The world’s oldest family ate a specific meal throughout their lives, and it’s backed by experts too.
The Melis family were featured in the 2023 Netflix documentary series Live to 100: Secrets of the Blue Zones, along with their unconventional diet.
Of that family, nine siblings were given a shared Guinness World Record in 2012 for having a combined age of 818.
That’s an average age of 90.8 between the nine of them. In 2025, Italy’s average life expectancy is 82.8 according to the World Health Organisation.
Genetics likely played a massive role, especially seeing as siblings are more genetically similar to each other than anyone else, but it seems that a particular dish had a hand in rocketing their lifespans well over the average.
The documentary followed Dan Buettner, an American author, as he travelled to so-called blue zones around the world.
A blue zone is an area where people typically live longer than the average — one of those is Sardinia, Italy, home to the Melis family.
Buettner, styled as an expert in how healthy living increases lifespans, was excited to highlight the Melis’s family lunch and its purported benefits.
What’re we having?
The plant-based and vitamin-rich meal is as follows:
"A sourdough bread, a three bean minestrone soup - a chunky minestrone with garden vegetables,” explained Buettner.
"It always had three beans; a garbanzo, a pinto and a white bean.
"And then they had a small glass of red wine. I'm talking a two to three ounce glass.
"Now this wasn't because 'my diet requires me to do it'.
"No, they loved it."
What’s so special about the Melis’s meal?
The beans are doing most of the heavy-lifting here.
Dietician Samantha Cassetty told Today.com: "People who live the longest, healthiest lives tend to eat half a cup to a cup of beans daily.
"It's also noteworthy that the soup uses three types of beans and multiple vegetables.
"Research suggests that eating 30 unique plant foods per week can improve your gut diversity, a marker of a healthy gut.
"Your gut regulates health functions, like blood pressure and cholesterol, inflammation, mood, weight and nutrient absorption, so you’ll be more likely to live a longer and healthier life if you have a healthy gut."
Pinto beans are rich with nutrients, protein and fibre. Garbanzo beans have the same qualities, and both types are also free of cholesterol.
White beans, meanwhile, are proper nutrient powerhouses that contain folate, magnesium and vitamin B6 among others.
How are the Melis family getting on now?
Since getting their 2012 Guinness World Record, some members of the Melis family have sadly passed away.
The eldest sibling, Consolata Melis, died in 2015 aged 108
Her sister, Claudina, passed away in 2016 aged 103, while Maria died at 100.
Their brother Antonio passed away aged 97.
As far as innings go, the Melis family has certainly enjoyed some good ones, and much of that could be owed to their bean-heavy lunch.
It sounds delicious, too.
Featured Image Credit: Getty Images/istetiana
Rachael Davis