 The best way to keep and consume walnut oil is within the walnut itself. But which is better for cardiovascular disease protection? Black walnuts or English, also known as common walnuts? Regular English walnuts have been shown to decrease cardiovascular disease risk, however black walnuts do not appear to have been studied for their cardioprotective benefits until now. Maybe black or even better. Who do you think won the contest? Three choices, black best, English best, or the same? I would have guessed black, just based on their rich color and flavor, but I would have been wrong. English best, and I'll show you why. They both tended to lower cholesterol, but when participants were given a meal containing a sandwich with salami and cheese on white bread smeared with two spoonfuls of butter, along with yogurt, and then a big handful of black or English walnuts, everything very different happened. When we whack our arteries with that kind of load of saturated animal fat, our blood vessels immediately, within hours, become inflamed and stiff, you eat English walnuts with the salami sandwich, though, and they're so packed with anti-inflammatory goodness that you significantly lessen the impact. Black walnuts, however, did not improve endothelial function, the cells of the arterial lining, which can be explained by the nutritional differences between the nuts. English walnuts, for example, have nearly 10 times as much anti-oxidant capacity as black.