Fresh ingredients. Meals made from scratch. Enough food for the whole family. All seasoned with the most important ingredient: A healthy dose of love.

Lately, it seems like everyone’s been talking about the Mediterranean diet: The science-backed meal plan that draws upon the cuisines of Crete, Southern Spain and Southern Italy. But Italian grandmothers – or “nonnas” – have been practicing healthy eating habits for much longer. What valuable lessons can we learn from their wisdom? Keep reading to find out.

Use Fresh Seasonal Ingredients

In a perfect world, you’d be able to wander out your back door in the sunny Italian countryside to pick tomatoes and herbs from your garden. But until that dream becomes a reality, visiting your local farmers’ market is probably the next best thing.

According to the University of Maryland Medical System, eating seasonally isn’t just delicious, it’s also good for your health. As they explain, “Fruits and vegetables that are allowed to ripen naturally and are consumed shortly after harvesting contain higher levels of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, which protect against cancer and other serious diseases, than produce that has traveled long distances and has to sit on grocery store shelves for long periods of time.”

If you’ve got a bounty of fresh local produce on your hands – like a bushel of juicy, just-ripe tomatoes – consider preparing them using simple recipes that will allow their natural flavors to shine. An easy summer Caprese salad is a perfect choice.

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Embrace Cooking From Scratch

In today’s busy world, there’s no shame in expediting meal prep by getting a boost from already-prepared ingredients. But if you have extra time and energy, making your meals from scratch can have unexpected benefits.

When you cook a meal from scratch – like by making your own sumptuous lasagna layered with homemade béchamel and red sauce – you can control exactly what goes into the recipe. This allows you to avoid any unwanted preservatives or additives that might be lurking in prepackaged foods. It’s also an opportunity to tailor the recipe to the tastes you love.

Start with easy recipes like homemade pasta sauce or focaccia, and over time, you might find that cooking from scratch becomes second nature. Before you know it, you’ll be canning tomatoes and rolling out pasta dough with the best of them.

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Practice Portion Control and Balance

When you picture Italian food, does a huge plate of pasta heaped with spaghetti and meatballs come to mind? If so, you might be surprised to learn how an Italian meal is typically served in Italy.

A classic Italian meal consists of a succession of different courses drawn from a variety of food groups. There’s an emphasis on moderate bite-sized portions: For example, antipasti is an early course meant to stimulate your appetite through a selection of little cheeses, charcuterie and more.

Serving out courses one at a time promotes slow, mindful eating. It allows you to taste and enjoy every dish on its own so that you can eat exactly as much as you want.

And pasta, while still an indulgent dish, is typically served in smaller portions as part of the primo – or first – course. Italians tend to favor light, simple sauces that go with noodles cooked al dente: Authentic cacio e pepe, which only uses three ingredients, is a classic example. Following primo is “il secondo” – or the second course – which balances out pasta with a simple meat, poultry or fish plate.

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Prioritize Family Meals

In American culture, food is often seen as fuel – a way to quiet your grumbling stomach and gain energy to power through the day. But is there something we’re missing by treating food as a means to an end?

In his essay “A Tavola, At the Italian Dinner Table,” Piergiogio Nicoletti recalls “the magical synergy that is created when the joys of conversation and intimacy commingle with the pleasures of beautiful food and drink.”

Looking back on family feasts – or “festas” – Nicoletti remembers how they brought the entire family together. “The food was always so lovingly prepared and delicious that everyone’s spirits were lifted; and as the meal progressed, the good mood grew in a kind of crescendo – helped along by family jokes, more and more boisterous play, which sometimes culminated in a few rounds of our family’s favorite songs – all accompanied by the seemingly endless flow of good wine and … more good food.”

Nicoletti notes that these meals would not have been possible without the hard work of the “mothers, grandmothers, daughters, aunts” of the family who dedicated their time to creating those incredible feasts.

The family feasts described by Nicoletti usually take place on special holidays, but even routine meals can still capture a bit of this magic. Start by setting regular family mealtimes where everyone gathers around the table. And try to leave your devices out of reach – when you aren’t constantly being distracted by buzzes and chimes, you might be surprised at how easy it is to enjoy your meal.

Embrace a More Plant-Forward Diet

One of the key features of the Mediterranean diet is its emphasis on a rainbow of different vegetables, legumes and whole grains. Carnivores will be relieved to know that you don’t have to abandon meat entirely – just consume it less often.

If embracing plants seems like too much of a jump, try cooking just one plant-based meal a week. A hearty, flavorful dish like this Tuscan cannellini bean soup is an excellent option for easing into a plant-forward diet.

Embrace Nonna’s Wisdom for a Healthier Life

Preparing food every day takes a lot of time and effort. Is it any wonder that, all too often, mealtimes start to feel like a chore? Learning from Italian nonnas can help us enjoy meals for what they truly are: an opportunity to celebrate the tasty bounty of the natural world with the people you love.

Once you start cooking like an Italian grandmother – preparing meals from scratch that feature seasonal produce, making time for family meals and creating balanced portions – you’ll find that there might be a reason why Italian grandmothers are revered for their knowledge and wisdom.

After all, as the Italians say, “una buona mamma vale cento maestre”: A good mother is worth a hundred teachers. Surely, the same applies to nonnas, too.