Bitter Herbs for a Sweeter Life: Insights from Guido Masé

Bitter Herbs for a Sweeter Life: Insights from Guido Masé

Sebastian: Hello there. Welcome to the herbcast, the podcast from herbal reality, delving into the plant powered world of herbalism. So, do you know your echinacea from your eleutherococcus, or your polyphenol from your polysaccharides? Whether you're a budding herbalist, an inquisitive health professional, or a botanical beginner, herbcast is here to inform and inspire you on your journey to integrating herbs in our everyday lives. So, settle down, turn us up, and let's start today's episode of the herbal reality herb cast.

Sebastian: Hello, everybody, great to be back with you. Back with herbcast. And today we've got a very important topic to discuss, which is how we can enhance digestion and sweeten life with the benefits of bitter herbs. And I'm really glad to be here with Guido Masé who is a herbalist and gardener and educator based out in Vermont. So, great to see you again, Guido.

Guido Masé: Sebastian, it's great to be here, thanks for the invitation. It's good to see you.

Sebastian: Yeah, thanks. so should we dive straight in and we're going to talk about the bitters. So, Guido, I know you've written a lot about this subject, and you've worked for companies using bitter herbs, etcetera, and in your clinic, obviously. So what are the bitters? Let's talk about that as a category.

Guido Masé: Yeah, I mean, at its simplest, bitters are herbs that taste bitter, that evoke that sort of bitter feeling that you get maybe from overbrewed black tea or from eating really strong radicchio. but more broadly in herbal medicine, I think bitters end up being this sort of preparation that often includes more than just bitter herbs. And it sort of formulates those bitters with combinations that are tried and true historically, and that often incorporate warming carminatives and other aromatic herbs and spices, both for flavour. And also, you know, if we can talk about this a little bit, to kind of round the effects on digestive function and allow these preparations to be taken habitually, you know, even every day, especially as we get a little older. Beyond that, I grew up in Italy, and there the liquid digestive bitters are pretty well embedded in the culture. it's something that folks will have either at the beginning of a meal or at the end, or sometimes both. And this scene is almost as commonplace as you might see. Or sort of dessert in the United States, or that second portion of french fries in the United States. I'm just part of a meal.

Sebastian: That idea of an aperitif, I think, in Europe, absolutely used to the idea of digesting a heavy, fatty, rich meal. And so that combination of bitter herbs, I don't know what are in some of these drinks like cyanara, etcetera, like wormwood and gentian and things like that.

Guido Masé: Yeah, absolutely. There's this whole range of herbs that are bitter tasting, when we put them in our mouth. And that does include gentian, it includes wormwood, for sure, and artichoke, which is one of the main bitter tasting things that you'll find in a liqueur like Chennar. But again, you know, the secret recipes often include ginger and maybe some mince and maybe some fennel or something that provides the counterpoint to the bitterness. And at least when I was growing up, and chenar is a great example, as are liqueurs like Averna or Ferna Branca, all bitter preps, they often have a little bit of sweetness in there too. And that really sort of ties it all together. And to me it was really interesting because you don't just have to experience the bitterness. You can balance it with warming spices and you can put that touch of sweetness in there to really make it a truly pleasant experience and still get all the sort of herbal and pharmacological benefits.

Sebastian: Yeah. Because one of the ways we think about bitters is that they're like an evolutionary mechanism to protect us from ingesting poisons, really, isn't it? And, we have plants pushing away animals and protecting them from various invaders. how come they can be good for us? If they're like an evolutionary mechanism to stop us taking poisons, how come these poisons are good?

Guido Masé: I mean, that's a fascinating question, right? And it begins to take me down this road thinking about how plants might really be sort of pulling the strings of human behaviour. And in our case, in this conversation, the way we relate to food and the way we relate to nourishment of ourselves. So you're right, the perception of bitterness that we get when we put artichoke leaf in our mouth or dandelion in our mouth is mediated by these receptors called bitter taste receptors or taste type two receptors. We often abbreviate them to t two r receptors. But these are sort of chemosensory

Guido Masé: structures that are well defined in primates, have similar analogues in other mammals, and though they're not identical, are also found, for example, in insects. And so in this case, what you see is, when a grasshopper or browsing insect begins to munch on the leaf of a plant. Not only do the plants begin to crank up the presence of these things called browsing deterrents, which to us universally taste bitter, right? Including alkaloids like quinine, for example. The insect then senses it using these chemosensory cells and alters its behaviour and response. It tends to eat less, partly because if it just kept going, these compounds end up having neurotoxic qualities. And we see this even in, you know, benign compounds like bitter tasting flavonoids. If you put them on cells like neurons at very high doses, they can end up having disruptive qualities to those cells. Now, lucky for you and me, we have digestive enzymes, we have digestive secretions, we have a massive liver based detoxification system, which allows us to really blunt any type of neurotoxicity that might occur from these chemicals. Beyond that, these chemicals activate all these things for those very good reasons. And as a result, we see improved production of secretions, improve activity of liver detoxification. It's sort of this echo of like, wow, be careful, slow down, begin to process and detoxify everything that's coming through your mouth. And as a result, we see that those flavonoids don't have neurotoxic effects. They end up getting processed in the system and actually improve liver function in so doing, and are present in such minute concentrations by the time they reach our bloodstream, that they may trigger beneficial effects across the system. effects that we call hormetic, perhaps. but that's a whole other story.

Sebastian: Maybe just mention hormetic for a second. Just clarify that in terms of.

Guido Masé: Yeah, the word hormesis, essentially, can be translated into, you know, what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger or something to that effect. That in minute quantities, substances that would be toxic for which our physiology has a sort of ancestral or genetic memory, the physiology begins to compensate when minute doses of these substances are detected in a way that increases the physiology's fitness. It's essentially trying to ramp up for what might end up being a challenging situation. That challenging situation never arrives, and as a result, the increased efficiency and physiological resilience remain. So I don't know if that kind of resonates with your understanding of the hormesis concept, but that's kind of how I would summarise it.

Sebastian: Yeah, definitely. Little doses of things can initiate a sort of catalytic response. In a way that means you can upregulate or downregulate, as necessary, certain functions in the body. Really? Yeah.

Guido Masé: And with bitters. It's really interesting because you actually see this effect in terms of our sensitivity to them too, you know, we always talk about how kids are often more sensitive to broccoli and some of those, sorts of isothiocyanate compounds that, you know, the sensitivity to that, nitrogen carbon sulphur group is much higher in young humans, and partly because there's a much higher density, particularly in the back of the tongue, of taste buds in general. And bitter taste receptors most specifically. And here it makes sense because the detoxification equipment of an infant or a toddler is not going to be as effective as the detoxification system of an adult. We know this from pharmacological studies under age twelve. It's not just small humans, it's really very sensitive, small humans. And so we have a higher density of bitter taste receptors during that time of life. And, you know, a big plate of broccoli is really going to turn us off. It's literally going to taste more bitter to a five year old kid than it would to me. As we get older, that density decreases. We're better equipped to handle potential toxins from the world. But to go back to this concept, of shifting or regulating the amount of bitter taste receptors that we might have in our body, if we expose ourselves to bitter taste testants even in adulthood, there's interesting research that suggests we might actually be able to upregulate the production of bitter taste receptors in our tongue specifically. And it does kind of make sense. If we're living in an environment where there's lots of bitterness, you're going to want to be more finely tuned to it. You're going to want to activate all that detoxification machinery, a little more quickly and a little more responsively in order to stay protected. So it's one of

Guido Masé: these neat examples, of sort of almost inverse tolerance, where when you expose yourself ongoingly to bitter tastings from the plant world, you actually become a, appreciative of them and b, something more sensitive to them. Right. They initiate that response a little more quickly than they would.

Sebastian: Wow. We know the body's amazing. Mind is amazing. And so let's explore what's going on in the body bit when we take the bitters. So, we've got our little, few drops of, wormwood or gentian or a little bit of coffee or asparagus or whatever, what happens in the mouth, digestive tract. And then we can go out to the rest of the body.

Guido Masé: Yeah. I mean, I think particularly in the GI tract. I would summarise it in sort of three main spheres. One is sort of a reflex that's mediated by nerves. And there's a central reflex that is broad and systemic. And there's local reflexes too. we'll talk about that. Then there's motility effects. What does that mean? Effects on the contractility of the smooth muscle that lines the entire digestive system. And which, at certain key points in the gut, sort of tightens into sphincters, particularly, in the upper part of the GI tract. And finally, there's modulation of secretions. And those secretions are substances that are both put into the lumen or the opening of the gut where the food moves through. Right. The doughnut hole, if you want to think of ourselves that way and the other secretions are actually hormonal. They're endocrine, meaning some bitter taste receptor bearing cells secrete hormones into the bloodstream. Which end up carrying those effects to various other parts of the body too. So reflex through nerve mediation, muscular tone and contractility and motility. And finally, secretions both into the gut and systemically into the bloodstream. Now, we can look at those all sort of in sequence, when you perceive bitterness on your tongue from even a couple of drops of wormwood tincture. we're very sensitive to bitter tastings for all the reasons of protection that we were talking about. and also those bitter taste receptors are able to distinguish between a range of different compounds. Over 25 different genes code for the protein structures that are making that bitter taste receptor. And there's many different kinds of bitter taste receptors too. And they're all kind of crowded into our tongue. Depending on which ones and which ratios of bitter taste receptors are activated, our body can actually distinguish between a range of different compounds. So that starts to happen, and it starts to happen in a sort of specific way that's tuned to wormwood or maybe gentian or maybe dandelion. And elicits a bit of a different response depending on which plant you use. Different bitters and in location, different.

Sebastian: Sorry to drop. Different bitters connect with different receptors, initiating a slightly different response in different parts of the body.

Guido Masé: Yes because there's so many different sort of similar but different types of bitter taste receptors. The bitter taste receptor is considered pretty promiscuous, right? So it can feel out a range of different compounds, even including potentially some novel ones that we might not have seen in nature before. But it certainly can tell, for example, the difference between a flavonoid and lactone from dandelion, which is a little more bitter. An iridoid from blue vervain or from gentian, which is even more bitter, or an alkaloid like quinine or hydrastein from goldenseal. and the thing is, like, you could put a good dose of bitter tasting flavonoids, which are mildly bitter, onto your tongue and be okay with it. But if you put a similar dose of alkaloids like quinine or secular iridoid glycosides like amarogentin from gentian, you would most likely trigger such a violent reaction that you would vomit. Right? So it's important to understand that in small doses and in appropriate strength, bitters initiate all of that sort of protective secretory modulatory effect in the gut. But in high concentrations, they actually trigger full on rejection by the body, especially if you take too much. So again, you know, while italian amati like chinar are consumed in 130 mil dose, which is pretty high, if you were to take a 30 milliliter dose of pure gentian tincture, you would most likely feel nauseous and just not pleasant because the body would have risen to the, occasion and said, wow, this is too much. This is actually poison coming down the system, and we need to literally reject it. So it's important to know the strength of the bitters. It's important to dose them appropriately, as a result. But when you have an appropriately dosed bitter and the tongue detects it, the first thing that happens is, you see this local secretory effect starting right away. I mean, you perceive it, and that's a neural reflex.

Guido Masé: But within a few seconds of that, you'll notice an increase in saliva. Right? And that's the first hint that that's going to continue happening down the GI tract. The nerve reflex goes through cranial nerves, including the glossopharyngeal, including the chorda tympani. It gets to areas in the brain, starting at the nucleus Tractus solitarius, where it interfaces with the parasympathetic system, which is, of course, our rest and digest system. And, there you start to see cues being sent further down the GI tract. It finally then makes it to our conscious perception area in the gustatory cortex, where we perceive bitterness. And we're like, wow, that wormwood. Whoo, bitter. And our face scrunches up, the saliva production increases, and the nerve relay carries that information from the nucleus tractus solitarius from the areas of the autonomic nervous system and the thalamus and hypothalamus, down through the vagus nerve to the rest of the gut. Everywhere except the last part of the colon, which is innervated by nerves that come from the bottom of the spinal cord. As a result, that nerve relay sends signals to the stomach, it sends signals to the pancreas, it sends signals to the liver. And the secretions that come from all of those organs begin to increase. Right. you don't just see the production of hydrochloric acid in the stomach. You also see an upregulation of mucus production. You see the production of digestive enzymes from the pancreas, bile, from the liver. All the stuff we need to begin to chemically break down our food. Chemical breakdown of food means clean breakdown of food. Therefore, you see a lot less fermentation and therefore less production of CO2, methane and other gasses that could feel distressing in the intestine. So that's kind of like the first thing when you first expose your tongue to those bitter cues. But it continues. And to me, this is actually one of the most fascinating things. If someone is starting to try and address digestive function with bitters, let's say they experience a little bit of heartburn or reflux, you know, that increased production of hydrochloric acid, you might want to be careful with that. It might feel a little weird at first. So I often will tell folks, just put it on your tongue, two to three drops, get that reflex sensation to occur, right. And then if you don't want to swallow it, you don't have to. Simply detecting the flavour is enough to kind of prime the response, then have some food, please put something in your belly and begin the digestive process that has been primed. If you are looking for some of the wider ranging benefits beyond digestion, that bitters can provide, particularly on, liver health, on insulin sensitivity, on metabolic balance, on things like adipocyte regulation, and, on things like microbiome regulation in the flora of the colon, you will need a higher dose and you will actually need to consume it internally. This is where I start recommending very concentrated liquid tincture type bitters that feature strong herbs. You might want to take even a full teaspoon of that, about five mLs before your meals. This is because bitter taste receptor cells are not just found on the tongue, they're also found in the stomach. They're found in the first part of the small intestine, the duodenum, and actually throughout the colon and beyond the GI tract. We can talk about that a little bit, in a sec. But the other activities that I was referencing, the production of secretions and the production of hormones that go into the bloodstream, are also mediated by the bitter taste receptors that are found further down the GI tract, beyond the tongue. This is where, when you put some of these bitter compounds and you plug them into the receptor sites on those bitter taste receptors, you start to see effects on the contractility of muscle in the GI tract. And this is really neat because you tend to see an increase in contractility in the upper part of the GI tract or in the gastric phase. This, again, is like something you feel. As soon as you taste wormwood or gentian, your mouth scrunches, but the valve at the bottom of your esophagus, the lower esophageal sphincter, also scrunches, both in response to the nerves and in response to the local impact of those bitter taste receptors on that tissue and the valve at the bottom of the stomach, the pyloric sphincter that keeps food in the stomach before releasing it into the intestines, that also scrunches up. So the stomach and its contents are churning around on that food, and the valves at the beginning and end are closed. And this has really helpful effects on people who experience things like acid indigestion and heartburn, because that acid kind of stays where it belongs. It also improves

Guido Masé: the digestion of things like protein by bathing them in the stomach in more hydrochloric acid and pepsin, churning that business around and not allowing it to go into the absorption zone before digestion is done. A lot of the issues I see in clinic are connected to letting food get into the absorption zone of the intestine before digestion is done. So, for example, if you put unmetabolized carbohydrates into the small intestine, you will encourage fermentative bacterial growth. They'll start to go to work on those carbs. They'll make gas, it'll feel uncomfortable, and you'll just select for those bacteria. Onward and onward and onward. Too much of our diet, right, is just carb based and has very few bitter signals in it to help regulate the digestion of those carbs. So it doesn't surprise me that people have a lot of gas and bloating after meals. Before thinking about what might be in that food that would be harmful to you, think about whether you have the right signals from the environment, aka these bitter compounds, to help regulate the metabolism and breakdown of all those types of foods that you're eating.

Sebastian: I mean, it's fascinating what you're saying. How does that work? In the one sense, it sounds like the bitters stimulate your appetite and help you digest food better. On the other hand, if that lower sphincter's closed off, sounds like it keeps your stomach full, and therefore you might want to consume less. So, I love a bit of contradiction, when it makes sense. How does that work?

00:25:00

Guido Masé: because you don't get that signal that goes away if you take bitters before you eat.

Sebastian: You.

Guido Masé: You feel full when you are full. And it sort of syncs that response up. So again, it increases relish and the desire of food, but it's non relishing by itself. It makes it so that you don't overeat and then you can push away, that sort of second helping, that other piece of cake, the super size me type mentality that you might see in american fast food culture, for example. And this, I think, is, again, the plant world at work. If something as foundational as appetite is so profoundly regulated by these molecules from herbs, what else about our human experience? What else about the thoughts we have, the desires we have? Those folks at the all you can eat buffet, they didn't say, like, oh, I'm stopping to eat because I took the bitter and therefore, etcetera. This is a feeling that they tended to rationalise with. Oh, I just felt full. oh, I just didn't feel hungry anymore. Right? Oh, I ate till I was totally full. I didn't want anymore. The thought that the person has almost feels like their own. But really it's the regulation that's coming from the plant world that is helping to set the stage. And so when I talk about tonics, right, there's a couple of ways you can go to get from point a to point b to get from your house to your friend's house. You can get into a motor vehicle and push the button and it will take you there burning petrol, or you can get on a bicycle, or put on your sneakers, and you can use your body to get to your friend's house. And as a result, what happens? Your body gets stronger. You engage and appreciate the world more because you're going at a slower pace, you're more involved, you're more engaged. All systems are online very different than if you just take a car or public transportation that's motorised to your friend's house. So similarly, if you're trying to address digestive health, there's so many ways you can go about it. You can use antacids, you can use different enzymes, you can really try to figure out what the body needs to do and like, impact this particular structure that we think is important, or this other. Or you can just develop a relationship to bitter plants and they will regulate the digestion the way they always have, the way they always have in the context of our food relationships. And as a result, your digestion will work in sort of a, ah, balanced way. Rather than guessing what secretion your body might want, you just engage with this holistic response that involves brain muscle, gut secretions and hormones, and let it do its work and the body balances itself out.

Sebastian: Wow it's amazing, isn't it? I mean, it's incredible. I mean, we've touched on some basic, but very fundamental, sort of foundational parts of health that bitters can support us with. And you know, given that we live in a world of great relishment. And if you don't relish it, we're tempted to relish it. You know, in clinic and society today, facing huge challenges with, I don't know, diabetes, obesity, blood pressure issues, cardiac etcetera. Should we just explore where can some of these sort of basic benefits that we've got from bitters? How could they support society and some of the health crises we're facing on a more fundamental level? Because there's this interesting research going on. From the benefits of the receptors into glp one, receptors impacting insulin release, etcetera. Should we explore some of that a bit deeper and go out into the rest of the body?

Guido Masé: Yeah, so the basic reflex that we talked about that increases secretions is foundational for a range of the digestive complaints that people feel that means gas and bloating, which is really common. Heartburn and reflux, which is also really common. In fact, in the United States, it's so common, we're not allowed to really talk about how herbs impacted disease processes in the body. With the exception of gas, bloating, and occasional heartburn, which the FDA has said that's normal part of being human, it's not really a disease. I don't know if I fully agree. I think it may be the normal part of being a human who doesn't have any bitter taste in their life. But a little bit of bitter taste is, over the course of a few days to a few weeks, able to really change that ongoing sort of discomfort that a lot of people feel in their belly. Help to regulate bowel function, help to decrease gas and bloating, help to decrease things like indigestion. But beyond that, as you point out, an ongoing relationship with bitter plants also has impacts on metabolism, liver health and liver function, insulin sensitivity. So a lot of folks will come into clinic for digestive complaints. And it's very simple to just suggest something like a bitter dandelion root tincture a couple of times a day before meals. I've seen amazing turnarounds,

Guido Masé: right? And we measure it in the amount of antacids a person takes. Typically, they would have taken it every day, and after a couple of weeks, they come back and often say, I remember one client specifically, you know, I'm not really taking antacids that much anymore. So that is incredible. And there's all sorts of neat consequences that come from engaging with herbal medicine that way, which is like, wait, these dandelions, are they the same ones in my yard? Which literally, I was asked that question by a client. I said, yes, they're the same ones in the yard.

Sebastian: And they're the same ones on my t shirt.

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Guido Masé: overeat when we consume bitters, because everything is kind of staying in the stomach a little bit longer, there's a hormonal reason as well that involves our central nervous system and involves our feeling of being satisfied by our food. it's similar to the feeling that you get from consuming high fat meals like, that are really buttery and rich, and you're like, oh, I'm satisfied. Or at the end of my meal, oh, I want that ice cream. Right. That high fat, satisfying effect. You get that same effect from bears. And what's really neat is that they're not stimulating the receptors for glp one. They're not stimulating the receptors for polypeptide yy. They're simply alerting the body that food is happening and that that food might contain some stuff that the body needs to detoxify and that it might need to slow down a little bit. And as a result, the hormones and the muscles work in concert to help reduce overfeeding, to help not make you deny your food. Like, I'm on a diet. I can't eat that cake. But simply, I've had a couple bites of that cake, and you know what? I'm full. I don't want anymore. And this is what begins to happen over time so that the person attempting to control their carbohydrate intake comes back after a few weeks and says, I don't know, but I just am not feeling like I have to eat quite as much sweet, especially between meals or especially at the end of a meal, compared to before I started taking bitters. It's really remarkable to see.

Sebastian: I mean, how is it that a bitter can make you feel more satisfied and therefore, in corollary, happier, basically. So, you know, bitters can sweeten your life in a way. So I love all of that. And it sounds like there's solid evidence in clinical practise of how bitters can help with type two diabetes, and metabolic issues, obesity, etcetera, all in a clinical setting. We're talking about having seen a herbalist who's giving you that specific treatment. There's also this fascinating research, isn't there, that there's like bitter receptors in our lungs, on our thyroid, in our heart? I mean, should we just kind of briefly what is going on there and how come there's always been this idea? I was always told you had to taste the bitters for them to work. But, you know, if the bitters are in my lungs, I'm not going to get many herbs in there, hopefully. So, directly. So, how, you know, let's explore that. And what benefit is that for the body?

Guido Masé: Yeah, Sebastian, it's so fascinating. And as they say, extra oral tissues or places in the body outside of the mouth. We've talked about the intestinal tract already, right? And I want to come back to the colon here in just a second. But like you said, cardiovascular system on the heart, for example, just something you may not be aware of. There are more bitter taste receptors on the heart than there are beta adrenergic receptors on the heart. So those receptors that are, you know, so well characterised, that are receiving a signal from the sympathetic, nervous system to sort of increase heart, contractility and heart rate. And that are so important in pharmacology because our beta blockers, right, like trying to release impact blood pressure, impact heart's contractility. No one has looked at these bitter taste receptors. It turns out that if bitter compounds are, bound to or bind to some of these bitter taste receptors in the heart, you see the heart produce an excess of this compound called atrial matriuretic peptide, or ANP. ANP is sort of a way to decrease fluid out of the body. And that was one of its first sort of, applications, natriuretic means it makes you peace, sodium. And with that sodium goes water. And so you remove fluid from the body and that also, of course, impacts blood pressure the way diuretics would. But some emerging research is finding as well that amp has this sort of more emotional heart opening quality too, that it also has an impact on our mind and our consciousness, tending to make us sort of go in the opposite direction of what a, high adrenergic beta receptor stimulation would do, which is like the fight or flight. So it encourages this sort of rest and digest state in the spirit. It helps you remove fluid from the water and, from the kidneys. And this paper actually came out a few years back and, herbalist Julie Whitehouse was one of the authors on it. And it's called time for a new paradigm. And here it actually talked about how these receptors on the heart, which were just beginning to be characterised, might be one of the reasons that when you have bitters on board after eating, you tend to see that, what's called a, postprandial hyperemia or this sort of engorgement of blood that has to go to the intestines to help with absorption of food, right? All that blood is going to go to the liver. All the nutrients from the food are going to get carried by that blood. The heart has to work hard to shift all the blood from where it is in the body to the intestines after you

Guido Masé: eat. And this is partly, sometimes clients come into me and they're like, I get this brain fog after meals all the time. Perhaps that's related to this blood shift going down to the stomach and intestinal tract. Well, when bitters are on board, perhaps through the bitter taste receptors on the heart, the heart is able to compensate for the postprandial hyperemia without an increase in blood pressure and helping to rearrange and maintain stable circulation to the brain and other important areas of the body that need it. In that paper with Julie Whitehouse and others, they also found that you can take gentian root capsules that are enteric coated and that release in the intestinal tract and achieve the same effects that the tasting is not required. And based on what we know now that there's these enteroendocrine cells throughout the GI tract, in the intestines, in the colon, they're going to get stimulated. And even though only trace amounts of secoiridoids like amarogentin from gentian actually make it into the bloodstream, they may be enough to impact all those bitter taste receptors in the heart and help the heart regulate where the blood has to go after a big rich meal. So that just to me blows my mind and it blows my mind in a way that's like, why is nobody looking at this for therapeutic purposes anyway?

Sebastian: I mean, maybe it's inherent within certain aspects of herbalism anyway, because certain herbs maybe like leonoras cardiac, you know, mother war has already got, bitter nature. And in Chinese medicine, the bitter taste goes to the heart. That's its specific location for reducing heart fire, or a certain type of agitated neurological, emotional state.

Guido Masé: The cooling.

Sebastian: Cooling. We haven't really mentioned the energetics very much. I know we're really in the sort of biomedical land, but of course bitters are cooling and drying and considered to be descending by light of the way. We've been sort of exploring this myth in a way that bitters are for cleansing and detoxifying. But if you adjust the dose and you're using maybe smaller amounts, you can get this literally toning and tonic effect on tissues. But you also get a nourishing effect in the sense that you can get better nutrition into the body, better coordination between your hormonal, endocrine system. So I think this dose thing is crucial, isn't it? And it'd be good to explore or just be aware if anyone listening, of what guido is saying, that there are literally our drop doses can be effective for some of these more stimulating tonic effects, should we say early on. And then the more cleansing perhaps happens at a higher dose.

Guido Masé: Yeah, at the higher doses, I tend to see a couple of things. And again, for people who are quote, bitter, naive, you want to be careful with those high doses right away. they can be very stimulating, they can be off putting. so often just starting with five drops so you can taste it on the tongue is a great way to go, particularly with the stronger tear bitters. Right. Goldenseal. Chinchona. Quinine. Peruvian bark, genshin. Wormwood. as you get into the gentler bitters, like dandelion, which is often a great place to start, you have a little bit more flexibility in doses. And going up to two to three millilitres of a tincture or brewing up a roasted dandelion and chicory root tea, is a fine way to start. But again, it's because it's milder, right? So it's overall like how intensely bitter are they? Now an example, first of all, detoxification, most of the time, if people are experiencing gastrointestinal distress, I want to get away from the idea that there's, like, dirtiness or toxicity that's at the root of that. maybe partially because I was raised Catholic and this idea of original sin never fit well with me. I don't believe human beings are inherently dirty. I think our bodies are incredible in the ability they have to sort of process all the stuff that we engage with on a daily basis. that said, people experience gastrointestinal distress, but what you said, sebastian, the, like, the coordination of secretion, motility and hormonal effects, and the chemical breakdown of food that comes from that coordinated activity, as opposed to the fermentation of food and the production of bacterial endotoxin that is secondary to that which irritates the gut, damages the gut lining, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That, I think, is more at the root of how bitters can really help, rather than, like, cleaning you out of stuff that is toxic. Now, if we're talking about, hepatic toxicity from pharmaceutical consumption or toxic exposure, that is for real, working with folks, early on in clinical practise, for example, were cleaning chemistry labs at university and not really taking good care of their exposure and developing hepatic inflammation as a result. We know that the liver experiences inflammation even from a night of binge drinking, and that it takes a while for hepatic function to recover. So in those cases, bitters can truly be an ally by stimulating

Guido Masé: both the production of bile, the process of, coloresis, and then also the secretion or ejection of bile from the liver in the gallsac, the cholagogue effect that is, associated with. But you can, in certain cases, particularly if people's gall sacs already have an issue, if there's gallstones or sluggishness or sludge there, going in with full dose bidders right away, can actually cause distress. And it's one of the places you have to be really careful if there is sort of pre existing gallbladder disease. because, again, squeezing that sac, filling it with more fluid, especially if there's sludge at a much too high of a dose too soon, in worst case scenario, could cause rupture in, you know, more often than not, can cause distress as there's sort of backup of bile through the common bile duct and, potentially aggravation of a gallbladder crisis. So it's important to be careful for folks who are experiencing liver gallbladder disease. but that said, if you rule things out and you want to support hepatic function and stimulate regeneration. You can couple, things like silymarin for milk thistle, with, which is in and of itself a mild bitter right away, with good standard digestive bitters like gentian, wormwood, angelica, dandelion or even one of my favourites at low doses, celandine cheladonium, because of its antispasmodic alkaloids and its bitter quality, it's a great sort of, supportive herb for managed gallstone disease or for someone who has clinical experience under supervision.

Sebastian: Yes, actually it's actually restricted herb in the UK, pterodonium to herbalist only to certain doses because of this strong impact on the gallbladder you're talking about. And thank you for bringing up those contraindications because even turmeric actually is contraindicated in gallbladder disease at initial stages, isn't it? So just a little call out to everybody listening. Wonderful that they are the bitters. And we've really been eulogising about some of their brilliant qualities. There are restrictions whilst we're on contraindications. Where else should we be careful with bitters, do you think?

Guido Masé: Well, like we were saying earlier, if people have, gastrointestinal issues that are related to hydrochloric acid production, for example, erosive esophagitis or really persistent intense reflux disease, or peptic or duodenal ulcers, you want to be careful with bitters at first. They're probably going to be part of a long term solution for that person, but not as the first line, maybe in tiny, tiny doses, but more soothing and repairing first. Now there's some exceptions, particularly because in duodenal and peptic ulceration, bacterial overgrowth, heliobacter, has been implicated with this, the particular berberine rich barberry, Oregon grape root. Even goldenseal herbs can have an application there. but they should be coupled with soothing herbs that, like licorice for example, if, it's appropriate, coat and soothe and improve mucus production and modulate acid production along with those, bitter herbs. And finally, particularly the pure bitters like gentian or goldenseal, organ grape, berberine rich bitters. You probably don't want to take them by themselves, especially for extended periods of time. One of the things I've seen is because they slow things down in the gastric phase of digestion. They can actually lead to stagnation like you're overcooling and over drying that situation. And some folks can complain that food just feels like it gets stuck there and isn't moving along enough. Bitters often help with bowel regulation and function, but they do slow things down up here. And so that's almost always why in traditional Chinese medicine, as well as in the European tradition, bitters are blended with warming herbs to countervail or counterbalance their somewhat cooling, energetic qualities. And the more bitter an herb, the more important this is. So with gentian, you're really going to want to add some ginger and some fennel and some warmth. Right. to that. And that really helps relax things where the bitter contracts. And so that combination seems to work really well for long term use. There are certain bitters, like Angelica and elecampane, that sort of have that warmth already built into them. And those can be taken just by themselves. they're almost a bitter formula all in one. and then there's other aromatics, like wormwood, that have a lot of that sort of aromatic quality where the warming ingredient is not quite as important as it would be with gentian. so I'd say beyond that, minding, ulceration, heartburn, reflux, minding liver and gallbladder disease, particularly gallstones, with the added wrinkle that if someone's gallbladder has been removed, bitters can actually be incredibly helpful, taken before fat containing meals to actually get enough bile produced. Right, because they're missing the sack.

Sebastian: Well, they're normally on, ox bile anyway, aren't they? But, yeah, you can

Sebastian: always, always add to that.

Guido Masé: And Sebastian, I'm glad you bring up ox bile because for Pete's sake, you're like, okay, the body requires more bile. I'm going to take it from an animal and put it into the body. the body requires more enzymes to break the food down. I'm going to take them from modified fungi or from animals and put them in the body. Okay, I get that. And in the short term, that might be important, but I would much rather help the body stand on its own, using a bitter tonic that improves physiologic function and that is less needed over time than attempting to provide an exogenous source of what the body is able to produce on its own. So this just goes back to this idea for me of herbal tonification and how it really, is a different way of doing medicine.

Sebastian: Yeah, I mean, you painted a beautiful picture for us. You really have. Where we've explored using bitters at different stages of life, you know, different range of dose for different lengths of time. There's a little bit of seasonal adjustment perhaps, where perhaps when it's really cold outside, you might not, and dry, you might not use them so much, but they really feel like a fundamental part of our life, really, that we seem to have excluded from lots of our diet. And maybe there's a mirror there. As the, you know, as the sweeter foods become, the further away from some of our natural habits, we've also become. and so it just feels like there's a very affordable, accessible solution to many of the daily digestive issues that people might have from being, you know, stressed or eating the wrong foods because they're out and about and can't get what they need. But also to address some of the really serious long term pathologies that people are ending up with when they end up eating our modern diet. And it looks like you really researched and clinically experienced how we can bring this into the treatments so that, that can then deliver a longer term result for people. And you've mentioned lots of the great herbs we have in our pharmacopeia. I mean, in a way, we're still talking about sustainable health, aren't we? How can people sustain their health? And a couple of the herbs, I just want to bring it up, we've mentioned, have got sustainability issues. So if you do use them, make sure they've come from a cultivated source like hydrastis, for example, goldenseal is one of them, probably, ah, quinine. Some of these other herbs that are more difficult, when they're barks or got a long growing cycle, just check the source. All the herbs you use, you should check the source, whatever it is. Actually, Guido, I know you've worked with urban moonshine. It was set up by jovial, who has a wonderful company doing aromatic bitter digestives. And I know you work at traditional medicinals as well, and so your knowledge is extensive. And I really enjoyed our conversation. I'm just wondering to wrap up because we could go on for much longer. If there's something else you'd like to share? Anything you'd like to add, to share with our listeners?

Guido Masé: Well, there's so much more we could have touched on. For example, there's all sorts of bitter taste receptors, as you mentioned, in our airways. Why the heck are they in our airways? There's bitter taste receptor analogues throughout the animal kingdom, in insects, even bacteria have these chemosensory cells. So I think what we've seen in the airways, for example, is that when they're stimulated, they're stimulated by bacterial quorum sensing molecules whose structure is chemically similar to the molecules that are secreted by dandelion roots to sort of attract and modulate mycorrhizae and bacterial microenvironment around their roots. Okay? So when bitter compounds are secreted by bacteria in our airways, our body activates innate immune responses and secretes these defenses to help address that infection. So they're being researched for chronic sinusitis, they're being researched for the chronic infections associated with cystic fibrosis. Right? So overall, these bitter taste receptors that we carry, which are echoes of very ancient chemosensory apparatus that are present on, bacteria and throughout the animal kingdom, are there to help engage protective responses that modulate our interface with the world around us, particularly the food we eat and the air we breathe. In the context of bacteria that might be present by re engaging with these bitter plants, don't think of it as taking medicine. Think of it as restoring the healthy operational context, not just for yourself in the short term and you experience all these benefits from it, but multigenerational, Sebastian. Because if we're seeing diabetes and obesity increase in this country and in this world, it's not just because of the overconsumption of sugar, as you pointed out. It's also because we really have dialed back on the presence of these bitter compounds, which would have been included in every meal even up to a couple hundred years ago, just by the nature

Guido Masé: of vegetables. Right? So let's restore the operating context. That's what herbalists do best. We help the physiology work in concert with the ecology. And the ecology has our back. And bitter compounds are a great entryway and bitter herbs are a delicious cultural entryway for being able to put that into your life in a really meaningful and clinically relevant.

Sebastian: Thank you. Well, I hope everybody listening is inspired to take their bitters because, Guido, you've laid out many good reasons why we should include them, and not just on a physical level, but it feels like on a more symbiotic level, a way of us engaging with some of the beauty, wonder and majesty of nature. We can do that through a little tasty drop of bitters. So thank you so much for your time.

Guido Masé: My pleasure.

Sebastian: And so if any of you haven't, read Guido's article on herbal reality, he's written a great article on bitter herbs and he's also written a fantastic book called the Wild Medicine. Solution, and so you could check that out. All right, thanks, everyone. Take care. Great to be with you.

Sebastian: You've been listening to the herb cast, the podcast from herbal reality. We hope you enjoyed this episode. If so, perhaps you'd like to leave us a rating that'd really help us to spread our message for herbal health. We hope you'll join us again for the next episode. And in the meantime, if you'd like a few more herbal insights from us, do have a look@herbalreality.com. or learn more from us via Instagram, where we're at herbal reality, and we're on Twitter and Facebook, too. We'll be back with another episode of the Herb Car soon.

Sebastian: Thanks for joining.