as well, which is just that I actually think your tastes change a lot.

And at least in my experience as someone who definitely ate tons of highly processed food, it’s almost like your palate can’t even tell that this food tastes good. And then you start to appreciate it and it, and it does really shift.

I love that. I love the story about feeling. Empowered.

So rather than being told this is what you have to do, you just feel like you have answers that support you.

And I guess the other thing that comes through really strongly is this idea of both having the information to understand what’s going on and that you both have found.

Being able to really understand specifically for an individual meal or a food, what’s good allows you to make these decisions and changes, but critically that it’s sustainable.

You know, Becky, your story is really powerful. It’s also similar to stories I think that we, we hear quite often about, many, many times, embarking on a very restrictive diet, having a lot of short-term benefit, it being unsustainable, then feeling full of. Guilt and self-loathing falling off it.

You are incredibly hungry, so you put on all the weight or you like relapse in terms of the health measures that you might be looking at Mark.

And so I think the thing that probably I always find very sustaining, I, I, I suspect Sarah and Tim feel the same way, is like this idea of making something that you can just keep doing forever, I think comes through really strongly.

And then finally, you give some brilliant tips, which were new.

So I love this idea of like a nut. Box, which might include like I heard, like roasted chickpeas. You know, have an apple, take it for something where you’re going to an event where you won’t be able to eat until later.

I think the restaurant, you know, add extra vegetables, but also don’t be afraid to ask to change.

And I would just conclude by saying it’s incredibly powerful to hear these stories. And I hope that there are, are a few listeners here who feel like, actually maybe in 2026, this idea of like. Doing something sustainable might be the best habit to try and, embark on. And you are amazing examples of that.

Jonathan: Thank you