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The Olive Oil Hunter News #117

Posted on by The Olive Oil Hunter

French Onion Soup with Cheesy Croutons Recipe, Spotlight on Onions, A Better Beef Broth, Vegetables that Lower Diabetes Risk and Breakfast for Better Sleep

It’s one of the mainstays of fine French dining—classic soupe à l’oignon, or onion soup. You might think it’s hard to recreate at home, but if you have the patience to caramelize the onions, you can be enjoying it tonight! It’s a great way to get in more veggies, which may help you avoid type 2 diabetes, according to a new study I’m sharing here, too.

French Onion Soup with Cheesy Croutons

  • French Onion Soup with Cheesy Croutons French Onion Soup With Cheesy Croutons

    This simple adaptation of the classic French onion soup is a meal in itself—perfect for lunch or dinner. If you’ve got a free afternoon, making your own rich beef stock is a slow-food pleasure, but a store-bought brand will still deliver rich taste. Take the time to fully caramelize the onions at the start of this recipe—that’s where most of the active cooking time is needed and where the deep flavor develops. You’ll be well rewarded for the effort. This recipe is for a very large batch, enough for two or three meals, depending on how many people you’re serving. For the melted cheese topping, this twist on bread rounds is fun and easier to eat with a spoon! 

    Ingredients

    For the soup:

    • 5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
    • 5 pounds yellow onions, peeled and sliced into roughly ½” rounds
    • Coarse salt
    • Sugar
    • 1/2 cup cognac
    • 8 cups beef stock
    • 1 cup dry vermouth
    • Freshly ground black pepper to taste

    For the croutons:

    • 10 baguette slices, about ½” thick, cut into cubes
    • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
    • 1/2 cup grated gruyere cheese

    Directions

    Step 1

    Caramelize the onions: Heat a large, heavy-bottomed skillet over medium-high heat. Note: Depending on the size of your skillet, you may need to work in batches or use two skillets at once. Add one tablespoon of the oil for every pound of onions you sauté at a time. As you place the onions in the pan, separate each slice into rounds. Toss the onions in the oil and then cover the pan to sweat the onions for about 10 minutes over low-medium heat, taking care not to burn them. Take off the cover, sprinkle the onions with large pinches of salt and sugar, and continue cooking until they become soft and browned, up to 50 minutes (the liquid in the pan will evaporate; add a tablespoon of water as needed to prevent burning). At the end of the cooking time, add the cognac to deglaze the pan and then transfer everything to a large stockpot.

    Step 2

    To finish the soup: Add the beef stock and vermouth to the stockpot and bring to a boil. Lower the heat to a simmer and continue cooking for another hour. Taste and add black pepper, if desired.

    Step 3

    For the croutons: Just before serving the soup, turn on your oven to broil. Spread out the bread cubes on a cookie sheet and toast under the broiler, watching closely, as it should take only a few seconds. Very carefully, take the sheet out of the oven and use tongs to push the toasted croutons together. Sprinkle on the grated cheese and put back under the broiler until the cheese melts, again for only a few seconds.

    Step 4

    To serve, ladle soup into bowls or wide mugs and, using tongs, top each with some cheesy croutons.

    Yields 10-12 servings

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: The Color of Onions

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

The Color of Onions

Onions are wonderful flavor enhancers and can impart different degrees of sweetness based on the variety:

The most popular and easy-to-find onion is the yellow onion, a great option when the onions will be cooked. You might also see Spanish yellow onions, which are a bit sweeter. 

Even sweeter are varieties such as Vidalia, Walla Walla, and Maui, though they’re not usually available year round. When caramelized, they add exceptional flavor to dishes like French onion soup.

Occasionally, you’ll see white onions, milder in flavor than yellow onions and with a great crunch that makes them perfect for eating raw.

Red onions add bright color to dishes, and a more noted, spicy flavor to go with it. The taste is sweeter right after summer harvest, but can turn sharp as they age, so you might find that they taste different depending on the time of year (they will always be milder when cooked). They’re a great choice for pickling and for boldly flavored recipes, but they can overpower a mild dish. 

Quick Kitchen Nugget: A Better Beef Broth

Quick Kitchen Nugget

A Better Beef Broth

Supermarket shelves are filled with options from thick pastes you dilute to ready-to-go cans. New, more authentically made broths, often labeled bone broths (though meaty bones are at the heart of any broth) are now available. Some come frozen, others in pouches or milk-like containers. Not always at the corner grocery, many are available online. Bonafide Provisions, Brodo, and Pacific Foods brands are some flavorful choices. 

Be aware that many store-bought broths get a lot of their taste from added salt, sometimes a lot of it—anywhere from 350 to 700 mg a cup, a big chunk of the 1500 mg recommended maximum daily intake. For the salt conscious, it’s worth noting that Pacific Foods organic low sodium beef broth has just 125 mg sodium per serving. When using prepared broth, you may not need to add any additional salt to a recipe—reach for black pepper first to avoid sodium overload.

For Your Best Health: Vegetables to Lower Diabetes Risk

For Your Best Health

Vegetables to Lower Diabetes Risk

According to an Edith Cowan University analysis of the long-term “Danish Diet, Cancer and Health” study, eating your veggies can translate to lowering diabetes risk. Comparing dietary intake records from 54,000 people, the scientists found that those who consumed the most vegetables were 21 percent less likely to develop type 2 diabetes than those who consumed the least amount. 

At the top of the list were leafy greens and cruciferous veggies such as spinach, lettuce, broccoli, and cauliflower. Interestingly, white potatoes, often thought of as unhealthy, were actually neutral…as long as they were boiled rather than mashed with butter and cream or deep fried. People who ate potatoes prepared with unhealthy fats were also more likely to consume more butter, red meat, and soft drinks, foods known to increase type 2 diabetes risk. The researchers also pointed out that plain potatoes shouldn’t be lumped in the same category as certain other high-carb foods such as white rice and pasta because the potatoes have fiber, minerals, and good nutrients, which make them a higher-quality carb.

The study, “Vegetable, But Not Potato, Intake Is Associated With a Lower Risk of Type 2 Diabetes in the Danish Diet, Cancer and Health Cohort,”was published inDiabetes Care.

Fitness Flash: Breakfast for Better Sleep

Fitness Flash

Breakfast for Better Sleep

Tired of waking up groggy? “Many of us think that morning sleepiness is a benign annoyance,” said Matthew Walker, PhD, UC Berkeley professor of neuroscience and psychology and senior author of the study, “How people wake up is associated with previous night’s sleep together with physical activity and food intake,” published in Nature Communications. “From car crashes to work-related accidents, the cost of sleepiness is deadly. As scientists, we must understand how to help society wake up better and reduce the mortal cost of society’s current struggle to wake up effectively each day.”

He and colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley, teamed up with other researchers, including those in the UK and Sweden, to learn how to avoid that sluggish feeling. By analyzing data culled from more than 800 people over a two-week period, they were able to predict individualized metabolic responses to foods based on a person’s biological characteristics, lifestyle factors, and the foods’ nutritional composition. 

The participants were given a variety of breakfast meals; wore wristwatches to record their physical activity and sleep quantity, quality, timing, and regularity; kept diaries of their food intake; recorded their alertness levels from the moment they woke up and throughout the day; and wore continuous glucose monitors.

The researchers found that the secret to alertness is a three-part prescription: getting the right amounts of exercise and sleep and eating the right breakfast, one that won’t spike blood glucose. “All of these have a unique and independent effect,” said UC Berkeley postdoctoral fellow Raphael Vallat, PhD, first author of the study. “If you sleep longer or later, you’re going to see an increase in your alertness. If you do more physical activity on the day before, you’re going to see an increase. You can see improvements with each and every one of these factors.”

Here are the specifics:

Breakfast. The participants were given preprepared meals with different amounts of nutrients:  moderate amounts of fat and carbohydrates; high protein; high carbohydrate; or high sugar. The worst type of breakfast, on average, was high in sugar; it was associated with an inability to wake up effectively and maintain alertness. The high-carbohydrate breakfast, without simple sugars and with only a modest amount of protein, was linked to individuals revving up their alertness quickly in the morning and sustaining that alert state.

“We have known for some time that a diet high in sugar is harmful to sleep, not to mention being toxic for the cells in your brain and body,” Dr. Walker said. “However, what we have discovered is that, beyond these harmful effects on sleep, consuming high amounts of sugar in your breakfast, and having a spike in blood sugar following any type of breakfast meal, markedly blunts your brain’s ability to return to waking consciousness following sleep.”

Sleep. Sleeping longer and/or later than usual resulted in individuals ramping up their alertness very quickly after awakening. According to Dr. Walker, between seven and nine hours of sleep is ideal for ridding the body of “sleep inertia,” the inability to transition effectively to a state of functional cognitive alertness upon awakening. Most people need this amount of sleep to remove a chemical called adenosine that accumulates in the body throughout the day and brings on sleepiness in the evening, something known as sleep pressure.

“Sleeping later can help with alertness for a second reason,” Dr. Walker said. “When you wake up later, you are rising at a higher point on the upswing of your 24-hour circadian rhythm, which ramps up throughout the morning and boosts alertness.”

Exercise. “It is well known that physical activity, in general, improves your alertness and also your mood level, and we did find a high correlation in this study between participants’ mood and their alertness levels,” Dr. Vallat said. ” Participants who, on average, are happier also feel more alert.”

It’s not completely clear what physical activity does to improve alertness the following day. “It may be that exercise-induced better sleep is part of the reason exercise the day before, by helping sleep that night, leads to superior alertness throughout the next day,” Dr. Vallat said.

“How you wake up each day is very much under your own control, based on how you structure your life and your sleep. You don’t need to feel resigned to any fate, throwing your hands up in disappointment because ‘it’s my genes, and I can’t change my genes,’” said Dr. Walker. “There are some very basic and achievable things you can start doing today, and tonight, to change how you awake each morning, feeling alert and free of that grogginess.”

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The Olive Oil Hunter News #109

Posted on by The Olive Oil Hunter

Rich and Hearty Chili Recipe, Grinding Your Own Meat, How to Boost the Gut Microbiome and The Risks of Shortchanging Yourself on Sleep

Cold winter nights demand soul-satisfying dishes, and this chili recipe really delivers. Rich spices and slow cooking give it depth of flavor—there’s also a health advantage of all those spices. While the answer to winter’s chill isn’t to hibernate, it pays to take a look at how much quality sleep you’re getting. Turns out the risks of poor-quality sleep are much greater than you might realize.

Rich and Hearty Chili

  • Rich and Hearty Chili Rich and Hearty Chili

    A mix of rich spices takes run-of-the-mill chili to a whole new level. You’ll need a few hours for the flavors to develop, but not a lot of active effort. And the results are more than worth it! If you prefer to start with dried beans, soak a total of two cups of your favorite variety or varieties and add them to the pot when you add back the cooked beef. Made with beans, this chili is a good source of important fiber as well as other nutrients.

    Ingredients

    • 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
    • 2 large onions, diced
    • 3 garlic cloves, minced
    • 16 ounces baby portobello or white button mushrooms, sliced thin
    • 2 pounds ground beef, chicken, or turkey
    • 1 6-ounce can tomato paste
    • 1 28-ounce can whole peeled tomatoes with liquid
    • 2 15-ounce cans great northern beans, rinsed and drained
    • 2 15-ounce cans kidney beans, rinsed and drained
    • 3 bay leaves
    • 2 cinnamon sticks
    • 1 teaspoon ground cumin
    • 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
    • 2 tablespoons ancho chili powder
    • ½ teaspoon each cayenne, allspice, and coarse salt
    • 1 tablespoon apple cider or sherry vinegar
    • Optional toppings for serving: diced raw onions, shredded cheddar cheese, sour cream, and crushed corn or tortilla chips as desired

    Directions

    Step 1

    Heat a large stockpot or Dutch oven. Add the oil and then the onions and garlic. Cook over medium heat until soft. Add the mushrooms and sauté until soft. Add the ground meat in batches and cook until browned. 

    Step 2

    Push everything to the sides of the pot and add the tomato paste. Cook it until it turns a deep, brownish red and then fold it into the vegetables and meat. Add the rest of the ingredients and stir to combine. 

    Step 3

    Bring to a simmer, cover, and cook for three hours, stirring every half hour. If the liquid is evaporating too quickly, place the lid ajar. Remove the bay leaves and serve with your choice of toppings. 

    Yields 8 hearty servings. 

Food Pairings: The Power of Purple Potatoes

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

Grinding your own meat

Convenience rather than flavor is the reason to buy packaged ground meat at the market. Doing the grinding yourself allows you to choose your cut of beef (and fat content) or, in the case of chicken or turkey, your desired mix of light and dark meat. A home grinder, like the attachment made for the KitchenAid mixer, is great, but you can grind your own with the steel blade of a food processor using the pulsing function. The secret to a great grind is a chill-down for the meat and the grinder parts/processor blade. For meat in particular, this keeps more of the fat integrated and creates less fat smearing on the sides of the workbowl. 

Prep the meat by trimming as needed and then cutting it into 1-to-2-inch cubes. Place the cubes in a single layer on a sheet tray and pop it into the freezer along with your grinding blade for about 30 minutes—you want the meat cold and firm, but not frozen.

There’s no limit to how much meat you can run through a dedicated grinder. For the average size food processor, pulse about 8 ounces at a time; use a spatula to get out as much as possible before adding another batch. 

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Sweet spices for savory dishes

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

Taking chili vegetarian

If you’d like to skip the meat, this chili recipe can easily adapt. For the same number of servings, increase the veggies and the beans by 25 percent and opt for the portobello mushrooms, prepping them into a ½-inch dice instead of slices. If you’d like to increase the protein content beyond what the beans offer, crumble 8 to 16 ounces of firm tofu into the pot when you add the beans. 

Healthy Kitchen Nugget: The Truth About Nondairy Milks

For Your Best Health

Boosting the gut microbiome

The human gut microbiome is a collection of trillions of microorganisms that live inside the intestinal tract. The bacteria there can affect nearly all systems of the body, including metabolism and the building and maintaining of the immune system.

In two separate studies done at Penn State, nutritional scientists looking at the effects of small changes to the average American diet found improvements to the gut microbiome when participants added a daily ounce of peanuts or about a teaspoon of herbs and spices to their intake.

“Research has shown that people who have a lot of different microbes have better health, and a better diet, than those who don’t have much bacterial diversity,” said Penny M. Kris-Etherton, PhD, Evan Pugh University Professor of Nutritional Sciences.

In the peanut study, published in the journal Clinical Nutrition, Dr. Kris-Etherton and colleagues compared the effects of snacking on 28 grams (about 1 ounce) of peanuts per day to those of a higher-carbohydrate snack of crackers and cheese. At the end of six weeks, participants who ate the peanut snack showed an increased abundance of Ruminococcaceae, a genus of bacteria linked to healthy liver metabolism and immune function.

In the herbs and spices study, published in The Journal of Nutrition, scientists analyzed the impact of adding blends of herbs and spices, such as cinnamon, ginger, cumin, turmeric, rosemary, oregano, basil, and thyme, to the controlled diets of participants at risk for cardiovascular disease. The team examined three doses: about 1/8 teaspoon per day, a little more than 3/4 teaspoon per day, and about 1-1/2 teaspoons per day. At the end of four weeks, participants showed an increase in gut bacteria diversity, including in Ruminococcaceae, most notably with the medium and high doses of herbs and spices.

“It’s such a simple thing that people can do,” said Dr. Kris-Etherton. “The average American diet is far from ideal, so I think everyone could benefit by adding herbs and spices. It’s also a way of decreasing sodium in your diet but flavoring foods in a way that makes them palatable and, in fact, delicious! Taste is really a top criterion for why people choose the foods they do.”

However, she pointed out that more research is needed to understand all the implications of diet and the workings of the gut microbiome itself. “We need a lot more research on the microbiome to see what its proper place is in terms of overall health,” she said.

Healthy Kitchen Nugget: The Value of Variety

Fitness Flash

The risks of shortchanging yourself on sleep

According to a new study that involved 7,000 men and women between the ages of 50 and 70, getting less than five hours of sleep in mid-to-late life could be linked to an increased risk of developing chronic diseases. Researchers from the University College London in the UK examined the relationship between how long each participant slept each night and whether they had been diagnosed with two or more chronic diseases (called multimorbidity), such as heart disease, cancer, or diabetes, over the course of 25 years.

People who reported getting five hours of sleep or less at age 50 were 20 percent more likely to have been diagnosed with a chronic disease and 40 percent more likely to be diagnosed with two or more chronic diseases over 25 years, compared to people who slept for up to seven hours. The researchers also found that sleep duration of five hours or less at age 50 was associated with 25 percent increased risk of mortality over the 25 years of follow-up: Short sleep duration increased the risk of chronic disease(s) that, in turn, increased the risk of death.

“Multimorbidity is on the rise in high income countries and more than half of older adults now have at least two chronic diseases. This is proving to be a major challenge for public health, as multimorbidity is associated with high healthcare service use, hospitalizations, and disability,” said Dr. Severine Sabia, lead author of the study. “As people get older, their sleep habits and sleep structure change. However, it is recommended to sleep for 7 to 8 hours a night as sleep durations above or below this have previously been associated with individual chronic diseases. To ensure a better night’s sleep, it is important to promote good sleep hygiene, such as making sure the bedroom is quiet, dark, and at a comfortable temperature before sleeping. It’s also advised to remove electronic devices and avoid large meals before bedtime. Physical activity and exposure to light during the day might also promote good sleep.”

As part of the study, researchers also assessed whether sleeping for a long duration, of nine hours or more, affected health outcomes. There was no clear association between long sleep duration at age 50 and multimorbidity in healthy people. However, for participants already diagnosed with a chronic condition, long sleep duration was associated with around a 35 percent increased risk of developing another illness. Researchers believe this could be due to underlying health conditions impacting sleep.

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The Olive Oil Hunter News #96

Posted on by The Olive Oil Hunter

Easy Pizza Dough for Personal Pies Recipe, Spotlight on Pizza, White versus Wheat Flour, Why Thinking is Exhausting and Why Daily Exercise is Not

Who doesn’t love pizza? The problem is that it’s often saddled with the “unhealthy” label. But I’m here to tell you that homemade pizza can be delicious and nutritious. It all depends on the ingredients, and by that I of course mean the toppings! And I have some more food for thought: Why thinking is exhausting and why daily exercise nuggets are not (they’re actually invigorating!).

Easy Pizza Dough for Personal Pies

  • Personal Pizzas Easy Pizza Dough for Personal Pies

    Using bread flour is the secret for crusty pizza—one that holds up to a lot of sauce and toppings! You can make two large rounds from this dough, but making individual pizzas is more fun. Note: If you’re able to find instant yeast, you can streamline the technique even further, as it can be mixed with the other dry ingredients for a few seconds before adding the water and oil, before proceeding with the kneading as described. 

    Ingredients

    • 1 1/2 cups warm water, about 110-115°F, plus more as needed
    • 1 teaspoon sugar
    • 2 1/4 teaspoons (or one envelope) active dry yeast
    • 1 teaspoon coarse sea salt
    • 4 cups bread flour, plus more as needed 
    • 4 tablespoons olive oil, divided

    Directions

    Step 1

    Place the water, sugar, and yeast in the bowl of a stand mixer with the dough hook attached. Turn it on for a few seconds to mix and then wait 5 minutes for the yeast to bubble up. 

    Step 2

    With the mixer on the lowest setting, add 3 tablespoons of olive oil, the salt, and the flour to the bowl. Once a doughy mass forms, slowly raise the speed and continue kneading until the dough ball is smooth and elastic, about 8 minutes. If the dough feels too dry, add more water, a scant tablespoon at a time. If too wet, add more flour, a scant tablespoon at a time.

    Step 3

    Lift the dough out of the bowl, remove the dough hook, and pour in the last tablespoon of olive oil, coating the bowl thoroughly. Place the dough back in the bowl, cover it with plastic wrap, and let it rise for about 60 minutes or so (depending on how warm your kitchen is) until double in size and spongy.

    Step 4

    Preheat your oven to 450° or 500°F, depending on how high it goes. Gently transfer the dough from the bowl to a large piece of parchment paper. Use a knife or pastry cutter to cut the dough into quarters. Transfer three of the pieces onto their own sheets of parchment. If the dough is sticky, first sprinkle the parchment paper with flour or some cornmeal. One piece at a time, stretch out the dough with your hands, rotating it by quarter turns until it reaches your desired thickness. The shape—round, rectangle, or oblong—is up to you, but keep a slight lip all along the perimeter. Transfer the pizzas to large baking sheets (you should be able to fit two per sheet). Use scissors to trim the parchment to within two inches of the dough.

    Step 5

    Working in batches as needed based on your oven capacity, bake the pizzas for 8 minutes. Carefully take them out of the oven, add your desired toppings, and return to the oven for another 8 to 10 minutes or until bubbly.

     Yields 4 individual pizzas

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Perfectly Petite Pork Tenderloin

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

“Healthify” Your Pizza

One of the things I love most about making individual pizzas is that everyone can customize their pie. I like to “healthify” my pizza with loads of veggies, like onions, mushrooms, Brussels sprout halves, and broccoli rabe. Cherry tomatoes are a fun addition when there’s no time to make sauce (or even in addition to it). Topping your pizza right as it comes out of the oven with arugula and a drizzle of olive oil gives it a fresh and slightly peppery finish. Of course, almost any ethnic dish that you’d eat with bread, from chicken tikka marsala to shish kebab, can top your pizza for a delicious twist.

Healthy Kitchen Nugget: Meat Safety: Temperature is Everything

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

White versus Wheat Flour

Another trick to making pizza good for you is replacing about 25 percent of the white flour with whole wheat or whole wheat pastry flour. Because these flours are the least processed, they retain fiber and nutrients. At the other extreme is 00 pizza flour. It’s been getting more attention lately as Italian brands become more readily available (there’s also 00 flour for pasta, and they’re not interchangeable). It has the silkiest, smoothest texture of all flours and, consequently, retains virtually no fiber. Since, as always, the proof is in the pudding, you might do your own taste test to see the difference and even experiment by using 00 along with some whole wheat flour.

For Your Best Health: Rethinking Moderate Drinking

For Your Best Health

Don’t overthink it!

New research has found that too much mental effort can be as exhausting as physical labor. What’s more, it can cause toxin by-products to build up in the brain (fortunately, they can be recycled during down time). 

Study co-author Mathias Pessiglione, PhD, of Pitié-Salpêtrière University in Paris, France, explains: “Our findings show that cognitive work results in a true functional alteration—accumulation of noxious substances—so fatigue would indeed be a signal that makes us stop working…to preserve the integrity of brain functioning.”

To better understand what mental fatigue really is, Dr. Pessiglione and his colleagues used magnetic resonance spectroscopy to monitor brain chemistry over the course of a workday. They looked at two groups of people: those who needed to think hard and those who had relatively easier cognitive tasks.

They saw signs of fatigue only in the group doing hard thinking. Those participants also had higher levels of glutamate in synapses of the brain’s prefrontal cortex. This supports the notion that glutamate accumulation makes further activation of the prefrontal cortex more costly, meaning that cognitive control is more difficult after a mentally tough workday.

Is there some way around this limitation of our brain’s ability to think hard? “Not really, I’m afraid,” Dr. Pessiglione says. “I would employ good old recipes: Rest and sleep! There is good evidence that glutamate is eliminated from synapses during sleep.” He also advises people to avoid making important decisions when they’re tired.

Fitness Flash: The Dangers of Too Much Sitting

Fitness Flash

Weight Training in Daily Spurts

We all know how important weight, or resistance, training is—having strong muscles is essential to staying self-sufficient, especially as we get older. But you may have a hard time getting enthused about going to the gym for heavy-duty pumping iron sessions. New research from Australia’s Edith Cowan University (ECU) found that small amounts of daily activity could well be the most beneficial approach for muscle strength.

For their study, researchers from ECU in collaboration with Niigata University and Nishi Kyushu University in Japan had three groups of participants perform an arm resistance exercise (eccentric bicep contractions) using a weight training machine, and then the researchers measured and compared changes in muscle strength and muscle thickness. 

Each group followed a different training schedule across the four weeks of the study. Two groups performed 30 contractions per week, with one group doing six contractions a day for five days a week (the 6×5 group), while the other crammed all 30 into a single day, once a week (the 30×1 group). The third group only performed six contractions on just one day each week.

After four weeks, the group doing six contractions once a week did not show any changes in muscle strength or muscle thickness. The group doing 30 contractions in a single day did not show any increase in muscle strength, though they had a slight increase in muscle size. The 6×5 group saw an increase of greater than 10 percent in muscle strength along with a slight increase in muscle size.

ECU Exercise and Sports Science Professor Ken Nosaka, PhD, says this and other studies suggest very manageable amounts of exercise done regularly can have a real effect on strength. “People think they have to do a lengthy session of resistance training in the gym, but that’s not the case. Just lowering a heavy dumbbell slowly once six times a day is enough. We only used the bicep curl exercise in this study, but we believe this would be the case for other muscles also, at least to some extent,” explains Dr. Nosaka, adding, “Muscle strength is important to our health. This could help prevent a decrease in muscle mass and strength with ageing. A decrease in muscle mass is a cause of many chronic disease, such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, some cancers, dementia, plus musculoskeletal problems such as osteoporosis.”

He stresses that it’s also important to include rest in an exercise regimen. “In this study, the 6×5 group had two days off per week,” he points out. “Muscle adaptions occur when we are resting; if someone was able to somehow train 24 hours a day, there would actually be no improvement at all. Muscles need rest to improve their strength and their muscle mass, but muscles appear to like to be stimulated more frequently.”

Dr. Nosaka also believes that there needs to be more emphasis on making exercise a daily activity, rather than hitting a weekly minute goal. “If you’re just going to the gym once a week, it’s not as effective as doing a bit of exercise every day at home,” he says. The study was published in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports.

Fitness Flash: The Dangers of Too Much Sitting

A New and Exciting Health Event

Is Your Immune System in Prime Shape?

While we tend to think of the body’s immune system as our first defense against the flu and other viruses, it’s responsible for so much more. That’s why I’m excited to share news about a brand-new online series called The Immunity Solution led by Austin Perlmutter, MD, the internationally recognized educator on the neurobiology of mood and decision-making, and Jeffrey Bland, PhD, the integrative health pioneer.

These well-respected experts know that an imbalance in your immune system can hurt your health, sap your energy, and bring down your mood.  It’s also been linked to poor gut health, painful joints, brain fog, skin problems, and more. But they also know that there’s a lot you can do to improve immunity…and they’ve put together a new 12-episode event to show you how.

Joining Drs. Bland and Perlmutter for this groundbreaking new series are leading experts on health, nutrition, and the immune system. You’ll learn how to beat fatigue and increase energy, improve mood, and optimize your health so that you feel great, all by making some simple diet and lifestyle changes. 

Consider this your personal invitation to attend this incredible event for FREE!

From October 12 to 23 at absolutely no cost to you, you will have the opportunity to learn about the latest discoveries and breakthroughs in immunity and get powerful tools that will work fast and last for the rest of your life. Here are just a few of the featured experts and topics in the 12-episode series:

  • Dr. David Perlmutter: The Brain Immune Connection
  • Dr. Daniel Amen: Mental Health in the Modern Day
  • Dr. Uma Naidoo: Food and Mood Connection
  • Dr. Mark Hyman: The Longevity Immunity Connection 
  • Dr. Austin Perlmutter: Nature, Sleep, Exercise
  • Dr. Jeffrey Bland: Food, Nutrients, Supplements, and Energy Immune Connection
  • JJ Virgin: Women’s Health and Immunity
  • Dr. Tom O’Bryan: The Incredible Gut-Immune Connection
  • Dr. Anna Cabeca: Inflammation: What Is It? And Why Care?

To learn more about this unique series hosted by Dr. Austin Perlmutter and Dr. Jeffrey Bland, go to The Immunity Solution.

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The Olive Oil Hunter News #81

Posted on by The Olive Oil Hunter

Crab-Stuffed Piquillo Peppers Recipe, Spotlight on Crabmeat, Pickling Peppers, Block Out Light for Better Sleep and the Importance of Moving Now to Be Able to Keep Moving Later

Stuffed peppers are always a huge hit at gatherings. The small ones used in this recipe make a perfect finger food, and the crabmeat filling makes them decadently delicious as well as healthy. Speaking of health, I’m continually amazed at the variety of research published on a near-daily basis. The two articles I’m sharing this week are on topics that often fly under the radar: the underappreciated health consequences of too much light in the bedroom while sleeping and the underappreciated benefits of lifelong leisure activities for muscle function in older age.

Crab-Stuffed Piquillo Peppers

  • Crab-stuffed piquillo peppers Crab-Stuffed Piquillo Peppers

    Piquillo means “little beak” in Spanish, and piquillo peppers get their name from that shape, though, ironically, they don’t have the “bite” of many other pepper varieties. Grown in the Navarra region ofnorthern Spain near the town of Lodosa, they’re very mild.After harvest, they’re fire-roasted for a sweet and smoky flavor, peeled and seeded by hand, then packed in brine. You can purchase them from many online purveyors. For a variation on the crabmeat, try flaked Spanish tuna. 

    Ingredients

    • Extra virgin olive oil, about 3 tablespoons in all
    • 6 ounces goat cheese or cream cheese, at room temperature
    • 1 tablespoon dry Spanish sherry
    • 1 cup crabmeat, shredded
    • 3 tablespoons finely chopped pitted black olives, preferably Spanish 
    • 3 tablespoons finely minced scallion tops (green parts only) 
    • Kosher or coarse sea salt 
    • Freshly ground black pepper 
    • 12-ounce jar of brined whole piquillo peppers, drained 

    Directions

    Step 1

    Preheat your oven to 425°F. Drizzle the bottom of a baking dish with olive oil and set aside. Use a wooden spoon to combine the cheese and sherry in a bowl. Fold in the crabmeat, olives, and scallions, and season to taste with salt and pepper.

    Step 2

    Transfer the cheese-crab mixture to a piping bag fitted with a 1/2-inch donut filler tip, or use a sturdy resealable plastic bag and snip off one of the lower corners to make a 1/2-inch opening. (In a pinch, you can use a small spoon.) Gently pipe about a tablespoon of the cheese-crab mixture into each pepper, being careful not to overstuff and risk tearing the walls of the peppers.

    Step 3

    Arrange the stuffed peppers in a single layer on the bottom of the baking dish. Drizzle a few drops of olive oil over the top of each pepper. Bake until the cheese is bubbling, about 12 minutes. 

    Yields 6 to 8 appetizer servings

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight: Chives

Healthy Ingredient Spotlight

A primer on crabmeat

Buying crabmeat can be confusing, with many different types at many different price points. Here are the varieties you’re most likely to see at stores, according to the experts at Phillips Seafood, the 100-year-old Baltimore, Maryland-based company specializing in high-quality crabmeat.

Jumbo lump crabmeat comes from the two large muscles attached to the crab’s swimming fins. These nuggets have an impressive size, bright white color, and delicious crab taste. Use this crabmeat in recipes when the crabmeat will be visible and you want to make a wow statement. It’s usually the most-expensive option.

Lump crabmeat combines broken pieces of jumbo lump and special crabmeat (see below). It’s ideal for crab cakes, dips, salads, casseroles, and filling the peppers in this week’s recipe. 

Special crabmeat is made from smaller pieces of meat taken from the body of the crab, and it works well in many recipes, from crab balls and dips to salads, wraps, and soups.

Claw meat comes from the swimming fins of the crab. It’s brown in color and has a stronger flavor. Use it in dishes with heavy sauces or in dips and soups—the flavor of the crab will come through without being overpowering. It’s usually the least-expensive option. 

Healthy Kitchen Nugget: Get dedicated kitchen shears

Healthy Kitchen Nugget

Pickling peppers

Pickling your own peppers is quick and easy, and you can do it with almost any peppers you grow yourself or buy at a farmers market. Here’s a simple method: Carefully remove the stems and seeds of the peppers—a grapefruit knife does a neat job—and pack the peppers in a lidded jar. Prepare a pickling solution and bring it to a boil A good starting point is to use equal amounts of vinegar and water, a few smashed garlic cloves, a tablespoon of sugar, and a teaspoon of salt, but have fun experimenting with additional aromatics, like herbs. Pour the hot liquid over the peppers, being sure that they’re completely submerged and that the liquid goes to the top of the jar; this will discourage any mold. Screw on the lid, and once the jar has cooled to room temperature, refrigerate it. You can start to enjoy the peppers in a few days, but the flavors will intensify over time. The peppers will last for a few months in the fridge.

For Your Best Health: Tapping into creativity

For Your Best Health

Tapping into creativity

A famous episode of Seinfeld centered on the havoc wrought on Kramer’s sleep when the neon light of a roasted chicken franchise shined into his apartment. Turns out this is no laughing matter. A new study from Northwestern University found that even moderate light exposure during sleep—whether from streetlights, your own beside lamp, or a TV that stays on—can harm heart health and cause insulin resistance the next morning. Insulin resistance is when cells in your muscles, fat, and liver don’t respond well to insulin and can’t effectively use glucose from your blood for energy. To make up for it, your pancreas makes more insulin. Over time, your blood sugar level rises.

“The results from this study demonstrate that just a single night of exposure to moderate room lighting during sleep can impair glucose and cardiovascular regulation, which are risk factors for heart disease, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome,” says senior study author Dr. Phyllis Zee, chief of sleep medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a Northwestern Medicine physician. “It’s important for people to avoid or minimize the amount of light exposure during sleep.”

“We showed your heart rate increases when you sleep in a moderately lit room,” says Dr. Daniela Grimaldi, study co-first author and research assistant professor of neurology at Feinberg. “Even though you are asleep, your autonomic nervous system is activated. That’s bad. Usually your heart rate together with other cardiovascular parameters are lower at night and higher during the day.”

Here are Dr. Zee’s tips for reducing light during sleep.

Don’t sleep with any lights on. If you need to have a light on for safety, make it a dim light that is close to the floor.

Color counts: Amber or a red/orange light is less stimulating for the brain than white or blue light. Keep it as far away from you as practical.

Blackout shades or eye masks are good if you can’t control the outdoor light even after moving your bed so that the light isn’t shining on your face.

“If you’re able to see things really well, it’s probably too light,” Dr. Zee says.

Fitness Flash: Why “use it or lose it” is real

Fitness Flash

Keep moving now to be able to keep moving later

Ever wonder why it seems that the less exercise you do, the harder it is to exercise at all? New research offers one possible explanation. Doing less exercise could deactivate the body’s vital Piezo1 protein, according to scientists from the UK’s University of Leeds. Piezo1 is a blood flow sensor. Deactivating it reduces the density of capillaries carrying blood to the muscles, and that restricted blood flow means activity becomes more difficult and can limit the amount of exercise you’re able to do.

The research, published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, was carried out using mice, but because the Piezo1 protein is also found in people, the same results could occur. As lead author Fiona Bartoli, PhD, a postdoctoral researcher at Leeds’ School of Medicine, says, “Exercise protects against cardiovascular disease, diabetes, depression, and cancer. Unfortunately, many people fail to exercise enough, for reasons such as injury and computer usage. This puts people at more risk of disease. The less people exercise, the less fit they become, often leading to a downward spiral.

“Although many responses to exercise are known, how the benefits of exercise are initially triggered at a molecular level is mysterious. Our study highlights the crucial link between physical activity and physical performance made at this level by Piezo1. Keeping our Piezo1s active by exercising may be crucial in our physical performance and health.”

During the experiment, mice who had their Piezo1 levels disrupted for 10 weeks showed a dramatic reduction in activities like walking, climbing, and running on a wheel activity. Specifically they did fewer wheel revolutions per exercise session and had slower running speeds. The mice didn’t have less desire to exercise but rather less ability.

Adds David Beech, PhD, the study’s supervising author, “Our work sheds new light on how Piezo1’s role in blood vessels is connected to physical activity. A lot was already known about its role in blood vessel development, but far less was known about its contribution to vessel maintenance in adults. Our discovery also provides an opportunity to think about how loss of muscle function could be treated in new ways: If we activate Piezo1, it might help to maintain exercise capability.”

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