Foods of the Mediterranean Diet Pyramid

What is different about the Mediterranean Diet pyramid as opposed to the more common food pyramid? Specifically, what is the difference between what constitutes the usual consumption of the average citizen of the industrialized world and the fare of the Mediterranean-located citizen? There's a number of ways, and some of them make for the most interesting revelations...

Mediterranean Diet: raw, unprocessed, or very lightly cooked foods.
Typical Industrialized Diet: deep-fat fried, charred, highly processed.

We're especially looking at the fast-food restaurants and workplace microwave cuisine: everything is blended to a puree, mixed with preservatives into a food paste, molded into patties, and cooked at 400+ degrees. Maybe a little variety would be nice? Don't frown and go: "How do you cook a grape?" Try tasting something natural for a change.

Mediterranean Diet: high dairy, very low dairy, goat's milk
Typical Industrialized Diet: cow's milk

It's actually kind of strange that humans eat or drink anything made from another species' mammary glands. Meanwhile most of our culture idolizes the female breast, and then the one time we get the chance to partake of it's product - its whole purpose in life, mind you - we make a formula out of powder. maybe we aren't intended to consume so much milk?

Mediterranean Diet: An abundance of green, leafy vegetables.
Typical Industrialized Diet: Potatoes, potatoes, potatoes.

If it isn't "burger and fries", it's "fish and chips". Restaurants absolutely love to sell ground potato product fried in fat. Potatoes in moderation have some nutrition, but mostly they're just starch. Are they really so delicious that we must eat them by the ton? No, they're just convenient to cook and serve. If you must have a deep-fried, breaded vegetable, have you ever had fried zucchini or fried mushrooms for a side dish? For that matter, would it be so hard to just serve them steamed?

Mediterranean Diet: Natural flavors
Typical Industrialized Diet: Sugar, sugar, sugar, corn sweeteners, corn syrup, sugar substitute, with sugar on top.

Fun game, industrialized diners! Name some food in your pantry right now that has no added sugar. Bread? Nope, has sugar. Coffee or tea? We add sugar. Fruit juice? Sugar. Ketchup? Sugar. Cereal? Not unless you specifically go out of your way to find "no added sugar" cereal. Check the ingredients on the label, and anything that says any one of "Sucrose, Glucose, Fructose, Syrup, Sugar" has sugar or a sugar substitute. Even in stuff that doesn't taste sweet; even in stuff that you'd think wouldn't need sugar. Which brings us to the next question: What are the nutritional benefits of sugar? Answer: Nothing! That's right, you could live all your life never eating any sugar at all and not suffer any negative health effects.

Mediterranean Diet: Olive Oil
Typical Industrialized Diet: Every other kind of oil.

As with the potato snacks, we get oil from other foods mostly because it is more convenient rather than by preference. But olive oil is hands-down the healthiest oil we have discovered yet.

Mediterranean Diet: No corn.
Typical Industrialized Diet: Corn in everything.

If you thought find-something-without-sugar was a hard game, you will find it impossible - I repeat - impossible to find a single packaged food (as opposed to raw food) that does not contain a corn by-product. Corn starch is in every baked product, high-fructose corn syrup in everything sweet, corn oil is in every deep-fried product and butter substitute, and corn can also be fermented into grain alcohol, and so there's whiskey and vodka and vinegar, too. Corn or a product derived from corn is also known under the names "partially hydrogenated vegetable oil", "glycerin", "adjunct", and "maltodextrins", to name a few. Now consider that just about every bite of land-living animal protein you consume is also fed corn. We do that because it makes them fat. Ring a bell?

This image display (courtesy of www.oldwayspt.org) attempts to give an overview of the monthly, weekly and daily intake typically consumed on the traditional Mediterranean diet. The Mediterranean region in its most recent past has been renowned for low rates of many chronic diseases and also important, the highest life expectancy of adults. There has been much research in the areas of nutrition to support the very impressive outcomes of this diet. The chart below is approximate but gives the viewer a reasonably accurate overview of the diet in general. The segmentation has been taken from historical data.