Recipe: Ikarian Longevity Stew from the New Blue Zones Cookbook
Have you ever heard of the Blue Zones? These are areas where the healthiest and happiest people in the world live, and where people grow considerably older than elsewhere in the world. After years of researching this, Dan Buettner filled a cookbook with 100 healthy recipes inspired by these Blue Zones. Every one of them is a recipe that promotes human longevity and well-being. Like this longevity stew.
Dan: “Right after I had asked Dr. Antonia Trichopoulou, an expert in Mediterranean nutrition, how I could get the people of the American town of Albert Lea – famous for its meat-processing industry – to eat vegetables, I knew I had found the right person. We were sitting in Thea’s Guesthouse, with several of her amazing Ikarian dishes in front of us. Dr. Trichopoulou pointed to the spread and said: ‘Feed them.’ So I knew what I had to do and went looking for a recipe that would appeal to a lot of people. A few months later, I invited all of Albert Lea to come and eat.
Small orange flecks in meat sauce
More than 2,200 people came to watch several cooks prepare this Ikarian stew in two gigantic cooking pots. These people had often only seen vegetables as small orange flecks in their meat sauce. It was nerve-racking to serve them a completely plant-based meal. Less than an hour later, both cooking pots were completely empty, and the town had taken a first step toward a healthier diet. After a year, participants had added an estimated 2.9 years to their lives, and sick days had dropped by 49 percent. This experiment was the foundation of what is now the Blue Zones Project, the program involving 47 communities in the United States. This is the recipe for the stew we made in Albert Lea at the time.”
The Greek island of Ikaria is one of the five Blue Zones in the world. The other Blue Zones are the Italian island of Sardinia, the city of Loma Linda in California, Nicoya in Costa Rica, and the Japanese island chain of Okinawa.
How to make the longevity stew
- For dried black-eyed peas: place the beans in a pan and add enough water to cover them. Bring the beans to a boil and let them boil for 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat and let the beans
rest for an hour. Drain and rinse them. (Skip these steps if you are using canned black-eyed peas.) - Heat half of the olive oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add the onion, garlic and fennel and cook the vegetables for about 12 minutes, until soft. Stir them occasionally.
- Add the black-eyed peas and stir them well into the vegetables. Add the tomato and tomato purée and pour in enough water to cover the mixture. Add the bay leaves. Bring the bean mixture to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer until the black-eyed peas are half-cooked (if using dried
beans); this takes 40–60 minutes. If using canned beans, heat the mixture for 10 minutes and continue with the next step. - Add the chopped dill and salt to taste. Let the beans simmer gently for another 20 minutes or so.
- Remove the pan from the heat and take out the bay leaves. Stir the remaining oil into the stew and serve.
Title: Blue Zones
Author: Dan Buettner
Price: €25,-
Publisher: Spectrum
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