Why When We Eat Matters, Part 2 (#22)

The second half of an early two part conversation with Rangan Chatterjee, and the applied one. Part one built the case that when we eat matters. This episode is about what to do with that in an ordinary household with jobs, children, commutes and social obligations.

The discussion works through the real obstacles rather than the ideal case. Family meals that fall at an inconvenient hour. Shift schedules that cannot be moved. Weekends that undo the weekday pattern. Dr Panda's position is that the eating window is robust to some drift, since it is a habit rather than a protocol, but that the drift has limits, and that a window kept roughly every day does more than a strict one kept intermittently. The underlying reason is that the organ clocks entrain to a repeated pattern, and a pattern that changes daily never establishes itself.

Chatterjee also raises what to tell children and older relatives, where the advice differs. Best heard after part one, though it stands on its own if you already know the basics.