The UK’s Channel 4 put out an entertaining series on Superfoods with Kate Quilton in 2015 – “Superfoods, the real story”.
Series two followed in 2016 and the third series is now running. It’s obviously proving to be a popular show.
The series aims to uncover the myths and often overblown claims about Superfoods, revealing which are actually scientifically good for us; as well as answering the often overlooked question -‘If I want to benefit from this, how much do I actually have to eat?’
Kate looks at the claims and realities of such foods and drinks as tomatoes, sweet potatoes, red wine, broccoli and quinoa, amongst many, many more. In series 3, she goes even further afield to India and Africa to look at weeds, turmeric and snail slime.
Good Science?
The programme is upbeat, with a good approach of investigating the science behind the claims. However, in order to make interesting TV viewing, the show opts for lots of quick experiments (mostly involving Kate and 1 or 2 other people) which often produce ‘staggering’ results. The problem with this, of course is that it encourages people to see such ‘anecdotal’ evidence as influential and sometimes conclusive.
Some of the biggest challenges of research are that many interventions are short-term and may have small sample sizes, thus making results inconclusive and certainly not scalable or applicable to other populations. Fortunately, researchers and scientists on the show often give the commonly inevitable – ‘more research is needed!’
Good findings
Kate does manage to expose some ridiculous claims though, including the supposed benefits of sticking buckwheat up your bum (yes, really and they charge a small fortune for it!) and eating grapefruit to lose weight.
For example, she discovers that whilst grapefruit does contain a substance, naringenin, that can help weight loss, you need to eat about 40 grapefruits (in one sitting) to get the benefit! Claims of the grapefruit weight loss diet instantly lose some weight!
Good fun
Overall, it’s a nice international look at food (yes, at times the show feels like a travel show) and it is more entertainment than anything else – but a good way into learning more about certain foods.
As a lover of languages, I love the interviews with people from around the world where everyone speaks their own language, and there is a slightly comical moment where Kate usually nods and pretends to understand the replies she is getting. Nice!
Fun approach to Superfoods, and some clear Yes’s and No’s for some of them, make it a show worth delving into.
The one caveat, as Harriet Hall suggests in her film reviews, is ‘viewers should not accept any claim in a movie without fact-checking it for themselves’. Totally agree – for me, this show is entertainment first, science second.
You can access most episodes of series 1 and 2 on Youtube, and just recently some episodes of series 3 have been added too;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8scqr5tKSXM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89YCEHWG5T0
If you live in the UK you can watch it all on Channel 4’s website;
http://www.channel4.com/programmes/superfoods-the-real-story/episode-guide/series-3