Flavor Your Diet with Primo Oils and Vinegars
Happy New Year! If you’re anything like 62 million* other Americans starting a healthier diet is high on your list of 2019 new years resolutions. If you’re anything like us, and considering you’re reading a blog on a foodie website you are, there’s no diet in the world that you’ll stick to if you’re not allowed healthy, savory, sweet and delicious food options as a part of that diet.
Primo Oils is Here to Help You Stick to Your Diet
Our flavored Olive Oils and Vinegars are the best way to add flavor and variety to a restrictive diet. We’re going to look at the top 3 diet choices of 2019, according to Health.com, and share some recipes and Olive Oil and Vinegar flavors that will help you stick to that diet and add a burst of flavor without a burst of calories.
Diet #1: The Meditteranean Diet
The Skinny
The Meditteranean Diet is the number one diet in the nation. It’s popular because of the wide variety of foods available to eat and incredible health benefits. Olives and Olive Oils are some of the healthy fats available in this diet. The Meditteranean Diet recommends four to six servings of healthy fats every day.
Primo Oils to the Rescue
There are so many ways Primo Oilive Oils and Vinegars can add flavor to your Meditteranean Diet! Our Olive Oils satisfy your healthy fat requirement in this diet and a teaspoon of any as a salad dressing counts as one serving of a healthy fat. Our favorite olive oils to use in a dressing are the Mushroom Sage Olive Oil, Herbs de Provence Olive Oil and Garlic Olive Oil.
We have several recipes that work well on this diet and more available all the time. We all love to cook here at Primo and are happy to help you discover new-to-you recipes that will work for your diet. Some of our favorites that fit within the Meditteranean Diet are our Shaved Fennel Salad,
A great way to “food-prep” for the week is to make our Italian Chicken on a Sunday and then use this flavorful chicken in salads, sandwiches and brown rice or quinoa bowls for lunch. We also love our Wild Smoked Salmon and can use pita bread or homemade pita chips instead of the crostini’s.
Diet #2 The DASH Diet
(which stands for Dietary Approach to Stopping Hypertension)
The Skinny
The DASH Diet started as a way for people to reduce their blood pressure but became a success because of the positive side effects of the diet; weight loss and prevention for an array of chronic diseases like osteoporosis, heart disease, stroke and diabetes. The downside of the diet is its severe restriction on sodium intake. Most American’s consume an average of 3500 mg of sodium a day. The DASH Diet’s goal is to cut this in half with the more restricted version topping you off at 1500 mg of sodium a day.
Primo Oils to the Rescue
There’s only about 4 mg of sodium in a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar and ZERO in olive oil. This makes our flavored Olive Oils and Balsmic Vinegars the best way to add flavor to your DASH Diet without upping your sodium intake. Our Summer 
Linguine with Shrimp recipe is a perfect meal for the DASH Diet. Just substitute zoodles or spaghetti squash for the linguine and you’ll have a delicious low-sodium, heart-healthy meal.
Pre-mixed store-bought salad dressings and marinades can be another culprit of high sodium intake. We recommend switching your regular store-bought dressings and marinades for Primo options. Here’s a list of some of our favorite Olive Oil and Balsamic Vinegar combinations.
- Blood Orange Olive Oil + Fig Balsamic
- Garlic Olive Oil + Blackberry Ginger Balsamic
- Basil Olive Oil + Strawberry Balsamic
Diet #3: The Flexitarian Diet
The Skinny
The Flexitarian Diet is a way to cut your meat consumption in half. The goal of the Flexitarian Diet is to have 5 meatless dinners each week and to switch out some of your breakfast and lunch go-to’s with meatless options. The Flexitarian Diet encourages eating legumes, extra veggies and tofu.
Primo Oils to the Rescue
Our Olive Oils and Vinegars are the perfect way to dress up a plate of veggies. And don’t worry that you’ll be stuck eating salads all day. We love using the Cinnamon-Pear Balsamic Roasted Sweet Potatoes or Vegetables de Provence over some quinoa or brown rice. These make great make-ahead and take lunch options.
For dinner try our Balsamic Vinegar Grilled Eggplant. Eggplant is a very substantive vegetable and the balsamic gives it a fun tang. You could try switching up the balsamic on the recipe too. We suggest trying our Neapolitan Herb or Pomegranate Balsamic on this dish.
To Your Health!
Whatever your new year’s resolutions are we hope that they include spending some time in the kitchen. Home cooked meals are the best way to keep yourself and your family healthy.
* Link to 2017 New Year’s Resolutions: The Most Popular and How To Stick to Them
