`Virginia Beach Event to Champion the Mediterranean Lifestyle - Olive Oil Times
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Virginia Beach Event to Champion the Mediterranean Lifestyle

By Paolo DeAndreis
Apr. 29, 2025 15:33 UTC
Summary Summary

The Let’s Fight Back Foundation is host­ing an event at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Virginia Beach to pro­mote extra vir­gin olive oil as a tool in pre­vent­ing chronic ill­nesses, with med­ical doc­tor Simon Poole and chef Amy Riolo attend­ing. Foundation founder Chasity Pritchett aims to empower com­mu­ni­ties to com­bat chronic dis­eases through the Mediterranean lifestyle, high­light­ing the health ben­e­fits of olive oil and offer­ing a free 12-week course on incor­po­rat­ing it into daily habits.

On May 22, 2025, the Let’s Fight Back Foundation will host an event at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Virginia Beach, high­light­ing extra vir­gin olive oil as a pow­er­ful ally in the fight against chronic ill­nesses.

Simon Poole, a Cambridge-based med­ical doc­tor, author and health con­sul­tant who has spent years inves­ti­gat­ing the mechan­ics of the Mediterranean diet, will attend the event.

The event will high­light the sci­en­tific evi­dence sup­port­ing the role of extra vir­gin olive oil in pre­vent­ing chronic dis­eases.

See Also:Olive Oil Industry Pushes for Tariff Exemption at D.C. Event

“Not only does the oleic acid pro­mote good cho­les­terol lev­els, but it also has anti-inflam­ma­tory effects and can sup­port healthy glu­cose reg­u­la­tion,” Poole told Olive Oil Times in a recent inter­view, refer­ring to some promi­nent health ben­e­fits of daily olive oil con­sump­tion.

Other guests will include Amy Riolo, an award-win­ning chef and ambas­sador of Mediterranean cui­sine.

As an author and expert speaker on healthy cook­ing, she has high­lighted on sev­eral occa­sions how good-qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oil is an essen­tial addi­tion to any dish, enhanc­ing fla­vor while also boost­ing nutri­tional value.

I feel like the U.S. is kind of left out, and my demo­graphic is left out. To me, it’s impor­tant that we can all share this knowl­edge.- Chasity Pritchett, Let’s Fight Back Foundation

The Let’s Fight Back Foundation, estab­lished by Emblem Olive Oil founder Chasity Pritchett, is ded­i­cated to empow­er­ing com­mu­ni­ties to com­bat chronic dis­eases by pro­mot­ing what Pritchett defines as ​“the Mediterranean lifestyle.”

Chasity Pritchett’s Let’s Fight Back Foundation promotes olive oil’s health benefits to underserved communities. (Photo: Chasity Pritchett)

“I don’t like to call it a ​‘diet’ because diets are usu­ally per­ceived as tem­po­rary behav­iors. Instead, this is the way we’re going to eat for­ever. So, it’s more of a lifestyle,” Pritchett told Olive Oil Times.

“A fight for your life” is the title of the event.

“We are only here for a lim­ited time, here on Earth, we’re all going to pass away. So why are we going to allow the things we eat to bring us to an early death?” she said. ​“People are now start­ing to fight for their own lives and the lives of the peo­ple they love.” 

“They are fight­ing because every week they want more out of life, and they do not want to be stuck on med­ica­tion just because of the way they were brought up to eat,” Pritchett added. ​“So it is a fight for your life, a life of abun­dance, a life of health.” 

Pritchett’s jour­ney began in 2019 when she dis­cov­ered the health ben­e­fits of olive oil.

“After research­ing and hear­ing about the health ben­e­fits of olive oil, know­ing that it can pre­vent and reverse heart dis­ease, high cho­les­terol, ADHD and all these other chronic ill­nesses, I asked myself: why is this not known in my com­mu­nity?” Pritchett said.

In response, she launched Emblem Olive Oil, focus­ing not only on pro­vid­ing high-qual­ity olive oil but also on edu­cat­ing con­sumers.

Recognizing the lack of rep­re­sen­ta­tion of black indi­vid­u­als in the olive oil indus­try, Pritchett was moti­vated to cre­ate a brand that res­onated with her com­mu­nity.

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The foun­da­tion’s flag­ship pro­gram is a free 12-week course that teaches par­tic­i­pants how to incor­po­rate extra vir­gin olive oil into their daily cook­ing and eat­ing habits.

“I am on a mis­sion to empower indi­vid­u­als to regain their health and elim­i­nate chronic ill­nesses. And that’s through the Mediterranean lifestyle,” Pritchett said.

According to its pro­mot­ers, the pro­gram has led par­tic­i­pants to expe­ri­ence sig­nif­i­cant health improve­ments, includ­ing weight loss and reduced blood pres­sure.

Pritchett explained that the May 22 event aims to bring together chefs, physi­cians and com­mu­nity mem­bers to bridge the gap between the culi­nary arts and med­ical sci­ence, demon­strat­ing how extra vir­gin olive oil can be a cen­tral com­po­nent in both.

According to Pritchett, who recently com­pleted the Olive Oil Times Education Lab Sommelier Program in London, extra vir­gin olive oil should be rec­og­nized not only as a sig­nif­i­cant food ingre­di­ent but also as a med­i­c­i­nal super­food.

“I want to heal America. I want peo­ple to real­ize how impor­tant olive oil is and what it can do in your diet,” she said. ​“This ini­tia­tive is a faith-based non­profit, as with­out God, I do not believe I could do any­thing.” 

The Let’s Fight Back Foundation’s efforts align with a grow­ing body of research that sup­ports the health ben­e­fits of extra vir­gin olive oil.

Studies have shown that con­sum­ing extra vir­gin olive oil daily can reduce the risk of car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­ease, type 2 dia­betes and cer­tain types of can­cer.

According to the foun­da­tion, the goal is to make extra vir­gin olive oil a sta­ple in American house­holds and a rec­og­nized tool in the fight against chronic dis­eases.

The chal­lenges are sig­nif­i­cant. According to Pritchett, one of the major ones is the mis­in­for­ma­tion often found on social media about olive oil.

“That is very hard to counter. Anyone can say any­thing, like what they say about olive oil’s smoke point,” she said. ​“People repeat these things over and over and end up believ­ing mis­con­cep­tions.”

Another issue is olive oil pric­ing. ​“It’s about break­ing habits, try­ing to explain to peo­ple what qual­ity olive oil is and why it is impor­tant to choose that. Not easy to do when you can go into a store and buy a $4 (€3.5) bot­tle,” Pritchett added.

Olive oil con­sump­tion in the United States has dra­mat­i­cally increased in recent decades.

According to the International Olive Council (IOC), it rose from 79,000 met­ric tons in 1991/1992 to 398,000 tons esti­mated for the cur­rent 2024/2025 sea­son.

However, IOC data show that the U.S. typ­i­cally pro­duces between 10,000 and 15,000 tons of extra vir­gin olive oil annu­ally. Imports are expected to reach almost 400,000 tons in the cur­rent sea­son.

These fig­ures trans­late to a per capita con­sump­tion of less than two kilo­grams per annum in the U.S., far below the lev­els seen in olive oil-rich coun­tries. In Spain, per capita olive oil con­sump­tion is esti­mated at almost ten kilo­grams per year.

According to Pritchett, the lack of diver­sity in the olive oil world has hin­dered aware­ness from spread­ing across the entire U.S. pop­u­la­tion.

“I feel like the U.S. is kind of left out, and my demo­graphic is left out. To me, it’s impor­tant that we can all share this knowl­edge,” she said.

“On top of that, not much research on olive oil has included African-Americans or blacks,” Pritchett con­cluded. ​“I would like such a sce­nario to change. It’s a work in progress.”

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