U.S. Dietary Guidelines Put Olive Oil and Table Olives at the Center of Healthy Eating

Summary

The United States Department of Agriculture and the Department of Health and Human Services have rec­om­mended incor­po­rat­ing olive oil and table olives into the American diet in their new dietary guide­lines, which will remain in place until 2030. While indus­try groups wel­comed the empha­sis on olive oil, con­cerns were raised about other ele­ments of the guide­lines, includ­ing rec­om­men­da­tions related to fat and pro­tein intake, as well as the redesigned food pyra­mid.

Olive oil and table olives have been placed at the heart of new dietary guide­lines rec­om­mended by the United States Department of Agriculture and the Department of Health and Human Services.

The government’s offi­cial health and nutri­tion rec­om­men­da­tions, which will remain in place until 2030, call on Americans to con­sume more nutri­ent-dense foods and healthy fats from whole foods, includ­ing table olives, and to cook with ​“essen­tial fatty acids, such as olive oil.”

The U.S. government’s guid­ance on food and drink is highly influ­en­tial, shap­ing meals served by pub­lic insti­tu­tions such as hos­pi­tals, mil­i­tary bases, pris­ons and schools, as well as food dis­trib­uted through fed­eral assis­tance pro­grams.

Leading indus­try groups wel­comed the empha­sis on olive oil, while some food, health and nutri­tion experts expressed reser­va­tions about other ele­ments of the guide­lines.

“We applaud the strong rec­om­men­da­tions to inte­grate olive oil into the American diet as an essen­tial means of improv­ing U.S. health,” said Kimberly Houlding, chief exec­u­tive of the American Olive Oil Producers Association. ​“The sci­ence is defin­i­tive: extra vir­gin olive oil is a cor­ner­stone of a healthy dietary pat­tern.”

Joseph R. Profaci, the exec­u­tive direc­tor of the North American Olive Oil Association, echoed those views in a LinkedIn post.

“The Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2025 – 2030 place extra vir­gin olive oil at the cen­ter of the food pyra­mid for the first time,” Profaci said. ​“The guide­lines also explic­itly advise pri­or­i­tiz­ing olive oil when cook­ing or adding fats to meals. This is a clear sig­nal from U.S. health author­i­ties: olive oil isn’t optional — it’s foun­da­tional to healthy eat­ing.”

Beyond olive oil, experts also wel­comed rec­om­men­da­tions to con­sume five daily serv­ings of fruits and veg­eta­bles, include two to four serv­ings of whole grains, and limit ultra-processed foods and added sug­ars.

However, con­cerns were raised about guid­ance related to fat and pro­tein intake.

While broadly sup­port­ing the guide­lines, the American Heart Association warned that some rec­om­men­da­tions could lead to exces­sive con­sump­tion of sat­u­rated fat and sodium.

The guide­lines advise keep­ing sat­u­rated fat below ten per­cent of daily calo­ries, but also endorse cook­ing with but­ter and beef tal­low, sea­son­ing food with salt to taste, and con­sum­ing sig­nif­i­cantly more pro­tein than pre­vi­ously rec­om­mended.

Decades of research — widely accepted by many health and med­ical pro­fes­sion­als but dis­puted by some U.S. offi­cials — have linked high intake of sat­u­rated fats, includ­ing but­ter and lard, to poorer car­dio­vas­cu­lar health.

Other experts ques­tioned the rec­om­mended pro­tein intake of 1.2 to 1.6 grams per kilo­gram of body weight per day, warn­ing that excess pro­tein may be con­verted into fat. Previous guid­ance advised 0.8 grams per kilo­gram per day.

Some health pro­fes­sion­als also crit­i­cized the redesigned food pyra­mid, which replaces the tra­di­tional pyra­mid with an upside-down tri­an­gle.

The new design aims to help con­sumers com­pare food vol­umes for daily con­sump­tion, but experts ques­tioned the logic behind the place­ment and rel­a­tive size of cer­tain food groups.

For exam­ple, fruit — rec­om­mended at two daily serv­ings — appears in the mid­dle sec­tion of the tri­an­gle, while whole grains, rec­om­mended at two to four serv­ings, occupy a smaller area at the bot­tom.

Health experts also said the lack of clear def­i­n­i­tions for ​“nutri­ent-dense” foods and ​“essen­tial fatty acids” could cre­ate con­fu­sion.

Still, they wel­comed the oppor­tu­nity to clar­ify that polyphe­nols, includ­ing those found in extra vir­gin olive oil, qual­ify as nutri­ent-dense.

Current U.S. dietary guide­lines dif­fer sig­nif­i­cantly from the Tuscan food pyra­mid, which reflects Italy’s offi­cial rec­om­men­da­tions.

In the Tuscan model, fruits and veg­eta­bles form the base, fol­lowed by whole grains and extra vir­gin olive oil, while non-dairy fats and ani­mal-based pro­teins sit at the top and are meant to be con­sumed spar­ingly.