Recipe uses tomatoes, extra virgin olive oil, onions and garlic (photo: Javier Lastras/Wikimedia Commons)
Published on 03/27/2024
Agência FAPESP* – Some simple and quick-to-prepare dishes can have health benefits, such as sofrito, a tomato sauté usually prepared with extra virgin olive oil, onion and garlic, which is the basis of Mediterranean cuisine. Animal studies show that this sauté can modify the metabolism and limit weight gain.
Published in the journal Antioxidants, the study was conducted by researchers from the International University of Catalonia, the University of Barcelona and the Carlos III Health Institute, in Spain; the Edmund Mach Foundation and the University of Parma, in Italy; and the Food Research Center (FoRC), a FAPESP Research, Innovation and Dissemination Center (RIDC) based at the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences of the University of São Paulo (FCF-USP), in Brazil.
The research complements the results of a previous study, published in the journal Molecular Nutrition and Food Research, which found that obesity-prone rats given the sauté supplement in their diet gained the same amount of weight as those not given the supplement, despite consuming more feed and energy. The current study identified compounds related to sofrito consumption and possible organ changes that explain this effect.
To obtain these results, multiple research approaches were used, including analysis of the metabolite profile and gene expression in the blood plasma, liver and adipose tissue of the animals tested.
The researchers evaluated four groups of animals, half of which were normal weight (considered ideal weight) and the other half of which were prone to obesity. For a period of eight weeks, one group prone to obesity and another normal weight group received a diet with sofrito supplementation; the other groups received the same diet but without the sauté.
“Of the total amount of food, 2% was sofrito, a percentage that corresponds to the average intake of tomatoes by the Spanish population,” says José Fernando Rinaldi de Alvarenga, first author of the article, whose study is the result of his doctoral thesis at the University of Barcelona.
Using metabolomics, a technique that analyzes various compounds present in organs and tissues that result from chemical reactions that take place in the body, and biostatistical tools, butanediol was identified in the livers of the animals. “Our hypothesis to explain the effects of the sofrito is the presence of this compound, detected only in the animals that ate the sauté, which is described in the literature as a precursor of ketone bodies – substances that activate energy metabolism,” says Alvarenga.
A lipidomic investigation (the same type of analysis directed only at lipids) was also carried out to observe changes in adipose tissue, but no substantial changes were found.
“We observed that sofrito favors changes that lead to lipid oxidation, but we didn’t find any significant changes in composition,” says Alvarenga.
It was also found that the animals that ate the sauté had more diglycerides, energy reserves made up of two fat molecules, while the animals that did not receive the supplement had more triglycerides, energy reserves made up of three fat molecules. “This may indicate a metabolic change that led to the breakdown of these molecules, which may also favor not gaining weight,” adds the researcher.
Despite being an important ally of a healthy diet, Alvarenga emphasizes that sofrito is not a magic formula for weight loss.
The article “Integrated Metabolomics, Lipidomics, and Genomics Reveal the Presence of a New Biomarker, Butanediol Glucuronide, Associated with the Activation of Liver Ketogenesis and Lipid Oxidation by Tomato-Based Sofrito in Obese Rats” can be read at: www.mdpi.com/2076-3921/11/11/2165.
* With information from FoRC, a FAPESP Research, Innovation and Dissemination Center.
Source: https://agencia.fapesp.br/51232
