Why are people eating blue muffins?

Have you heard about the Blue Poop Challenge? Maybe you have seen people baking and eating blue muffins on social media. When I first heard about the BPC it made me cringe but not for the reason you may think.

As a Functional Nutritionist I am always asking clients about their bowel movements – what do they look like, how often do they occur, what shape and color are they? Seriously, I could talk about poop all day. A lot of good information is deposited into the toilet, and I encourage everyone to take a look before they flush. I can hear the collective “EEWWWW!” but hear me out.

Bowel movements should be regular and uneventful. They should lack urgency, be strain-free, have minimal odor, have a snake-like shape, be a moderate brown color, and do not require half a roll of toilet paper to tidy up after.

The objective of the BPC is to measure bowel transit time. Transit time is the length of time it takes for food you eat to move through the digestive tract and the leftover waste to be excreted from the body. Transit time provides some insight into the health of your microbiome. A good general guideline is for a transit time of around 24 hours.

If you are experiencing diarrhea, your transit time is too fast. A short transit time does not allow adequate time to extract the nutrients from the foods you eat.

If you tend toward constipation, your transit time is too slow. A longer transit time creates an opportunity for the toxins intended to be transported out of your body to be reabsorbed and recirculated.

Here’s the thing with the BPC, I think we can do better than the junky ingredients in the blue muffin recipe: wheat, corn (from the baking powder), sugar, vegetable oil, and blue food dye. These ingredients are highly processed and common sources of food sensitivities. Don’t get me wrong, I completely support checking in with your transit time and suggest trying this alternate option:

Are you ready to test your transit time? Do it! Think of it as a science experiment. Your body is sending you a message with every trip to the loo. Find out what it is trying to tell you. If you do not like what you “hear” contact me! I specialize in supporting clients regain optimal digestive function by using stool testing and food sensitivity identification.