Are olive leaves and whole green olives healthier than olive oil?

#1

Olive leaves are lower in calories!!

Can one just confirm an organic olive farm for the olive leaves
Oleopeurin if you can tolerate the taste

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#3

FWIW, on the ZOE podcast, I learned that olive oil is ok at high heat for most home cooks. They said the issue is the ultra high heat you might produce in a restaurant setting. I can’t speak to its accuracy but they seemed to know what they were talking about. As a result, I use EVOO with anything unless it’s on the grill.

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#4

Oleuropein is the polyphenol responsible for the bitter taste of the good EVOO.

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#5

That’s why I love Greek food, dolmades !

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#6

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/pharmacology-toxicology-and-pharmaceutical-science/secoiridoid

#7

lindsay’s large pitted olives: 500 units of acrylamide (larger pitted black olives often have more)

#8

Olives and leaves may be healthier than olive oil gram for gram. However olive oil has 3 distinct benefits:

  1. EVOO increases consumption of healthy foods as part of a med diet. Without olive oil my salad, vegetable, fish and wholegrain consumption would be much lower. Simply because evoo massively increases the pleasure of eating those foods.
    2.EVOO displaces less healthy fats. I eat less butter and animal fat and less cooked vegetable oil because i use EVOO
  2. high EVOO consumption as part of the Mediterranean diet naturally keeps my total calorie consumption lower. An olive oily salad is a hunger satisfying meal. salad on its own isn’t
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#9

im in portugal now and i ate unripe olives (olive trees EVERYWHERE) and they’re strong but tolerable (strong enough for the GLP1s to work!)

we need to be making more products out of unripe olives

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Short answer: not automatically. Tree age by itself doesn’t guarantee higher polyphenols or more oleo-whatever. The big drivers are cultivar, ripeness at harvest, water stress, season, and how the mill runs the paste. You know, all the boring details humans ignore until their oil tastes like lawn clippings.

On age specifically:

  • Some evidence says middle-aged trees (≈30–50 years) often peak in total phenolics compared with young orchards. Not a law of nature, but it shows up in field data for certain cultivars.
  • Ancient trees can still produce very high-phenolic oils, but it depends on the individual tree and year. “Old” doesn’t auto-upgrade your polyphenols; some venerable trees are stars, others phone it in.
  • In at least one comparative study, adult trees outperformed other age classes for polyphenols at early harvest, again pointing to “it depends” rather than “older = better.”

For the molecules you meant:

  • I’m guessing you mean oleocanthal and oleacein (not “oleoceucin,” unless you’ve discovered a new secoiridoid in your kitchen). These spike with early harvest and drop as fruit ripens. Processing choices matter too.
  • Organic/low-input practices and certain agronomy choices can push oleocanthal/oleacein higher; heavy irrigation usually dilutes overall phenolics.

Practical buying signal, since you’re probably not carbon-dating trunks at the mill:

  • Look for early-harvest (green) EVOO, recent harvest date, lab-reported total phenols (mg/kg), and that throat-sting cough test from oleocanthal. If a producer publishes oleocanthal/oleacein by NMR, even better.

Bottom line: older trees don’t magically pump more polyphenols or oleocanthal. If you want high bioactives, chase cultivar, early pick, smart milling, and a producer who treats olives like a perishable fruit instead of a suggestion.

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Short take: “Mediterranean” isn’t a magical polyphenol factory. Stress can crank up plant defenses, but it’s messy: drought often boosts phenolics; extreme heat just as often trashes them. Xenohormesis is a real hypothesis, not a universal coupon code.

Here’s the non-fairy-tale version:

  • Mechanism: When plants get poked (drought, UV, nibbling), they upregulate the phenylpropanoid pathway and stockpile flavonoids/phenolics. That’s the xenohormesis idea in a nutshell: our cells respond to those plant stress molecules. Great story, some solid biology, still context-dependent.
  • Drought vs heat :
    • Drought frequently raises total phenolics in many crops and herbs; examples range from leafy amaranth to olives. Controlled deficit irrigation can even yield higher-phenolic EVOO.
    • Heat is trickier. Moderate heat can bump certain antioxidants in tomato, but sustained high temps wreck pollen, photosynthesis, and can degrade or suppress key pigments like anthocyanins in grapes. Translation: sometimes more phenolics, often worse fruit.
  • “But it’s the Mediterranean!” Most commercial veg there are not joyriding raw sun stress. Growers lean on drip irrigation, shade nets, and greenhouses to avoid stress and keep yields stable. That tamps down the very stress signals you’re hoping for.

So, do Med veggies “in general” have more polyphenols?

No general bump just for having a coastline and a July. Species, cultivar, timing, irrigation, and postharvest handling dominate. Plenty of northern or high-altitude produce beats a coddled Mediterranean greenhouse tomato on phenolics. The signal isn’t geography; it’s controlled adversity.

If you want the xenohormesis edge, stack the deck:

  • Go for naturally tough plants: bitter/aromatic herbs (oregano, thyme, rosemary), eggplant skin, radicchio, rocket, purslane. These are chemically spiky even without torture.
  • Pick early/undersized, sun-exposed, colorful: smaller, more bitter leaves and deeply colored skins tend to carry more phenolics. Grapes and other anthocyanin-rich fruit skew higher with cooler nights, not heat waves.
  • For oils: choose early-harvest, high-phenolic EVOO; deficit-irrigated lots often test higher. Your throat should tingle from oleocanthal.

Net: Mediterranean fields can produce very high-phenolic foods, but it’s because of crop choice and smart stress management, not because July sun sprinkled antioxidant glitter on everything.

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#10

Yes. You cracked the code. Oregano, thyme, and rosemary are classic Mediterranean shrubs, born in sun-blasted, nutrient-poor slopes where rain takes summers off. They didn’t get tasty by being pampered. They evolved to hoard phenolics and zingy terpenes to survive heat, drought, and things with teeth.

Key bit you’re circling: they’re “Mediterranean,” but the chemistry comes from genetics plus stress, not the passport stamp. Grow them in Oregon or Osaka and you still get high phenolics if you treat them like they’re from rocky Greek hillsides.

If you want maximum xenohormesis punch:
• Full sun, lean soil, minimal nitrogen, light irrigation once established.
• Harvest just before flowering, mid-morning after dew dries.
• Favor wild-type chemotypes: oregano high in carvacrol, thyme high in thymol, rosemary lines rich in rosmarinic and carnosic acid.
• Dry gently at low temp, store airtight and dark. Don’t slow-roast your antioxidants.
• Don’t overwater or overfertilize unless you enjoy bland herbs with identity issues.

So yes, Mediterranean. But the molecule count follows misery and lineage, not geography alone.

#11

Rarely discussed, with regard to olives, and EVOO, is hydroxytyrosol.