The Magic of Olive Oil, Fish, and Other Healthy Fats

Olive oil is the basis of the Mediterranean diet. (Shutterstock)
Olive oil is the basis of the Mediterranean diet. (Shutterstock)
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The Magic of Olive Oil, Fish, and Other Healthy Fats

Olive oil is the basis of the Mediterranean diet. (Shutterstock)
Olive oil is the basis of the Mediterranean diet. (Shutterstock)

By Alice Callahan

The Mediterranean diet isn’t like other diets. To begin with, it’s more of a style of eating than a strict regimen. And adopting it doesn’t involve many of the sacrifices people associate with healthy eating.

Compared with other wholesome diets, for example, the Mediterranean diet is relatively high in fat. Federal health officials recommend that 20 to 35 percent of your daily calories come from fat — while that number can be around 30 to 40 percent in the Mediterranean diet.

Yet in clinical trials, people who followed the Mediterranean diet had lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels and were less likely to develop cardiovascular disease than those who followed a low-fat diet.

That’s probably because the Mediterranean diet emphasizes heart-healthy fats from sources like olive oil, fish, whole grains, and nuts and seeds. And it includes less saturated fat than the typical American diet, because it discourages butter and red and processed meats and includes only moderate amounts of cheese, yogurt, poultry and eggs.

Researchers believe that olive oil, the preferred fat source in the Mediterranean diet, may be one of the main contributors to its health benefits. It’s rich in heart-healthy monounsaturated fats and has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties that can prevent damage to your cells and blood vessels.

In a 2022 study of more than 90,000 U.S. adults spanning 28 years, for instance, those who consumed at least half a tablespoon of olive oil each day were significantly less likely to die of cancer or cardiovascular, neurodegenerative or respiratory diseases than those who rarely or never consumed it.

Fish also features prominently in the Mediterranean diet, especially fatty varieties like salmon, tuna, anchovies and sardines. These are excellent sources of omega-3 fatty acids, which can improve blood cholesterol levels and reduce inflammation and blood pressure. Most Mediterranean diet guidelines recommend at least two servings of fish per week.

But let’s not give olive oil and fish all of the credit. Whole grains, nuts, seeds and olives also contribute to the diet’s healthy fats. And though they’re not native to the Mediterranean region, avocados are rich in monounsaturated fats and are often included in modern versions of the diet.

How to cook with healthy fats

For each day of our Mediterranean diet series, we and our colleagues at NYT Cooking have picked a few recipes that embrace the ingredients we’re highlighting. This is not intended to be a meal plan for a day, but rather inspiration for how to include more of these healthful foods in your week.

For breakfast, you might smash some avocado onto whole-grain toast and top it with a drizzle of olive oil. In this recipe from Julia Moskin and Giles Russell, optional garnishes like fresh herbs, pickled red onions and pumpkin or sesame seeds take avocado toast to the next level.

Craig Claiborne’s classic tuna salad sandwich is a quick, budget-friendly lunch option — but if you’re looking for something more “intense and pronounced,” try Ali Slagle’s sardine salad on a whole-wheat bagel, over greens or between two slices of whole-grain toast. Anchovies are also a flavorful addition to salad dressing, as in David Tanis’s vibrant radicchio-anchovy salad.

For dinner, try Alison Roman’s slow-roasted citrus salmon with herb salad (ready in 35 minutes) or Mark Bittman’s grilled tuna with herbs and olives (ready in 20). And let’s not forget about tinned and jarred fish.

The New York Times



How Did a Jet Flip Upside Down on a Toronto Runway and Everyone Survive?

A Delta Air Lines plane that crashed at Toronto Pearson International Airport is seen on February 18, 2025 in Toronto, Canada. (Getty Images/AFP)
A Delta Air Lines plane that crashed at Toronto Pearson International Airport is seen on February 18, 2025 in Toronto, Canada. (Getty Images/AFP)
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How Did a Jet Flip Upside Down on a Toronto Runway and Everyone Survive?

A Delta Air Lines plane that crashed at Toronto Pearson International Airport is seen on February 18, 2025 in Toronto, Canada. (Getty Images/AFP)
A Delta Air Lines plane that crashed at Toronto Pearson International Airport is seen on February 18, 2025 in Toronto, Canada. (Getty Images/AFP)

Investigators are probing the causes of an unusual plane crash at Canada's largest airport on Monday, when a regional jet flipped upside down upon landing during windy weather, sending 21 of the 80 people on board to hospital.

Video shows the Delta Air Lines plane belly up and missing its right wing at Toronto's Pearson Airport, and of the crash that involved no fatalities, circulated widely on social media. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada said on Tuesday that parts of the plane -- a Bombardier-made CRJ900 -- separated after impact and the fuselage came to rest slightly off the right side of the runway, upside down, facing the other direction.

The TSB said it is too early to know what happened and why. Here is what we know about this accident and similar crashes.

HOW DOES A PLANE LAND UPSIDE DOWN?

US aviation safety expert Anthony Brickhouse said aircraft are normally designed to land first on the two main landing gear, and then the nose gear. While the cause of the accident is unclear, the type of impact on the runway likely damaged the landing gear, leaving the plane imbalanced.

Brickhouse said that the plane ending up pointing in the opposite direction speaks to the amount of force and speed that led it to change direction.

"With all the forces and everything going on, if that wing is not there to support the aircraft it's going to go over," Brickhouse said. "It's not something that we see regularly, but when structures start failing, they can't do their job and the aircraft is going to react to the different forces on it."

HOW DID EVERYONE SURVIVE?

Passengers say they were hanging upside down in their seats after the crash.

"All of the passengers were wearing the safety belts. This prevented more serious injuries from occurring," said Mitchell Fox, director of the Asia Pacific Center for Aviation Safety.

Airplane seats are designed to withstand the force of 16 times the normal pull of gravity, or 16Gs, in a crash, whereas wings and fuselage are designed to handle 3-5Gs.

"In an impact-survivable crash, it's more important for the seats to hold up, giving passengers the best chance of survival," said Raj Ladani, a program manager for aerospace engineering at Australia's RMIT University. Good evacuation is key to air accident survivability, as witnessed last year when all 379 people escaped a burning Japan Airlines plane after a runway collision.

"The crew did a remarkable job of evacuating all of the passengers expeditiously," Fox said of the Delta crash.

HAS THIS HAPPENED BEFORE?

While rare, there have been cases of large jets flipping over on landing, including three accidents involving McDonnell Douglas' MD-11 model.

In 2009, a FedEx freighter turned over on landing in windy conditions on the runway at Tokyo's Narita airport, killing both pilots. The left wing was broken and separated from the fuselage attaching point and the airplane caught fire.

In 1999, a China Airlines flight inverted at Hong Kong while landing during a typhoon. The plane touched down hard, flipped over and caught fire, killing three of 315 occupants.

In 1997, another FedEx freighter flipped over at Newark in the United States, with no fatalities.

Brickhouse said it is too early to draw any conclusions from these earlier cases, especially as the MD-11 is a three-engine aircraft and the CRJ900 has two engines mounted toward the back of the aircraft, producing different flight dynamics.

HOW WILL THE INVESTIGATION PROCEED?

Unlike other investigations in which parts of the plane have gone missing, and there are mass fatalities, investigators will be able to interview all 76 passengers and four crew.

Investigators have access to the fuselage and wing, which are on the runway, and the black boxes -- the flight data and cockpit voice recorders -- have been sent for analysis.

"This is going to be a textbook investigation," Brickhouse said. "Some accidents, a lot of the pieces of the puzzle are missing. But right now looking at this accident, all the puzzle pieces are there. It's just you piecing them back together at this point."