Make Any Meal 10x More Nutritious

Dr. Eric Berg DC| 00:09:04|Mar 7, 2026
Chapters4
The video outlines 27 strategies to make meals more nutrient-dense, starting with tips like using high-quality extra virgin olive oil to improve fat-soluble vitamin absorption and pairing olive oil with foods, plus adding black pepper to boost turmeric absorption.

Dr. Berg reveals 27 practical tweaks—from olive oil boosts and black pepper with turmeric to mindful eating habits—that massively lift meal nutrition and absorption.

Summary

Dr. Eric Berg DC breaks down a concrete, no-nonsense playbook to make any meal 10x more nutritious. He walks through 27 strategies, starting with extra-virgin olive oil on salads to maximize fat-soluble vitamin absorption, and warns to seek real olive oil free of soy or canola adulteration. He emphasizes black pepper’s ability to boost curcumin absorption and explains why beets and arugula differ in boosting nitric oxide. Cabbage and sauerkraut highlight unique vitamins, including sulforaphane and vitamin K2 produced by microbes. Apple cider vinegar is pitched for better digestion and mineral absorption, while sea salt at night covers multiple trace minerals. Shellfish, broccoli with mustard, baby broccoli sprouts, and EGCG in green tea are covered for their synergistic nutrient effects. Berg also covers practical tips like soaking nuts, choosing grass-fed meat, starting with a protein-rich breakfast, and pairing fat-rich foods (olive oil, eggs, avocado) to enhance polyphenol absorption. He adds lifestyle hacks (a post-meal walk) and cautions about grilling with herbs like thyme or rosemary to counter carcinogens. The list closes with collagen sources, omega-3 emphasis, raw cheese quality, secret weapon of nutritional yeast, and the power of cooked tomatoes and onions, while recommending avoiding refined sugar and starches. The overall message is clear: combine nutrient-dense ingredients with mindful preparation and timing to dramatically improve daily nutrition.

Key Takeaways

  • Use extra-virgin olive oil on salads to help extract fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E, K1, and K2, and choose authentic oils free from soy or canola adulteration.
  • Add black pepper when using turmeric or curry to boost curcumin absorption dramatically (up to ~2000%).
  • Beets are rich in nitrates but arugula contains three times more nitric oxide precursors; combining arugula with olive oil enhances vascular benefits.
  • Sauerkraut boosts vitamin K2 production via microbes, helping keep calcium in bones and out of soft tissues.
  • Apple cider vinegar with water before meals acidifies the stomach, aids protein digestion, and improves mineral absorption; sip through a straw to protect teeth.
  • Sea salt at night provides 84 trace minerals beyond sodium chloride, supporting sleep and overall mineral balance.
  • Shellfish are dense in zinc, selenium, and iodine—valuable trace minerals hard to obtain from other foods; aim for at least weekly consumption.

Who Is This For?

Essential viewing for health-conscious readers and home cooks who want practical, evidence-informed tweaks to meals—especially those curious about nutrient absorption, gut health, and anti-inflammatory eating.

Notable Quotes

"“Extravirgin olive oil is one of the better fats to use because it's going to help you extract fats soluble vitamins.”"
Dr. Berg explains the vitamin-absorption benefit of olive oil.
"“If you add black pepper, you increase the absorption by 2,000%.”"
Boosting turmeric/curcumin absorption with pepper.
"“Beets have a lot of nitrates that turn into nitric oxide, but arugula has three times the amount.”"
Comparison of nitrate sources for nitric oxide.
"“Sauerkraut microbes make K2, which helps keep calcium in your bones.”"
Vitamin K2 role from fermented cabbage.
"“Crush garlic, wait 10 minutes, then eat it to 10x or 15x the effectiveness of alliinin.”"
Maximizing alliin/allyl sulfur compounds in garlic.

Questions This Video Answers

  • How can I maximize nutrient absorption from salads?
  • What are the best foods to boost nitric oxide naturally?
  • Is sauerkraut or kimchi better for vitamin K2 and gut health?
  • What are practical tips to increase collagen intake besides bone broth?
  • Which cooking oils enhance nutrient uptake in vegetables?
Olive oilTurmeric and black pepperNitric oxide and beets vs arugulaCabbage and sulforaphaneSauerkraut and vitamin K2Apple cider vinegarSea salt and trace mineralsShellfish nutrientsBroccoli with mustard and sulforaphaneEGCG and lemon in green tea|nutrition hacks
Full Transcript
Today, we're going to show you how to make any meal 10x more nutritious. I'm going to show you 27 different ways that make your food more nutrientdense. Let's start with number one, combining extra virgin olive oil with your salad. Extravirgin olive oil is one of the better fats to use because it's going to help you extract fats soluble vitamins, too, like vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin E, vitamin K1, vitamin K2. really make sure you're getting the real olive oil because a lot of times it's corrupted with added soy oil or canola oil. When you consume this extra-virgin olive oil, you should feel a little kind of a burning itching thing in the back of the throat. Number two, adding black pepper to various things, especially turmeric. Let's say for example, you're you're making a meal with curry or you're making a meal with eggs and you add turmeric. Unfortunately, turmeric doesn't release a lot of its active compound, curcumin, but when you add black pepper, you increase the absorption by 2,000%. Next one has to do with nitric oxide. This is involved with keeping your blood pressure low. Nitric oxide also helps you increase blood flow through your brain. Beets have a lot of nitrates that turn into nitric oxide. But if we compare beets to arugula, arugula has three times the amount of nitric oxide to be. In order to bring up the nitric oxide in beets, you'd have to consume it in a beet juice powder form. One thing that I do several times a week is I have an arugula salad with extra virgin olive oil. So, I get that extra benefit of nitric oxide as well. Number four, cabbage. The reason I'm bringing up cabbage is because cabbage has this very unique vitamin called vitamin U, which has to do with its ability and its quality of improving ulcers both in the small intestine and the stomach. By eating cabbage, you get this extra sulurophane that helps you in many different ways, including helping you detoxify your liver. If we roll into number five and we consume fermented cabbage as sauerkraut, we get some really cool enhancements. vitamin K2 because the microbes in the sauerkraut make K2. Vitamin K2 helps keep calcium in your bones and out of the soft tissues like your joints and your arteries. Number six, apple cider vinegar with water. You just take a teaspoon of it and a glass of water, maybe add some lemon right before you eat food. What is that going to do? It's going to acidify the stomach and allow you to break down protein better and also help you absorb minerals as well as kill microbes. Many people don't have enough acid. Adding some apple cider vinegar and you can drink it with a straw so it doesn't get in your teeth can greatly help your digestion. Number seven, sea salt in the evening before bed. It will help you sleep. And a lot of people just don't consume enough salt, but you don't want to just have regular table salt. You want to have sea salt. That way you get additional 84 different trace minerals and you also get the sodium chloride. Number eight is shellfish. The trace minerals are what most people are missing, especially zinc, selenium, iodine. Shellfish will give you those key nutrients because it's really hard to get those trace minerals with any other food. You don't need to have it very often, but at least once a week. Number nine, if you consume broccoli, add a little mustard to it. There's a certain enzyme that interacts with something in broccoli to allow the enhancement of something called sulfurophane. This key nutrient that helps a lot of things, decreasing symptoms from Alzheimer's, also decreasing symptoms from autism. And the list goes on and on and on. If you actually instead of the broccoli had baby broccoli and baby broccoli sprouts, now we're really going to magnify that by a factor of 10 to 30 times more. Number 10 compound in green tea called EGCG. People take it to help them lose weight. People take it to prevent cancer. It literally does so many things in the body, but you can enhance EGCG by adding some lemon by an enhancement factor of 80%. You can do lemon juice or just a little squeeze of a lemon. So, a lot of people ask me, "What supplements do I recommend?" Now, of course, I'm not biased of my own high quality supplement line, but if you go to Amazon and type Dr. Ber supplements, you'll find more information. Number 11, consuming your vegetables with added butter because the fat will help actually extract some of the phytonutrients, but also there's fat in eggs, right? The egg yolk. Let's say you had an avocado with egg. Perfect combination because the fat will allow you to absorb all the wonderful polyphenols in that avocado. Number 12 is dark chocolate. But there's something in dark chocolate that your microbes love. And if you take care of your microbes, they'll take care of you. Also, dark chocolate can increase nitric oxide, that thing that's good for the inside of the arteries to help lower your blood pressure. Number 13 is consuming the bitter vegetables first. Because when you eat something bitter like arugula, that actually increases the digestive juices, not just the enzymes, but the bile from your liver. Dandelion greens, Swiss chard, you have kale, have a bitter component to it. Number 14 is not something you eat. It's just something you do. I wanted to add it in there because it's very important. Go for a walk after you eat. This way you burn off any sugar that you ate and basically it doesn't have a chance to convert to fat. Number 15, garlic. And garlic is very potent anti-cancer because of this compound called allisonin. This allisonin is only activated when you crush it. So what I recommend you do is you crush the garlic, wait 10 minutes, then eat the garlic. 10xing or 15xing the effectiveness of allisonin in that garlic. Number 16, cooking steak or hamburgers on the grill. There is a component of that that could be carcinogenic. One really good antidote to both of those situations is to add thyme or rosemary, sage, or garlic to your meat when you cook it. Number 17 has to do with nuts. If you're consuming walnuts, for example, or other nuts, realize if they're raw, they have enzyme inhibitors that can then prevent you from absorbing some of the nutrition in those nuts. What you can do is you can soak the nuts in water overnight, dry them out in the oven or a dehydrator, and greatly enhance the digestibility of that nut and the nutrients in that nut as well. Number 18, animal protein. Grass-fed meat is so so much better than tofu. Number 19, a protein breakfast. If you're going to consume any breakfast at all, your brain is going to work a lot better and you're going to crave less foods and you're not going to be tired after you eat. Don't do the carbs. Number 20, low carb with intermittent fasting. If I could do any of these, it would be that to produce the biggest bang for my health. 21 has to do with collagen. To get your collagen, you have bone broth. Consume the skin on the fish or the chicken. You can take a collagen powder, but you'd be surprised on how difficult it is to get enough collagen. And collagen makes up all the ligaments, tendons, fashcia, the skin. Number 22, omega-3 fatty acids. Another big problem that most people have is they're very heavy on the omega-6 fats, which are inflammatory. You need to add more omega-3 fat. That's consuming sardines, cod liver, cod liver oil, fatty fish like salmon. 23 has to do with the quality of cheese that you eat. American cheese. Just do not consume that. Get your cheese raw. You're getting a really high quality source of calcium that you can't get from anything else. Number 24 has to do with your salad. I shred some cheese on my salad and then I put some nutritional yeast in the salad because it's loaded with B vitamins. For a lot of people who are under anxiety, stress, worry, nervous tension, when they consume B vitamins, especially B1, they can breathe. They just feel calmer. Number 25 has to do with tomatoes. If you can consume some cooked tomatoes, you spike the phytonutrient lycopine, which is good for the prostate. It's good for vision. It's good as an anti-inflammatory. Number 26, onions. Onions are loaded with corsetin. Corsetin is an awesome anti-inflammatory. It's good for the cardiovascular system. It's good for your microbiome, and it's easy to put in most of your foods. And 27 is something you should avoid anything refined, especially refined sugar and refined starches because those two will suck out nutrients from your other food and your body. Now that you know about sugar and starches, there are other things that are way more dangerous to your health than those two. And for that information, watch this video right here.

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