The Peter Attia Drive - September 15, 2025


#364 – AMA #75： Diets： how to evaluate and implement any diet including keto, carnivore, vegan, Mediterranean, and more


Episode Stats

Length

13 minutes

Words per Minute

174.87183

Word Count

2,342

Sentence Count

138

Misogynist Sentences

3

Hate Speech Sentences

1


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hey everyone, welcome to a sneak peek, ask me anything or AMA episode of the drive podcast.
00:00:15.820 I'm your host, Peter Atiyah. At the end of this short episode, I'll explain how you can access
00:00:20.280 the AMA episodes in full, along with a ton of other membership benefits we've created,
00:00:24.900 or you can learn more now by going to peteratiyahmd.com forward slash subscribe.
00:00:30.600 So without further delay, here's today's sneak peek of the ask me anything episode.
00:00:38.880 Welcome to ask me anything AMA episode 75. In today's AMA, we're taking a closer look at how
00:00:46.640 to choose a diet for yourself rather than which diet is the best of them all. I start by laying
00:00:52.320 out the five non-negotiables every sustainable eating pattern must hit. Energy balance, metabolic
00:00:58.700 health, adequacy of protein, micronutrient sufficiency, and long-term adherence. From there,
00:01:05.580 we introduce a simple rubric. First, define the diet's rules, then pinpoint its strengths and
00:01:11.240 ideal users, and finally surface the potential pitfalls so you can make corrections when necessary.
00:01:16.360 With that framework, I walk through the four diets you asked about most, ketogenic, carnivore,
00:01:23.680 vegan, and Mediterranean, to show how to apply the framework. We discuss why I'm aiming this episode
00:01:29.680 at the majority of people who feel confused, not the diet zealots, so everyone has a common sense
00:01:35.220 roadmap. A deep dive into each of the five non-negotiables for any diet and how missing
00:01:40.400 even one can sink long-term results. Applying the define strengths, weaknesses rubric to keto,
00:01:47.660 carnivore, vegan, and Mediterranean diets, highlighting metabolic effects, micronutrient
00:01:52.000 gaps, and adherence hurdles. Practical ways to track progress, DEXA scans, important lab metrics like
00:01:58.280 fasting insulin, hemoglobin A1c, CGMs, and simple symptoms to log, so you know whether a diet is
00:02:04.700 actually working. Why there's no single perfect diet, and instead the best diet meets those five
00:02:10.320 core needs and your current goals, and how to iterate as life changes. If you're a subscriber
00:02:15.760 and you want to watch the full video of this podcast, you can find it on the show notes page,
00:02:19.800 and if you're not a subscriber, you can watch the sneak peek of this video on our YouTube page.
00:02:24.600 So, without further delay, I hope you enjoy AMA 75.
00:02:33.600 Peter, welcome to another Ask Me Anything. How are you feeling?
00:02:38.600 I'm honored to be back. Thank you for having me.
00:02:40.820 Do you ever think about just sleeping in the podcast studio so you can just be ready
00:02:45.400 at any given moment if we need you to record something?
00:02:48.740 I think there are times when my wife would like that.
00:02:51.160 We should just, on the other side of the table in the studio, just put a tent,
00:02:55.260 and every now and then you and the boys just camp in the studio.
00:02:58.740 Could work. That could work.
00:03:00.480 All right.
00:03:01.060 Speaking of the boys, quick chess update. We had a little chess tournament,
00:03:04.220 in-house chess tournament this weekend. I made it to the finals with the youngest,
00:03:08.500 my youngest boy, and I was playing kind of a bananas game, kind of playing lights out chess.
00:03:15.980 And this is the one that loves to trash talk, so it was awesome. And then I made this idiotic
00:03:22.880 blunder, and in a second, the game changed. And five moves later, it's checkmate against me.
00:03:30.800 And I was like, God, this is why I love and hate this game so much.
00:03:34.700 I do love that you started this by bragging about making it to the finals of an in-house chess
00:03:39.900 tournament, which composed of three people.
00:03:42.400 No, no, no. There were a few others. There were some other people in the tournament.
00:03:45.600 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:03:46.080 I thought it was you and the two boys, both under 11. And I was like, it's kind of audacious to
00:03:52.580 brag about making it to the finals of a three-person chess tournament, two of which can't even drive
00:03:57.740 yet. But okay. That's good to hear there was more people involved. The bigger question is,
00:04:03.320 when you lost that game, did any pieces go flying through the air?
00:04:07.620 It happened one time, Nick. One time. I'll never live it down.
00:04:11.120 One time during this chess tournament?
00:04:12.520 No, no, no. It only happened that one time. I am not a chess piece thrower, ordinarily.
00:04:18.340 That's because Mama Atiyah put her foot down.
00:04:20.440 That's true.
00:04:21.240 Have you gotten Jill to start playing chess yet?
00:04:23.720 Zero chance Jill will ever play chess.
00:04:26.280 I don't know. Never say never. You sometimes do things that you said you never were going to do
00:04:33.280 in the past. So you kind of never know. I mean, much like this AMA, which is all on not only your
00:04:40.740 favorite meta topic, but your favorite micro topic. Not only is this nutrition focused, but it's diet
00:04:48.660 specific focused, which anyone who's listened to this for a while knows maybe not your favorite
00:04:55.320 topic to cover, but I think it's going to be really good. Here's why. We get a ton of question
00:05:00.980 on diets. And I think it's because there's so much information in the ether on diets. And so
00:05:05.980 what we did is we gathered those questions. We went to the audience, asked for questions,
00:05:11.160 combined them all, organized them, and we're going to structure them in this way.
00:05:14.500 The goal here is to not be a nutrition AMA, which we've done before, which we can link.
00:05:19.560 It's much more to focus on diets and to do it in a way that doesn't really talk about everyone
00:05:26.120 should follow this diet or this diet or this diet, and not to kind of join the tribal battles that
00:05:32.720 people see, but instead really just take a pragmatic listen and really identify how can anyone listening
00:05:41.520 to this understand the pros, cons, how to think about diets, and put it into their own life.
00:05:48.340 In it, we want to give people a framework to evaluate a dietary approach, whether you follow
00:05:54.380 the same one now that you did years ago or you change in the future. To do that, we'll start by
00:05:59.880 laying out the five non-negotiables that you think any diet must address. So no matter if it's
00:06:05.420 vegan or carnivore, what are the approaches that they all should follow? And then we're going to
00:06:10.720 evaluate each diet through a framework, which is what are the core requirements for that diet to
00:06:15.380 work? What are its strengths, including who is it best suited for? Because oftentimes we've talked
00:06:21.480 is sometimes there's going to be different diets that are better for different people. So what is
00:06:25.800 that and why is that? And then we'll look at its weaknesses, which is if someone's going to follow
00:06:30.920 a diet, what are some of the pitfalls and how can they be addressed and how can they avoid those?
00:06:36.040 And then with that framework, we'll cover four of the diets that are asked about us the most,
00:06:41.820 seem to be talked about the most, and paint the broadest picture, which is keto, carnivore,
00:06:47.540 vegan, and Mediterranean. And we'll close with practical takeaways. So we got a lot of diet
00:06:54.820 talk today. Anything you want to add before we roll into it?
00:06:59.880 I think that's a good setup. I'll add two unrelated comments. The first is, yeah, you pointed out how
00:07:05.160 much I just generally don't enjoy this subject matter. And the reason for it is it tends to
00:07:10.400 very quickly degrade into tribal religious discussions, as opposed to scientific discussions.
00:07:18.460 And there tends to be almost a morality that comes out of this, which I just frankly don't think belongs
00:07:23.480 in the space. But at the convincing of many listeners and our team have reluctantly decided
00:07:30.440 that it's worth doing. And I think that sort of feeds into the second point, which is, I came into
00:07:35.080 this kicking and screaming, not wanting to do it. But I think Josh Roche on our team did a great job of
00:07:42.080 pointing out, Peter, you're not doing this for the extremes. You're not doing this for the extremists
00:07:51.280 in each of these camps. You're not doing this for someone who is so hardcore in a dietary camp
00:07:57.220 that they believe that their diet is the one true diet. And anyone who doesn't eat that way is an
00:08:03.120 awful human being. And like, you're not trying to talk that person off that perch. You're doing this
00:08:08.000 for frankly, the 87% of people who are confused, who are in the middle, who don't quite know what to do,
00:08:16.060 who have tried this and they're not sure if it makes sense.
00:08:18.820 I think that was a very helpful framing for me because it's very easy for me to focus on the
00:08:23.520 fanatics and the fanatics across all lenses really turn me off. But as long as I just keep in my mind
00:08:29.980 that I'm not talking to those people, I'm here for virtually everybody else, which fortunately is
00:08:34.620 the majority of people who just kind of want some common sense frameworks for how to evaluate
00:08:40.300 these dietary strategies. So with that said, I feel a little bit better about it.
00:08:44.440 That's great. I imagine you'd feel even better if you won that in-house chess tournament, but
00:08:48.040 it's probably always good to have a chip on your shoulder.
00:08:50.240 Don't think we're not having a rematch and don't think I am not going to put a world of hurt on
00:08:55.820 that little seven-year-old. In chess, just to clarify.
00:09:02.080 By the way, he spent the rest of the weekend walking around the house telling everybody how he
00:09:07.580 smoked my bags. I mean, you couldn't help but laugh.
00:09:11.340 You have to, especially because it sounds like he did.
00:09:13.840 He did.
00:09:14.160 Sounds like he just put you in his pocket.
00:09:16.620 Just. Yep. We could talk about that all day.
00:09:20.240 We'll save that for the seven-year-old roundtable we still need to set up.
00:09:23.820 All right. So maybe before we start, we've kind of mentioned quickly, we did a nutrition AMA
00:09:29.140 somewhat recently. We'll link to it. Do you just kind of want to walk through how you think about
00:09:34.440 nutrition and diets a little differently?
00:09:37.180 Yeah. So the nutrition AMA, which was released, I think it was December of last year,
00:09:42.620 it covered the big picture questions. Is there a best diet? How does nutrition compare to exercise
00:09:47.660 for health outcomes? How much protein do you actually need for maintenance versus muscle growth?
00:09:53.780 But it didn't really delve into, I think, the way most people think about it, which is individual
00:09:59.280 dietary approaches. Now, in the past, I've said, look, people should pick a diet that they can stick
00:10:04.660 to and that meets a certain list of non-negotiable physiologic states and needs. But how to exactly
00:10:12.120 go about doing that? We haven't talked about that, frankly. And frankly, what should people watch out
00:10:17.340 for? How do you make a decision and know if it's the right choice for you?
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