Olive oil

It is said that olive oil is very good for health because it helps to reduce cholesterol, but that is not exactly thus. Let us know the role of fat and olive oil in the organism.

How can we do it

We need to eat fat, animal or vegetal ones, because they are essential for the organism (it permits to assimilate certain vitamins, it operates on the formation of some hormones... and they supply energy). Olive oil, that mainly contains fat, is one of the options.
An excess of animal fat (a non-equilibrated diet, thus) can facilitate an accumulation of cholesterol in the blood vessels.
If we have an excess of cholesterol, to substitute in the diet animal fats for vegetal ones (except palm and cocoa) or those from fish will be beneficial, because we will reduce the quantity of cholesterol that we are consuming.
Olive oil also contains vitamins A and mostly E, which are antioxidant (they neutralize certain toxins that are formed by metabolism of the cells). It seems that those antioxidants also provide elasticity to the blood vessels.
So that the oil provides us all this nourishment it has to be virgin, because when it is refined (look at the following tab), nutrients disappear or get denatured.

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Data d'actualització: 10/06/2010 - 19:28

Keep this in mind!

Virgin olive oil is very nutritious, the refined one (labelled as olive oil), not so much.

At the Mediterranean basin there is a big production of olives and ecological oil.

If we buy the olive oil for all the year at an agrarian shop on crop time, we will promote rural environment.

Information sources

Companies and Sectorial organizations: Consell Oleícola Internacional, Almazara Ecológica de la Rioja, Cooperativa Agrícola Sant Jaume Apòstol, Federació de Cooperatives Agràries de Catalunya, Grupo Borges, La Labranza Toledana, Oliflix, Olivar de Segura;

administrations: Comitè Andalús d'Agricultura Ecològica, Consell Català de la Producció Agrària Ecològica, Junta d'Extremadura;

magazines: Alimarket;

books: several authors, Sabores del Mediterráneo. Aportaciones para promover un patrimonio alimentario común, Institut Europeu de la Mediterrània 2005;

organizations: Fundació Catalana per la Prevenció de Residus i el Consum Responsable, Fundación CARTIF, Sindicato de Obreros del Campo.