Today we’re with Lynne Parmiter Bowman, author of the Amazon best selling cookbook, Brownies for Breakfast.

You probably won’t believe it, but Lynne is 76. You would most certainly never know it and we’re going to spend some time finding out how she maintains her youth.

But there’s a lot more to Lynne Bowman than a pretty face. Lynne has been featured at women's expos throughout the country, speaking on kitchen table culture, community planning and the gift of diabetes.

She teamed up with actress Deidre Hall to write and publish Deidre Hall's Kitchen Closeup (2010) and Deidre Hall's How Does She Do It? (2012).

In a previous life, she worked with Silicon Valley companies as a creative director, winning national awards. She was Creative Director at E&J Gallo Winery, Advertising Manager at RedKen Laboratories, and held various other positions with agencies and clients in San Jose, Los Angeles, and on the East Coast.

Lynne has also worked as an actress, makeup artist, screenwriter, illustrator, legal journalist and television Weather Person. She is the mother of three grown children, and has two grandchildren. So we have a lot to talk about today.

What does she mean about “the GIFT” of diabetes? We need to find out about that. We’ll talk about her cookbook, Brownies for Breakfast, and see what that’s all about. And, we’ll talk about healthy eating, things we can do to stay healthy, and a lot more.

So, Lynne, thanks for joining us today on Lean to the Left.

Q. First off, when we first chatted about you coming on my show, you said you wanted to do it because you “lean to the left, with good reason.” How about explaining that?

Q. You’re 76 and still going! You could be doing anything you want, or nothing! Why this?

Q. How is Brownies for Breakfast different from other cookbooks for diabetics?

Q. The title includes the line “A Cookbook for Diabetics and The People Who Love them.” Why did you include “...and the people who love them” in your title?Q. Does this book have any meat or dairy in it?

Q. You’ve done a lot of things in your career, but what makes you an authority on healthy eating and diabetes?

Q. What surprised you most during your research and writing?

Q. What’s the one new habit that would make a big difference in someone’s health?

Q. Do you think there should be more cooperation and coordination between the food and healthcare industries?

Q. How do you get kids to eat healthy?

Q. Climate change is affecting all of us, and you guys are really experiencing the impact there in California. How does our food culture affect the environment?

Q. What are your thoughts about what needs to be done to combat climate change?

Q. What are your thoughts about fast food and the constant battle between fast food companies for market share?

Q. You and your husband have a small farm on the coast there in Northern California. What do you do there?

Show Notes

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Show Transcript

[00:01:54] Lynne Bowman: I am so happy to be with you. As you already know, I was excited to meet you after going back and forth for weeks and weeks now, and we just about, got blown away in this storm that hit California and we didn't have power and I was just stranded out here on this little farm with nothing to do but podcasts. 

[00:02:15] Bob Gatty: That's something fun to do. I gotta tell you, I you guys have had some nasty freaking weather out there. And I know that we've had to, we've had to postpone this interview a couple of times because of the weather and the havoc that it played with your computer system, right?

[00:02:37] Lynne Bowman: Yeah. But we have survived in spite of everything. We have survived. 

[00:02:41] Bob Gatty: Okay. So we're in good shape. All right. You know what, the first thing I wanted to ask you was when we first chatted about you coming on my show you said you wanted to do it because you quote lean to the left with good reason. Okay. How about explaining that now you're in California, I assume everybody in California leans to the left.

[00:03:09] Lynne Bowman: Because yeah, we're all smart, right? And yeah. Come on. I'm a Californian, born and bred. I was born in Hollywood, California, of all the crazy places to be born. So what am I gonna be except a lefty? There was just no other direction to go, and I don't regret it for a minute. I graduated from high school in 1964 okay. That was I think I was just determined by the universe to be a flag waving feminist lefty for the rest of my life. And I never went back and I never regretted it. Now I've lived in North Carolina I've lived in France I suppose I've been exposed to some other things, but Yeah.

[00:04:08] You know it, first of all, it's very hard to be a female career sort of person without owing a great deal to the left politically. Come on. That's just waiting. 

[00:04:26] Bob Gatty: We're living in some, we're living in some troubled times right now too. 

[00:04:30] Lynne Bowman: Boy. Howdy, huh? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I'm not going back, right? Yeah, I 

[00:04:39] Bob Gatty: You're not going back. Yeah, the Republicans would like you to though, wouldn't they? 

[00:04:47] Lynne Bowman: They sure would. And as we were talking about before you clip the record button, you know now when you see any photographs of what's going on, the floor of Congress or whatever, it's just this sea of white faces and suits and ties and semi balding... love you white guys, older white guys, but we need some variety happening in government or it's not gonna ever be a real government. 

[00:05:18] Bob Gatty: Oh, that's for damn sure. Yes. And it, upsets me. I look at the, just like you, you look at the pictures from the House floor and especially on the Republican side, and and that's just what it is.

[00:05:34] It's white males, mostly older, and they're all telling you women what to do with your body 

[00:05:41] Lynne Bowman: and everything, what to do with everything. . What to do with our Yeah. What to, how to raise our kids, how to educate our young ones. Yeah. How whatever. Exactly. On and by the way, yeah. I hope cuz we have so much to talk about, but there is this deep connection between good health and the left, and I wanna talk about that.

[00:06:05] Bob Gatty: Okay, let's do that. All right. Yeah. Yeah. Let's, first of all, I want you to tell me, about Brownies for Breakfast and, what that's all about. First of all, the title intrigued me because who would have a brownie for breakfast unless they're a kid and just in love with sweets.

[00:06:26] Okay. Although the other day I made some, just wait a minute. Let me just tell you the other day I made some some blueberry muffins and I'd never made 'em before and I I love blueberry muffins. So I found a Betty Crocker box Oh of okay. Berry Muffins, . And I made them and I ate 'em all on in one day.

[00:06:55] Okay. And there's the reason, and then I felt like crap. Huh? 

[00:06:59] Lynne Bowman: Do you wanna hear the reason for that? Do you know why they now tell me the reason? Because they were, because there's too much sugar in it, right? Yes, but they were actually engineered by a bunch of guys in New Jersey along the turnpike, in the craveability industry so that you could not stop eating them. They are actually designed to kill you, to poison you. And I'm not kidding. There's so much. I'll tell you what, let me tell you. I got on the scale this morning after doing that, and I'd gained a pound and a half. And now, I don't know if it was just the blueberry muffins or the combination of the blueberry muffins and the pizza that I also had for dinner

[00:07:49] Oh, okay. 

[00:07:50] Okay. Let's start there. There are, okay, go ahead. 

[00:07:55] There are two foods that are particularly notable because they are extremely addictive. Now, you probably know this, you're a guy, you're a seasoned guy. You've been around, you know this, but 

[00:08:08] Bob Gatty: seasoned guy, that's for sure. 

[00:08:11] Lynne Bowman: Okay, we're I'm being kind. Number one, sugar. Sugar is the thing we should be eating. I don't know if you know why exactly, but yeah. Sugar, big, fat. No, But the, prepared foods identified in scientific studies as the most addictive is pizza. Do you know why? Can you guess what it is in that pizza? That is a problem. All right, I'm gonna start, I'm gonna break it down for you.

[00:08:46] The crust okay is white flour and grease. And I don't even, I can't even account for what kind of grease was put in the white flour, cuz I don't know what brand it was. But white flour is actually no different in many ways from sugar when it hits your body, it's processed to become sugar, glucose when it hits your body.

[00:09:08] So you've been eating white flour, grease and then on top of it, the red stuff that you think is tomato sauce is basically added sugar and then the pepperoni on top that you think is protein is, yeah, carcinogenic. You knew that preserved meats like that are carcinogenic science. I didn't make it up. Okay so, far we've got sugar, grease,, carcinogenic meat, and now the, cheese like substance on top, if in fact it is real Cheese is from cows who have been humiliated and desecrated and given hormones, and who are massacurring the earth. along with your gastrointestinal system, . So have I hit all the buttons there? 

[00:10:07] Bob Gatty: Yeah, you hit all the buttons. It makes me wanna say I'm not gonna eat anymore pizza, but I probably won't do that. 

[00:10:12] Lynne Bowman: No, You're going to eat pizza, but it's gonna be good pizza. And I, 

[00:10:17] Bob Gatty: First of all, I don't buy, I don't buy pizza from prepared pizza. I, go to this one little Italian restaurant that makes what I think is really good fresh pizza.

[00:10:33] Lynne Bowman: But I bet the flower is just white processed flour too. 

[00:10:37] Bob Gatty: Oh yeah, I'm sure pepperoni. And also, yeah. What'd you say? 

[00:10:43] Lynne Bowman: The pepperoni is still carcinogenic, but Yeah. 

[00:10:46] Bob Gatty: Yeah, I know. And I love it. Yeah. Yeah. Along with salami? I love salami. Okay. You know what? I made it this. I made it to 80, so I guess I'm not doing too bad, 

[00:11:00] Lynne Bowman: but that's because you're mean and I can say that for myself. I really attribute a lot of my own longevity just being a cheeky mess who never took no for an answer, . I. And I even missed Covid. I shouldn't even say that out loud, but so far everybody else in the family got it.

[00:11:20] And everybody else in the village got it. And it missed me. My children. 

[00:11:26] Bob Gatty: Yeah, I know the same here. 

[00:11:27] Lynne Bowman: Terrified, but I don't know. Yeah, true. Not let's same here. 

[00:11:32] Bob Gatty: Neither my wife nor I got it.

[00:11:35] Lynne Bowman: Bob, my book, okay. 

[00:11:37] Bob Gatty: Tell me about Brownies for Breakfast and how it's different from mother cookbooks. For diabetics. Okay. It's an innocent little title, but it's actually the secret to the universe and saving your health and saving the planet health and everything, and it's easy recipes for everybody who wants to stop eating crap.

[00:11:58] That's the basic idea. Okay, so the brownie. , you're listening carefully, right? The brownie is made with plain cocoa, pumpkin puree out of a can, and the cocoa came out of a can too. And nut butter. In my case, I usually use almond butter and some almond butter. Okay. . Yeah. Monk fruit sweetener.

[00:12:26] I use others and I can describe what those are. No sugar and what else? Egg or egg substitute and baking soda. And that's about it. You pour a bowl, you mix it up, but what you've done is you created a meal. It's high protein it's, got good vegetable fats in it from the nuts.

[00:12:50] It's got pumpkin. It's got a vegetable in it and cocoa is good for you. So it's quite possible to make yummy treats and meals with no crap in them, but nobody's doing it. That's good. . 

[00:13:07] Yeah. So that's good to know. So your cookbook has all kind of recipes for stuff like that's healthy and tasty and, easy 

[00:13:18] Lynne Bowman: And saves the earth. Yeah. Pilot saves your guts and. saves the United States. A huge part of the money that it spends saves a huge part of the money you spend all of us spend on healthcare because why are we on dialysis? Dialysis? Why are we in the hospital getting our liver looked at and everything because we're eating crap all the time.

[00:13:45] And why are 85 of the bankruptcies in this country? Because of heralthcare emergencies because we're eating crap. 

[00:13:53] Bob Gatty: Where does the line in the people who love them come from in your title? You say it's a cookbook for diabetics and the people who love them. 

[00:14:05] Lynne Bowman: Two reasons. Where's that come from? it means everybody, because everybody's got a diabetic in their family. And two, it's very difficult for a diabetic along with other people who have diet issues to eat healthy if their family isn't supportive. And I hear so many stories. Constantly about what a struggle it is to sit at the table with your vegetables and your healthy things.

[00:14:33] Even Bob when I tell people that my stuff is sugar free and, I'm offering them you the response I get from people, it's oh no thanks. Sugar free. No thanks. Really? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because people, have this kind of two decade old idea of what sugar-free tastes like or is and we've, had a lot of swell, newish products the last couple decades that make it possible to make sugar free stuff that you wouldn't know you were eating sugar free. But I'm quite accustomed to getting that response from people. It's oh no thanks. I like my sugar. I love my sugar. Okay. Yeah. With your bad selves. Yeah. And you now, do you Go ahead. That I'm, people are slugging down Starbucks all the time and they think they're drinking coffee.

[00:15:32] And they're really slugging down bad milk and sugar with a little bit of coffee sprinkled over it so we have a bad epidemic. 

[00:15:42] Bob Gatty: What do you mean bad? What do you mean bad milk? What do you mean bad milk? 

[00:15:47] Lynne Bowman: Dairy is really questionable these days. Where does your dairy come from? How is it produced?

[00:15:55] And if you, I'm fond of saying if you have a cow in your yard or in your neighbor's yard and you know that cow's name and you know the neighbor's name, you can get great milk. And products from that cow. Otherwise, if you're buying it from a commercial dairy, chances are it's full of hormones you don't want growth. factor that you don't want and, it's creating all kinds of pollution that you don't wanna add too. And it's not a good product that your body can process well. So there you go. 

[00:16:28] Bob Gatty: Okay. Did you, do you have personal experience with diabetes? Did you get diabetes contract diabetes yourself, or what?

[00:16:37] Lynne Bowman: You are looking at a diabetic poster girl. That's me. I was really post in forties. Yeah. Which is why I think of it as a gift because I knew a lot earlier that a lot of type two diabetics know because I, was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. when I had my kids. Oh. So wow. I started relatively doesn't that seem so early in your life now to you and me, right?

[00:17:07] In your forties? For sure. Ancient history, yeah. But it meant that I started paying attention a long time ago. And so for decades now I've been exercising and trying to eat smart and taking care of my fa and so often men, particularly you adorable old white man. don't pay any attention because there are no symptoms until you have, let's say, erectal dysfunction and then all of a sudden now you, we have your attention and the reason that you have this dysfunction is because you've been diabetic now for some time and it's eating up your insides..

[00:17:50] Bob Gatty: That doesn't sound good. All right. Now you've, done a lot of things in your career. I just listed a whole bunch of things. You, were a weather person, an actress and on. You did all these things. Yeah. But what what makes you an authority on healthy eating and diabetes, other than the fact of your own personal experience?

[00:18:16] I've been doing it, studying it, speaking about it, writing about it for a long time, and I think it's actually an advantage in some ways to be outside of the medical community because the medical community bring its own exhaust. It's like academia, there's stuff you just can't publish in academia because it would get you fired. And there's plenty of stuff that you cannot do as an MD because it puts you outside of the mainstream and it puts you outside of where we think the research is supposed to be. Yeah when, you come at it as a grandma, let's say you get to, you're the maverick. You're the renegade, and you can put the, like right now I'm, working on a piece that I hope I can get done.

[00:19:07] before I'm dead, which is about, we got keto, paleo, carnivore, plant-based, who's right, you know what, where in, and they're all being discussed in very serious terms by MDs who have all said, I've heard them. on record. They've all said, this is the optimal human diet. Fill in diet here, right?

[00:19:37] And it's, again, I'm a little prejudiced, but primarily men doing this. And funny thing, at the bottom of the screen, you find out that what they're actually doing is selling supplements, books, courses, whatever. But they're very persuasive and I think we're all a little bit confused. They're MDs they have all these credentials.

[00:20:02] And so how can they, how can these two guys be talking about the optimal human diet and having it be two entirely different things? What's up with that? . Yeah. Yeah. Good question. Hey, I got another question for you and that. Go ahead. What's my personal experience? I'm a grandma. Yeah. Grandma's, know shit.

[00:20:27] Yeah. Okay. Okay. grandma's know shit. That's a good line. I like that. . 

[00:20:32] Lynne Bowman: It's true. . 

[00:20:34] Bob Gatty: Yeah. How old are your grandkids? 

[00:20:37] Lynne Bowman: Oh, they range . I, have two. They range by fabulous grand. Yeah. Okay. One is 15 months old and one is 15 years old. Oh, wow. How about that? ? That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. And they are the light of my, okay.

[00:20:54] They're fabulous. Love 'em. 

[00:20:56] Bob Gatty: Of course they are. Of course they are. Yeah. Yeah. Okay I got three. I got three. I have three granddaughters and yeah. All of whom I'm very proud of. Yeah. How old are yours? They're, all adults. They're all adults. My, my one granddaughter is actually married she's graduated from college.

[00:21:18] The other one is in college. And the third one is a a young woman who was, My daughter and her husband adopted from China. And and she actually shares my birthday, which makes me very pleased. What's your birthday? Yeah. Yeah. January 12th. And I'm sorry I missed it. . Yeah. Yeah. and yeah, I just turned 80.

[00:21:50] I, it's hard to believe, but that's a fact. Cuz you said you graduated from high school in 1964. I graduated. Graduated from high school in 1960. And you said you had lived in France? I did too. I lived in, I graduated from high school in France actually. 

[00:22:07] Lynne Bowman: Oh, where? 

[00:22:08] Bob Gatty: My dad was in the military, so Verdun., Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway let's get back to this. You said that there should be more cooperation in coordination between the food and healthcare industries. What do you think should happen?

[00:22:28] Lynne Bowman: I'm starting to see it. It's, obvious to anyone. looks at all in this direction that you can heal with food, just as you can make people ill with food.

[00:22:43] You, cannot have good health without good food. And it's becoming difficult for the medical community to ignore food. And you, again, you know this, I'm not the first person to say this, but medical school... what did you not learn in medical school? Nothing about nutrition. Nothing. Maybe you had an hour of nutrition one.

[00:23:07] The other thing that, yeah, what? 

[00:23:09] Bob Gatty: That's amazing to me. That is amazing to me. 

[00:23:12] Lynne Bowman: It's amazing. But that's the way it's been done for time immemorial . That's always the way it's been done. So that's one. Two, a thing that really struck me recently is what do medical students learn to do? They learn to not sleep.

[00:23:29] Right Famously. So many stories about how medical school is about not sleeping. What do we learn about good health? We learn that you absolutely cannot heal without sleep. So in addition to eating well, if you're not sleeping well, you can't be healthy. You can't, your body needs to be in deepest sleep to heal from anything or to go through this process of autophagy that was never discussed until fairly recently, which is how your cells clean each other up, how your body cleans itself from the inside out. Do you know about autophagy?, your friend autophagy? 

[00:24:16] Bob Gatty: No, I don't know about that.

[00:24:18] What is it? 

[00:24:18] Lynne Bowman: Okay. It's our vocabulary word of the day. I, love this word. Okay. It literally means eating self. And what happens is, okay, after your body has stopped ingesting food for 12 14, 16, sometimes even 18 hours, you need a long period of hours there before your body goes okay, he's done shoving pizza down.

[00:24:45] We can get to work now. And the cleaning crew comes out. It's kinda like the freeway at night. The cleaning crew comes out and your cells have this remarkable ability to recycle themselves and other cells, so they get busy. eating up all these little chunks of molecules and things and cleaning everything out, hoping to do it before you're gonna have breakfast or lunch.

[00:25:11] And if they are successful, then your body has this whole kind of fresh start. But if you don't leave at least 14, 16 hours between your last meal and your first. There's no time to get that done. So do the calculation and think, okay, how many times have I had that pizza in front of Jimmy Kimmel?

[00:25:36] And then how many hours before? Not that many. So here's this simple, obvious way to stay healthy that none of us know about. Nobody knows this which is autophagy. Yeah. , right? 

[00:25:56] Bob Gatty: Which has taken enough time between, the time you finish your last meal until the time that you have breakfast or your first meal of the day, right? Need time for your body to process the food that you've consumed. 

[00:26:12] Lynne Bowman: Think about when you're sleeping. Do you think about or before you go to sleep, and when you plan your sleep. Are you conscious of the fact that's when you'll heal anything that needs healing, and that's when you'll clean all this stuff that needs cleaning.

[00:26:29] Sleep and medical students are being trained not to sleep. 

[00:26:34] Bob Gatty: Not to sleep, yeah. That makes no sense. Yeah, that makes no sense at all. Yeah, and then I've always wondered about the schedules that they put these people through. I don't understand why, it's so necessary. 

[00:26:50] Lynne Bowman: Have you ever tried to get a meal at a hospital?

[00:26:54] Bob Gatty: Have I ever tried to get a what? 

[00:26:57] Lynne Bowman: A good meal at a hospital? 

[00:26:59] Bob Gatty: Oh no. Fortunately for me, I've not been in the hospital over mealtime . But I'm lucky 

[00:27:11] Lynne Bowman: as a visitor, right? You drop in and because you're gonna see your Aunt Elinore and you know you need something to eat, whatever.

[00:27:19] Yeah. Find good food in a hospital is, it can be tough. Yeah, because that's, 

[00:27:25] Bob Gatty: you can find a vending machine but 

[00:27:29] Lynne Bowman: or the cafeteria, but it's kinda scary. Yeah. Donuts. Donuts. Yeah. And I don't my donuts. And by the way, there are recipes in brownies for breakfast, for donuts that are a fabulous meal that you can make yourself at home.

[00:27:44] Really? Yes, sir. You're gonna love this, Bob. When you have the book, you're gonna be unstoppable with your cooking. You're gonna send me, you're gonna send me the book? Is that what you're gonna do? , I'd be happy to send you a book. Go ahead. I'd be even happier if you bought it and gave me a fabulous review, but I'll send it to you if that's what I have to do.

[00:28:06] Bob Gatty: Yeah, , sure. Ah I would love to have an autograph copy of it. I really would. I will see that you All right. Let's, okay. All right. Now what's the one new habit that would make a big difference in someone's life, in someone's health? Is that getting more sleep is, , you're talking about?

[00:28:30] Lynne Bowman: That's a beauty. Yes. But the first thing I really want everybody to do, because it has such you'll feel it, you'll see it, it'll make such a difference for you is quitting sugar completely. Just dropping it. Absolutely. And it's not easy because, 

[00:28:48] Bob Gatty: no, it's not. I will tell you why. In my case I am an addict of ice cream..

[00:28:58] Huh. I eat ice cream way too often and I know that. 

[00:29:05] Lynne Bowman: So that's bad dairy and sugar. Okay. Congratulations. 

[00:29:09] Bob Gatty: Yeah. Yeah, I know. I really so, think of this, you go you, go to dinner, right? You have a, you have pizza for dinner, right? And then you come home and you sit down and you sit down and you watch a movie on tv and you go, oh, I think I need some ice cream.

[00:29:29] So then you go get a bowl of ice cream. . So now you've had pizza with all this garbage on it that you just described, right? And then you get a bowl of ice cream that's got all this sugar and dairy that you're saying is not good for you. It's a wonder I'm still alive, man. 

[00:29:49] Lynne Bowman: It's a, tribute to your deep core of meanness,

[00:29:54] Bob Gatty: That must be it. All right. Tell me this. How do you get kids to eat healthy? 

[00:30:00] Lynne Bowman: It's really not complicated. Huh? Kids eat what? Kids. Yeah. What do you do? If they cook it, they'll eat it or if they grow it. Yeah, especially, and then cook it. They'll eat it. Yeah, but parents are sitting 'em all down and going, okay, little Mary Ellen won't eat this, she won't eat that, so I'm gonna give her this.

[00:30:20] And little Johnny won't eat this and won't eat that. So he's gonna have a hotdog again, and oh here comes granddad, and he'll eat nothing but pizza. That's the way meals are being organized so often, and actually the, yeah, the reality is they're being eaten in the back of a car.

[00:30:38] .Everybody's driving through. Yeah. With their kids cuz they're going to martial arts and mandarin and choir and this and that, and they're not at home at a table in a kitchen with real food that was actually cooked a lot of times. 

[00:30:57] Bob Gatty: Which brings us to fast food restaurants. Yes.

[00:31:01] Most people know that what's served up at McDonald's and Burger King and all of those places is not exactly healthy food. How dangerous though, is all of this Lynn? 

[00:31:15] Lynne Bowman: Very that's why yeah, we havethis epidemic, this pandemic of diabetes, of overweight, of, disease because we're driving through and we're eating out of a bag or outta the box. That's it in a nutshell. Yeah. Yeah. We're sitting on our butt too. We're not moving like we should be. We don't have we're, spending too much time.

[00:31:40] Oh, that's true. We're not walking and we're eating crap. Yeah. It's yummy crap. It's been designed by the best craveability designers to be irresistible. Yeah. Golly. Who doesn't? 

[00:31:58] Bob Gatty: Craveability designers. I, love that term, craveability designers. I used to do a lot of work in the food industry, and I never heard that term, but I can see that it's true. 

[00:32:11] Lynne Bowman: It is true, and I didn't make it up. And for reference, I will cite Michael Moss, who's done a couple really great books about the industry, about big food. And one of 'em is called Uhhuh Book that kind of tells you the story. So I recommend , his stuff. But lots been written in the past few years because here we are talking about the billions of dollars spent on healthcare and fighting in Congress about healthcare and so on.

[00:32:38] Why? Because we're a mess health wise and, we're bringing it ourselves. We have made a decision not to be healthy and we want someone to pay the bill. So that doesn't sound really left wing, but what I'd like to say that is left wing is that one of our big problems is that women got outta the kitchen. Yay.

[00:33:04] We're no longer slaves to the kitchen. But yeah, no one has picked up the slack with daycare with taking more responsibility at home, whatever, so that we have what we need at home. We were hurting at home, in the kitchen, nobody wants work in the kitchen anymore. And my book by the way, makes it very easy because my superpower, I raised three kids, single mom, and my superpower was putting it on the table fast and cheap, cuz I never had any money or time.

[00:33:44] Okay. Okay. That's a thing that people I don't even really understand. Everybody says how can it's so much more expensive to eat healthy. No, it's not. Sorry. No, it's cheaper. And do you ever add in what it costs you to be sick? False economy there anyway, but when, the pandemic hit I 

[00:34:14] Bob Gatty: that is so true Lynne, because people eat themselves into a big mess. Yeah. And then they go to the doctor and they want to be fixed. Yeah. And somebody's gotta pay the bill for that. Yeah. And you and I are, doing that for people who don't take care of themselves. And I don't know, it pisses me off.

[00:34:41] I see people.

[00:34:42] I don't wanna be well fat people who smoke. Yeah. Does that make any sense to you at all? Anybody? You know who and, you. You see it all the time. , 

[00:34:57] Lynne Bowman: Come on, stop. 

[00:34:59] Bob Gatty: That's, true. That's true. But if you are, at the same time, if you have a, bad diet, you don't get exercise you're overweight, bordering on obese or, obese, and you are not taking care of yourself in any way.

[00:35:21] And then you come down with with whatever heart disease, cancer. Yeah. Whatever it is you come down with. And, then you go to the hospital and, somebody's gotta pay the bill for that. Okay. You might have health insurance. And that picks up a good chunk of it. But nevertheless our tax dollars are going to that.

[00:35:51] And I don't know if that's left wing or right wing, but I don't like the idea of people here being irresponsible. 

[00:35:58] Lynne Bowman: That's right. Your family money is going to that. You're paying for it personally. Yeah. As well as, and I can provide an example. Yeah, mother died when I was 18 of a chronic disease.

[00:36:13] So really I think what started me on this quest, if you wanna call it that, goes back that far because I watched what chronic. Does to her family, it destroys the family. At the age of 18, my house was gone. My dad was off on another life, my siblings were off. My dog had to be given away. Everything.

[00:36:33] Literally my luggage was on the lawn, and that was it for me because my mom had kidney disease, which she could not have helped. Wasn't her fault. , it was affordable it was very expensive and she'd had it for years, and so it broke our family apart. So imagine how it feels for me to see someone do that to themselves and their family voluntarily.

[00:37:05] And, look at the, dialysis industry. Billions of dollars are being made by people who serve, people who have ruined their kidneys with diabetes and that's all dialysis basically is. is hooking up people who have severe longtime diabetes, type two typically. And, so whose internal organs are gone, including they have renal failure, their kidney is failing.

[00:37:39] So there's this industry that is profiting, their shareholder value is being supported by crappy food being consumed by everybody. and Okay. People, not being diagnosed with this. It's okay. It's pretty serious. 

[00:38:02] Bob Gatty: Now, there's another side to this that I wanted to explore with you, Lynne.

[00:38:06] Okay. And that is the impact of diet on the environment and climate change? Yes. I suspect, I don't know this for a fact, but I suspect that you are either a vegan or vegetarian. Is that true? 

[00:38:26] Lynne Bowman: Not true. No. No. Not true. Okay. You believe that? I'm, sorry, go ahead. It surprises you, it surprises a lot of people.

[00:38:39] Bob Gatty: Yeah, it does surprise me. But I have a lot of friends who, I have at least one particular friend who is vegan, and he's always arguing about the horrible impact that the livestock industry has on on climate change. And with him. What'd you say? 

[00:39:04] Lynne Bowman: I'm with him. He's right. The difference are you, is the difference is I live particularly in this kind of epicenter of regenerative agriculture. And, I'm in this kind of peculiar, Stanford University's 20 miles over the hill. University of California's in both directions. I'm out in the funny little agricultural area between San Francisco, Santa Cruz, California where, we raise all kinds of grassfed ,pasture- raised critters and I can walk or drive in any direction and call out to the cattle on the hill or the chickens clucking around. I know them by name. Goats named sheep cattle. They're fabulous, but, and they are being raised for consumption or for food production , but they're being very consciously raised.

[00:40:05] In together with the grass, in other words, and we've had big arguments over the years about is this a proper use of this grassland, should there be hoofed animals on this dirt? And the answer is yes. So we're, trying to find this balance here locally and in a lot of places around the world and around the country where you can raise animals to eat or to use their milk or whatever. We have a fabulous goat dairy world famous. And the cheese is unbelievable. So Great. And you need to know that goat cheese and milk is a different protein than cow cheese and milk. So people who have difficulty with cow products do well with goat and sheep..

[00:40:55] I want you to remember that. 

[00:40:56] Bob Gatty: Oh, wow. I didn't know that. 

[00:40:57] Lynne Bowman: It's, yeah. It's yeah, so you can have cheese, just not necessarily from cows, but there's no question that factory farming has wrecked most of the farming communities in this country. And when I say factory farming and, big acts, so those big combines the, mono culture.

[00:41:22] So it's not just critters, it's plants as well. We have really. Wrecked our top soil and, we have wrecked the rivers and we've wrecked the bays with our ag. So it's it's, not a matter of never eating meat again, it's making sure that if you eat an animal product, Source it correctly, make sure it's a chicken that's been happy and emotionally well adjusted and eaten slugs and grass and all those things.

[00:41:56] Not a chicken that was raised in a box and never allowed to move and couldn't breathe. And we've all seen those pictures and they're true. And cattle, same thing. If you're gonna have a steak, make sure that the only bad day in that cow's life was the last one. And maybe that wasn't even

[00:42:16] Bob Gatty: And how do you do that though? 

[00:42:19] Lynne Bowman: Sourcing carefully from people farmer's markets local and if you live someplace, if you live in you're on the coast there's a lot of rural communities surrounding where you are. But even if you're living in Manhattan, , I guarantee that a couple phone calls away, you will find a purveyor of grass fed, pasture raised happy, well-adjusted college educated chicken and cattle

[00:42:52] I will only eat a college educated chicken. I will tell you that. There you go. That's for sure. . And when I was a little kid, my. 

[00:43:02] You're old enough to know what a real egg should look like, what color that yolk should look like, right? Yeah. There's a difference of, the 

[00:43:14] Bob Gatty: I don't like eggs.

[00:43:14] I don't eat 'em. But , what? No, I don't like eggs. I hate 'em. Matter of fact, I got a whole long story about that, but Oh goodness. It's OK. 

[00:43:25] Lynne Bowman: Time when we have time. Yeah. We'll, talk. Yeah. That was, 

[00:43:31] Bob Gatty: When I was a little kid my dad was a preacher and, we were poorer than church mice and and the, we, he had his churches, he had a bunch of churches, but they were mostly in the country.

[00:43:48] And so farmers would give us their f give us food. They'd give us chickens, they'd give us a side of beef and so on. But the chickens I hated because they, he'd, they'd bring us a, live chicken and Somebody had to kill it and my dad would get it and we'd take it out in the backyard and he had to stump and he'd lay the chicken down with his head on the stump and I had to hold it while he whacked its head off with an ax.

[00:44:20] And it was years before I would eat a chicken or an egg. 

[00:44:24] Lynne Bowman: Yeah. Because knew where it came from and who paid the price for it. Yeah. That. Nothing wrong with that. 

[00:44:30] Bob Gatty: I don't it was nasty. Anyway there we go. Now you you and your husband have a small farm on the coast there in Northern California.

[00:44:43] Lynne Bowman: Farm with quotes, 

[00:44:44] Bob Gatty: do you raise animals? Farm with quotes around, what'd you say? Farm with, quotes around it, with air quotes, quotes around it. Yeah. Okay. Yep. So you don't raise animals or what? 

[00:44:55] Lynne Bowman: No. I'll give you a hint. The name of the farm is Old Dog Farm, , old Dog Farm. See, you raise a bunch of dogs, , just two, and they're old.

[00:45:09] They're old. I had an old dog too. Poor guy. I had to have him put down here not long ago. They do that. One of them is right over here. Yeah. In case you want evidence of that. But no, we raise our own vegetables. We, have fruit trees and we have lots of, I don't know, raccoons and foxes and owls and mountain lion.

[00:45:36] Wow. Yeah. Sounds great. Actually. Sounds great. It's, heaven to us and again, to me this was paradise. Absolutely. Yeah, because I, a lot time, 

[00:45:46] Bob Gatty: how far are you from, how far are you from la? 

[00:45:50] Lynne Bowman: It's about a five and a quarter hour drive. It's 400 miles. Oh. . Oh, okay. Okay. All right. You know what we've covered a lot of stuff.

[00:46:03] Is there anything else you'd like to I wanna know where people can find your book. I'm sure it's on Amazon, right? 

[00:46:09] It is on Amazon, absolutely. And yeah, easy to find there. And also if you go to your independent bookseller and we love our independent bookseller. Just ask 'em for it. They can order it through their wholesaler and make a plug.

[00:46:27] It's you don't have it. Come on. It's blowing up. It's fantastic. You should order it. But they will. From their wholesaler for you, and either way, okay. I would love reviews from anybody who gets it and uses it. I wanna hear from you. My website, lynn bowman.com. It's l y n e b o w m a n I, again I, have a contact thing there and I love getting questions and suggestions and so on, on the website, and then you can sign up should you choose to. And I don't fill your inbox up with, but I send revisions of recipes when I have another idea about something that works great. Or get information that I think you need I'll, send stuff to you. So yeah, would love to have you on lynn bowman.com.

[00:47:17] And, I owe you one, Bob. Cause I did, I, you thought you were getting someone more glamorous than me and I show up in a baseball cap and I felt like I, I should, 

[00:47:27] Bob Gatty: no, you know what you're perfectly, glamorous. My goodness gracious, beautiful woman. And that's a cool hat. Tell me about the hat.

[00:47:39] And this is I'm really happy with this cuz it's brand new. It was gifted to me yesterday from Gravity, saddle makers in APTAs. Shas is a French. Saddle maker in the Aires tradition who is making these gorgeous saddles. And I just, I had to wander into a shop. It was, I, it was like the scent of saddles being made or something.

[00:48:03] I don't know. I just had to open the door up and go in and met this marvelous man who is crafting these beautiful, things and, I'm a horseman, loved talking with them about it. And I walked out with a vest, oh my, a hat and my daughter got a hat. And so we are just smitten and look at that beautiful logo.

[00:48:22] Isn't that pretty? 

[00:48:23] Oh, it is very cool.

[00:48:25] Lynne Bowman: So I'm happy to be so, 

[00:48:26] Bob Gatty: Do you have horses on your farm ? 

[00:48:29] Lynne Bowman: Right now? No, I am bereft my medi a year ago. And oh. . Yeah, I'm horseless at the time. But it's a disease that you never really talk about, chronic. You never get over it. And I missed it.

[00:48:48] Yea, tell me about it. I owned two horses when my kids were, yeah. When my kids were teenagers. Yeah, I I owned a a quarter horse who was a barrel jumper. Yeah. And my son. Rode her. And then when she died we ended up getting a thoroughbred to replace her and my daughter rode him for a long time until we life happens and we ended up having to sell the place. And I, Yeah. Horses, such horses and all that kinda thing. Yeah. Yeah. But having, horses I just loved, I grew up as a kid As I told you, my dad was was a preacher, and we lived out in the country, and I learned to ride horses on a big draft horse.

[00:49:46] He was so wide that my feet just stuck straight out in the air like that. I was what, six or seven? My legs were like that. There's such, but in France? Yeah. Yeah, in France. I actually learned some trick writing and did, a bunch of stuff over there. It was cool.

[00:50:10] Anyway enough of that glad to, to have you on. Lean to the left, Lynn, and I hope we can do this again and we can talk about some other stuff, cuz you've got a lot going on.. 

[00:50:21] I do have a lot going on and we haven't even touched any of the historical stuff and, so much more about horses and other critters and critters from my past.

[00:50:31] Okay. That'd be fun to talk about. 

[00:50:33] Thank you Lynn. 

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