Olive oil has long been a staple of the Mediterranean diet, and has become a must-have in North American pantries. It’s rich in monounsaturated fatty acids, is thought to lower cholesterol, moisturizes skin and hair and, most importantly, tastes amazing.

Sitting on the supermarket shelves en masse, waiting to be drizzled on salads or into sauces, olive oil seems so honest and innocent. You’d never suspect those bottles of green goodness to be anything but what they claim to be. Believe it or not, however, there are plenty of olive oil impostors lurking out there.

In 23 countries, the International Olive Oil Council (IOOC) defines quality standards and monitors the authenticity of commercially sold olive oil. People buying olive oil IOOC supervised countries can rest assured that they’re getting the real thing. In countries such as the United States and Canada that are not members of the IOOC, retail grades have no legal meaning, and terms like “extra virgin” can be used to describe any old oil.

It happens to everyone. You wake up on what already feels like a horrible morning - so horrible that you just feel like staying in bed and not even brushing your teeth. You’ll contemplate whether it was because you made out with a total stranger last night, or if it’s because your father loved your brother more. These thoughts will get you to rationalize why you should stay in bed all day. But you shouldn’t.

Being down sometimes is normal. This temporary state of being brings with it the desire to inflict more pain and punishment on oneself; therefore it is important to do the complete opposite of what depression wants. Whereas some people would have gone for a day of self loathing and occasional crying outbursts, you’re going to get your ass out of bed and fight the good fight against hormones, chemical imbalances, and your mind’s sick way of dealing with a lack of neurotransmitters!

Try to stay away from the Prozac. Instead, try eating your way to a better mood. It’s not about chowing down on junk food to ease your feelings of emptiness, but it is important to nourish your body and brain, and snap the hell out of it!

It’s commonly believed that food high in omega 3 helps relieve depression and its immobilizing symptoms. On their own they taste a bit like sand paper and wood, but flax seeds are an excellent source of omega 3. They can be added to cereal in the morning; baked into muffins and even thrown into some pasta sauce at dinner.

Also, try foods that are rich in Serotonin. This includes foods like sunflower seeds, bananas, turkey, avocados, mangoes, broccoli, and almonds. Furthermore, if you have trouble relaxing or have a stressful lifestyle, Ginseng can help balance the nerves. It’s available in the form of tablets, tea, and energy drinks (be careful with the pick-me-up juice, though. Once you crash from the buzz, it isn’t pretty).

Keep in mind you should also be decreasing your intake of alcohol, caffeine, and carbs if you get these moods often. Coffee tends to make you jittery and alcohol is a brain depressant – it’s no wonder we feel like crap on a stick the day after some hard-core partying.

Try our Anxiety-Stricken Chicken Soup recipe to calm your frazzled nerves.

Most importantly, just remember everyone has their days – but it takes a real trooper to be proactive when you really feel like throwing in the towel. Eat well, stay active, and these major downer days will be a thing of the past.

- Angelique Picanco

The recession is upon us. The economy is collapsing, the world as we know it is changing, and we're all holding our breath, waiting for things to get worse. This is what we're hearing, right?

Such doom and gloom have even infiltrated food literature. I'm seeing articles everywhere about "Depression cooking," or "Wow to Survive on Nothing but Cabbage," or even "Cannibalism: The Next Food Trend?"

Okay, that last one might be made up, but my point is this: if we were to take every sensationalist article about recession eating seriously, we would quickly be convinced the apocalypse is nigh and that people will be tearing each other's limbs off for snacks in T-minus 3 months.

Unless you are a glutton, a meat-a-holic, or a truly ineffective grocery shopper, you don't have to drastically change your eating and shopping habits in a recession. Sure, you may want to eat more home-cooked food and less takeout, but that's better for your health as well as your wallet.

Extreme Frugality: Supermarket Strategy by Gourmet writer W. Hodding Carter—while great—is not exactly groundbreaking to me.  He writes about how he and his family have drastically cut back on their grocery spending by buying what's on sale and working their meals around that. He calls this technique "the poor man's answer to the chef only buying the produce or meat of the day at his local farmers market."

Is this technique really only for poor men? Does it really qualify as "extreme"? Doesn't it just make sense? Carter discusses changing his dinner menu from one with green beans to one incorporating asparagus (which was on sale) as if it is the most innovative shopping strategy of the new millenium.

I have always shopped in this manner. Though I make a rough list before I leave the house, I always adapt it once I see what's fresh and cheap at the store. This—shopping spontaneously and economically—is perhaps the best way of shopping for any passionate cook. It allows you to be inspired by seasonal offerings and use your imagination to cook up ideas while you browse the produce section.

I've never been rich, so things like white truffles and Kobe beef have never been on my list. There was, therefore, no painful extraction process once shit went down with the economy. I'm used to eating simply, looking for deals, and being open-minded enough to try whatever's on special that week (and, okay, wincing when I see Valrhona chocolate and tell myself, "you'll be able to afford to try it one day").

But if you, like Carter, tend to go overboard with your food spending, maybe his strategy to "shop with the slash mark, and cook with your heart," is revolultionary advice indeed. You can find it on page one in Grocery Shopping for Dummies.

- Dallas Curow

Yes, the time has come for someone to say it: Peta has gone too far. Recently, the organization has shocked (and potentially disgusted) many of its followers around the world. How you ask? Through their new super-disturbing tofu recipe: CloFu.

CloFu is actually tofu soaked in George Clooney's man-sweat. I'll give you a moment to digest that thought, gather yourselves, and shake yourselves back into reality. But alas, it is true. Peta recently claimed that they were testing ways to harvest Clooney's sweat from a gym towel they snatched in order to fuse its taste (shudders) into Tofu.

Peta is so serious about the idea, that they contacted Clooney himself to give him the... good news. Thankfully, the Hollywood actor reacted the same way anyone would react if Peta were collecting their salty sweat for flavouring.

Are there women (or men) who would actually eat this perspiration tofu? Not bloody likely - or at least I hope not. The idea of shkoffing down some sweaty soy curd is not appealing, even if it is George Clooney.

- Angelique Picanco