Ras El-Hanout

10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

This is a spice blend, and its name (رأس الحانوت) means “head of the shop”. It’s popular throughout Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, but can often be found elsewhere. The exact blend will vary a little from place to place and even from maker to maker, but the general idea is the same. The one we provide here today is very representative (and for an example of its use, see our Marrakesh Sorghum Salad recipe!).

Note: we’re giving all the quantities in whole tsp today, to make multiplying/dividing easier if you want to make more/less ras el-hanout.

You will need

  • 6 tsp ground ginger
  • 6 tsp ground coriander seeds
  • 4 tsp ground turmeric
  • 4 tsp ground sweet cinnamon
  • 4 tsp ground cumin
  • 2 tsp ground allspice ← not a spice mix! This is the name of a spice!
  • 2 tsp ground cardamom
  • 2 tsp ground anise
  • 2 tsp ground black pepper
  • 1 tsp ground cayenne pepper
  • 1 tsp ground cloves

Note: you may notice that garlic and salt are conspicuous by their absence. The reason for this is that they are usually added separately per dish, if desired.

Method

1) Mix them thoroughly

That’s it! Enjoy!

Want to learn more?

For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:

Take care!

Don’t Forget…

Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

Recommended

  • South Indian-Style Chickpea & Mango Salad
  • How to Think More Effectively – by Alain de Botton
    Unlock the power of your mind with Alain de Botton’s guide to cognitive improvement. Challenge your thinking and make it more meaningful.

Learn to Age Gracefully

Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:

  • Paracetamol pack sizes and availability are changing. Here’s what you need to know

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Changes are coming into effect from February 1 about how paracetamol is sold in Australia.

    This mainly affects pack sizes of paracetamol sold outside pharmacies and how paracetamol is accessed in pharmacies.

    The changes, announced by Australia’s drug regulator, are in line with moves internationally to reduce the harms of liver toxicity and the risk of overdose.

    However, there are no new safety concerns when paracetamol is used as directed. And children’s products are not affected.

    Bowonpat Sakaew/Shutterstock

    What is paracetamol?

    Paracetamol is commonly sold under brand names such as Panadol, Dymadon and Panamax. It’s used to treat mild pain and fever for short periods or can be prescribed for chronic (long-term) pain.

    Millions of packs of this cheap and accessible medicine are sold in Australia every year.

    Small packs (up to 20 tablets) have been available from supermarkets and other retailers such as petrol stations. Larger packs (up to 100 tablets) are only available from pharmacies.

    Paracetamol is relatively safe when used as directed. However, at higher-than-recommended doses, it can cause liver toxicity. In severe cases and when left untreated, this can be lethal.

    Why are the rules changing?

    In 2022, we wrote about how the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) was considering changes to paracetamol access because of an increase in people going to hospital with paracetamol poisoning.

    An expert review it commissioned found there were about 40–50 deaths every year from paracetamol poisoning between 2007 and 2020. Between 2009–10 and 2016–17, hospital admissions for this increased (from 8,617 to 11,697), before reducing in 2019–20 (8,723). Most admissions were due to intentional self-poisonings, and about half of these were among people aged ten to 24.

    After the report, the TGA consulted with the public to work out how to prevent paracetamol poisonings.

    Options included reducing pack sizes, limiting how many packs could be bought at once, moving larger packs behind the pharmacy counter and restricting access by age.

    Responses were mixed. Although responses supported the need to prevent poisonings, there were concerns about how changes might affect:

    • people with chronic pain, especially those in regional areas, where it may be harder to access pharmacies and, therefore, larger packs
    • people on limited incomes, if certain products were made prescription-only.

    Although deaths from paracetamol poisoning are tragic and preventable, they are rare considering how much paracetamol Australians use. There is less than one death due to poisoning for every million packs sold.

    Because of this, it was important the TGA addressed concerns about poisonings while making sure Australians still had easy access to this essential medicine.

    Pharmacist typing at computer behind the counter
    If you buy large packs of paracetamol for chronic pain, you’ll need to go to the pharmacy counter. StratfordProductions/Shutterstock

    So what’s changing?

    The key changes being introduced relate to new rules about the pack sizes that can be sold outside pharmacies, and the location of products sold in pharmacies.

    From February 1, packs sold in supermarkets and places other than pharmacies will reduce from a maximum 20 tablets to 16 tablets per pack. These changes bring Australia in line with other countries. These include the United Kingdom, which restricted supermarket packs to 16 tablets in 1998, and saw reductions in poisonings.

    In all jurisdictions except Queensland and Western Australia, packs sold in pharmacies larger than 50 tablets will move behind the pharmacy counter and can only be sold under pharmacist supervision. In Queensland and WA, products containing more than 16 tablets will only be available from behind the pharmacy counter and sold under pharmacist supervision.

    In all jurisdictions, any packs containing more than 50 tablets will need to be sold in blister packs, rather than bottles.

    Several paracetamol products are not affected by these changes. These include children’s products, slow-release formulations (for example, “osteo” products), and products already behind the pharmacy counter or only available via prescription.

    What else do I need to know?

    These changes have been introduced to reduce the risk of poisonings from people exceeding recommended doses. The overall safety profile of paracetamol has not changed.

    Paracetamol is still available from all current locations and there are no plans to make it prescription-only or remove it from supermarkets altogether. Many companies have already been updating their packaging to ensure there are no gaps in supply.

    The reduction in pack sizes of paracetamol available in supermarkets means a pack of 16 tablets will now last two days instead of two-and-a-half days if taken at the maximum dose (two tablets, four times a day). Anyone in pain that does not improve after short-term use should speak to their pharmacist or GP.

    For people who use paracetamol regularly for chronic pain, it is more cost-effective to continue buying larger packs from pharmacies. As larger packs (50+ tablets) need to be kept out of sight, you will need to ask at the pharmacy counter. Pharmacists know that for many people it’s appropriate to use paracetamol daily for chronic pain.

    Natasa Gisev, Clinical pharmacist and Scientia Associate Professor at the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, UNSW Sydney and Ria Hopkins, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, UNSW Sydney

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

    Share This Post

  • The Menopause Brain – by Dr. Lisa Mosconi

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    With her PhD in neuroscience and nuclear medicine (a branch of radiology, used for certain types of brain scans, amongst other purposes), whereas many authors will mention “brain fog” as a symptom of menopause, Dr. Mosconi can (and will) point to a shadowy patch on a brain scan and say “that’s the brain fog, there”.

    And so on for many other symptoms of menopause that are commonly dismissed as “all in your head”, notwithstanding that “in your head” is the worst place for a problem to be. You keep almost your entire self in there!

    Dr. Mosconi covers how hormones influence not just our moods in a superficial way, but also change the structure of our brain over time.

    Importantly, she also gives an outline of how to stay on the ball; what things to watch out for when your doctor probably won’t, and what things to ask for when your doctor probably won’t suggest them.

    Bottom line: if menopause is a thing in your life (or honestly, even if it isn’t but you are running on estrogen rather than testosterone), then this is a book for you.

    Click here to check out The Menopause Brain, and look after yours!

    Share This Post

  • 100,000 People, 30 Years, One Clear Winner vs Aging

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Generally speaking, the scientific community most highly lauds the Mediterranean diet as being best for general health:

    The Mediterranean Diet: What Is It Good For? ← what isn’t it good for?!

    However, even this can be tweaked with specific health considerations in mind, for example:

    Four Ways To Upgrade The Mediterranean Diet ← these tweaks offer adjusted versions of the Mediterranean diet, optimized for anti-inflammation, gut health, heart health, or brain health

    And today we present to you some very good research into…

    The best diet for aging well

    Let’s be clear on terms first: by “aging well”, this means reaching age 70 without chronic diseases and maintaining good cognitive, physical, and mental health.

    105,015 participants (of whom, 66% women, average age 53 at the start of the study) were followed for up to 30 years. Not in the stalkery way, but in the longitudinal study way. We say “up to”, because as with any sizeable longitudinal study, some died before the end of the study.

    9,771 of them were deemed, at the end of the study, to have achieved “healthy aging”.

    So, how did those participants achieve that, in terms of diet?

    The dietary patterns that had the strongest positive impact were:

    • AHEI (Alternative Healthy Eating Index): best for mental and physical function, overall healthy aging.
    • PHDI (Planetary Health Diet Index): best for cognitive health and survival to age 70.
    • DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension): strongest general impact.
    • MIND (Mediterranean-DASH Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay): best for brain health.
    • rEDIH (Reversed Empirical Dietary Index for Hyperinsulinemia): most effective for chronic disease prevention.

    In contrast:

    • EIDP (Empirically Inflammatory Dietary Pattern): shocking nobody, performed least well in all areas

    You are probably wondering what those dietary patterns actually consist of, so click here to see a chart of what’s included or excluded in each dietary pattern.

    As you can see, the AHEI diet that was “best for mental and physical function, overall healthy aging” is essentially the Mediterranean diet with three small tweaks:

    1. no seafood, but long-chain omega-3 fatty acids include to compensate
    2. no sugar-sweetened beverages or fruit juices
    3. “no” sodium (in other words, minimal sodium, since almost everything contains trace amounts)

    The PHDI diet, which was “best for cognitive health and survival to age 70” is essentially a whole-foods plant-based diet. Which in turn is very consistent with the Mediterranean, except that it excludes animal products, of which the Mediterranean diet uses small amounts.

    You can read the paper in its entirety here:

    Optimal dietary patterns for healthy aging

    Want to know more?

    A panel of 69 doctors and nutritionists examined the evidence for 38 diets (including Mediterranean, MIND, DASH, Vegan, Keto, Slimfast, WeightWatchers, Nutrisystem, and more) and scored them in 21 categories (e.g. best for general health, best for weight loss, best for heart, best against diabetes, etc):

    Which Diet? Top Diets Ranked By Experts

    Enjoy!

    Share This Post

Related Posts

  • South Indian-Style Chickpea & Mango Salad
  • How Regularity Of Sleep Can Be Even More Important Than Duration

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    A recent, large (n=72,269) 8-year prospective* observational study of adults aged 40-79 has found an association between irregular sleep and major cardiovascular events.

    *this means they started the study at a given point, and measured what happened for the next eight years—as opposed to a retrospective study, which would look at what had happened during the previous 8 years.

    As to what qualifies as major cardiovascular events, they counted:

    • Heart attack
    • Cardiac arrest
    • Stroke
    • Cardiovascular death (any)

    Irregular sleep, meanwhile, was defined per a bell curve of participants. Based on a sleep regularity index (SRI) score, those with a score of 87 or more were on the “regular” side of the curve, and those with a score of 72 or lower were on the “irregular” side of the curve.

    What they found is that irregular sleep is associated with major cardiovascular events, regardless of the actual amount of sleep that people got. So in other words, you could be sleeping 9 hours per day, but if it’s a different 9 hours each day, your cardiovascular risk will still be higher.

    How much higher?

    • For those in the middle of the curve (so, moderate irregularity), it was 8% higher than those on the “regular” side.
    • For those on the “irregular” side of the curve, it was 26% higher than those on the “regular” side.

    All of the above is after taking into account confounding variables such as age, physical activity levels, discretionary screen time, fruit, vegetable, and coffee intake, alcohol consumption, smoking, mental health issues, medication use, and shift work. Which is quite something, given that shift work is a very common reason for irregular sleep schedules in a lot of people.

    Limitations

    While, as noted above, they did their best to account for a lot of things, this was an observational study, not an interventional study or a randomized controlled trial, and as such, it cannot truly establish cause and effect.

    For example, an observational study in the 90s found that the sport most strongly associated with longevity was polo. For any unfamiliar, it’s a game played on horseback with mallets and balls. Why was this game so much better than, say, swimming? And the answer is most likely that polo is played almost entirely by very rich people. It wasn’t the sport that enhanced longevity—it was the wealth.

    So similarly here, it could be for example that people who are predisposed to heart conditions, are prone to having irregular schedules. We won’t know for sure until we have interventional studies (and we probably can’t get RCTs for this, for practical reasons).

    Still, it seems likely that the association is indeed causal, in which case, having a regular sleep schedule if at all possible seems like a very good way to look after one’s health.

    You can read more about the study here:

    Irregular sleep may elevate risk of major cardiovascular events

    Practical take-away

    This study strongly suggests that sleep regularity is even more important than sleep duration.

    This means that there is extra reason to not sleep in past one’s normal getting-up time, even if one had a less restful night.

    That’s the end of sleep that’s the most important in practical terms, too, because we can control our getting-up time, whereas we can’t really control our going-to-sleep time, because it’s perfectly possible to just lie there awake.

    So, controlling the getting-up time is really the key to the whole thing. See also:

    Calculate (And Enjoy) The Perfect Night’s Sleep

    And for scope, you might enjoy reading:

    Morning Larks vs Night Owls: How Much Can We Control Our Sleep Schedule?

    Enjoy!

    Don’t Forget…

    Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

    Learn to Age Gracefully

    Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:

  • Anti-Aging Myths This Dermatologist Wants You To Stop Believing

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Dermatologist Dr. Sam Ellis lays all bare:

    Bare-faced lies?

    Obviously, we are hearing from a dermatologist here, so the focus is on skin aging specifically. We may well also not want to age our brain, joints, etc, but that’s not what this one is about.

    So, without further ado, here are the myths she wants to bust:

    • “Medical grade skincare”: the term “medical grade” is a marketing term and does not indicate superior efficacy or better ingredients.
    • “Expensive skincare is more effective”: price does not always correlate with effectiveness; some high-end products justify their cost, but many do not.
    • “More products = better results”: using too many products can reduce effectiveness and cause irritation; a simple routine with sunscreen and a retinoid is key.
    • “Drink more water for better skin”: if you’re dehydrated, then yes, hydrate—but drinking excessive water does not improve skin appearance beyond normal hydration levels.
    • “You don’t need anti-aging products until you see signs of aging”: starting skincare early, especially sun protection, helps maintain youthful skin longer.
    • “Wrinkles are the first signs of aging”: hyperpigmentation and sagging are often more significant early indicators of aging than wrinkles.
    • “Skincare is all you need for anti-aging”: by “skincare” here she means creams, lotions, tonics, etc, and recommends other treatments such as laser treatment and even Botox*.
    • “Non-prescription retinoids are a waste of time”: over-the-counter retinoids like retinol and retinal can still be effective alternatives to prescription retinoids.
    • “You must use retinoids every night”: retinoids are effective even when used a few times per week, depending on individual tolerance.

    *We’re not convinced about the Botox; we’ll have to do a deep-dive research review one of these days!

    For more on each of these, enjoy:

    Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

    Want to learn more?

    You might also like:

    Retinoids: Retinol vs Retinal vs Retinoic Acid vs..?

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

    Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

    Learn to Age Gracefully

    Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:

  • Passion Fruit vs Pomegranate – Which is Healthier?

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Our Verdict

    When comparing passion fruit to pomegranate, we picked the passion fruit.

    Why?

    Both of these fruits have beaten a lot of other contenders, so it’s time to pit them against each other:

    In terms of macros, passion fruit has more protein, carbs, and fiber, the ratio of which meaning also that passion fruit has the lower glycemic index. So, we say passion fruit wins on macros.

    In the category of vitamins, things are more even; passion fruit has more of vitamins A, B2, B3, B6, and C, while pomegranate has more of vitamins B1, B5, B9, E, and K. In light of this 5:5 tie, and since passion fruit’s overall vitamin coverage is better (in terms of meeting RDA needs) but pomegranate’s vitamins are often in shorter supply in diet, we’re calling it a tie on vitamins.

    When it comes to minerals, passion fruit has more calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, and selenium, while pomegranate has more copper, manganese, and zinc. That’s already an easy 6:3 win for passion fruit, before we even consider the fact that passion fruit’s minerals’ margin of difference is greater too.

    Adding it up makes for a clear win for passion fruit. As ever when it comes to plants, enjoy both if you can, though!

    Want to learn more?

    You might like to read:

    What’s Your Plant Diversity Score?

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

    Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

    Learn to Age Gracefully

    Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails: