When it comes to healthy eating and lowering your blood pressure naturally, the Mediterranean diet offers some of the finest food the world has to offer: abundant fresh
fish, and shell fish, vegetable that are rich in color and vitamins; pulses and grains that are the finest complex carbohydrates; nuts – that divine pine nut – fruit as basic and simple as mere oranges and lemons (but there’s more!); herbs and spices, and last but not least that, fragrant bronzed and utterly delicious, olive oil – an indispensable ingredient that has so many healthy benefits, you won’t want to use any other product.
Mediterranean people have put olive oil on all their breads – in the early morning, before it gets too hot – for breakfast, or manteca, (lard! my goodness, also flavored with peppers or paprika!) a cheaper and ‘less healthy’ option the Western diet gurus have you believe. Animal fats! A horror story for your health! Now we know the body needs a small but certain amount of animal fats in order to thrive. A low fat diet was thought to be necessary for heart health, but a study in 2006 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/07/AR2006020701681.html dispels that ‘truth.’ How many times have we been told this only to be told that after a few years of study, and simple reflection? Trust the locals to know what they are doing. They have been eating animal fats and plenty of meat including all offal. Waste not want not. There are plenty of cemeteries around to attest to the health benefits of living and eating on the Med. Walk around the walls and you’ll see plenty of octogenarians looking sturdy and strong in pictures displayed by their loving relatives.
Of course, not only food and lifestyle will guarantee a better quality of life, better health and lower blood pressure, but love makes the world go round, and love is what you still
see within the generation. Afraid of your dear old mom ending up in care, you seeing her
once a month or so only to get stressed out that has bed sores, is nutritionally starved because no one cares or has the time to feed her? Intergenerational bonds are loosening too but on the Med there’s still more love to go around. Your mom might be frail, but she’ll be out in the sunshine, walked and held by her daughters and grand daughters. Get some sun in your life, figuratively and literally. Sun is the source of happiness, and that is just good for lowering your blood pressure naturally!
I’ll be back with more stories from the Med. Share my enthusiasm for sun, sea and the healing power of love!
