Paleo diet

[fluffybear2]

Originally Posted by fawn

Thank you fluffy for your hard work on the paleo research. While it's fascinating I personally don't beleive a lot of what is out there is condusive to modern day eating for many different reasons and I'm not quite selfish enough to consume animal proteins in the manner that is currently being promoted on other threads and boards (ie: someone I hear actually believes they are doing their body good by consuming strictly walmart tubes) though I do believe clean natural animal proteins imperative to health. Extremes just don't get us far in modern day society. That's my opinion.

In researching, I have a question of interest.......everyone refers to the inuit as if somehow everyone evolved from this particular group.
Do those of you who have researched this have knowledge from your personal evolutionary history? ie: I am of Native American descent. In speaking with my relatives and in some small research I have done, we lived primarily on small game like birds and squirrel as well, acorns etc....... What's your input?

Fawn I agree with much of what you say. The Paleo Diet that I follow is by Loren Cordain. His findings are well researched and collaborated. However, many people on both sides of the fat issue take exception to his views. Those who believe that we evolved eating a vegetarian diet disagree with him because he promotes a meat-rich diet and those who advocate a lot of dietary fat disagree with him because he believes we should eat only lean meat. Cordains views stand right in the middle between those two extremes. He is not against fat per say. However he believes that the meat paleo humans ate was nothing like the grain fed beef, pork, lamb, poultry and even farmed fish we consume today. I am sure you'll agree with that. He has done studies to show that not only are game meats less fat than all factory produced meat and poultry, but that their percentage of body fat waxed and waned seasonally. He also promotes eating non starchy vegetables and fruit because it has been irrefutably proved that paleolithic humans except for those living in climate extremes like the Inuit and others ate the omnivorous diet of hunter gatherers.

As far as who descended from who, there is less than .1 difference in the human genome world-wide. The.1 difference makes up the difference in skin, eye and hair color, but basically we are all the same genetically no matter where our more recent ancestors came from.

Now for the meat only eaters. If (and that's a big IF) they could eat caribou, seals, walrus and even whales like the Inuit USED to do exclusively, then perhaps they would not have any problems with an all meat diet. And I will tell you why I say "perhaps" a little later in this post.

First lets look at the Inuit. They migrated to the Arctic before the end of the last great ice age, populating what is now Alaska, northern Canada and Greenland and the islands in the Arctic Sea. They most likely followed the caribou herds as they crossed a land bridge that was open about 50,000 years ago. They had no doubt been living in one of the coldest parts of the world for thousands of years before then in Siberia and so were already used to that type of living (is little vegetation). BUT lets just think about the caribou for a minute. THEY (meaning the caribou) were of course not meat eaters. They had to survive on vegetation. Therefore there must have been some type of vegetation where the Inuit lived. Inuits didn't eat grass like the caribou, but they did and still do make use of seasonal vegetation in the warmest months of the year (July and August). They ate berries and other small plants. These accounted for only a tiny portion of their diet, even if dried and stored for winter, but nonetheless the Inuit thought they were necessary.

Now as far as all that meat and fat go. The types of meat the Inuits ate were especially high in nutrients compared to today's meat and most importantly the meat was unpolluted. Today the Inuits are suffering greatly because there is a concentration of pollutants in the atmosphere at the North Pole. These pollutants are stored in the fat of the very animals that used to sustain the Inuits and they are now getting sick. Also because the ice in the Arctic is melting a faster rate than previously, the animals the Inuit traditionally hunted are vanishing.

None of the above negates the meat only diet theory, it just goes to prove that neither the Inuit or anyone else can eat exactly like they did anymore.

Another thing about the Inuits is that they ate a lot of fish. In fact the actic explorer Stefansson talked about all the fish he ate when with the Inuit. However the promoters of an all meat diet, including the "Bear" rarely if ever mention fish. They are all about big beef steaks, pork, bacon and the like. Fish as most of us know has many health benefits. I've read some of the posts on the Zero Carb board and they actually encourage each other to drink bacon grease and other such things. That is a far cry from how the Inuits ate.

As far as the diet of the Paleo Americans (I've taken classes in college about them) their diet was as varied as the locale in which they lived as it was for any other people before agriculture. The eastern native Americans ate primarily small game such a opossum , badger, groundhog, squirrel, birds, fish and an occasional deer, while those in the great plains relied on buffalo even before the Spanish introduction of the horse. They hunted in small bands, but their numbers were limited. Those of the southwest, Mexico and central and South America began to farm earlier than others, but they too hunted for small game such as prairie dogs, armadillos, chipmunks, snakes, etc.

There never was any ONE paleo diet. It differed depending upon the locale and climate humans lived in. That is why Cordain believes in a lot of variety. His books contains recipes all the way from chicken breasts to Rocky Mountain Oysters (testicles) and from beef to bison, depending upon your tastes. He particularly promotes eating berries, but allows for other fruit and veggies. I personally try to eat small tart fruit and a lot of greens (dandelion and such) as I think that's what our paleo ancestors did.

Hope this helps.

[Tesaje]

Originally Posted by fluffybear2

There never was any ONE paleo diet. It differed depending upon the locale and climate humans lived in. That is why Cordain believes in a lot of variety. His books contains recipes all the way from chicken breasts to Rocky Mountain Oysters (testicles) and from beef to bison, depending upon your tastes. He particularly promotes eating berries, but allows for other fruit and veggies. I personally try to eat small tart fruit and a lot of greens (dandelion and such) as I think that's what our paleo ancestors did.

This a very salient point. In winter, the paleo peoples in the temperate climates probably ate more meat and whatever they could dry and store. By the end of winter, they probably had hungry days as their supplies dwindled and it got harder to find food. Women probably ate more vegetable/fruit matter as they gathered. And how could they not be snacking on the berries in the summer? They are so yummy and easy to get. Fish must have been eaten a lot by most peoples, especially the fresh water kinds that were easy to catch. I think we all agree that the modern food animals are fed an unnatural and unhealthy diet of grains designed to fatten them up.

Also, your position in the tribe would determine your eating status. Hunters probably got the best stuff, pregnant and lactating women would come second, children 3rd, older men 4th, and older women last of all. I have a theory that middle age women have such a hard time with weight gain because it was an evolutionary advantage to their grandkids if they live on but they were least likely to get sufficient food. So, older women evolved to conserve calories after their childbearing years are over.

The studies do show that humans can live very healthily on only meat and fat with some of the stomach contents. The Inuits depended heavily on fish and ate the offal as well as the fat of the animals they ate. The animals they ate have a lot more fat than warmer climate animals do. But the non-grain fattened animals have a much lower omega-6 and higher omega-3 fat content so their fat is healthier than our stockyard animals have. But the Inuits and Steffanson were burning a whole lot of calories keeping warm in the polar regions too.

I've read that they believe the current Inuit populations are fairly recent arrivals from Asia and are not very closely related to Native Americans that live much further south. They are closely related to the mongoloid populations that live in Siberia. The NA are thought to have come in at least 3 distinct waves and are not all closely related. Some of them might have been of far eastern Caucasian stock (Caucasian aboriginal peoples lived in the far east during the ice ages and migrated west as mongoloid populations moved north and displaced them after the glaciers receded. The Ainu in Japan are remnants of this population.) Some of these peoples may have migrated to Alaska and down to populate the Americas in the first waves. This would explain why the earliest finds (like Kennicunick man) don't match up particularly well with modern tribes and why there is such a huge ethnic variation in the NA populations. Some are clearly mongoloid like the Inuit but many others have no traits like that while many others seem to be some combination.

It is hard to figure out how much genetic variation is responsible for what. After all, we share 95% of our genes with all animals. Only a tiny bit of the genes are responsible for large differences. I also don't think we have to go all the way back to the proto humans before our species. If we had that much change to form a new species some 200,000 years ago, then that is plenty of time to have evolved a different diet and dietary needs. There were distinct racial developments more recently than that and some of those characteristics are evolved and confer a survival advantage. For example, southern Indians (India) are Caucasian but evolved skin as dark as any equatorial African to better survive the intense sun there.

It does seem that we are particularly adaptable to eat a variety of foods and that is no small part of why we are such a successful species. It might be that some populations that have spent millennia eating only vegetables are more adapted to that diet than those of us whose ancestors always ate a lot of meat. If not, then those populations would have died out.

While it is not clear how much time is needed to truly adapt to a new diet (5,000 years, 10,000, 25,000, 50,000?) it is clear that we have not adapted to the modern frankenfood started in the last century or the huge change in macronutrient constitution of the last 30. That experiment is clearly a huge failure.

[fluffybear2]

Very good post Tesaje! thanks for adding more info about SEASONAL eating.

Also about the grandmas (post menopausal women). Gee I can even remember my own grandmother (born in 1900) who would be the last to eat and would only take the parts of the chicken no one else wanted like the neck or wing (before the hot wing craze --ha ha). It was traditional in a lot of cultures and still is in some for the best parts of the meal to go to the workers (hunters), child-bearing mothers and children.

I believe that science has borne out the fact that humans didn't just find a niche' like other animals, but adapted to many varied circumstances. That adaptability has led to their survival.

You brought up some good points.

[fawn]

Truly fascinating information from both of you....thank you. And yes fluffy, today's animal proteins are very different and if one is going to consume meats only, one should give themselves the very best. There are no scientific studies done one Walmart tubed ground beef until there's a fecal scare........ and at that the testing is limited.

[fluffybear2]

Originally Posted by fawn

Truly fascinating information from both of you....thank you. And yes fluffy, today's animal proteins are very different and if one is going to consume meats only, one should give themselves the very best. There are no scientific studies done one Walmart tubed ground beef until there's a fecal scare........ and at that the testing is limited.

I was wondering what you meant by Walmart "tubes."

Truly disgusting stuff!

I want to SEE the meat I will consume before I buy it.

Even then I am getting pretty picky about where it is from and where it is processed.

[fawn]

Originally Posted by fluffybear2

I was wondering what you meant by Walmart "tubes."

Truly disgusting stuff!

I want to SEE the meat I will consume before I buy it.

Even then I am getting pretty picky about where it is from and where it is processed.

or from HOW many heads of hopefully beef and not old scrappy dairy cows? That's just wrong I tell ya!

[weasel!]

Originally Posted by fawn

or from HOW many heads of hopefully beef and not old scrappy dairy cows? That's just wrong I tell ya!

Sadly, dairy cows don't get as old as they used to.

From Get The Facts

Fully 25% of dairy cattle are slaughtered before they are 3 years old. Only 25% of dairy cattle live more than 7 years, although the natural life span for cattle is 20-25 years. (The oldest cow on record lived to be 49 years old!) Injury, illness, milk production lower than optimum, poor conception rates, and other factory-farming-induced health problems are common reasons dairy cattle are sold for slaughter long before they have lived out their natural life span.

[fluffybear2]

I knew that Dr. Michael Eades, author of Protein Power had written a blub on the back cover of Loren Cordain's book, The Paleo Diet, but I had no idea they were such good friends and shared an interest in paleolithic diets as well as going on annual family picnics together. Read this from Dr. Eades blog.

Eades/Cordain Tahoe picnic | The Blog of Michael R. Eades, M.D.

[Goldenrod]

Originally Posted by Tesaje

While it is not clear how much time is needed to truly adapt to a new diet (5,000 years, 10,000, 25,000, 50,000?) it is clear that we have not adapted to the modern frankenfood started in the last century or the huge change in macronutrient constitution of the last 30. That experiment is clearly a huge failure.

ABSOLUTELY.

When I start to feel overwhelmed by all the different ideas out there about what, exactly, we should be eating for optimal health and longevity, this is what I try to keep in mind. It seems like no amount of research is going to be able to answer every question with facts beyond the shadow of a doubt. But we *do* know--for sure--what our ancestors did NOT eat -- regardless of the geographic area they lived in or migrated to/from.

Whatever we decide we "should" eat for ourselves, there are without question plenty of things we should not eat.

[paleopaleo]

I'm so sorry I haven't had any time to contribute to this thread since subscribing. I so enjoy reading and debating about the origins of the human diet, but life is just beyond busy at the moment.

There can be no doubt that human beings are able to exist on a very wide range of foodstuffs; that's what made us so successful as a species to begin with. Humans are opportunistic feeders, which means there could not possibly be only one, true way to eat "paleo". However, as Ray Audette concluded, if you can't eat it raw and it involves anything beyond a sharp stick to process it, it's highly unlikely to be a source of calories our bodies originally evolved to eat. Under these restrictions exist a vast array of edible matter, including very occasional, tiny amounts of dairy (udder contents of hunted animals) and edible seeds.

Whether an individual has more success with a meat-based diet or all vegetable matter is a matter of experimentation in my opinion. I do believe that folks have a genetic predisposition one way or the other, similar to many other physiological variations across the human genome.

I personally have ethical issues with meat and all animal products, so I've made several well-researched attempst to live as both a cooked and raw vegan. However, after more than four years of extremely mindful eating, I still couldn't make it work for my body. Once I added sashimi and grass-fed meats again, my body literally surged back to health.

I'm a trained scientific sceptic, but my own experience was all the evidence I needed - my personal metabolism requires animal protein. Yet I have no doubt that there are other folks who thrive on vegan sources of protein, since I know several. Only one fact is clear to me (as Goldenrod pointed out), I have yet to meet anyone in vibrant good health who primarily lives on lots of processed foods of any kind.

The bottom line? Keep it real, process it minimally and steer clear of any foods that require technology to produce or make edible. That includes factory-farmed meats, genetically manipulated vegetables and fruits, additives, quantities of dairy, legumes, potatoes, etc.

This is the theory anyway. My little family sticks to the 80/20 principle when it comes to eating paleo. We strive to eat as high as possible a percentage of "paleo-legal" foods when we have control over it, and limit our exposure when we don't.

[fawn]

Originally Posted by paleopaleo

I'm so sorry I haven't had any time to contribute to this thread since subscribing. I so enjoy reading and debating about the origins of the human diet, but life is just beyond busy at the moment.

There can be no doubt that human beings are able to exist on a very wide range of foodstuffs; that's what made us so successful as a species to begin with. Humans are opportunistic feeders, which means there could not possibly be only one, true way to eat "paleo". However, as Ray Audette concluded, if you can't eat it raw and it involves anything beyond a sharp stick to process it, it's highly unlikely to be a source of calories our bodies originally evolved to eat. Under these restrictions exist a vast array of edible matter, including very occasional, tiny amounts of dairy (udder contents of hunted animals) and edible seeds.

Whether an individual has more success with a meat-based diet or all vegetable matter is a matter of experimentation in my opinion. I do believe that folks have a genetic predisposition one way or the other, similar to many other physiological variations across the human genome.

I personally have ethical issues with meat and all animal products, so I've made several well-researched attempst to live as both a cooked and raw vegan. However, after more than four years of extremely mindful eating, I still couldn't make it work for my body. Once I added sashimi and grass-fed meats again, my body literally surged back to health.

I'm a trained scientific sceptic, but my own experience was all the evidence I needed - my personal metabolism requires animal protein. Yet I have no doubt that there are other folks who thrive on vegan sources of protein, since I know several. Only one fact is clear to me (as Goldenrod pointed out), I have yet to meet anyone in vibrant good health who primarily lives on lots of processed foods of any kind.

[COLOR="Red"]The bottom line? Keep it real, process it minimally and steer clear of any foods that require technology to produce or make edible. That includes factory-farmed meats, genetically manipulated vegetables and fruits, additives, quantities of dairy, legumes, potatoes, etc.[/COLOR]

This is the theory anyway. My little family sticks to the 80/20 principle when it comes to eating paleo. We strive to eat as high as possible a percentage of "paleo-legal" foods when we have control over it, and limit our exposure when we don't.

The Red, so very true. when one eats with conscious, the choices do become more limited. I'm ok with that.
Knowing where, who and how my food was processed is so important to me.

Amazing to me that we will spend months on end as a society researching which television best suits us yet while we're researching it, we're popping food mindlessly.

Quite nicely and accurately stated for this period of time....

[weasel!]

Check it out, Dr. Mike Eades just posted an extensive article about Paleo eating:

Rapid health improvements with a Paleolithic diet | The Blog of Michael R. Eades, M.D.

[fluffybear2]

Originally Posted by weasel!

Check it out, Dr. Mike Eades just posted an extensive article about Paleo eating:

Rapid health improvements with a Paleolithic diet | The Blog of Michael R. Eades, M.D.

Yes I just read that today. Dr. Eades is a big paleo buff. He and Loren Cordain who wrote the Paleo Diet are good friends, although they disagree about saturated fats in the diet.

[Tesaje]

Very intersting blog on the "paleo" experiment in Eades' blog. I've been looking at the Cordain version of "paleo" and I have to agree - it is not any such thing. How could canola oil be paleo? Normal rapeseed, from which canola oil is gotten, is very poisonous even to herbivores. There is no way paleo man ever ate any of it, let alone the bred version of today which gets the toxins low enough not to outright poison us and is highly processed. Also, the very sugary fruits recommended are absurd too. Maybe some of the tropical paleo peoples might have eaten more of the sugary fruits, but those who adapted to Europe certainly did not ever eat such sugary fruits.

I've been trying to up my fats and one side effect is that my sweet tooth is greatly decreased. I can go for days without even wanting fruit which I found very hard to give up before and little need for the sugar subs. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be losing weight.

[fluffybear2]

Originally Posted by Tesaje

Very intersting blog on the "paleo" experiment in Eades' blog. I've been looking at the Cordain version of "paleo" and I have to agree - it is not any such thing. How could canola oil be paleo? Normal rapeseed, from which canola oil is gotten, is very poisonous even to herbivores. There is no way paleo man ever ate any of it, let alone the bred version of today which gets the toxins low enough not to outright poison us and is highly processed. Also, the very sugary fruits recommended are absurd too. Maybe some of the tropical paleo peoples might have eaten more of the sugary fruits, but those who adapted to Europe certainly did not ever eat such sugary fruits.

I've been trying to up my fats and one side effect is that my sweet tooth is greatly decreased. I can go for days without even wanting fruit which I found very hard to give up before and little need for the sugar subs. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be losing weight.

Let's see just what did paleo people actually eat.

I hear a lot about what paleo people did not eat, so let's just take a look and see what they did and did not eat.

What they did NOT eat:

canned food
packaged food of ANY type
animal milk
cheese
yogurt
domesticated beef, pork or poultry
farmed fish
cultivated vegetables
cultivated fruit
cultivated grains

What they did eat:

mammoths
mastadon
giant cave bear
jackals
wild boar
warthogs
aurocks
horse
donkey
camel
seeds and nuts
grapes (wine)

What they probably ate (based upon observation of hunter-gatherer people):

fruit
roots
tubers
melons
leafy greens

It's impossible in a modern society to eat like paleolithic humans did. In fact many of the things they ate don't even exist today. However to criticize Cordain or anyone else for suggesting readily available fruit and vegetables and yet still eat modern domesticated animals of any type is rather disingenuous.

[Laura in Arizona]

Hey Fluffybear,

I was curious to see how you are doing with Paleo eating. Care to give us an update?

The more I read the more I am moving toward Paleo style. Baby steps, changing a little here and a little there. I have been on "diets" before but for me now this about changing my way of eating and my way of life. I am most concerned with health, the weight will come off as I get healthier.

[fluffybear2]

I absolutely LOVE eating this way. I have lost weight using various methods, but the Paleo Diet is the one that I am most comfortable with. I have NO constipation or acid stomach like I've had with regular low carb diets and I am not hungry like with low fat and vegetarian type diets. The one drawback is eating out since the "sides" at most restaurants are either rice, potatoes of some kind or other high carb food. I was out of town for a funeral this past week and ate out in restaurants at least 15 times. So I gained back 5 lbs. However after going back on Paleo for the last 3 days I have lost the 5 lbs. I gained.

So it works as long as you stick to it. It is not fast however. I've lost about 12 lbs. in two and a half months months. My body has to adjust each time I lose about 5 lbs. before I can start to lose again.

[Tesaje]

I ask them to give me extra vegetables instead of their starch. They almost always do. This way, I've been able to maintain or even lose weight when traveling.

[Laura in Arizona]

Originally Posted by Tesaje

I ask them to give me extra vegetables instead of their starch. They almost always do. This way, I've been able to maintain or even lose weight when traveling.

Me too. Although I rarely go out to dinner I have asked what else I could have besides the starch/carb. They will usually sub something. Not always the greatest but better than some carby thing. One restaurant I went to had a limited menu but they said they could give me extra salad. I thought great, then it came and it was about 6 cups of iceberg lettuce piled in a bowl (but I ate it).

So, glad you are doing well Fluffybear even with a slow weight loss. I am not so concerned with weight loss as I am health. I lost 20 pounds slowly from June to Nov. Then did not concentrate on weight loss for Nov to Jan. I gained about 5 pounds back which after I got serious about "doing good" quickly came off plus 2 or 3 more. I am in the process of getting back into walking and am preparing for the next 20. I had hoped to lose all my weight (about 60 pounds total) in a year. It looks like it is going to take me longer but I don't care. I will get to whatever weight my body sees fit in whatever time frame it wants. I am not going to risk my health by doing wacky things (like I did when I was younger) just to be thinner.

[thestreets]

Originally Posted by fluffybear2

As far as who descended from who, there is less than .1 difference in the human genome world-wide. The.1 difference makes up the difference in skin, eye and hair color, but basically we are all the same genetically no matter where our more recent ancestors came from.

)

I think that difference accounts for a lot more. And, .1 can be a lot, there's just a one percent difference between chimps and us.
Different races have different predispositions to illnesses and were made to thrive on different diets(which stems from where they settled). For example, in lactose intolerance, the variance by race is quite extraordinary. and there is also the thrifty gene in native americans.

[fluffybear2]

Originally Posted by thestreets

I think that difference accounts for a lot more. And, .1 can be a lot, there's just a one percent difference between chimps and us.
Different races have different predispositions to illnesses and were made to thrive on different diets(which stems from where they settled). For example, in lactose intolerance, the variance by race is quite extraordinary. and there is also the thrifty gene in native americans.

Well I haven't read The Thrifty Gene yet (so I'm not able to comment on that particular theory), although its on my list of "must read" books. When I do, I'll get back to you.

[Stevie Renee]

Glad you are back. You were missed.

[sbarr]

I have nothing to add (my education, professional and personal are quite removed from this fascinating area) but I want to express my appreciation and admiration to the writers on this thread....This is one of the most articulate, thoughtful threads on the site. It's worth printing and reading a few times. Thank you for all of the contributions. I am sure there are probably many lurkers out there. It's further reinforcing many beliefs and giving me more to think about.

[kamills]

Subscribing. I'd like to do this diet once I'm maintaining. A few more months go before I'm there though!

[greenandchic]

This is pretty much how I eat by default (cant eat gluten and most other grains anyway). I tend to have insulin resistance so I need to keep starch intake as low as possible - usually not at all. I do take in 2 tbs of coconut oil a day. I cant do low-fat.

Eating out in my area is pretty easy. Sashimi and anything without rice, bread, noodles, starches, etc is usually what I order.

For protein, I usually eat fish, shellfish, some chicken and nuts. I don't eat much beef (though I have a little grass-fed steak in my freezer). With that said, I am bored a lot. I eat a lot of green veggies, salads, and protein. I cant fill up on fruit like I used to and that's difficult.

[weasel!]

Did anyone hear Loren Cordain on Jimmy Moore's Livin' La Vida Low-Carb podcast a few weeks ago? It's available for download at iTunes or Jimmy's site still. Very interesting. It's a good, long interview.

[Laura in Arizona]

Originally Posted by weasel!

Did anyone hear Loren Cordain on Jimmy Moore's Livin' La Vida Low-Carb podcast a few weeks ago? It's available for download at iTunes or Jimmy's site still. Very interesting. It's a good, long interview.

Yes, I stumbled across it and really enjoyed it. I started looking at some of the other podcasts you can listen to and there are a lot. There is a two part one with Drs. Mike and MD Eades that I listened to as well. He has one with Taubes that I have not listen to yet. Also Dr. William Davis of the Heart Scan was very good. I highly recommend poking around Jimmy's site.