After a breakfast of Greek yogurt sprinkled with blueberries and chased with walnuts, Mehmet Oz, MD, the author of You: On a Diet, talks what he discovered during a recent hosting gig. "The Truth About Food," a miniseries based on the title book, challenged the most common nutrition rumors with 30 experiments using 500 subjects, led by top scientists and experts. The takeaway? Different aspects of your everyday life — your waistline, skin, stress levels, liveliness and even your kids — respond directly to your diet. Dr. Oz walks us through the most surprising evidence that supports how much we control our health, and serves up his own nutrition tips and tricks for staying healthy and trim.

Q: What made you want to sign onto this project?
A: I would argue that it's the most comprehensive documentary ever on nutrition. When I was first presented with the idea, I was so enamored by it that I read all the raw plans in one night. As a heart surgeon, I see the long-term ramifications of people's eating habits. Every once in a while, I walk out of the O.R. thinking, "You know what, I didn't have to do that. I shouldn't have been there. This person could have avoided me." As you begin to realize how much power there is in the food people eat, you realize the true solution to health care in America isn't policy changes in Washington. When you talk about health in broad policy perspectives, you'll lose people. But when you talk about it in very concrete terms, people walk away with concrete steps they can act on. We control our health destiny.

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Q: What results surprised you the most?
A: Food impacts our health in such powerful ways. We tested out an Evo [Evolutionary] Diet, a plan that included what our ancestors would have eaten thousands of years ago. Nine volunteers in their thirties and forties ate 2,300 calories of fruit, vegetables, nuts and honey every day. Over the course of 12 days, their cholesterol levels fell by almost a quarter — those results beat what we get from drugs! Also, their blood pressure dropped by 10 percent and they lost an average of 10 pounds. They ate 11 pounds of food a day — but it was all high-fiber, low-sugar, low-salt and low in saturated fat.

Q: Is a diet like that sustainable?
A: Our ancestors did it their whole lives. The issue isn't whether you can do it; it's the fact that if you do it, it's powerful. Even if you eat fruits, vegetables and nuts for two meals a day or for dinner four days a week, it will still have a huge impact on your health. Imagine if you're on a diabetic drug, a cholesterol drug and a blood pressure drug — and coming off all three drugs just because you changed your diet. It's nutty!

Q: What's another common nutrition myth you guys busted?
A: People feel they can go on a detox diet and quickly fix their bodies. Detox diets are nutrition programs that are meant to eliminate environmental and dietary toxins from your body. Most of these programs are three-day or five-day programs, but it takes your body longer than this to release toxins. We ran a detox diet experiment for a 10-day period and then tested the subjects' liver functions, since that's where the body metabolizes different toxins, like caffeine. It showed that you really can't detoxify yourself within 10 days. Toxins are stored in fat, so the results didn't shock me.

Q: We're all looking for instant results. What can someone change about her diet today to reap benefits tonight?
A: It's a no-brainer: Add fiber to your diet. If you eat fiber today, you'll poop tonight — evidence that your body is getting rid of toxins, which helps reduce your risk of cancer and heart disease. Within a week, your cholesterol will drop, because fiber helps you pass bile (the juice that helps you digest food in your small intestine), which turns into cholesterol if it sits around for too long. Over a month or so, you'll see weight slip off effortlessly — since fiber is so filling, it reduces your appetite dramatically. It also binds to fats and pushes them out of your system, which may help your body get rid of toxic trans fats. Most of us eat about seven grams of fiber every day, but women need about 25 grams of fiber, which can be found in fruits, vegetables, whole grains and legumes.

Q: What would you tell women who believe they are too time- and cash-strapped to eat healthfully?
A: The cheapest food in America is the worst food in America. However, it's not that much cheaper. You don't have to shop at gourmet places, and there are places like Wal-Mart that sell food very inexpensively. During the day, when I'm rushing around doing a hundred things at once and I don't have time to think about food, I standardize. The breakfast I had today [Greek yogurt and blueberries] is my breakfast at least four days a week. For lunch I usually get a salad with a bit of salmon, then I have some fruit in the middle of the afternoon, because I get a little hungry around 3 or 4. I also keep nuts in my office. I don't vary my meals until dinner. At dinnertime I go out a lot, or I'll have whatever my wife has cooked for our four kids. The rest is inexpensive, and I repeat my meals, so it doesn't require extra time or money.