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The Olive Oil Hunter News #36

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Chacareo Chileno Recipe, Spotlight on Cilantro, No-Bowl Marinade, Feeding Your Brain Through Fitness and Is It Time to Join a CSA?

Ready to elevate your grill game? In this week’s edition of The Olive Oil Hunter Newsletter and in many editions to come, I’m going to share with you my favorite recipes for the tastiest and easiest-to-make grilled foods. The recipes often start with a marinade—usually extra virgin olive oil, an acid such as vinegar or lemon juice, and herbs and spices—designed to infuse flavor and help whatever you’re cooking stay juicy. My first tip: The longer you marinate, the more flavorful the food becomes.

The steak sandwich is an American tradition, but I’m shaking it up by going Chilean-style. The mix of tastes and textures makes for a truly memorable experience.

Chacareo Chileno

  • The Olive Oil Hunter News #36 Chacareo Chileno

    Santiago’s signature sandwich is the chacarero, a mouth-stretching pileup of grilled steak, mashed avocado, tomato, green beans, and a shot of hot sauce on a soft roll. This unusual combination, chockful of healthy veggies, is served up at casual eateries all over the city, from lunch counters to beer halls. It’s equally delicious when made with grilled pork, chicken, or vegetables, and thanks to the olive oil-based marinade, guaranteed to be anything but ordinary! ​

    Ingredients

    • 1 1/2 pounds boneless steak, such as rib eye, strip, or sirloin
    • 5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus more for the rolls
    • 2 cloves garlic, minced
    • 3 tablespoons fresh lime juice, divided
    • 1 tablespoon chopped cilantro, plus whole leaves for serving
    • 1 teaspoon kosher salt, divided
    • 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
    • 1 1/2 cups fresh green beans, julienned
    • 2 ripe avocados, pitted and peeled
    • 4 Kaiser rolls or other large soft rolls, sliced and lightly toasted
    • Four thick slices ripe red tomato
    • Thinly sliced jalapeños (optional)
    • Hot sauce for serving

    Directions

    Step 1

    Place the steak in a resealable plastic bag along with 4 tablespoons olive oil, the garlic, 1 1/2 tablespoons lime juice, the chopped cilantro, and 1/2 teaspoon each salt and pepper. Marinate, refrigerated, for 4 to 8 hours. Meanwhile, steam or boil the beans in salted water until tender-crisp, about 5 minutes; plunge them in ice water, then drain and set aside.

    Step 2

    Mash the avocados with the remaining lime juice, 1 tablespoon olive oil, and 1/2 teaspoon salt and set aside. Set up a grill for direct grilling and preheat to medium-high. Drain the steaks. Season well with salt and pepper and grill to medium-rare, turning once with tongs. Let rest for 5 minutes, and then thinly slice on a diagonal. Drizzle the cut sides of the rolls with olive oil. Thickly spread one-fourth of the avocado mixture on the top half of each bun. Divide the meat between the bottom halves of the buns. Top the meat with a tomato slice, jalapeños (if using), cilantro leaves, and green beans. Replace the top half of the bun and press lightly. Serve with hot sauce.

    Yields 4 servings.

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Cilantro

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

Cilantro: With Olive Oil, It’s a Match Made in Culinary Heaven
There’s no question about it—cilantro is a versatile herb, as integral to Asian cuisines as it is to Mexican and Latin American ones. Rich in a variety of vitamins and minerals, cilantro is very nutritious, and I like to use both the leaves and the tender part of the stems, so little goes to waste. Depending on the recipe, you might coarsely hand-chop it or give it a whir in the blender or food processor to make a fine mince or even a purée with the help of a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.

Growing your own cilantro in the garden or on a windowsill is quite easy, but I suggest starting with a small plant rather than seeds to speed up how soon you’ll be able to take cuttings. In the garden, at the end of the growing season when the plant starts to turn brown, seed heads will develop—you know cilantro seeds as coriander, typically sold dried and used whole or ground. You can make your own coriander by cutting off the seed heads and hanging them in a brown paper bag until fully dry. Then transfer the seeds to a spice jar, label it, and start cooking—toast or grind the seeds, homegrown or store-bought, before using for better flavor.

Fun fact: If you’re a person who just can’t cozy up to the taste of cilantro, it’s not your imagination—it’s your DNA. Research studies, including one done by 23andMe, actually discovered that people who find cilantro unpleasant, often likening the taste to soap or dirt, have a gene that causes this perception. On a positive note, the aversion might not extend to coriander seeds, so be sure to give them a try.

Healthy Kitchen Tip: No-Bowl Marinade

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

No-Bowl Marinade

For a no-fuss, no-cleanup-needed way to marinate food, I use resealable plastic bags, as in the above recipe. Add all your marinade ingredients to a gallon bag, pop in your protein or veggies, seal, and refrigerate. You’ll get good flavor after an hour, but it will intensify the longer you leave the bag in the fridge—up to eight hours or even overnight. Turn the bag occasionally so that the marinade gets evenly distributed.

For Your Best Health: Is It Time to Join a CSA?

For Your Best Health

Is It Time to Join a CSA?

CSA stands for “community supported agriculture,” and for over 25 years, it’s been a great option for buying local seasonal food directly from a farmer. Tens of thousands of families have joined CSAs, and in some areas of the country there is more demand than there are CSA farms to meet it. How it works: The farmer offers a certain number of “shares” or subscriptions that entitle purchasers to a box of fresh-grown foods each week. The CSA model is considered a “shared risk”—customers pay up front for the whole season and the farmers do their best to provide an abundant box of produce each week.

There are also now many variations on the CSA arrangement. With some, members go to their CSA farm and pick and choose what they want from offerings. Plus, many CSAs aren’t limited to produce—some offer eggs, homemade bread, meat, cheese, flowers, and other farm products. For options near you, check out localharvest.org with its database of more than 4,000 CSA farms. You can also learn more about how CSAs work and what to expect.

Fitness Flash: Feeding Your Brain Through Fitness

Fitness Flash

Feeding Your Brain Through Fitness

Your heart isn’t the only organ that benefits from exercise. Turns out that the brain also loves it when you get up and move. That’s one of the key takeaways from Keep Sharp: Building a Better Brain at Any Age, the latest book from neurosurgeon Sanjay Gupta, MD. Aerobic exercise in particular enhances brain function and its ability to fight off disease—it lowers harmful inflammation and starts a chain reaction that boosts neural cells. If you sit for most of the day, it’s just as important for your brain as for your overall health to get up frequently and walk around.

Among Dr. Gupta’s other tenets are getting enough sleep, continually learning and challenging your brain with problem-solving and reasoning activities, staying connected with others, and eating well. He’s a fan of Martha Clare Morris, epidemiologist and founding member of the Global Council on Brain Health, and her recommendation to follow the Mediterranean way of eating with a diet built on vegetables, berries, beans, whole grains, fish, poultry, and olive oil.

Best of all, it’s never too late to get started—your brain and your body will thank you.

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The Olive Oil Hunter News #35

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Grilled Flank Steak with Salsa Verde Recipe, Spotlight on Parsley, Olive Oil and Herb Cubes, The Importance of Sleep and The Four Cs of Fitness

The key to tender flank steak is to cook it to medium-rare, then slice it thinly on a sharp diagonal.

Grilled Flank Steak with Salsa Verde

  • The Olive Oil Hunter News #35 Grilled Flank Steak with Salsa Verde

    I love sauces that are simple to make yet complex in flavor, and Spanish-style salsa verde fits the bill. The capers and anchovies meld with the lemon and parsley to make the sauce zesty and salty at the same time. The extra virgin olive oil adds another level of flavor and gives this green sauce a rich mouthfeel. Leftover sauce makes a great veggie dip or a wonderful condiment for almost any sandwich. Enjoy!

    Ingredients

    For the salsa verde:

    • 1 1/2 cups packed, roughly chopped flat-leaf parsley
    • 2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
    • 1/4 cup capers, drained
    • 2 anchovy fillets
    • 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
    • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
    • 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated lemon zest
    • 2 medium cloves garlic, minced (about 2 teaspoons)
    • Kosher salt
    • Freshly ground black pepper

    For the steak:

    • One 2-pound flank steak
    • More kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

    Directions

    Step 1

    Make the salsa verde: Place the parsley, olive oil, capers, anchovies, vinegar, lemon juice and zest, and garlic in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade. Pulse until the parsley is well chopped, stopping to scrape down sides as necessary. Season the sauce with salt and pepper to taste. Transfer to a small bowl and set aside.

    Step 2

    Set up your grill for indirect grilling and heat to medium-high. Generously season the steak on both sides with salt and pepper. Grill the flank steak for about 3 minutes per side or until done to your liking. Let it rest for 2 minutes before carving thinly against the grain on a sharp diagonal. Serve with the salsa verde.

    Yields 4 to 6 servings.

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Parsley: More than a decoration

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

Parsley: More than a decoration

You might be so used to seeing a piece of parsley adorning your dinner plate at restaurants that you forget it’s a lot more than a decoration. Parsley not only has great flavor (many people do prefer the Italian flat-leaf variety to its curly cousin), it’s also chockfull of vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients. Topping that list are vitamins C and A, followed by volatile oil components (sounds scary but they are actually good for you), and flavonoids with antioxidant properties that help protect cells. Parsley is the star ingredient in a South American favorite, chimichurri sauce, as well as in salsa verde. You can use parsley with (or instead of) basil for a milder pesto and as an enhancement in tomato-based dishes. And that bit of old folklore still holds true: Chew on a sprig of parsley to freshen your breath. Parsley is easy to grow in the garden and usually comes back on its own year after year.

Healthy Kitchen Tip: Olive Oil and Herb Cubes

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

Olive Oil and Herb Cubes

Whether you want to preserve herbs you grew yourself or make the most of a bunch you bought at the store or farmers’ market, a terrific option (and future timesaver) is to freeze cubes of olive oil and herbs. You can use a single herb or a mix, depending on the recipes in your repertoire. My quick technique is to rinse, chop, and pat the herbs dry, then process them with just enough olive oil to make a thick purée. Pour the purée into the sections of an ice cube tray, freeze, and transfer the cubes from the tray to a freezer bag. Then label the bag and put it back in the freezer. For a cold sauce, let the cubes defrost for about an hour before using. For a hot dish, pop them right in your pan—you might need to add an extra minute or two to the cooking time.

For Your Best Health: Importance of Sleep

For Your Best Health

Importance of Sleep

A good reason to get enough sleep: British researchers tracked thousands of people at 50 years of age and found that getting six hours or less of sleep a night was associated with an increased risk for developing dementia later in life, specifically in their late 70s. They didn’t find an exact cause-and-effect relationship, so other factors might be in play, but getting enough sleep (usually considered seven to nine hours a night) is a preventive step everyone can take. The New York Times did a great analysis of the study’s limitations and positive findings if you want to know more.

Not sure how to improve sleep time and sleep quality (which helps you feel more refreshed when you wake up)? Try this advice from the CDC:

  • Go to sleep at the same time each night and get up at the same time each morning, weekends included.
     
  • Keep your bedroom quiet, dark, relaxing, and at a comfortable temperature—on the cool side is best.
     
  • Move all electronic devices—yes, the TV and your cellphone—out of the bedroom.
     
  • Stop caffeine and alcohol a few hours before bed.
     
  • Exercise during the day to help fall asleep more easily at night—and boost overall health.

Fitness Flash: The Four Cs of Fitness

Fitness Flash

The Four Cs of Fitness

Having a hard time keeping your head in the game when it comes to participating in sports or simply getting in daily exercise? Try these techniques—“the four Cs”—from the American College of Sports Medicine used by athletes to stay mentally tough:

Cope. Find ways to beat stress. That means learning coping mechanisms to handle stress rather than acting like it doesn’t exist. General stress can keep you from focusing on exercise (or any activity), while stressing specifically over how well you’ll do at a competitive event can weaken your game day performance.

Confidence. Believe in yourself. Most of us focus on our shortcomings or failures, or how far we still have to go. Instead, why not spend all that energy on positive thinking? Use imagery—seeing a picture of yourself succeeding in your mind—to help you gain self-confidence. It works whether you want to run a 2K or just get through a set of weightlifting reps.

Commitment. Devote time to getting better. Yes, when exercise feels hard, it’s so easy to just throw in the towel and devote energy to aspects of your life that are already going well. But exercise is so tied to well-being that it’s important to commit to getting fitter. Make it a priority to go to the gym or walk every day, or to practice a sport to get better at it (imagery can help here, too). And when you’re engaged in fitness activities, don’t let yourself be distracted by other thoughts—give it your all for however long you do it.

Challenge. Embrace the difficult. Elite athletes welcome challenges and see them as opportunities to grow. They thrive on completing difficult fitness routines and defeating formidable opponents. The rewards go deeper than momentary satisfaction: Challenges force you to exert more effort and determination, and that leads to better performance.

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The Olive Oil Hunter News #34

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Asian Slaw Recipe, Spotlight on Cabbage and Ginger, How to Ease Symptoms of Insomnia, and Moving to Combat Arthritis

Asian Slaw

  • The Olive Oil Hunter News #34 Asian Slaw

    As we finally get the OK to get back to normal, a fun first step is a backyard get-together—great food, great friends, great fun! It’s one of the things I’ve missed the most. When I’m menu planning, I love to include one of my favorite sides, boldly flavored Asian slaw, easy to prepare but so intensely delicious. It also goes with everything, from burgers to pulled pork. And you can make it a few hours in advance—that’s enough time for the flavors to meld, while the slaw still remains crisp. Enjoy!

    Ingredients

    For the dressing:

    • 1/3 cup rice wine vinegar
    • 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lime juice
    • 2 teaspoons fresh lime zest
    • 2 tablespoons brown sugar
    • 2 tablespoons soy sauce
    • 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
    • 1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
    • 2 tablespoons peeled and finely minced fresh ginger
    • 1 large clove garlic, finely minced
    • 1/2 to 1 red jalapeño, stemmed, seeded, and finely minced

    For the slaw:

    • 1 medium head Napa or Savoy cabbage, cored and shredded
    • 2 carrots, peeled, trimmed, and cut into matchsticks
    • 3 scallions, trimmed; white and green parts thinly sliced on a sharp diagonal
    • 1/2 cup fresh cilantro leaves
    • 1/2 cup roasted peanuts, roughly chopped (optional)

    Directions

    Step 1

    For the dressing, whisk together the rice wine vinegar, lime juice and zest, brown sugar, and soy sauce in a small mixing bowl. Whisk in the olive oil and sesame oil. Stir in the ginger, garlic, and jalapeño—half of it for mild heat, all of it for more heat.

    Step 2

    To assemble the slaw, toss the cabbage, carrots, and scallions in a large bowl. Add the dressing, and toss to lightly coat. Top with the cilantro leaves and peanuts if you’re using them.

    Yields 4 to 6 servings.

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Cabbage

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

Cabbage

I love the light crunch of Napa, or Chinese, cabbage. Oblong rather than round like traditional green and red cabbage, it’s so easy to shred by making half-inch crossways slices as though you were slicing a loaf of bread. It seems to turn into ribbons for slaw just like that, but you can also cut each tranche into smaller sections for a finer slaw. Napa cabbage is also ideal for a stir-fry because it cooks quickly. And it’s the main ingredient in kimchi, the fermented condiment that, like kefir and kombucha, can boost gut health.

Savoy cabbage looks like a frilly and deeper-green version of traditional cabbage, but like Napa cabbage, it has a lighter taste. If you’ve never had it before, Asian slaw is a great way to try it. Both these cabbage varieties are good sources of vitamins A and C plus fiber.

Healthy Kitchen Tip: Ginger

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

Ginger

Ginger is an essential in many Asian cuisines. Its knobby appearance can leave you wondering how to choose a good piece and then how to cut into it! Fortunately, the answers to both dilemmas are surprisingly simple. Overall, the peel should be smooth, not wrinkled, and there shouldn’t be any mold growth—two signs that it’s past its prime. Ginger will keep in the fridge, wrapped in a paper towel and placed in an open plastic bag, for a few weeks, so don’t worry about hunting through a ginger display for a small piece. If a knob does develop mold or becomes shriveled, just cut off and discard that part.

Chances are you’ll need a two-inch knob for most recipes. Use the edge of a spoon to shave the peel from the section you want to use. Mincing ginger by hand can be slow going, so I prefer to run the exposed knob of ginger over a microplane grater. Do the grating over a bowl to catch the ginger “juice” as well as the flesh. The microplane also does a great job of separating out the unwanted fibrous threads. Best of all, this method helps you distribute ginger flavor throughout a dish rather than in bits and pieces that can taste overly pungent if you bite into one.

For Your Best Health: How to Ease Symptoms of Insomnia

For Your Best Health

How to Ease Symptoms of Insomnia

We all know how important fruits and vegetables are for health, thanks to their plant-based phytonutrients. Now a team from the University of Michigan School of Public Health has found that fruits and vegetables can help ease symptoms of insomnia. Their study involved adults between the ages of 21 and 30 who reported eating fewer than five servings of fruits and vegetables per day—over a third also said they had trouble falling or staying sleep at least three times a week for three months or more. The study found that participants who increased daily fruit and vegetable intake by at least three servings over a three-month period had some improvements in the time it took to fall asleep and in insomnia symptoms, with women getting the most benefits. “What is unique about our study is that we were able to see that as fruit and vegetable intake changed, insomnia-related sleep characteristics also changed,” said lead author Erica Jansen, research assistant professor of nutritional sciences. The researchers hope the findings will become part of other sleep hygiene principles, like maintaining a consistent bedtime and wake time; turning off screens an hour or more before going to sleep; sleeping in a dark, cool environment; and not drinking alcohol or ingesting caffeine before bed.

Fitness Flash: Moving to Combat Arthritis

Fitness Flash

Moving to Combat Arthritis

It sounds counterintuitive, but the way to combat the pain and stiffness of arthritis is to move. According to the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM), skipping physical activity will make you weaker and stiffer and make joint pain worse. But how should you get started when moving is the last thing your joints say they want? You don’t have to run a marathon—just focus on sitting less and moving more, even if it’s standing up once an hour and walking to another room and back. Then build from there.

A study published in JAMA Internal Medicine found that people with knee osteoarthritis responded well to a web-based exercise program, and many health organizations have videos of exercises online you can follow. But it makes sense to talk to your doctor about the best exercises for you and possibly about setting up a program with a physical therapist. A PT can also show you how to move in ways that won’t cause pain. It also helps to engage in activities that you really like so that they won’t feel like work and to partner with an exercise buddy—you’ll keep each other on track. Get more ideas from ACSM here.

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The Olive Oil Hunter News #33

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Cauliflower Caponata Recipe, Spotlight on Golden Raisins, How to Best Store Nuts, Cooking with Cocoa for Weight Loss, and The Link Between Exercise and Air Pollution

Cauliflower Caponata

  • The Olive Oil Hunter News #33 Cauliflower Caponata

    As you know by now, I love all foods Mediterranean, and caponata is a wonderful dish that melds many flavors of the region. Traditionally the main ingredient is eggplant, but I’m super excited to share a wonderful variation with you that capitalizes on the wild popularity of cauliflower. As a cruciferous veg, cauliflower gets high marks for its nutrients, and its mild taste really lets the sweet and savory ingredients in this recipe come through. Caponata is often served as an appetizer, but it’s also a wonderful main dish when you want something light. I love to mound it on grilled bread slices for a fast bruschetta or serve it in a bowl surrounded by bell pepper sections to use as dippers—easy-peasy when company’s coming over. Enjoy!

    Ingredients

    • 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
    • 1/3 cup golden raisins
    • 1 head cauliflower, cut into bite-sized pieces
    • 3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil, divided
    • 2 cloves garlic, minced
    • 1/2 red bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and diced
    • 1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
    • 1/2 cup diced celery hearts or inner stalks of a full head
    • 1 teaspoon hot red pepper flakes (optional)
    • 4 to 6 peperoncini, stemmed and thinly sliced
    • 1/4 cup pine nuts, toasted
    • 2 tablespoons brined capers, drained
    • Zest and juice of one lemon
    • 2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
    • 2 teaspoons chopped fresh oregano
    • Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

    Directions

    Step 1

    Heat the vinegar in a small saucepan or in the microwave and pour on top of the raisins. Soak for 30 minutes to plump them and infuse flavor. In the meantime, bring a pot of salted water to boil and blanch the cauliflower for 90 seconds, strain, and cool to room temperature in a large bowl.

    Step 2

    In a large sauté pan over medium heat, add 1/4 cup of olive oil, the garlic, bell pepper, red onion, celery, and red pepper flakes, if using. Cook for several minutes, stirring frequently, until the bell pepper is tender-crisp and the onion and celery are translucent. Remove from the heat and pour over the cauliflower. Add the raisins and vinegar to the cauliflower mixture along with the peperoncini, pine nuts, capers, remaining 1/2 cup of olive oil, lemon juice and zest, parsley, oregano, and salt and pepper to taste. Gently mix the ingredients. Serve at room temperature or slightly chilled. It keeps for 5-7 days in the fridge.

    Yields 6 appetizer servings

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Golden Raisins

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

Golden Raisins

Luscious golden raisins have a sweeter taste than traditional brown raisins even though they come from the same source (Thompson seedless grapes). That’s because they’re processed differently—plumped with water and dried under controlled conditions rather than in the sun. This helps them retain more phytonutrients. But they’re also treated with sulfur dioxide to keep their sunny color. If you’re allergic to sulfites or simply want to reduce your exposure to preservatives in general, a delicious alternative is the golden Hunza raisin. Grown in the Hunza region of the Himalayas and available online from many companies, like Nuts.com, these raisins are typically sun-dried without any preservatives.

Healthy Kitchen Tip: Storing Nuts

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

Storing Nuts

Shelled pine nuts are a great modern convenience, as are other shelled nuts, like pistachios and almonds. To keep nuts fresher longer, experts at the University of California, Davis, recommend storing them in the fridge or freezer rather than at room temperature, which could hasten the rate at which their healthful natural oils go rancid. Nuts will retain their quality for a year or more in the fridge at 40°F or below and up to two years in the freezer at 0°F or below (they don’t actually freeze, so there’s no thawing time needed). To prevent them from picking up any odors, keep them in clean, tightly closed plastic or glass containers.

For Your Best Health: Cooking with Cocoa for Weight Loss

For Your Best Health

Cooking with Cocoa for Weightloss

If you’re like me, you rejoiced at studies showing that dark chocolate has positive health effects thanks to plant nutrients like antioxidants and that eating judicious amounts of chocolate is associated with lowering the risk of cardiometabolic diseases, including stroke, coronary heart disease, and type 2 diabetes. Recently a team from Penn State took a deep dive into cocoa powder, which is rich in fiber, iron, and many of the same nutrients as chocolate but has a lot fewer calories. They looked to see whether it has benefits, too, specifically a reduction of fat in the liver, which is often seen in people who are overweight. Fatty liver disease has become a global health problem and a risk factor for more serious liver conditions.

The Penn State team used commercially available cocoa and fed it to one group of overweight mice on a high-fat diet. When compared to a similar group of mice that didn’t get any cocoa, these mice had slower weight gain, 56% lower levels of oxidative stress, and 75% lower levels of DNA damage in the liver. It’s not entirely understood how cocoa might account for all this, but the theory is that it may inhibit the enzymes responsible for digesting dietary fat and carbohydrates. Even better, the researchers suggest that getting about 10 tablespoons of cocoa powder a day could have similar benefits for people, especially when combined with a healthy overall diet and increased exercise. Whisk a tablespoon or two of unsweetened cocoa powder into your coffee a few times a day and enjoy it in hot cocoa instead of eating chips or cookies for snacks. It’s also a great enrichment for chili and sauces like mole. Just hold the marshmallows!

Fitness Flash: Exercise and Air Pollution

Fitness Flash

Exercise and Air Pollution

Is exercise ever bad for your health? It could be if you exercise for long stretches in areas of high air pollution, according to a study published in the European Heart Journal. The multiyear research involved nearly a million and a half Korean city dwellers ages 20-39 who completed questionnaires asking about their physical activity over select seven-day periods. When factoring in the effects of exercise on the heart, researchers also looked at corresponding pollution levels including levels of small particulate matter, which are of great concern. As expected, the risk of heart disease was higher among people who didn’t meet recognized guidelines for exercise (a high intensity 15-30 minute workout five times a week or a moderate intensity 30-60 minute workout five times a week). But those who exceeded those guidelines and were exposed to high levels of air pollution experienced adverse effects, too.

“Overall, our results show that physical activity, particularly at the level recommended by European Society of Cardiology guidelines, is associated with a lower risk of developing heart and blood vessel disease among young adults. However, when air pollution levels are high, exercising beyond the recommended amount may offset or even reverse the beneficial effects,” explained Professor Sang Min Park of the Seoul National University College of Medicine, who led the research.

The body-wide negative effects of air pollution have been a concern for some time and for every age group—a recent study published in Nature Aging found that even short exposure can harm cognitive function, for instance. Protect yourself by checking daily pollution levels in your area with the Air Quality Index, especially before you exercise outside.

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