The Mediterranean diet

Linda Hall

AH! The Mediterranean diet!

Is there anything better? Not if you take in every adulatory word written about it in the international media.

fully use E­ 102 food colouring as it’s cheaper than saffron and gives a better colour. Incidentally, E­102 ­ which can cause migraine, blurred vision, rhinitis, itching and purple skin patches ­ is already banned in Norway and Austria.

With that she was able to go back to work and continue earning.

The BBF can only help people like Margaret with the generosity of others. If you would like to support our work with a donation please go to www.britishbenevolentfund.org. Thank you on behalf of all those your money helps with. Olaf Clayton, Chair BBF

The funny thing is, though, that the Mediterranean diet I read about is rarely the same one that is common in Spain.

What always bring me up short are the whole grains. Olive oil, check. Vegetables, check. Pulses, check. Nuts, sort of check. Seeds, again just a sort of check because the only seeds commonly eaten in the part of the Mediterranean that I am familiar with are sunflower seeds.

But whole grains? I exclude the young from this because they’ll eat anything, but offer whole grains to a no ­ longer youthful Spanish person and you will receive a polite refusal and what was once known as an oldfashioned look.

They won’t give brown rice the time of day and white rice must be coloured bright yellow to be edible. That’s why Spanish home cooks cheer­

Never mind, probably Mediterranean Spain has developed immunity to dodgy E ­ 102 so let’s move on to ‘lean proteins and healthy fats’.

I’ll give you fish and lean protein. Serrano ham has fewer calories than chicken breast and even pork is considered white meat these days. Nor is there a great liking for beef outside cocido, apart from fillet steak or entrecote for high days and holidays.

And I’ll give you healthy fats, too, because there’s not a lot of butter in Mediterranean food although those healthy pulses swim alongside fatladen chorizo, morcillas and belly of pork.

What everyone forgets about the Spanish Mediterranean diet is that it was once eaten in moderation by people who expected to walk everywhere, who worked hard and practised a frugality imposed on them by hard times.

Good luck with that LETTERS

THIS is just a precursor to fully­fledged, no go zones for the police, which will mirror the goings on in ‘culturally rich’ Sweden.

Birmingham City Council’s website says that “Birmingham is one of the first ‘super diverse’ cities in the UK where citizens from ethnic minorities make up more than half the population.” The headline to the article is “Why Birmingham’s super ­ diversity is a strength, and not a surprise.”

We’ll see how that strength plays out.

Schengen

David

I read in your April 20­26 edition that the UK along with France are the big spenders in the Valencian region. I wonder if the authorities are aware that thanks to Brexit and the Schengen 90­day Agreement that they are missing out on even more UK income. Although I own property here I am now not coming over as much as I did and there are many more like me.

Manuel de Falla Villamartin.

Alan Morgan MD

Hello again

Do you think you could write something about this?

I have just read an article which has reduced me to tears of laughter, and it is serious. I tell you, 100 years down the line people are going to look back to now and very recent times as lunacy. Political correctness is like an Orwell novel, as is woke etc.

This article refers to ‘larger­bodied’ people and ‘people of size’. How bloody ridiculous. By normalising fat people, who are fat because they eat too much or do not exercise, we make life uncomfortable and more expensive and (health) less efficient for ‘normal­sized’ people.

Currently, it is always the norm, the majority, who have to suffer and subjugate themselves to the will of any minority.

The article is about Australia charging for two seats for a fat person. My opinion is that if that person can produce a valid medical certificate as to why they cannot reduce their weight, they should not be charged for two seats; otherwise, fair play ­ two or even three seats charged.

If these people were shamed, perhaps they would do something about it. Go back 100 years, were there so many huge people about? No!!! Mostly it’s nothing to do with a medical condition. It is eating too much and laziness.

I have struggled with weight during my life and, because it is ugly and unhealthy, I have always tried to diet, exercise and keep it down.

Nowadays we are forced to watch ex ­ tremely fat, mostly plain women, on our TVs in varying states of undress; in dramas or advertisements etc. It is unpleasant.

I agree with acceptance, of any person, but why do we have to aggrandise absolutely every deviation from the norm?

Once again, sorry for the rant.

Jane

PS. Oh, and don’t start me on this bullying rubbish!!

Help needed

Dear Sir

I have a problem that I hope you or your readers can help me with.

I am an 86­year­old woman and I travel quite a lot .

I am quite fit, I go bowling two or three times a week. I also work one day a week in a charity shop.

I have always had travel insurance whenever I go away.

Since Covid the travel companies will not insure a person of my age.

The one I usually use stops at 85 years.

I have tried other companies, some stop at an even earlier age.

I might add I have never had to make a claim with any company.

I hope you can help me. I do have the card which entitles me to emergency medical treatment in some countries.

I can’t be the only older person who likes to travel.

I am hoping you can help me .

Kind regards.

I believe

Gwendoline Ottley

I was very interested to read your column in EWN April 20­26 as I also believe “what you think is what you get.”

My bracelet is engraved with my motto ‘Think it, feel it, have it, be it’.

I followed the Law of Attraction for years then spent a long time studying a book on quantum physics. I was even compiling data to write a book about it all, then discovered that Pam Grout had already done one ­ E2that gives you nine experiments to prove your thoughts create your reality.

When I talk to friends about it and the way that I can do things “because I believe I can”, I do get some strange looks, so it was great when I learned that the 2022 Nobel Prize for Physics was awarded to the men who proved the key supposition of quantum theory: that local realism is fake.

Thanks again for sharing the information so clearly ­ I do hope others who read it will learn more and change their lives for the better.

Kind regards,

Tricia Gabbitas