One of Netflix’s hottest new series relies on Sacramento food. Here’s why

A new Netflix show uses Sacramento-made food to answer one question: What effect do different diets have on genetically identical people?

“You Are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment,” which premiered on New Year’s Day, follows an eight-week Stanford University study that fed 22 sets of identical twins two different diets — one vegan, the other omnivorous — and monitored changes to their health.

All twins ate meals from Trifecta, a health-focused, refrigerated meal delivery service based in Downtown Commons at 428 J St., Suite 800, for the first four weeks of the trial before cooking their own meals in the final weeks. Founded in Los Angeles in 2015, the business moved to downtown Sacramento the following year to be closer to farmers and ranchers, president and CEO Greg Connolly said.

Trifecta customers across the U.S. place online orders for seven to 21 fully-prepared, vacuum-sealed meals per week, as were delivered to the twins on “You Are What You Eat.” Categories include keto, vegan or Whole30 for the meals, which run $13-$15 apiece, and people can normally select individual dishes (cilantro-lime chicken over jasmine rice, say, or Southwest tofu quinoa bowls).

Yet Trifecta had to do away with individual selection after the premiere of “You Are What You Eat,” which had 8 million views in its first week on Netflix and is the streaming service’s the third-most watched show so far this year. All meal packages are “chef’s choice” for the time being.

Trifecta’s website traffic is up 600% and sales are up 400% since the series was released, Connolly said, slamming the business on top of the usual January rush that follows New Year’s resolutions.

“At first we were looking at the website and we thought we were under a cyber attack from Russia or Moldova ... because we had so much traffic, we were like something’s wrong,” Connolly said. “But then we noticed that sales were going up along with the traffic, and suddenly we had we had customers calling into our customer service team and telling us, ‘you know, I’m buying because you guys are going viral on Netflix right now.’”

Trifecta is the official meal delivery partner of the UFC and PGA Tour, and is a title sponsor for CrossFit and USA Weightlifting. The company’s meals are designed to be high in protein and packed with macronutrients, attracting people such as brand ambassador and former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Even though “You Are What You Eat” correlates the most positive changes with plant-based diets, Connolly urged people to define their own diet with what works for them. It’s better to find healthy foods you enjoy and will eat consistently, he said, than to make an overly ambitious transition and eventually revert to bad habits.

“There are a lot of ways to eat a healthy diet,” Connolly said. “And we really encourage people, whether it’s in Sacramento or across the country, to pick the diet that they’re going to stick to, not necessarily the one that’s currently trending on the Internet.”

What I’m Eating

You smell Our Family BBQ & Pies before you see it. The storefront is tucked away in the corner of a shopping center between Sierra Oaks and Arden Arcade. Scents from Steven Wright’s smoker waft through the parking lot, inviting customers in for down-home barbecue.

Ribs, tri-tip, chicken and hot links ($16-$31 with two sides and a drink, depending on the number of meats selected). That’s the extent of the mains, all smothered in a St. Louis-inspired barbecue sauce and served in a Styrofoam box with plastic baggies of white bread.

I have nice things to say about all of it — the moist and tender chicken, the tri-tip’s pink smoke rings, the slow burn of the beef sausage, the juicy rib tips hiding at the bottom of the pile — but would have preferred to add my own sauce to better taste each individual meat.

Tangy collard greens are a star side (potato salad, baked beans and macaroni and cheese are the other options), dressed up with bits of pork and hot wing sauce. A lemony icebox pie ($4 per slice) with a crumbly graham cracker crust was a nice deviation after such a rich meal.

Our Family BBQ & Pies

Address: 2326 Fair Oaks Blvd., Suite J, Sacramento.

Hours: 12-9 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday, closed Monday and Tuesday.

Phone number: (916) 333-3397.

Website: https://www.instagram.com/ourfamilybbq/

Drinks: A few beers on tap, soda, bottled water and the house specialty “cinnamon water,” a refreshing sweet-bitter drink made by soaking cinnamon sticks in ice water.

Vegetarian options: Only sides such as potato salad and macaroni and cheese.

Noise level: Quiet aside from ambient music.

Openings & Closings

▪ Southside Park’s newest Thai restaurant, Thai Time, opened around New Year’s Day at 2030 10th St. Look for fried shrimp with tamarind sauce, mango-glazed salmon salad and crab fried rice among other options.

Jayna Gyro opened its second area location (and third overall) Monday in Roseville’s Ridge at Creekside shopping center at 1132 Galleria Blvd., Suite 100. The Emeryville-based concept puts a California spin on Mediterranean dishes such as lamb burgers, housemade dolmas and roasted chickpea pita wraps.

▪ Fair Oaks favorite Wild Rooster Bistro closed on New Year’s Eve after six-and-a-half years in business. Owned by Jalisco natives Salvador Sanchez, Rocio Fierro and Lorena M. Van Rein at 7984 California Ave. in Fair Oaks Village, the vegetarian-friendly restaurant specialized in Cali-Mex brunch and dinner dishes such as chiles relleno, cochinita pibil and huevos con chorizo.

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