Publisher/Editor
Randy Hartnell
Producer
Craig Weatherby
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VitalChoices
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New Organic Extra Dark Chocolates
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We love great chocolate, so we’re very pleased to announce the availability of Vital Choice Extra Dark Organic Chocolate. Each of our three varieties—Extra Dark, Extra Dark with Blueberries, and Extra Dark with Hazelnuts—is made in small batches using premium cocoa cultivars from Central and South America.
While many chocolate bars labeled “dark” contain only 50 to 60 percent cocoa solids, ours boast a stratospheric 80 percent cocoa solids for maximum flavor and preventive-health power.
All three varieties are Certified Organic and Kosher (Earth Kosher-DE).
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New Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil
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Our delicious new Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil is pressed from choice Spanish picual olives, which boast a fruity flavor, with hints of almond and fruit. The oil is pressed from the olives within hours of harvest, without heat or chemicals, to ensure optimal flavor and nutritional value.
As we reported (see "Extra Virgin Olive Oil Seen Superior for Reducing Cardiac and Cancer Risks"), recent research results confirm that the antioxidant polyphenols abundant only in extra virgin grade olive oil provide health-protections well beyond those offered by heavily refined, "pure" grade supermarket oils.
The olives are grown in a family farm’s ancient groves, arrayed on the sun-drenched hills of Andalusia. The farmers hand-tend the heirloom trees with care, and employ only natural pest-control techniques.
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Herbs & Spices ...
... Organic & Kosher
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Customers had often asked us to expand our seasoning offerings beyond our Organic Salmon Marinade blend. We thought they had a good idea, but it took time to secure superior sources.
Each fresh, flavorful seasoning in our new line of 10 Organic Herbs & Spices is certified Organic and Kosher (OU), and is naturally rich in beneficial “phytoceutical” compounds.
And if, like many, your pantry harbors some old, faded seasonings, our Herbs and Spices Medley package—which includes our Organic Salmon Marinade blend—will upgrade your seasonings scene in one fell swoop!
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Enjoy Alaska's Natural Beauty Up Close!
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We don’t normally advertise other companies but wanted to share something really special with you: a “trip of a lifetime” to astonishingly beautiful Southeast Alaska.
Like us (Vital Choice owners Randy and Dave), our old friend Dennis Rogers was a long-time Alaskan fisherman. Now, his Alaska Sea Adventures charters offer multi-day journeys for up to eight guests at a time.
These amazing journeys provide an unsurpassed opportunity to experience the natural wonders of Alaska's Inside Passage: a group of wide, glorious waterways that wend through a chain of lushly forested islands, and offer easy access to fjords, glaciers, whales, orca, porpoise, bears, and eagles.
In 2004, Dr. Andrew Weil joined us for a week aboard the M/V Alaska Adventurer, as described in Vital Choice Explores Southeast Alaska.
Voyages fill up early, so if you’re interested in a trip this coming season don’t delay!
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Vital Choices!
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Salmon's Tasty and Healthy for Me, Too!
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Your canine companion will love our Wild Alaskan Salmon Organic Pet Treats. These chewy, human food-grade salmon jerky pieces will make him or her very happy and healthy. Make a Vital Choice for fido!
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Like Your Lox Luscious?
Ours Makes Mouths Water
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Vital Choice smoked salmon is far superior to the preservative-laden farmed product found in most grocery stores.
After curing in natural alder wood smoke, our Smoked Sockeye Portions and silky, Cold-Smoked Sliced Nova Lox are immediately vacuum-packed and flash-frozen. Thawed and served, they taste as though they came fresh out of the smoker.
"I am in love with the hot-smoked salmon. It is fabulous flaked and scrambled with eggs and onions. They give the eggs a lovely zing." — Dana Jacobi, author of 12 Best Foods Cookbook.
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The World's Finest Fish Oil
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We put only whole, unrefined oil from wild Alaskan sockeye salmon in our premium salmon oil supplements. Wild Alaskan sockeye salmon is one of the cleanest fish in the sea: a trait reflected in the purity of our unrefined sockeye oil, which is now certified by NSF: one of the best-respected independent labs in the U.S.
Because our naturally pure salmon oil does not need to be distilled, it provides the essential omega-3 fatty acids (EPA & DHA), plus 30 other natural fatty acids and astaxanthin: the potent antioxidant that gives sockeye its distinctive deep-red color.
Last, but not least, ours comes in pure fish-gelatin capsules and it is the only salmon oil supplement certified as sustainably sourced by the Marine Stewardship Council (www.msc.org).
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Why Our Albacore Tuna's A Cut Above
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Our young, low-weight Pacific Albacore Tuna—fresh or canned—is simply superior!
Smaller means safer: Vital Choice troll-caught tuna weigh just 12 lbs. or less, so they contain less mercury, and more omega-3s, than the larger troll-caught tuna touted by other “minimal mercury” vendors.
No loitering allowed: Our tuna are hauled in fast, bled, and flash-frozen within about two hours. (Standard long-line-caught albacore spend 12 hours in the water.)
Better, fresher flavor, even in the can: Unlike standard canned albacore—which is cooked twice at great cost to flavor and omega-3 content—Vital Choice tuna is cooked only once (in the can) to preserve its healthful oils and fresh flavor.
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The Vital Choice Advantage
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Click here to learn about the Vital Choice Advantage ... the many reasons why William Sears, M.D. — renowned as "America's Baby Doctor"— calls Vital Choice his favorite salmon source.
Vital Choice was founded by two longtime Alaska fishermen—Randy Hartnell and Dave Hamburg—who know where to get the highest quality fish. And they test it periodically to ensure your safety.
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Berries to Live For!
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Vital Choice fresh-frozen organic blueberries, strawberries and red raspberries are rich in anti-aging antioxidants, and draw customer comments like this:
“OH MY GOODNESS! I cannot believe the flavor ... the taste reminds me of something from my childhood. Thanks for a great product!
Berries are incredibly healthful foods, and it's smart to seek out organic berries, grown without synthetic pesticides.
Our organic berries come in convenient one pound bags, each yielding about 3-1/2 cups. They freeze well, so you can keep plenty on hand!
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Our brand new catalog features several exciting new offerings. To receive yours, click here.
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Omega-3s Enhance Mood and Brain Speed in Clinical Trial
Finding coincides with two "Times" conclusion that fish really is brain food
by Craig Weatherby
That fish is brain food is apparent both from the fact that the brain is rich in DHA—a long-chain “marine” omega-3 fatty acid found only in fish and algae—and from the findings of population studies and of clinical trials in adults and children.
But until now, the effects of marine omega-3s had never been tested thoroughly in healthy adults.
Italian team tests effects of fish oil on mood and mental performance
To determine whether omega-3s enhance the performance of normally functioning brains, a group of researchers at the Italy’s University of Siena conducted a 35-day placebo-controlled trial in 49 healthy men and women aged 22 to 51 years.
Every day for 35 days, 33 of the study participants consumed four-gram fish oil capsules containing 2.4 gm of omega-3s each (1.6 g EPA and 0.8 g DHA) daily, while the other 16 participants took capsules containing four grams of if olive oil.
The participants were all in good health, free of medications, had no history of psychiatric or hormonal disorders, and exercised at least four hours a week.
All participants took the Profile of Mood States test and four attention tests on the first and last days of the trial. The attention tests included assessments of alertness, ability to repress an unsuitable response, ability to react to different stimuli, and sustained attention.
Key measures of participants’ electro-physiological status—e.g., electroencephalogram, electromyography, heart rate, and reaction times—were also recorded during the attention tests.
Fish oil group shows gains in mood and brain speed
Participants in the fish oil group showed significant improvements on all the components of the mood tests, compared with baseline values, but there were no significant changes in the olive oil (placebo) group. For example, perceptions of vigor increased while negative states such as anger, anxiety, fatigue, and depression diminished significantly.
The fish oil group also enjoyed significantly reduced reaction times in the attention tests, but reaction times were unchanged in the olive oil placebo group.
The authors noted that tests in which reaction times were shorter were those that involve central processing of information: findings consistent with previous reports that linked consumption of long-chain marine omega-3s with enhanced cognitive performance.
None of the outcomes measured was associated with the sex or age of the participants. The fish oil group also experienced a large, beneficial decrease in the ratio of omega-6 arachidonic acid to omega-3 EPA, from about 14:1 at baseline—a ratio that reflects the typically imbalanced dietary intakes of omega-6 and omega-3 fats in industrialized countries—to about 4:1 after the experimental period.
We should note that the participants consumed at least four times more long-chain marine omega-3s every week than you’d get by eating two meals of fatty fish per week, which is the typical dietary recommendation, intended to reduce the risk of heart disease.
Two "Times" agree evidence supports old fish-is-brain-food saying
As Dr. Andrew Weil told Time magazine this week, in a special section on brain health, “The reason fish is so good for the brain is the so-called omega-3 fatty acids it contains. Oily fish, like salmon, sardines, mackerel, herring, bluefish and black cod, are the best sources of those special fats. …"
"In my diet I stick to sardines, herring, Alaskan black cod and Alaskan sockeye salmon. All sockeye (red) salmon are wild—fish farmers haven't yet been able to domesticate them—and since those fish are less carnivorous than other types of salmon, they have lower levels of the environmental contaminants that accumulate as you work your way up the food chain.”
And as The New York Times concluded in a recent edition of their recurring “The Bottom Line” column, “… when it comes to one piece of dietary advice that many of us were brought up on, the old wisdom prevails: fish is apparently food for the brain.”
The New York Times article noted that some scientists believe humans and their immediate ancestors gravitated to oceanic and inland coastal areas where protein food (i.e., fish and shellfish) was plentiful and easy to catch, and that the resulting fish-rich diet gave them the ample supply of omega-3 fatty acids necessary to development of the large, quick brains that gave humans a huge competitive edge.
We witnessed an extremely compelling presentation of this hypothesis from the eminent British brain-nutrition researcher Michael A. Crawford, Ph.D. of London Metropolitan University, at the Seafood & Health Conference we attended last November, and we’ll explore it in more depth in a future issue of Vital Choices.
As the author of the New York Times column noted, evidence from many studies provide support for the idea that fish is brain food: “One study this year at Harvard, which looked at 135 mothers and their infants, found that the more fish the mothers ate during their second trimesters, the better their infants did on tests when they were 6 months old. … Another recent study … found that elderly people who ate fish at least once a week did better on tests of memory and mental acuity than their peers who did not, and had a 10 percent slower decline in mental skills each year. … THE BOTTOM LINE: Fish is good for the brain.”
Sources
- Fontani G, Corradeschi F, Felici A, Alfatti F, Migliorini S, Lodi L. Cognitive and physiological effects of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation in healthy subjects. Eur J Clin Invest 2005;35:691-699.
- O’Connor A. “Really? The Claim: Fish Is Brain Food” New York Times, January 3, 2006. Accessed online January 3, 2006 at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/03/health/03real.html
[PRINTER FRIENDLY VERSION]
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