Introduction 

Is soy good, bad or ugly? For so many years, so many of us have thought that soy is bad for you and causes all sorts of health issues. However, it is quite the contrary. In this podcast, I talk about why soy is good for you, what makes it bad and why it might be thought of as ugly. 

In my early 30’s I sat on the fence about whether soy was good for me to eat, or not. I sat for some years until I realised I really didn’t know.

Now I know all about soy, and in this podcast episode, I will reveal whether soy is the good, the bad or the ugly, or maybe a bit of each.

For many years soy was given a bad rap. I had been putting soy milk in my daily cup of tea since my late teens then in my early 30’s, I was in a school staff room (in my primary school days) and the whole team of teachers were telling the vegetarian teacher that she had to give up soy because it was bad for her.

They had all watched a 60 Minutes episode on how bad soy was for your health.

I was a bit baffled by this, as I had only heard good things about soy.  I looked into it and found, at the time, that the dairy board were a major sponsor of 60 Minutes!

But then, at the same time, someone I knew who had been studying health and wellbeing, said that soy was bad for you too. So I sat on the fence. I still kept drinking my organic soy milk in my tea, but started to take coffee black, and chose tempeh, which is fermented soy, over tofu.

With very little internet in those days, and access only to the local library, I had no clue how to research the science behind soy.  

Then a friend who is a Chinese doctor told me how the Japanese ate soy to counteract the radiation, and I thought, I need to work this out for myself.

It took me over 10 years to really discover the truth about soy. Thankfully I kept eating it, I didn’t eat much tofu in that time, and I regret that now, but at least I was eating tempeh and miso and drinking soy milk.

What people have known for a very long time

Because the science shows us what millions of people in Asia have known for a very long time, that soy is a fabulous food.

There has been so much controversy over the humble soy bean, and so many studies done, with so many favourable benefits coming out of eating soy on a daily basis.

Yes, sure, you don’t want to eat 

non-organic soy, 

nor GMO soy, 

nor the soy that is in all those processed foods, 

but eating it in the form of 

organic, 

tofu,

soy beans, 

tempeh,

natto,

miso ,

edamame beans, 

is a fabulous addition to  your diet.

Protein content of soy 

Other than that, soy sports some fabulous credentials

 It is a complete protein legume, containing all 9 essential amino acids 

1 cup soy milk provides 7g of protein

100g tofu provide 11.8g protein 

100g soy beans provides 20g protein 

1 tbsp soy miso 2.2g protein 

100g tempeh 20g protein 

100g edamame – 11.9g protein. 

It can reduce coronary heart disease and reduce the risk of breast cancer – this is more the case for people who consumed it in their adolescence and onwards rather than for people who started consuming it in their adulthood.

In a women’s health study in China of 73,223 women; the women who ate the most soy had a 59% lower risk of breast cancer, but the risk of getting cancer was lower for those women who consumed soy in their adolescence. 

Soy contains isoflavones

It is packed with isoflavones, which classify it as a phytoestrogen, which is brilliant for all stages of menopause and for increasing bone mineral density. 

It lowers the risk of prostate cancer, 

alleviates indications of menopause, including hot flushes, 

can affect renal function positively,

and improve skin health.

It contains fabulous minerals and vitamins; like iron, calcium, folate and thiamine.

There have been studies showing the improvement to bone health after consuming soy, and the uptake of calcium despite the phytic acid and oxalate content being high when consuming soy.

Can lower LDL cholesterol

Acts as a prebiotic, as soy beans are comprised of ogliosaccharides and are not digestible in the intestinal enzymes, so they boogie on down to the colon where they can stimulate growth of  bifidobacteria, which is beneficial to the body. 

So all of those reasons really make soy look like the good – rather than the bad or the ugly.

The bad of soy

But lets look at the bad of soy – is there a bad?

What rumours have you heard about soy?

It heightens oestroge levels and lessens testosterone  in men. 

It causes thyroid dysfunction. 

It causes breast cancer.

But do you know that these are actually all 

myths.

Soy does not increase the oestrogen levels in men, nor lower testosterone, unless you drink copious amounts of soy a day like one man did. He drank 3 litres of soy milk a day and ended up with heightened oestrogen levels, but wouldn’t that happen if he had also drunk 3 litres of milk a day?

For breast cancer, there were studies that showed that high doses of isoflavones could increase the risk of breast cancer, but all these studies were done on rats and not humans, so this is not substantial evidence.

And for thyroid function, while a meta-analysis of 18 randomised controlled trials showed that soy supplements raised thyroid-stimulating hormone levels slightly, they did not affect the actual thyroid hormone production.

Where soy can be bad is for those that are allergic to it, or those that don’t produce the enzyme needed to break down soy.

So now we have determined that soy is really the good and only the bad if you are allergic to it or don’t possess the enzyme that breaks down soy.

What I would do though, is not over consume soy, but that is the case for everything actually. Your soy milk in your cuppa or two a day is fine, then no more than 100g of tofu or tempeh a day is plenty.

What about the ugly

Soy in the form of soy milk can curdle in coffee that looks pretty ugly, but used as a milk in baking, it makes fabulous cakes and baked goods.

Soy in the form of tofu and tempeh can be pretty ugly if not cooked properly.

And what tofu and tempeh needs is some marinade.

Some oil and tamari drizzled and rubbed into tempeh, and then fried or baked takes tempeh to the next level. Cooking it until it is crisp makes it super nice too. As does grating it into a pasta sauce.

Marinades for soy 

Then there are 101 marinades for tofu.

You can marinade them overnight, or all day.

Here are my fave marinades - then you can pan fry or oven bake, and with some of them you can coat them in corn or potato starch to give them a crispy texture.  

Greek Halloumi

Olive oil, lemon juice, nutritional yeast and salt. 

Mustard maple 

Dijon or seeded mustard, white wine or apple cider vinegar, maple syrup, salt and pepper. 

Italian 

Olive oil, lemon juice, garlic - fresh or powdered, Italian dried herbs, nutritional yeast, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. 

Asian 

Brown rice vinegar, tamari, toasted sesame oil, garlic, grated ginger, chilli.

Teriyaki 

Tamari, maple syrup, plum sauce, garlic, ginger and brown rice vinegar. 

Mexican 

Chilli sauce, garlic, onion powder, lime juice and cayene.

FCT  (fun cooking tip)

Boiling tofu – makes it more porous – so boil for 6 minutes to make the tofu soft and 10 minutes to make it hard – it needs to have 1 tsp of salt in the boiling water as this takes the water out of the tofu and also helps make it more porous.

So there you have it. The good, bad and the ugly of soy.

I wasn’t planning on having soy for dinner, but now I am tempted and inspired and craving. Yum.

So hope you have gained some good info from this podcast. On average it takes Mak and I five hours to produce an episode for the podcast and we love doing it. We love doing it even more when we find out people are listening to it. For me to keep my mojo going I really would love some more listeners so please can you share my podcast with your family, mates, friends and networks. I would be forever grateful. 

Have a delicious week wonderful cook.