Could You Eat the Way Tom and Gisele Do?

Korin Miller
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Tom and Gisele’s list of food restrictions is no joke. (Photo: Getty Images)

The personal chef of Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen just gave a revealing interview about the couple’s eating habits. And their dietary restrictions are no joke.

Allen Campbell, a Boston-based chef, tells Boston.com that the power couple are “really laid back” about what they eat, which is a diet that consists of 80 percent vegetables. However, there are restrictions on what he serves them, including:

  • No non-organic foods

  • No white sugar

  • No white flour

  • No cooked olive oil

  • No iodized salt, only Himalayan pink salt

  • No coffee or caffeine

  • No fungus

  • No dairy

  • No fruit (for Tom, who will only eat bananas in a smoothie)

  • No nightshades

Um…what? “[Tom] doesn’t eat nightshades, because they’re not anti-inflammatory,” Campbell says. “So no tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms, or eggplants.” Brady also avoids tomatoes because they “cause inflammation.”

If you’ve never heard of nightshades before, you’re not alone. Nightshades are a family of flowering plants that include agricultural crops, medicinal plants, spices, and weeds. Among the more popular nightshades that might show up in your diet: Peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, and eggplants.

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But those are typically considered healthy foods. Is it bad to eat them?

Not really, Gina Keatley, a certified dietitian-nutritionist practicing in New York City, tells Yahoo Health.

“Nightshade plants produce alkaloids, which are organic substances that contain nitrogen,” she explains. Some people avoid them because nightshades have a bitter taste to them and some naturopaths claim they may exacerbate arthritis, but Keatley says there’s no good reason not to eat them.

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“There are a lot of myths about dangers of nightshades causing arthritis, osteoporosis, migraines, etc.,” registered dietitian nutritionist Tara Gidus, author of “Flat Belly Cooking for Dummies,” tells Yahoo Health. “None of that has been proven to be true and accepted in the scientific community. “

Alkaloids have been rumored to damage joints by increasing inflammation, but registered dietitian-nutritionist Karen Ansel, co-author of The Calendar Diet: A Month by Month Guide to Losing Weight While Living Your Life says there isn’t any solid research to support this. “If someone does suspect that they are sensitive to nightshade foods, cooking them can reduce a food’s alkaloid content by roughly 40 to 50 percent,” she says.

Keatley points out that Brady and Bundchen are not the average person and are both looking for every edge possible. While she applauds the family’s decreased sugar intake and vegetable-rich diet, she calls their avoidance of nightshades “misguided.”

Ansel agrees that there’s no reason to avoid nightshades, but points out that everyone has different reactions to foods. If you notice a reaction after eating nightshades, you may want to see if you feel better by avoiding them.

As for the tomato/inflammation claim, Keatley says tomatoes can cause inflammation in some people similar to the way a peanut allergy works. However, she says they may actually reduce chronic inflammation in others.

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But what about not cooking with olive oil? “The idea behind not cooking olive oil is that once it gets too hot, it becomes rancid and this is harmful to your body,” Keatley says. “However, studies have shown that even at very high heat (frying) the antioxidants available in the olive oil outweigh the free radicals produced.” If you eat it with other vegetables high in antioxidants, Keatley says there’s “nothing to worry about.”

Bottom line: To maintain a healthy diet, limit your sugar intake and eat your fruits and vegetables — including nightshades.

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