Ever wondered if soy is a friend or foe during menopause? You're definitely not alone. There's so much conflicting information that it’s hard to know what to believe. Some people, like me, are big fans of including soy regularly, while others say it should be avoided completely. It’s a hot topic in the world of nutrition, women’s health, and especially menopause—and today, we’re diving right into it.

I’ll start by clearing up some common myths, then get into the science-backed benefits of soy. Plus, I'll wrap things up with a few easy ways to incorporate more of it into your diet.So let’s jump in, bust some myths, and figure out if soy has a place on your plate!

Links Mentioned: 
8 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started Perimenopause
Breast Cancer Myth Busting with Tamar Rothenberg, RD

If you're curious and want to give it a try, I’ve updated my Menopause Nutrition for Undieters Guide with some of my favorite simple, delicious soy-based recipes.

TRANSCRIPT

Jenn Salib Huber: 0:00

Hi and welcome to the Midlife Feast, the podcast for women who are hungry for more in this season of life. I'm your host, dr Jenn Salib-Huber. I'm an intuitive eating dietitian and naturopathic doctor and I help women manage menopause without dieting and food rules. Come to my table, listen and learn from me trusted guest experts in women's health and interviews with women just like you. Each episode brings to the table juicy conversations designed to help you feast on midlife. And if you're looking for more information about menopause, nutrition and intuitive eating, check out the midlife feast community, my monthly membership that combines my no nonsense approach that you all love to nutrition with community, so that you can learn from me and others who can relate to the cheers and challenges of midlife.

Jenn Salib Huber: 0:49

Have you ever wondered whether soy is friend or foe in midlife and menopause? There is a lot of conflicting information out there. There are people, like me, who think that it definitely belongs on our plate on a regular basis, and then there are others who say that it should be avoided at all costs. It's a very polarizing topic in the nutrition world, in the women's health world, in the menopause world, and today I want to break it all down for you.

What are we talking about when we even say soy? What does that even mean? What are some of the myths? And we're going to start with the myths, because I think this is a really important piece of understanding, and then we're going to lead into what I think are some of the benefits supported by evidence, and I'm going to end with some of my tips for incorporating these foods more often. And, if you think that this is something that you want to learn more about, and if you're looking for some recipes, I have updated my menopause nutrition for undieters guide to include several of my favorite easy and delicious soy based recipes. So let's dig a little bit into what are we even talking about with soy?

What is Soy? Addressing Common Questions

Jenn Salib Huber: 2:01

So when we say the word soy, we're usually talking about soy foods. So these are foods that come from the soybean plant. So the soybean whether this is a mature soybean, or whether we're talking about edamame, which are the young soybeans, whether it's tofu, which is prepared from soybeans, or soy milk, tempeh, which is a fermented type of soy product, miso these would all be under the umbrella of soy foods. Now there's another kind of side group of plant-based foods, mainly meat alternatives, so things like, you know, your plant-based pepperoni and those kinds of things which are made including soy protein.

Specifically, you're usually this textured vegetable protein or TVP, and this isn't usually what we mean when we say there are benefits to including soy. I'm going to talk about why they're not bad when we get into the myths, but they're not usually under the umbrella of foods to include for health benefits, and we're going to dive a little bit deeper into that. So when we're talking about the benefits of soy foods, most of the time this comes from its nutrient profile.

Jenn Salib Huber: 3:23

So soy is a plant. It's probably not news to you that including more plants on our plate and maybe even having a plant forward approach is beneficial to our health and might be something we want to do more often. But soy foods are also good sources of protein. They're a complete protein. They're one of the few plant-based sources of protein that provide all of the amino acids that our body needs in its functions.

Most soy foods are also great sources of fiber because, again, it's a bean, it's a legume, so these foods kind of come pre-packaged with fiber, and that is also something that many of us in midlife are trying to get more of, and that is also something that many of us in midlife are trying to get more of, depending on how it is made. So if tofu is made with what's called calcium so if it's calcium set tofu, then it's also going to be a good source of calcium. Soybeans and edamame and soy nuts are also sources of alpha linoleic acid, which is the plant-based precursor form of omega-3 fats acid, which is the plant-based precursor form of omega-3 fats. So there are lots of nutrient density reasons why I think these foods are great choices to have more often.

Jenn Salib Huber: 4:34

But one of the more interesting ones, and also one of the controversial ones, is because soy contains phytoestrogens in the form of isoflavones, and we're going to break down exactly what I mean by those, and I think it's important to understand both the safety and the potential effectiveness of these isoflavones, and so we're going to just dive right into it. So all plants have phytoestrogens, which are just these plant-based estrogen-like, and that's important.

They're not estrogen, they're estrogen-like compounds that are used as part of the cell or the plant's reproductive cycles, kind of how they communicate with other plants. In the case of soy foods, their phytoestrogens are from a group called isoflavones, and there are a couple that are important to note, or the kind of the most common, which is genestin and diadzine. You don't need to know those for the purposes of understanding how these work. Just putting it there for information. So when we're talking about these particular isoflavones from soy, the reason why they're so interesting is because they appear to be stronger in their estrogen-like effects than other types of phytoestrogens found in other, even beans and lentils.

They have the ability to bind to one or two of our estrogen receptors, but they have a preference for the one that is weaker and the one that is potentially more protective. So to understand what I mean by estrogen receptors, we have to back up a little bit and talk about how hormones work. So hormones are messengers that communicate from, often, our brain, parts of our brain, to parts of our body and in the case of estrogen, we have estrogen receptors in pretty much every cell in our body, and men as well, so this isn't just something that women have. So we have these estrogen receptors and we typically have two main types.

Jenn Salib Huber: 6:32

There's one called estrogen receptor alpha and there's one that's called estrogen receptor beta. So alpha I refer to as like the front door of your house it is the one that you're going to see first. Knock on first tends to be the one that sees the most action and because of that it is considered the stronger of the two. It's also the one that sometimes is associated with the problems with estrogen. So when you think about hearing about, you know, estrogen being problematic or too much estrogen, it's often in relation to its binding at this estrogen receptor alpha site. The other estrogen receptor is estrogen receptor beta, and so it's like the back door of the house and it doesn't see as much action.

Most people you know aren't even aren't knocking on that door first, but it's still a way into the house, and so when something binds to the beta receptor it is a much weaker effect than the alpha receptor, and research tends to show that it's actually protective and that it may actually help to balance or offset some of those really strong estrogenic effects that are coming from the estrogen receptor alpha activity.

Debunking the Myth: Does Soy Impact Hormones?

Jenn Salib Huber: 7:43

And this is where soy comes in. Soy's isoflavones bind preferentially not exclusively preferentially to the beta receptor at the back, and that's one of the reasons why, when we get into talking about the myths, soy has been shown to be safe, even for people who have had breast cancer. So a lot of the myths around phytoestrogens come from very early studies on mice that were done in labs in petri dishes, and then later studies in humans, and people found that you know what these are really really really weak estrogen-like compounds.

They are not as strong as estrogen. Studies show that they bind anywhere from 100 to 1,000 times more weekly than our body's own estrogens. So it's hard for us to get to a point where we would even be eating anywhere near enough to have an effect above and beyond what our body is already used to and expecting with our own estrogens. So I hope that explains a little bit about kind of what soy foods are and what are some of the main reasons why we talk about them, for both benefits and also just kind of some of the myths that are surrounding them.

Does Soy Cause Breast Cancer?

Jenn Salib Huber: 9:00

So let's get into what I think are some of the most common myths about soy, and the first is, hands down, that it causes breast cancer. So I have been practicing for 25 years and I think I hear this now a little bit less, but it's probably still weekly, certainly a couple of times a month someone will say but I've heard that soy is bad because it causes breast cancer. Times a month someone will say but I've heard that soy is bad because it causes breast cancer. Where did this come from?

Jenn Salib Huber: 9:32

When soy's isoflavones were first discovered many decades ago, they did what most researchers do they took a lot of it and they tested it on animals, and so in those early studies which were on mice or petri dishes, not people they found that doses many, many, many, many times above what anyone could ever consume with food had the potential to grow breast cancer cells, either in mice or in petri dishes, and this really led to the initial concern that, oh my gosh, this is a pro-estrogenic compound and we should probably not have a lot of it, or we should limit it and have concerns.

Now, of course, countries, people living in countries like Japan and China, have been eating soy foods forever. So it kind of doesn't make sense now that we think about it that these would be hugely problematic groups of foods or foods to include, because we have examples of cultures that have been including them forever and they have not been, you know, negatively affected by these foods. So what we have seen in the last 10 to 15 years is a lot of research telling us a few things. A lot of research telling us a few things.

One, there is no association between soy causing breast cancer and, in fact, overwhelmingly, the research tells us that it actually reduces the risk of cancer in both people who have never had breast cancer and including people who have had breast cancer. And this is a recommendation by the American Cancer Society, and I'm going to link to an episode that I did with Tamara Rothenberg, who is a dietician who specializes in breast cancer, and a breast cancer survivor herself, and we talk about some of this research in particular and some of the most current recommendations. But I can tell you without a doubt that soy does not cause breast cancer and even when we're looking at other types of cancer, soy food consumption is associated with a reduced risk of many cancers prostate cancer, colon cancer, breast cancer and probably a few others.

The Link Between Soy and Heart Health

Jenn Salib Huber: 11:38

The other big myth is around thyroid function. So when people say I'm worried about soy, I've heard that it causes breast cancer they often follow it with and isn't it really bad for my thyroid? Or I take thyroid medication and I have heard, read or even been told that I should avoid soy foods. So the concern around thyroid function is that it causes breast cancer. So when people say I'm worried about Thyroid function, is the potential for soy's phytoestrogens, those isoflavones to interfere with thyroid function, and what the research tells us is that this doesn't appear to be a concern for most people who are getting enough iodine in their diet.

And also people who take thyroid medication simply need to be aware of not having it within a four hour period or so of their medication. Now there's a black box warning on a lot of thyroid medications just not to eat anything within two to four hours, so I don't think that this is a difficult one for people to incorporate, but I don't know of any research that says that people who have an existing thyroid condition don't need to take it. And as recently as 2022, there was a really large meta-analysis, so a study of studies which showed that there was no negative impact of soy food consumption on thyroid function. So hopefully we can put that one to rest. But, of course, if you have any questions if you take medication, it's always best to talk to your doctor or your pharmacist and get specific information for you.

Soy is Not Feminizing

Jenn Salib Huber: 13:11

The third most common concern is that soy is feminizing, meaning that, especially for men or boys, that it is going to lead to, you know kind of development of female characteristics, or that it can cause early puberty in girls. This is also something that has been extensively studied and continues to be studied, and to date the research has not led to any credible concerns for people at a population level. So they have looked at testosterone levels, they have looked at sperm counts, they have looked at age of puberty, they have looked at development of gynecomastia, so kind of you know, male breast development, and they have not been able to link it to soy being a cause of this. And it's understandable again, when we think about okay, we've been talking about soy foods and isoflavones as these estrogen-like compounds. Shouldn't that be avoided for men especially? But remember, most of soy's isoflavones bind to the beta receptor.

Men in general have fewer estrogen receptors than women do, and the other thing is that they are so weak, they are estrogen-like and they are very weak, they are not estrogen. So what you know, what we know, even from studies looking at soy infant formula, is that babies who were fed soy formula as babies do not go through puberty at a different age than those who were fed regular formula or cow's base formula. So when we're looking at soy's potential side effects on people who don't have ovaries, there doesn't seem to be a concern and, as I always say. I have been feeding soy foods to my family, including my husband and my son, and I have absolutely no concerns that it is having a negative impact on health or fertility or anything else.

Why All Forms of Soy Are Beneficial

Jenn Salib Huber: 15:08

So the fourth myth that I want to get to is talking about processed soy foods, and so this is often where people will say oh yeah, I've heard that soy is good but it should be fermented soy or it shouldn't be processed soy, or it should only be whole soybeans. So this is where we often kind of fall into like the moralization of food and that this food hierarchy. So I really want to break it down, kind of going back to what I was talking about at the beginning, most of the research on the benefits, the potential health benefits, of soy foods have been done on soybeans, tofu, soy milk, soy nuts, edamame. They have not been done on soy protein, soy supplements or foods made with soy protein as an alternative to meat. I, as most of you probably know, have an all foods fit approach.

Jenn Salib Huber: 15:55

I don't think that we should ever be talking about never, always. Only because I think that that gets us into a really sticky place with foods and there's no real evidence to say that we have to have that all or nothing approach. In fact, there's lots of evidence to say, and our own experiences tell us, that we do much better with our goals if we have a flexible and forgiving approach. So let's say, for example, you're someone who's trying to eat less meat for whatever reason whether that's morals, ethics, health, whatever it is these are really tasty, easy ways to incorporate more plant-based protein.

Would I suggest a lot of them if you're looking for some of the benefits that we're going to talk about shortly? To your health? Probably not, but it's not because they're bad. It's just because they don't contain, or haven't been studied for the compounds that seem to be health promoting, and we're going to talk more about that in a sec. But I don't want anyone to think that they only have to have these particular set of foods.

Jenn Salib Huber: 16:58

And just to speak to the fermented one, because this is another one that people will say is yeah, I've heard that soy food's good, but it's only the fermented ones, because that's what they eat in Asian countries. That's what they eat in Japan. While it's true that Japan has a higher intake of fermented soy than non-fermented soy, the opposite is true in China, where they actually eat more non-fermented soy.

The benefits of fermented soy is that it's fermented, so there could be a source of probiotics there. But in terms of the overall health benefits of including these fermented soy products, I have not seen any research that says that we should be aiming for those exclusively or even more often than the regular soy. So let's just level the playing field. Food neutrality soy is soy, except when we're talking about a subset of these benefits around heart health in particular, and that's where we're kind of talking about soy foods and not soy products. So the last one is that you need to eat soy all the time for its benefits.

How Much Soy is Enough? Recommendations for Daily Intake

Jenn Salib Huber: 17:56

So it's really easy in the world that we live in, especially around food and nutrition, to think that, oh well, if I want to benefit from eating more soy foods, I have to become vegetarian or I have to replace all of my meat with these soy foods. Obviously, that's never going to be my philosophy, and I don't think that that's the philosophy or approach that's supported by research either, because we can add in. One of the things that I love doing in the Midlife Feast community, and a lot of the recipes and resources that I provide, is how do you add in tofu to a meal that has meat, or how do you make a substitution with? You know a recipe that is already, you know, your family favorite. It's easy, it's your go-to, and this is true with all beans and lentils or any plant-based versus a protein. It does not have to be all or nothing.

The bar is not set at a hundred percent. You can still experience some of the benefits of including more plant-based protein, including soy, even if it's just five percent of what you were eating before. So if you try and keep in mind intuitive eatings, add in philosophy, it's a lot easier to imagine how these foods might fit into your life. But you absolutely don't need to become vegetarian. I'm not vegetarian, I have no plans on becoming vegetarian, but I'm always looking for ways to add more plants to my plate, and here's why.

So I have talked about some of this or, you know, kind of hinted at some of this in a few other episodes, which I'm going to link below, specifically one on hot flashes, and also eight things that I wish I had known before perimenopause. So you know, if you're kind of looking for more about my own personal experience and how they have helped me, you can go back and listen to those, but I want to talk about some of the most strongly evidence based recommendations for including soy foods more often.

Jenn Salib Huber: 19:47

As I mentioned at the beginning, they're nutrient dense, they're complete sources of protein. They're you know, they have a lot of protein per serving, on par or very close to on par with what we get with animal foods. Most of them are also great sources of fiber. So if we're looking at beans and lentils as a whole, you're usually looking at somewhere between 12 and 15 grams of fiber per cup. So if you are even adding half a cup of edamame to whatever it is that you're eating or having it as a snack, you're adding five, six, seven grams of fiber in a really easy and delicious way.

So protein, fiber, also calcium If tofu is made with calcium or if you're using soy milk instead of another milk and it's been fortified with calcium, these are great, delicious and easy ways to add more calcium to your diet, which is important in menopause, because we are at a stage where we are losing bone density and, while calcium supplements may not be the answer to maintaining it, getting enough calcium in our diet is important for kind of keeping our calcium bank well stocked.

Jenn Salib Huber: 20:55

So now we're going to get into some of the reasons why you might want to include more of it if you're in midlife and menopause. So the first is that it is nutrient dense. It's a great source of protein. It is on par with animal protein for its amino acid composition. It's a great source of fiber, and beans and lentils in general provide us with a nice, hearty dose of fiber, so 12 to 15 grams per cup.

If you're adding half a cup of edamame to whatever it is that you're eating, you are going to be adding several grams of fiber in easy and delicious ways. And it can also be a source of calcium. So if it's calcium set tofu or if calcium has been added to soy milk in particular and whole soybeans are also sources of the omega-3 precursors, alpha-linolenic acid. So we're talking about a plant that just happens to be really nutrient dense in a lot of things that benefit us in midlife.

Jenn Salib Huber: 21:53

One of the important outcomes that we think about as we get into midlife and postmenopause especially is heart health and how can we reduce the risk of heart disease. So heart disease is the leading cause of death in postmenopausal women. It is not breast cancer, as so many people you know, as we had been led to believe by the media in particular. But it's heart disease. And as we get into postmenopause and this lower estrogen state, we see cholesterol go up, we can see blood pressure go up and we just see our risks kind of coming together from life and genetics and even kind of past history kind of converging in this place of midlife and so we are understandably starting to think about how can I help to protect my heart and reduce my risk of developing cardiovascular disease or even managing existing cardiovascular disease.

Jenn Salib Huber: 22:50

And soy is interesting because one it has been shown to lower cholesterol. So including 25 grams of it per day is one of the evidence-based ways that you can help to support lowering your cholesterol. This is also in part because it is a great source of fiber, and soluble fiber is one of the best or all fibers are one of the best ways that we can help to lower cholesterol. But it could also be because plant-based proteins are lower in saturated fat.

Essentially they you know they have a tiny little bit, but they have a negligible amount. They also have essentially no cholesterol, and so these are kind of coming together as one of the pieces of how we can help to support heart health with food, and soy just happens to be a convenient and dense source of many of these recommendations. So when it comes to supporting heart health, including more soy foods on your plate is one of the best things that we can do.

Soy for Hot Flashes and Night Sweats

Jenn Salib Huber: 23:43

The other is around cancers, and I hinted at this, talking about the ways in which we know that soy foods do not cause breast cancer and help to reduce it. It is likely also that we see these reductions in other types of cancers in diets that are high in soy foods. So if you're looking to overall reduce your risk of cancer, including more plants in your plate and including a plant forward does not have to be plant-based way of eating is one of the ways that you can do that. So it's one of the reasons why I love including these foods.

Jenn Salib Huber: 24:14

And then the last one is kind of around hot flashes and night sweats, and so you might be surprised that I'm adding this at like the last part of the list, but I always want people to know that soy is about more than just the phytoestrogens. I think that the phytoestrogens are kind of magical and they were life changing for me, which I talked about in the hot flash episode, because estrogen therapy just was not for me, and when that didn't work and I really needed to dive into okay, how do I manage these hot flashes and night sweats and the worst of perimenopause it was including these soy-based foods. That really kind of changed everything for me, and one of the things that I love people to know is that they can be really helpful but they don't help everyone and we don't have all the reasons why. Yet it could be that some people are equal producers, which is more complicated than we need to get into in this episode but let's just say that some of us have gut bacteria that metabolize the phytoestrogens more efficiently than others, but a lot of it, I think, comes down to dose, and so what we see in the research is that if soy's phytoestrogens are going to help you have fewer night sweats and hot flashes, you need to eat them consistently and probably for at least 10 to 12 weeks. So this can be challenging for people, because if you're not used to including them, if you have never cooked with them, if your only experience of them with maybe like soy food you know soy milk in the 70s and 80s which was like bland and had a terrible chalky texture maybe it just feels really overwhelming to even think about getting these twice a day.

But what I see in the people that I work with and the people in the midlife feast community is that when they add these in maybe just an average of like, say, 10 times a week so like one and a half servings a day kind of thing that they do notice a drop in their hot flashes, and often long before the 10 to 12 weeks. So my personal opinion is that they work more than we see reported or reflected in the literature. But a lot of it comes down to how well people are able to or how well supported they are in applying these recommendations, which is really one of the big things that I do in the Midlife Feast community is I try and make this information accessible, easy to understand, but also easy to implement.

So if you're looking for more support on that, you can find the links to learn more about that below, but I do think it's important to know that it can be really helpful. Probably doesn't work for everyone and we're still trying to figure out why.

Practical Tips for Including Soy in Your Diet

Jenn Salib Huber: 26:47

Now let's end with some practical tips for including soy more often in your diet. For including soy more often in your diet and the most, the one that I find is easiest for people to implement is changing the type of milk that you're using. So if you use milk in anything, whether that's cereal, smoothies, as a beverage, changing to soy milk can be a really easy way to get that in more often. Now I have not had great luck with soy milk in my coffee. Some people have found types that seem to work better. The barista blends, I think, are better suited to that, but I still put regular milk in my coffee. But I use soy milk in pretty much everything else, and so this is a really easy switch for people to make. The other switch that I like to suggest is keeping frozen shelled edamame in your freezer. So grab a handful, throw it into a stir fry, throw it into a salad, heat it up for a few minutes in the microwave or on the stove, with a little bit of salt, if you want, for taste, as a snack. This is a really easy way to get that whole food soy benefit of the protein, the fiber, the phytoestrogens in an easy, essentially no cook way.

Jenn Salib Huber: 28:06

Now tofu. I love and I have lots of great recipes that make tofu delicious, and my kids will tell you that crispy tofu is, hands down, their favorite recipe of all time, and I think that tofu is versatile and I could do a whole episode on tofu Maybe I will one day. But I also know that it is the part of the soy conversation that a lot of people feel intimidating, because they have either never cooked with it or they just see it as this big chunk of ick and they have no idea what to do with it.

So one of my favorite tips for tofu is freeze it before you use it, because that will get a lot of the water out very quickly and easily. Or take it out, wrap it in a couple of tea towels, put it under a heavy book cast iron frying pan and get as much water out as you can. When you do that, if you're cooking with the extra firm tofu, you essentially make it open to receiving whatever flavors you're going to inject into it, and that is kind of what tofu is known for.

Easy Ways to Prepare Tofu

Jenn Salib Huber: 29:07

It takes on the taste and flavor of whatever you're cooking it with. So whether that is spices, seasonings or marinades, it's very easy to make the tofu kind of mix in with whatever it is that you're having. So I love adding it to curries. I love adding it with chicken. So, like chicken and tofu is a really great combination for maybe families who are 100% sold on tofu as the only protein at the meal sold on tofu as the only protein at the meal. But knowing how to prepare tofu is 75% of what you need in order to enjoy tofu.

Jenn Salib Huber: 29:44

But before you get to tofu, if you've never cooked or used or eaten soy before, just start with soy milk. Edamame soy nuts are another great one that you can find pretty much everywhere, and they come in great flavors. And then work your way up to tofu and don't feel like this is something that you have to. You don't have to reinvent the wheel. If you're looking for support, if you're looking for ways to start adding these in more often, imperfectly, maybe even just once a week, then that's what the midlife feast community is here for and, like I said at the beginning, I've updated my menopause nutrition for undieters guide with some of my favorite recipes that will make it easy and delicious for you to apply all of these things to your diet.

Jenn Salib Huber: 30:31

So I hope that this deep dive into soy has helped you to understand what we mean when we say soy, what it is and what it isn't. What are some of the myths that you can just let go of, because they have been thoroughly debunked. And why it's a? You know I say that soy is a midlife gal's best friend, because there are so many pieces of the food that can help support us, whether that's symptoms or thinking about longer term health. So thanks so much for joining me today.

Jenn Salib Huber: 31:04

As always, let me know if you have any questions, either in the comments below. If you're watching on YouTube or if you have listened, you can always click the, send me a text or a message, because I always love getting your feedback. Thanks everyone. Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of the Midlife Feast For more non-diet health, hormone and general midlife support. Click the link in the show notes to learn how you can work and learn from me. And if you enjoyed this episode and found it helpful, please consider leaving a review or subscribing, because it helps other women just like you find us and feel supported in midlife.