Chances are you’ve heard how great fermented foods are for your gut. And it’s true! Ferments help your gut microbiome, digestion, and immune system - but not just for the reasons you might think.

The benefits of fermented foods often get placed solely on probiotics- the good bacteria that live in your gut. Maybe throw in prebiotics too, the food to fuel the probiotic bacteria. However, rising evidence places many of these health benefits as being a product of a third -biotic: postbiotics.

Postbiotics are essentially the waste products of probiotics, the dead or inactive bacteria. As unappealing as that might sound, they are responsible for many of the gut and general health benefits you might associate with probiotics or prebiotics. The key to what makes fermented foods so valuable for your health is that it contains all three of these, living and dead bacteria, which work together to maintain a healthy microbiome and digestive system.