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Paleo Diet 101: How and why you should eat like a Caveman

NewFresh

Member
your hyperbole regardless of sarcasm is duly noted.
Paleo is for those who wish to unleash the full potential of the human body. I will not convert anyone. anyone who wants to get into Paleo must make that first, second, and third step themselves. research paleo. test paleo. embrace paleo.

and then love paleo.

Is love step four out of three?
 

Darryl

Banned
I tried this diet for a week last year.
I first heard about it on the Joe Rogan boards and was really excited to try it.

For breakfast I had a poached egg and some fruit (usually a banana).

For lunch I had grilled chicken breast and a handful of mixed nuts.

Dinner would be grilled chicken breast with salad leaves and some fruit for afters.

In-between these meals I would also drink plain whey protein shakes as I go to the gym regularly...

I felt terrible.
Always hungry, really lethargic, moody/snappy.

I gave up after a week because I thought it was unfair on my girlfriend as I was so snappy and tired. I also felt hungry and nauseous a lot.

Should I have stuck at it longer? Would it have passed?

Maybe I should have mixed up what I ate a bit more? Are plain whey isolate shakes with water allowed?

sounds like you've got a carb/sugar addiction. try to avoid changing your diet so much at one time and just work your way into it.
 

ch0mp

Member
For breakfast I had a poached egg and some fruit (usually a banana).

For lunch I had grilled chicken breast and a handful of mixed nuts.

Dinner would be grilled chicken breast with salad leaves and some fruit for afters.

In-between these meals I would also drink plain whey protein shakes as I go to the gym regularly...
Low fat low carb, I'm not surprised you felt like crap.
 

Dead Man

Member
I'm always confused by the rationale behind this diet. Broccoli for instance. If people adapted to certain foods, how is an Asian or african person adapted to eat a vegetable they did not encounter until the 20th century? Hell, it didn't even get to England until the 18th century. Or corn.

I can understand that some types of foods may not be ideal for the average digestive system, but this diet seems to go much further than that.
 

Turok_TTZ

Member
I'm always confused by the rationale behind this diet. Broccoli for instance. If people adapted to certain foods, how is an Asian or african person adapted to eat a vegetable they did not encounter until the 20th century? Hell, it didn't even get to England until the 18th century. Or corn.

I can understand that some types of foods may not be ideal for the average digestive system, but this diet seems to go much further than that.

corn is a grain so it is banned by default. though I do understand yer concerns. Not sure. most veggies just seem to click for most human bodies.
 

Zolf

Member
I believe that "Paleo" works because it's essentially a low-carb diet. Maybe that's because pre-agricultural humans generally didn't consume many carbs (outside of fiber), but regardless any diet that will induce ketosis will help to lose weight.

Personally, I lost 50 pounds on a low carb diet that I would describe as being similar to paleo except that I would make use of certain high-fiber low-carb processed products such as low-carb tortillas (wraps are awesome as a sandwich replacement, also fajitas and such are great).
 

Dead Man

Member
corn is a grain so it is banned by default.

Is it considered a grain? Okay, so why if people were eating wild corn and domesticating it during the end of the Palaeolithic is it not on the diet? I get a rationale that says it is not ideal due to the starches or something, but labelling this diet as paleo is just marketing. It has no relevance to the actual diet.
 

Turok_TTZ

Member
Is it considered a grain? Okay, so why if people were eating wild corn and domesticating it during the end of the Palaeolithic is it not on the diet? I get a rationale that says it is not ideal due to the starches or something, but labelling this diet as paleo is just marketing. It has no relevance to the actual diet.

corn has an excessive high amount of fructose and phytic acid and for that reason it is banned. beans is a veggie but part of legumes family and is banned for that as well.

paleo studies what foods are beneficial and what are not and as a result of such studies corn is banned.
 

Dead Man

Member
corn has an excessive high amount of fructose and phytic acid and for that reason it is banned. beans is a veggie but part of legumes family and is banned for that as well.

Yes, but they (well, maize was if you lived in the americas) are part of a real paleolithic persons diet is what I am saying.
 

ch0mp

Member
Is it considered a grain? Okay, so why if people were eating wild corn and domesticating it during the end of the Palaeolithic is it not on the diet? I get a rationale that says it is not ideal due to the starches or something, but labelling this diet as paleo is just marketing. It has no relevance to the actual diet.
Eaten as a vegetable it's probably fine. It can be consumed without processing, unlike wheat or legume based products.
 

Turok_TTZ

Member
Yes, but they (well, maize was if you lived in the americas) are part of a real paleolithic persons diet is what I am saying.

im sorry but I tend to make edits soon after i post... please read my edit.

really surprised op forgot to add the science of paleo.
From Loren Cordain himself
Paleo does use science to back it up. Cordain and Wolf know what they speak.
Too bad many will not bother to read their stuff. oh well. not surprised. who'd bother going through every pdf?

Fake edit: OP. Highly recommend to add my link to ur resources. Published research should be viewed for sceptics willing to read.
 

Dead Man

Member
im sorry but I tend to make edits soon after i post... please read my edit.

really surprised op forgot to add the science of paleo.
From Loren Cordain himself
Paleo does use science to back it up. Cordain and Wolf know what they speak.
Too bad many will not bother to read their stuff. oh well. not surprised. who'd bother going through every pdf?

Fake edit: OP. Highly recommend to add my link to ur resources. Published research should be viewed for sceptics willing to read.

Re: Your edit, yeah, that's fine, but the whole point of Paleo is that it is Palaeolithic, except for stuff that is still bad? It should really be called something else instead of marketing itself under false pretences. If you are removing food that was eaten in the Palaeolithic period it is a self defeating exercise and you should call it something else. Maybe I'm just being too literal, it just bugs me.
 

Walshicus

Member
The missus started this whole paleo thing late last year, and it seems to have worked really well. Certainly made our meals a lot more varied and tasty!
 
An important note I would add: Not all meat is created equal
There's a pretty big difference between a steak from a grass-fed cow and one raised on a diet of corn and other refuse feed. The same goes for an animal which has been pumped full of antibiotics to suppress genetic weaknesses. A key to maintaining a successful paleo diet is eating high quality meat, not just lean meat as the OP suggests. A steak from a well-raised, grass-fed cow is much better than a chicken breast from a bird that was fed garbage and shot full of antibiotics its whole life. The same goes for eating fish with a short lifespan such as salmon over something with a long lifespan such as swordfish or tuna. The longer a fish lives the more time it has to raise its level of mercury and other harmful materials that should not be ingested in high quantities.
.

But how do I know what kind of meat im buying? Does it say on the label or are there specialty stores that sell the meats that haven't been pumped full of antibiotics and fed garbage?
 

KimiNewt

Scored 3/100 on an Exam
But how do I know what kind of meat im buying? Does it say on the label or are there specialty stores that sell the meats that haven't been pumped full of antibiotics and fed garbage?
What's wrong with being "shot full of antibiotics"?

EDIT: Incidentally, the book "Why We Get Sick (The New Science of Darwinian Medicine)" has a few chapters focusing on diet, and is a great book all throughout - I highly recommend it.
 

KimiNewt

Scored 3/100 on an Exam
For the quality of the meat, there is no problem, but it is a bad practise that needs to stop in terms of the evolution of bacterial infections.
Sensible, but has no place in suggestion a "good" diet, since that is on what you may call purely "moral" grounds (though I do fully believe in that cause).
 

Munin

Member
The one thing I don't like about these diets is that there's no decent replacement for a simple staple food like rice or pasta that you can use to add some calories to meals.
 

Ikael

Member
Extremely similar to the Dunkan diet. Also, both are damn right: we humans did not started to eat grains and milk products until very late in our evolution process. I tried it and losted weight while mantaining all my blood indicators (cholesterol, sugar, iron, etc) at healthy levels *thumbs up OP*

An important note I would add: Not all meat is created equal
There's a pretty big difference between a steak from a grass-fed cow and one raised on a diet of corn and other refuse feed.

Hear, hear. That being said, the whole notion of "organic food" seems terrfying to me. I mean, all my food is organic by default, what the hell. Living in Spain helps quite a bit with that, though.
 
Because it's based on pseudoscience, like most fad diets.
But I want a caveman to answer it!

Seems to me like it's just about making a simple package that you can sell to a wide market, as with all fad diets. Beans are great, peanuts are great if you're going to eat nuts anyway, brown rice is excellent, green lentils might be the healthiest thing you can send through your system.

Excluding all that is nice when you want to appeal to the modern caveman, but if you stop and think about it, you're doing yourself a disservice by excluding healthy foods that could easily be a benefit to you, in any diet, while building up aversion towards these healthy foods for silly reasons.

It's interesting to see how people get so passionate about diets but seem unable to think outside the box that's provided for them. Yeah some stuff in paleo is great, but its overly simplified and could be improved and/or expanded if you did a bit of research of your own.

But maybe legumes just flat out suck.
 
I sort of follow this, but only because its the easiest way to get a lot of protein in my diet for strength training.

I still eat cheese, Greek yogurt, oatmeal, etc.

Personally I'd suggest keto for you then. I've seen many posts on bodybuilding forums of folks doing keto and maintaining.
 
Really tried of seeing fad diets pop up, none of them work long term, if you want to lose weight eat a healthy balanced diet and add exercise it's that easy, stop trying to look for an easy way out there isn't one
 

SteveMeister

Hang out with Steve.
The paleo/primal restrictions on different foods really come down to one thing: inflammation.

Refined carbs -- sugar, high fructose corn syrup, white flour, white rice, etc cause inflammation. So do proteins humans aren't all that well adapted to, such as gluten (grains) and lectin (raw beans & legumes).

In addition, many types of fats cause inflammation: the unsaturated fats (polyunsaturated, monounsaturated, hydrogenated, trans-fats) are unstable and don't have a long shelf life before they become rancid. In addition, their ratio of omega 6 to omega 3 fatty acids are too high. To avoid inflammation you want fresher fats and to have a daily 6:3 ratio as close to 1:1 as possible. Most Americans eat closer to 6:1 omega 6 to omega 3 fatty acids. This is why fish oil tablets, high in omega 3s, are a recommended supplement. But you can go a long way to improving the ratio yourself by avoiding the bad fats. In general, don't use any vegetable oils at all unless it's either olive oil, coconut oil or avocado oil, and then opt for "extra virgin". This simply means the oil is less-processed. In addition, consume saturated fats from animals, such as butter, ghee, lard, and meat fat & skin. The grass-fed debate is actually about the same issue. Pasture raise cows and chickens eat the food that's natural for them. Cows are supposed to eat grass, chickens are supposed to eat primarily bugs & larvae. We feed them grain because it fattens the cows up and is cheaper & easier to feed mass-produced chickens a grain mix. But these diets do alter the meat & eggs, tipping the omega 6 to 3 balance in the wrong direction. So the fat in a grass-fed beef steak has a better (lower) 6 to 3 ratio than a steak from a cow that ate primarily grain.

Why is inflammation so bad? It is believed that inflammation is the root cause of many illnesses, and a driving force of the aging process. It can also compromise your immune system.

From my standpoint, I try to keep my omega 6 to 3 ratio low primarily by avoiding vegetable oils and supplementing with high omega 3 tablets. I also only eat free range eggs. I sometimes eat grass fed beef, but it doesn't taste as good so I'm not terribly picky about that.

Now as far as weight loss goes, primal/paleo works mostly because of the reduction in carbs. This is also why Atkins worked, although there was no focus on healthy vs unhealthy fats in Atkins, and Atkins is a truly ketogenic diet (less than 50g carbs on average per day) whereas paleo/primal is not (average between 50-100g carbs per day for weight loss, 100-150g per day for maintenance). Paleo/primal is also much easier to maintain than Atkins.

It certainly worked for me. I do let a few grains sneak in now and then, as well as cheat occasionally with a dessert. I am not lactose intolerant so I eat dairy. Cheese, whole milk (skim is basically sugar water), and Greek yogurt, which is a staple for me.

I like paleo/primal. There's a lot that makes sense about it -- you really can't go wrong focusing on whole, healthy foods. I'm not a 100% adherent to it as I said. But it does work.
 

Perkel

Banned
what this diet lack is that caveman used to be super strong to hunt which mean exercises.

This diet mean nothing if you don't hunt for your food with spear in woods
 

Dresden

Member
Hunter gatherers didn't exactly feast on five different types of meat a day, either, but that never stopped the marketing machine.

Eating more fresh food is never a bad thing though.
 

SeanR1221

Member
Personally I'd suggest keto for you then. I've seen many posts on bodybuilding forums of folks doing keto and maintaining.

I don't want to maintain at this point, I want to get stronger. I did try Keto for 2 months when I wanted to lose weight last year and didn't drop a single pound.

It's too bad this thread is just turning into both sides arguing. I was hoping for some high protein recipes to be posted.
 
I'd never do this drastic of a diet but I really do want to cut down on the amount of carbs I eat. Got some good ideas on how to do so from this thread, so thanks, op! This seems a bit too meat focused for me, seeing as I also want to cut down on my meat and animal fats.
 

CrankyJay

Banned
Really tried of seeing fad diets pop up, none of them work long term, if you want to lose weight eat a healthy balanced diet and add exercise it's that easy, stop trying to look for an easy way out there isn't one

They don't work long term because people don't understand the concept of changing your diet permanently. Pick a diet that fits into your lifestyle and stick with it.
 

Dash27

Member
I felt terrible.
Always hungry, really lethargic, moody/snappy.

I gave up after a week because I thought it was unfair on my girlfriend as I was so snappy and tired. I also felt hungry and nauseous a lot.

Should I have stuck at it longer? Would it have passed?

Maybe I should have mixed up what I ate a bit more? Are plain whey isolate shakes with water allowed?

I should update the OP with a section on this as it's fairly common to have the adjustment period you describe. Low carb flu is one term for it:

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/low-carb-flu/#axzz2H2cyhzbE




The one thing I don't like about these diets is that there's no decent replacement for a simple staple food like rice or pasta that you can use to add some calories to meals.

Paleo allows sweet potatoes as one example. Actually cauliflower "rice" isnt half bad. That said if you are active and athletic (which I highly recommend regardless of diet) I personally think some white rice, wild rice and potatoes are just fine in moderation.

An important note I would add: Not all meat is created equal
There's a pretty big difference between a steak from a grass-fed cow and one raised on a diet of corn and other refuse feed. The same goes for an animal which has been pumped full of antibiotics to suppress genetic weaknesses.

Paleo 102! GMO's, grass fed, FODMAPs, free range, organic, local sourced... all of these are the fine details in my opinion. For someone already into it who wants to go to the next level.

I wanted this OP to be as simple as I could make it. That said, I'm looking for good grass fed beef and free range eggs that are local to me so I can see if I notice any difference.
 

Dead Man

Member
But I want a caveman to answer it!

Seems to me like it's just about making a simple package that you can sell to a wide market, as with all fad diets. Beans are great, peanuts are great if you're going to eat nuts anyway, brown rice is excellent, green lentils might be the healthiest thing you can send through your system.

Excluding all that is nice when you want to appeal to the modern caveman, but if you stop and think about it, you're doing yourself a disservice by excluding healthy foods that could easily be a benefit to you, in any diet, while building up aversion towards these healthy foods for silly reasons.

It's interesting to see how people get so passionate about diets but seem unable to think outside the box that's provided for them. Yeah some stuff in paleo is great, but its overly simplified and could be improved and/or expanded if you did a bit of research of your own.

But maybe legumes just flat out suck.

Not forgetting of course that lentils were part of the paleolithic diet 12 thousnd years ago.

Hunter gatherers didn't exactly feast on five different types of meat a day, either, but that never stopped the marketing machine.

Eating more fresh food is never a bad thing though.

Yeah, this too. Eat fresh food, reduce (not remove) over all energy intake from carbs and sugars, maximise portein and vegetables and you will be well on your way.
 
I didn't exactly do this diet, but I did a low carb with less restrictions than this, I lost a good amount of weight but ended up getting problems going to the bathroom, doctor said high protein diets can be too binding.
 
Not forgetting of course that lentils were part of the paleolithic diet 12 thousnd years ago.
Ah, but of course.

I also just now saw the quote about raw kidney beans killing rats left and right. I guess it's a good reason to exclude items from your diet if you have to prepare the food to make it consumable and extremely healthy.
 

entremet

Member
Really tried of seeing fad diets pop up, none of them work long term, if you want to lose weight eat a healthy balanced diet and add exercise it's that easy, stop trying to look for an easy way out there isn't one

What does a balanced diet even mean?

For all you guys who poo poo on diets, you guys are very vague on providing alternatives. It's these kind of generalities that make if hard for trying to lose weight to find good information.

Doctors have been telling patients for years to eat a balanced diet, yet obesity continues to rise.
 
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