Health Tip of the Day! Scientific studies have shown that authentic extra-virgin olive oil lowers “bad” cholesterol and cuts your risk of heart disease and stroke. It helps protect against cancer, especially cancer of the breast, prostate, and colon. It’s a godsend for arthritis sufferers because it can cool inflammation and ease joint pain without any side effects. It has also been shown to lower blood pressure, reduce your risk of diabetes, and may even help reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease. If you want to avoid osteoporosis, it’s outstanding because it enables the calcium in your food to be better absorbed into your bones. Finally, it’s loaded with some of the most powerful disease-fighting antioxidants and polyphenols known to science, which fortify your immune system and help it protect every organ of your body against disease. The two most important words to remember whenever you shop for extra virgin olive oil are freshness and purity. Let’s consider freshness first... Olive Orchard Web Experts judge that freshness accounts for more than 80 percent of an olive oil’s flavor. This is because olive oil, unlike wine, does not improve with age. It’s at its healthiest and most flavorful the day it is pressed. Fresh-pressed extra virgin olive oil, squeezed from olives at exactly the right moment at harvest time, is insanely bright-tasting and flavorful. You can taste the difference immediately. If you’ve ever traveled the picturesque countryside of Italy, Greece, or Spain and stopped at a local, family-owned farm to sample fresh, authentic extra virgin olive oil, you know why connoisseurs hail it as one of Mother Nature’s culinary marvels. This is why, throughout Mediterranean countries, the locals go crazy for fresh-pressed extra virgin olive oil at harvest time, throwing parties to celebrate its arrival. Important Health Tip:Consume Your Olive Oil within Six Months after It’s Pressed Freshness is critical for another reason—all those wonderful health benefits! A recent study conducted at Italy’s University of Foggia on several varieties of Italian extra virgin olive oil, found that its precious polyphenols decrease by about 40 percent after six months of storage. In other words, if you want to enjoy the marvelous health benefits of extra virgin olive oil, you should secure and consume your oil within the six-month window after it’s pressed. The big problem for us in America is that only a tiny trickle of fresh-pressed extra virgin olive oil ever makes it to our shores. Olive oil is a heavy item to ship. To save on shipping costs, virtually all imported oils are sent here by slow cargo boats and are already more than six months old before you can even buy them, often resulting in dull-tasting, substandard oil. This is why almost all bottles on store shelves do not have a production or harvest date stamped on their labels. Some give you a “best used by”date, but not the harvest date because they don’t want you to know how old the oil is. Yet without that harvest date, you have no way of knowing if you’re paying good money for a substandard, stale oil that’s beyond the critical six-month window of maximum flavor and nutrition.
Posted on: Tue, 15 Oct 2013 14:53:26 +0000
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