The key to a long life: eat more fish

Fish is not only tasty, but an excellent way of getting essential nutrients. The following guidelines will help you incorporate the recommended dose of at least two servings of fish per week into your diet.

For dinner:

• Place a fish fillet on a large sheet of foil and top with your choice of flavourful additions (we like sun-dried tomatoes and chopped garlic with salmon and slices of fresh lemon over flounder) plus a splash of water, wine, or fruit juice.
• Bake at 180°C (350°F) until cooked through, usually about 20 minutes.

For lunch:

• Mix canned salmon or tuna with a bit of good-fat canola-oil mayo and grated carrots and apples.
• Enjoy on double-fibre bread with a leafy green side salad.

Despite the scary headlines about PCB contamination and environmental problems caused by fish farming, farm-raised salmon has no more toxins than a piece of chicken, experts say. And it "contains the same amount of omega-3 fatty acids as wild fish," notes Alice Lichtenstein, DSc, who heads the Cardiovascular Nutrition Laboratory at Tufts University in Boston.Even the ecologically savvy Environmental Defense Fund recommends the following farmed fish and seafood because they're low in contaminants and raised in an ecologically responsible manner: catfish, caviar, clams, mussels, oysters, scallops, shrimp and striped bass.

"It's a misconception that frozen and canned fish isn't as healthy as fresh, wild fish," says Jeannie Moloo, RD, PhD, a registered dietitian in private practice. "Frozen tilapia, sole, orange roughy and mahi-mahi are great choices — just let your fillets thaw in the refrigerator during the day, then broil with lemon or poach lightly."And don't overlook canned fish.

There's even affordable wild salmon hiding in the canned foods aisle, Dr. Moloo says. "Canned red or pink salmon is wild salmon — full of omega-3s and low in contaminants. It makes great salmon salad, salmon cakes, even a salmon loaf."

Canned pink salmon has 1.7 grams of omega-3s in a 100-gram (3.5-ounce) serving; canned sockeye (red) salmon's got 1.3 grams. Use it to make salmon salad, salmon loaf, or salmon burgers.

Reach for light tuna instead of white or albacore. Light is skipjack, a short-lived fish that has two-thirds less mercury than long-lived albacore.

Shrimp cocktail and peel-and-eat shrimp are fun ways to work more low-fat protein into your week. And don't fall for the high-cholesterol shrimp scare. Shrimp's quirky cholesterol count — about 200 milligrams in 12 large ones, about the same as the amount in one large egg — could make you pass up this low-calorie delicacy. But for most of us, shrimp should get the green light.

In a definitive Rockefeller University study, shrimp raised "bad" LDL cholesterol by 7 percent, but it also boosted "good" HDL cholesterol even higher and decreased heart-threatening blood fats called triglycerides by 13 percent. The bottom line is that it is heart–friendly. In fact, you may want to have shrimp salad instead of smoked salmon on your next bagel. Smoked salmon is high in sodium, and the smoking process may cut beneficial omega-3s by as much as 75 percent.

Hungry? Have a small serving of sardines, herring or smoked sable. They're all packed with good fats.