Tag: Mediterranean diet

Dr. Longo’s Longevity Diet: How to Do It in Summer – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

La Cucina Italiana

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Choosing carefully the foods we eat is a health strategy against age-related diseases and tumors. Professor Valter Longo, specialized in the longevity diet, explains to us that scientific evidence promotes a mainly vegan diet, with the addition of fish 2 or 3 times a week and with plenty of seasonal vegetables, whole grains, legumes and good fats, starting with extra virgin olive oil.

Romina Cervigniscientific director of the Valter Longo Onlus Foundation, suggests some precautions to be able to adhere to the key nutritional principles of Longevity Diet even in summer.

Valter Longo’s Longevity Diet for Summer

1. Seasonality

It is important to always respect the seasonality of products, especially fruit, vegetables and fish. Always eating seasonal foods means ensuring a diet that varies from month to month and that respect the territory and the rhythms of nature.

2. The fruit

The Longevity Diet recommends a daily intake of 150 grams of fruitor about one medium-sized fruit per day. It is important that it is well cleaned and that it is seasonal, to ensure the optimal content of vitamins, mineral salts and other nutrients. In summer the variety of fruit is very rich: apricots, melon, watermelon, peaches, plums, medlars, cherries, strawberries, prunes, figs, raspberries and blueberries.

3. The fish

The Longevity Diet recommends consuming it 2 or 3 times a week. The best choice that the consumer can make, from the point of view of nutritional composition, is certainly blue fish small size such as anchovies, mackerel, sardines, pilchards and anchovies: thanks to their small size, these types of fish tend to accumulate lower levels of methylmercury than larger ones.

4. Fats

For the Longevity Diet, the quality of the fats introduced is very important: it is best to favour quality mono and polyunsaturated fats, such as those contained in fatty fish (e.g. salmon or sardines) or in the nuts and in theextra virgin olive oilto the detriment of saturated fats and especially hydrogenated and trans fats.

5. Night fasting

Respecting a 12-hour night fast – useful for synchronizing the circadian rhythm, improving metabolism, having more mental energy and triggering autophagy, a mechanism that allows you to eliminate diseased cells and regenerate healthy ones -, even in summer is not an impossible mission. It is true that the days are getting longer and dinners out or parties increasebut in these cases, in order to reconcile the end of dinner with the time of breakfast the next day, it is possible, for example, postpone breakfastdrinking two glasses of water in the morning, as soon as you wake up, with a coffee or a sugar-free herbal tea, and then, later, 12 hours after the previous meal, introduce the solid food source.

The fasting mimicking diet (in the warm months)

Professor Valter Longo also developed the fasting mimicking diet. This is a 5-day low-calorie nutritional protocoldesigned to be carefully balanced in all its macro and micronutrients, which are appropriately distributed to constitute a strong caloric restriction, necessary to induce the body into a state of ketosis, useful for cellular regeneration and cleansing. Since it is a clinically tested protocol, it is necessary to consume, in order and without additions, all the foods present in the protocol. Since the fasting mimicking diet provides a caloric intake of 1150 kcal on the first day and indicatively of 800 kcal from the second to the fifthAnd It is also not recommended to practice strengthening physical activities and/or do it during the warmer months, otherwise you may experience some side effects, such as a feeling of tiredness and exhaustion, a slight headache, especially in the eye area, sometimes accompanied by a slight feeling of nausea, or a drop in blood pressure.

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What is Green MED, the modified Mediterranean Diet – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

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The modified Mediterranean diet, also called Green Med, is the latest version of the Mediterranean diet. In recent years, this new nutritional model has been at the center of several studies, which investigate how changes to the diet considered the healthiest in the world can further lower the risk of incurring disorders and diseases and contribute to good health. The conclusion reached by the scientists is that the green Mediterranean diet is even more effective than the “traditional” version for lowering the risk of metabolic and cardiovascular diseases and for contributing to longevity. To find out more about the modified Mediterranean diet, we asked the nutritionist some questions Lucia Bacciottinispecialist in food science and former teacher of nutraceuticals and integrated nutrition atUniversity of Florencewhich was the forerunner in Italy years ago, promoting the flexitarian diet or flexible, a predominantly plant-based diet with little protein of animal origin.

What is Green MED, the modified Mediterranean diet

«The modified Mediterranean diet, also known as Green MED, is a Mediterranean diet (MED) further enriched with foods of plant origin and in particular focused on the action of polyphenols which are bioactive molecules contained in fresh and seasonal vegetables and fruits explains nutritionist Lucia Bacciottini. «The increase in polyphenols at the table guarantees an epigenetic action both oriented towards the activation and deactivation of functional DNA genes, favoring the protection mechanisms for health and longevity.

What do you eat in the modified Mediterranean diet

«The Green MED or modified Mediterranean diet, in addition to being characterized by larger portions of fresh seasonal vegetables, does not include the use of red meat, except occasionally and completely excludes processed meats (cold cuts and sausages of all types). It also excludes refined white flours and all derived products together with simple sugars and sweets, which can only be consumed occasionally” explains nutritionist Lucia Bacciottini. «Another aspect that characterizes the modified Mediterranean diet is the presence of green tea, 4-5 cups per day, and walnuts (28 g per day, approximately 5-6 walnuts). And finally the presence of a new food, the so-called duckweedMankai, which has a high protein content and is also very rich in iron, vitamins – in particular the mineral vitamin B12 – and polyphenols and due to these structural biochemical characteristics it acts as a substitute for meat”.

Green and classic Mediterranean diet: the differences

«The Mediterranean diet, notoriously, represents a traditional, healthy and sustainable diet model and scientifically correlated with the prevention of chronic non-communicable diseases explains nutritionist Lucia Bacciottini. «The Mediterranean diet as we know it has been much studied and scientifically validated as a diet capable of containing the risk of cardiovascular and metabolic pathologies with particular reference to diabetes and, to date, it represents the scientific reference for the drafting of guidelines that allow contain the risk of heart attack and coronary heart disease due to the richness of polyphenols, biologically active substances present in vegetables, the presence of healthy fats, i.e. polyunsaturated fats and also due to reduced portions of proteins of animal origin” says the expert. «But the scientists went further and wanted to research and scientifically validate whether a version of the Mediterranean diet that features even more daily portions of green vegetables and with a further reduction in proteins of animal origin, with the complete exclusion of red meat, could contribute better at maintaining health and containing metabolic and cardiovascular pathologies” says the expert.

What scientists have discovered about the modified Mediterranean diet: the studies

«The first study to investigate the possible benefits of green Mediterranean diet it was DIRECT-PLUS study (Dietary Intervention Randomized Clinical Trial Polyphenols Unprocessed Study), which introduced the very concept of green-mediterranean diet, rich in polyphenols and has highlighted its advantages both in terms of intrahepatic fat loss compared to other healthy nutritional strategies, and in halving NAFLD, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.” From other studies that have been conducted over time, it has emerged that a diet rich in polyphenols such as the modified Mediterranean diet can primarily benefit the health of the heart and intestines, but can also be an excellent strategy to combat aging including the cerebral one. “One study published in the scientific journal Heart highlighted that a green Mediterranean diet compared to the traditional one has greater advantages in lowering cholesterol and blood pressure compared to the traditional one, while another subsequent study published in Genome Medicine highlighted that thanks to the richness of polyphenols, the green Mediterranean diet is an excellent strategy for keeping the intestine and its microbiome healthy, positively modifying its composition. A further study published onAmerican Journal of Clinical Nutritionalso highlighted how the green Mediterranean diet helps protect against age-related cognitive changes.”

Who is the modified Mediterranean diet suitable for?

«The modified Mediterranean diet is suitable for everyone and can be adopted from childhood to geriatric age. Athletes and sedentary people can follow it, modulating the doses of the various permitted foods and varying the proportions between foods. The only important attention, regarding the adoption of the Green MED, is for people who present transient or subchronic or chronic symptoms of inflammation of the colon, if the medical specialists have advised to modulate the dietary intake of fibre, of which, as is known, plant products are very rich. Even those sensitive to nickel must consult medical specialists to understand what to choose and possibly limit the vegetables that are richer in it.”

What to eat in the modified Mediterranean diet: an example of a menu

Breakfast: wholemeal oat flakes with plain yogurt and strawberries or blueberries, green tea.

Snack: 3 nuts and a seasonal fruit.

Lunch: mixed salad of fresh seasonal vegetables with grilled salmon and steamed vegetables and fresh seasonal fruit, green tea.

Snack: toasted legumes and 2 nuts.

Dinner: vegetable soup with fresh seasonal vegetables and aromatic herbs and bread made with wholemeal stone-ground wheat flour with oilseeds and chickpea and avocado hummus, green tea.

green med
Mixed salad with fruit

When you need freshness and lightness in winter, try preparing this mixed salad with fruit, full of colours, nutrients and taste

Go to the recipe

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What to eat during menopause: Angelica Cesena’s advice – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

La Cucina Italiana

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What to eat at menopause? There comes a time in life when women ask themselves this question. And we passed it on to the expert who gave us the right advice to best face this moment of profound change in the body, suggestions that are also useful for to prevent through correct lifestyles all those disorders and diseases that can occur at the same time. «A healthy and balanced diet plays a preventive role at every stage of life, and is crucial to deal with the consequences caused by the decline in estrogen that occurs during menopause” explains Angelica Cesenanutritional biologist and author of Made for women, the right food for every stage of life (Giunti Editore). «Estrogens are female hormones and the effects of their fluctuation are different: first of all they make bones weaker and then are associated with an increase in cardiovascular risk. Furthermore, together with a series of disorders typical of this phase such as hot flashes, changes in mood, insomnia, our body also changes profoundly during menopause: the adipose tissue which previously accumulated on the legs and buttocks, after loss of fertility begins to settle on the abdomen.”

What to eat during menopause to feel good?

The problem, obviously, is not the blemishes caused by possible accumulations of fat. The real problem is weight: during menopause you have to be particularly careful to keep it under control because an excess multiplies the risks of getting sick. Furthermore, maintaining your ideal weight puts less strain on your bones which at this stage begin to weaken. What to eat then? «The best diet remains the same Mediterranean: it means eating wholemeal and as many plant-based carbohydrates as possible every day, and therefore also proteins of plant origin, interspersing them with oily fish, dairy products, eggs and white meats. Red meat and sweets are always at the top of the food pyramid: it means that they should be eaten occasionally”, says Dr. Cesena. «Furthermore, to strengthen the bones, the body must be guaranteed the necessary taste Vitamin D and Football, contained especially in milk and derivatives, in some types of water, but also in vegetables such as broccoli, artichokes, legumes. In fact, in vegetables, calcium is sometimes more bioavailable, that is, more easily absorbed, than in foods of animal origin.”

Foods to avoid during menopause

Then there is a list of foods that would be better to avoid, especially in this phase of life: «First of all advises Doctor Cesena, «the spicy foods because they accentuate hot flashes. As well as i hot foods, drinks rich in caffeine and alcoholwhich among other things makes sleep more complex, which is already compromised during menopause: it is not uncommon to suffer from insomnia.”

Why you gain more weight during menopause (and how to fix it)

In addition to eating well, however, during menopause you generally also need to eat less than in the previous period. «The characteristic alterations in hormonal balance increase the sense of hunger, and we must take into consideration that at the same time, with the passage of time (every decade), the basal metabolism also decreases slightly” explains the expert. In short, you have more desire to eat but it is more difficult to dispose of it. «In general, in addition to reducing portions (which should always be evaluated with a specialist), it is important to move: if not necessarily doing a real sport, even just trying to walk more says Dr. Cesena. «For this reason, concludes the expert, «I advise every woman to speak to her gynecologist: in addition to possible pharmacological therapy, in this delicate phase of life it is good to re-evaluate one’s lifestyle also with an expert in health sciences. ‘diet”.

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