Gut Restoration: Cooking, Digestion, and Healing

Most weeks I write about the mental and emotional side of healing, because those are the areas many of us feel and notice most immediately. Yet our health is not one-dimensional. The mind and body are in constant conversation. What affects digestion shapes mood, and what affects mood shapes digestion.

This week I want to turn toward the physical, and share about cooking, digestion, and gut healing not as a separate topic, but as part of the same bi-directional influence that runs through every part of our lives.

Gut Restoration: Cooking, Digestion, and Healing

We are beginning gut restoration now because timing matters. When you start something new, the amount of information can easily feel overwhelming. Overwhelm is one of the fastest ways to shut down the change process. That is why we first worked on preparation and foundations, and only now are we layering in gut restoration.

At this stage we are looking closely at how we cook and prepare our foods so they become the most nourishing, digestible, and healing versions possible. This is not only about reducing symptoms. It is also about supporting your body and mind to thrive.

Cooked vs. Raw Foods

Cooked foods are, in many cases, more nourishing than raw foods. Cooking helps pre-digest the food. It unwinds proteins, breaks open cells, and increases bioavailability of vitamins, minerals, and macronutrients. Your body can then extract more of what it needs with less effort.

Slow-cooked meats are an excellent example. Stewing or using a slow cooker allows proteins to denature and nutrients to become more available. From an evolutionary perspective, cooking food is one of the practices that allowed humans to grow larger brains. By making food easier to digest, cooking freed up energy and nutrients that fueled human development.

Raw foods can be nutrient dense, but bioavailability matters. If your digestive system cannot access those nutrients, then the numbers on paper do not translate into nourishment in your cells. Think of ruminant animals like cows. They have specialized stomach compartments to break down cellulose in grass. We do not.

The Body and Its Environment

Most dysfunction in the body can be traced to a simple truth: there is a mismatch between our physiology and the environment we live in. We were not designed for late nights, screens, high stress, and constant busyness. These modern conditions create stress states that impair digestion.

Stress is one of the main reasons hydrochloric acid (HCl) production drops. Without enough stomach acid, food is not broken down properly. That means fewer nutrients are absorbed, which in turn makes it harder to produce the very stomach acid you need. Enzyme production drops as well, further weakening digestion. It is not a simple chicken-or-egg problem. Both sides feed the cycle.

Eating Like a Baby

When we feed infants, we stew, mash, and blend foods to make them easier to digest. Babies have high nourishment needs and limited digestive capacity. The same approach applies when restoring gut health as adults. Chopping, blending, stewing, and fermenting foods all make nutrients more accessible and less irritating to an inflamed digestive tract.

Imagine your gut like a small cut on your arm. When it is inflamed, it is sensitive. Scraping it with a wire brush would be painful. Raw, insoluble-fiber-heavy vegetables can act like that brush, further irritating the gut. Cooking and pairing them with soothing soluble fibers from starchy vegetables transforms the experience from irritation into nourishment.

Soluble vs. Insoluble Fiber

Non-starchy vegetables are high in insoluble fiber, which can cleanse but also irritate. Too much insoluble fiber may bind minerals, preventing absorption, and can aggravate an already inflamed digestive tract.

Starchy vegetables, on the other hand, contain soluble fiber, which is cooling and soothing for the gut. They also provide resistant starch, which your body cannot digest but your beneficial bacteria can. These bacteria ferment resistant starch into short-chain fatty acids like butyrate, one of the most powerful natural anti-inflammatories we know of. Butyrate supports the gut lining, lowers systemic inflammation, and even helps balance blood sugar and metabolism.

Cooking and cooling starches in the fridge for 24 hours increases resistant starch content. Reheating is fine as long as the food is kept under about 120 degrees Fahrenheit. This simple step allows you to create meals that not only feed you but also feed the microbiota that live with you and support your health.

The Gut and Neurotransmitters

Healing your gut also means supporting your mental and emotional state. Around 95 percent of serotonin, a neurotransmitter central to mood and resilience, is stored in the gut. GABA, another neurotransmitter tied to calmness and anxiety regulation, is also influenced by gut health.

When digestion is weak and the gut is inflamed, neurotransmitters are disrupted. That disruption can show up as depression, anxiety, fear, shame, and difficulty with change. By restoring your gut, you also create the possibility of more emotional stability, more courage, and more capacity to meet life with clarity.

Bringing It Together

Gut restoration is not about chasing trends or extremes. It is about aligning with how your body truly digests and absorbs nourishment. Cooking food, eating like a baby, focusing on soothing fibers, and feeding your microbiota with resistant starch are all ways of working with your physiology instead of against it.

As you move into this phase, notice not only what changes in your digestion, but also what shifts in your mood, your energy, and your ability to meet life. Healing is never linear. It is a weaving together of body, mind, and environment.

Jator 👽

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