Sláinte - To Your Good Health! - Galway, Oysters and Salmon
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ENJOYING THEMSELVES at the Galway Oyster Festival are Seattleites John Keane, Caitlin McHugh, John Alston and Maureen Keane.
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Sláinte is writing this article in Ireland at the Galway Oyster Festival which she is attending along with Seattle's very own Lord Mayor, Greg Nickels. After the parade, we all retired to the "tent" where Galway city officials plied us with all the Guinness, oysters and salmon we could consume.
No, Sláinte didn't try the oysters - she couldn't swallow one if her life depended on it. But she did treat herself to her favorite Irish foods: brown bread, salmon, and Guinness.
OK, so it was only one pint of Guinness and it later fueled a two-Imitrex spray migraine. Even so, the black stuff was so good it was almost worth the pain.
However, the headache prevented Sláinte from going to the black tie dinner later that evening which would have been a unique experience since in Seattle she is hardly ever encouraged to climb up on her dinner chair and wave her napkin around. Nor is she ever urged to slow dance on top of the dinner table amidst the plates. If Mayor Nickels learned anything on this trip, it was that Galwegians know how to party.
Oysters and salmon have several things in common. Perhaps the most interesting is that both are considered aphrodisiacs. Oysters perhaps have earned this reputation because they are a good source of omega 3 fats and an excellent source of zinc.
Salmon is an excellent source of omega three fats and the B vitamins. Zinc, B vitamins and the omega 3 fatty acids are needed to make testosterone - the hormone responsible for sex drives in both sexes.
A three ounce portion of salmon will provide more than one gram of omega 3 fatty acids (so will herring, mackerel and whitefish). But the oil in salmon offers much more than a healthy sex life.
Granted, our diets contain too much fat. Fat is a concentrated source of energy so one might think that low fat fish would be a better health option than a high fat one like salmon.
In fact, books written several decades ago considered salmon a poor dietary choice because of this. Sláinte used to cringe when she read this advice - even then there was evidence that salmon and other oil-rich fish were beneficial - as there's no evidence salmon contributes to obesity. If you need to reduce the number of calories you eat, cut back on animal products, not salmon.
However, the problem goes beyond how much fat we eat. Our diets are also imbalanced with regard to fats; they contain too much omega 6 fat (usually from animal products) and too little omega 3 fat (from fish and vegetable oils).
By shifting this balance and eating more of the omega 3 fats we can reduce inflammation (involved in many diseases including heart disease, cancer, arthritis and autoimmune disorders).
No one gets fat from eating salmon but they might make their body more prone to developing chronic disease by not eating enough!
Our diets are also low in DHA and EPA-fatty acids that the body makes from omega 3 fats. Sometimes our bodies do not manufacture enough DHA and EPA to support health and so we must eat sources of pre-made DHA and EPA. These two fatty acids are only found in fish and fish oil. They are not present in other sources of omega 3 fatty acids such as flaxseed.
By eating less animal fat and eating more DHA and EPA we can reduce the viscosity of the blood (make it thinner) so that clots are less likely to develop and it is easier for the heart to pump; we can reduce the risk of cardiac arrhythmias (irregular heartbeat); reduce high triglyceride and cholesterol levels; support the brain and nerves; and it's beneficial to those with diabetes, irritable bowel syndrome, systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and depression.
In recent years several studies have found that salmon, like other types of seafood, is contaminated with mercury and organochlorine compounds such as dioxins and PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls). Farmed salmon contains much more contaminants than wild salmon.
You may not be aware that fish is a crop that can be grown in aquatic "farms." Farmed salmon are fed other fish and fish oil and, as a result, contain more of the omega 3 fatty acids that bring immediate benefits to the cardiovascular system.
So far so good. Unfortunately, the fish meal fed to the salmon is contaminated with compounds such as PCBs and dioxins that over the years can cause cancer. Once these toxins enter a fish (or person), its body has no way of getting rid of them. The contaminants are passed along to the salmon and the salmon passes them on to us.
A study published three years ago in the journal Science analyzed approximately 700 farmed and wild salmon from around the world. It found that the concentrations of organochlorine compounds were significantly higher in farmed salmon than in their wild counterparts.
European farmed fish was the worst offender with North American farmed fish coming in second. Chilean farmed fish had the least. Both farmed and wild salmon contained the same amount of mercury - another toxin. Scientists are afraid the effects of contaminants might cancel out the beneficial effects of eating fish.
So how is a person to know when the short term benefits outweigh the long term risks?
Luckily for us, in 2005 Cornel scientists published a benefit-risk analysis of just this. Noting that farmed fish from Scotland, Norway and eastern Canada had highest level toxins, the researchers recommended fish from these areas not be eaten more than three times a year.
Farmed fish from Maine, western Canada and Washington State have the next highest levels and should be eaten no more than three to six times a year.
Chilean farmed fish had the least amount of contamination and should be eaten no more than about six times a year. Wild chum salmon can be consumed safely as often as once a week, pink salmon, Sockeye and Coho about twice a month, and Chinook just under once a month.
If you can't afford wild salmon, consider fish oil supplements. Beware that not all fish oil supplements are made alike. Usually Sláinte recommends supplements that are as natural as possible but in this case the more refined the better.
Choose a distilled pharmaceutical grade fish oil with a five star rating (out of five stars) from the IFOS (International Fish Oil Standards) program. For information on the IFOS program visit their website at: http://www.nutrasource.ca/ifos_new/index.asp?section=News.
Sláinte!
Maureen Keane MS CN is a graduate of Bastyr University and member of the American Dietetic Association. She is the best selling author of Juicing for Life, What to Eat When You Have Cancer, What to Eat when You Have Diabetes and 14 other health books. If you have a question or comment regarding nutrition or health that you would like to see addressed in this column, e-mail it to Maureen@KeaneNutrition.com.
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