But was it all necessary?
Today we have a new diet that's out for everyone's delight. It's called "The Paleo Diet". Yes, apparently you can lose all those rolls and unwanted love levers (because by now they've widened beyond simple handles), and be the fit, healthy new you. Sort of.
I'd never heard of the Paleo Diet until a few weeks ago, and by now, it's all over the place. Quite a number of people I know are now avid subscribers of this "breakthrough" diet that will have the floorboards to your happy home non-creaking in no time. (That was a fat joke...ha..haha.....*sigh*)
The bottom line for this new diet, per the dieticians who suggest it, is: "You gotta eat natural, unprocessed foods!" Because remember, when it comes to losing weight and getting healthier, it's 20% exercise and 80% diet. How hard and how long you exercise isn't as essential as what you munch on in-between workouts.
So what does one eat on the Paleo Diet?
Well, before we can go into "what" one would eat under this diet, it would be a good idea to know "how" one would eat the foods available. First off, if we base our Paleo Diet on the eating and food preservation habits of humans about 40,000 years ago (we'll stick with Pleistocene, not Hominins) then we might as well steer clear of any and all groceries stores. You can't go to the farmer's market either. Why? 40,000 years ago there were no markets, unless you consider a field, forest, or jungle a market. Its preagricultural. Unless it grows wild, you aren't eating it.
"But Aristotle's yo-yo, what difference does it make whether or not you buy food at the store?"
It makes a lot of difference.
Anthropologists and paleontologists will likely nod in agreement when I say, "If you want meat, you better grab your spear and go find it." What this means is that unlike today, 40,000 years ago you had to walk for a meal. In fact, you had to walk a lot. And once you found your meaty dinner, you had to stab it, possibly a lot (and try not to get injured or eaten yourself).
Then you have to gut it, skin it, scrounge for wood, start a fire--which if you've tried, takes a considerable amount of time for the inexperienced (remember, no matches or lighters)--cook the meat, and then, finally, you can eat. So as far as your kitchen is concerned, you can't use it. It's not "Paleo." The refrigerator is out too, but you can use a deep, cool hole in the ground if you wish, or maybe some pottery, if your tribe knew how to make it; though this depends on the Paleolithic time period you subscribe to.
In regards to cooking the meat you catch, you have to take into consideration 'how' you cook it. Obviously if we're staying true to the Paleo Diet we cannot use gas cookers, electric coil stoves, convection ovens, or anything borne of the labors of a physicist. Instead, we use a good ole cooking fire!
One thing you have to keep in mind is what kind of wood you will use to cook the meat. The main elements in wood include oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, potassium, and carbon. You won't get that from an electric or gas stove, or a convection oven.
And each varying specie of wood will offer a different mineral content and flavor to the meat you're eating. So it's not just one particular thing, it's a culmination of factors: walking to find the food, catching it, bringing it back, preparing it, starting the fire, the wood used, the time cooked (was it more raw, or thoroughly cooked?), and lastly, the kind of meat eaten. The paleo meat menu might include: wooly mammoths, wooly rhinoceros, cave lions, saber tooth cat, or glyptodons. But these are large and rather unfriendly beasts, so why not choose something a little easier for your knapped spearhead.
Why not deer?
They're always abundant, though a right ole pain in the arse to catch, especially when you don't have that long-range, scoped hunting rifle. Looks like you're walking again. Burn those calories Paleo Man!
Another aspect to look at is what types of plants the deer ate, and how many species of plant that that deer might have eaten are now extinct. What was the protein count of a wooly mammoth? Did it have Omega-3 fatty acids, like so many diet fanatics crave? Did it taste like burger or chicken? Hmmm.
If we look at cattle today we can see variations in fat and protein content. The Scottish Highland kyloes (Scottish word for 'herds') offer a leaner meat than most other cattle breeds due to its shaggy coat. What does the coat do? It dramatically reduces the needed amount of subcutaneous fat to keep warm. Less fat means leaner meat. Also, the Scottish Highland cattle thrive on lesser amounts of vegetation due to its talent at scavenging, making it a boon to livestock owners who may not have the best grazing land.
Was this the same for wooly mammoths? Who knows, we ran out of them millennia ago.
And what was the probability that a Paleolithic human would take on a wooly mammoth, even if he/she was accompanied by ten other humans? Remember, there are no hospitals, no EMS, no airlift. If you get trampled, gutted, or clawed, well, you're not going to have to worry about it for long. With the inherent risk of injury, and the energy required to hunt large game, other sources of food would have been sought after. Things like berries and nuts would be more accessible, easy to store, quicker to replenish in numbers, and less likely to eat you. What's more, you could dig up a berry-producing plant, if you had the know-how, and then replant it near your cave. Now you don't have to walk as far. Yay!
Try that with a saber tooth cat. It might not work out as well as you intended. When looking at Paleolithic humans in Africa, there's little to no evidence to support that they hunted elephants or rhinoceros. This is likely due to the fact that elephants and rhinos are lethal when confronted, especially when the only weapon you have is a stone-headed spear. Even Gerard Butler, at his Spartan peak, would hand you back the spear, shake his Scottish head, and shout, "This-is-STUPID!"
For those of you who are on the Paleo Diet, and eat meat, you have to think about what kind of meat you should eat. Because your Paleolithic diet should be based on a certain paleo human's environment. Is this a person in Asia Minor, North Africa, Europe, or South America? This matters because depending on where you choose, vastly affects what you choose to eat, and how you will prepare and store your food.
If you're a "Paleolithic Man/Woman!" who lives along the Euphrates, the types of plants and animals available to you would be different than, say, a Paleolithic human living in Equatorial Africa. Geography is key to figuring your Paleo Diet menu. So get it right!
Now, a horde of people will cross their arms and accuse me of being extreme, but there's a good reason for it. Some prehistoric humans might have had daily moments of "not eating". Why? Because if you didn't hunt and catch it, you didn't eat. Granted there were fruits and nuts to pick, you still had to go searching for it, and depending on how many humans are in your group/tribe, there may not be enough to satisfy everyone. The most important factor to the success rate of how much you ate, and the quality of food, depended solely on your abilities. How fast can you run, and for how long? How strong are you? How good is your vision? How keen is your sense of smell and hearing? Can you track an animal over long distance without losing them? How sharp is your aim when throwing a harpoon or spear? Do you know which berries and plants are safe to eat? You don't want to poison or sicken yourself, there's no Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Success relied heavily on your abilities, with death possibly being the result of your utter failure.
However, before we get anymore carried away with the history of the "Paleolithic Human," let's look at the actual Paleo Diet. So what can't you eat?
- Grains
- Legumes
- Dairy Products
- Potatoes
- Refined Salt
- Refined Sugar
- Processed Oils (olive oil, canola oil, sesame oil, coconut oil, rice bran oil, etc.)
Furthermore, sweet potatoes can benefit diabetics as it helps stabilize blood sugar levels and lowers insulin resistance.
As for processed oils, I've already mentioned the benefits of olive oil in my talk about the Spartan Diet. So I won't reiterate the health benefits.
What can you eat on the Paleo Diet?
- Fish (Which you don't have to catch)
- Grass-fed, pasture-raised meats (Which you don't have to hunt)
- Vegetables (Which you don't have to search for)
- Fruit (Which you don't have to search for)
- Fungi (Which you don't have to search for)
- Roots (Which you don't have to search for)
- Nuts (Which you don't have to search for)
Another factor to consider is that while we do know Stone Age people ate meat, we don't know exactly how much they ate. Was their diet mostly meat, or mostly plant-based? Was that determined by their habitat or migration patterns, or both?
So what did Paleolithic humans eat?
- Meat (examples: seal, elands)
- Fish
- Shellfish
- Leafy Vegetables
- Fruit
- Nuts
- Insects
- Wine (wine making was at its most primitive, but still present, depending on the era)
- Legumes (archaeobotanical discoveries made in Kebara Cave reveal as such)
- Wild cereal grain (dates back 23,000 years during the Upper Paleolithic Age)
- Dairy (example: reindeer milk)
This is a small list just to give you a general idea. What's more, depending on what timeline in the Paleolithic Age you choose, you might have a tribe that practices rudimentary horticulture, animal husbandry, and pastoralism. Around 14,000 BP, certain European Upper Paleolithic cultures domesticated reindeer for use of meat or milk, or perhaps both.
Australian Aborigines have been consuming the same plants and animals, known as bushfoods, for 60,000 years. What were/are some things on the bushfood menu?
- Quandong
- Kutjera
- Muntries
- Riberry
- Beefsteak Fungus
- Laccocephalum Mylittae - Commonly known as 'Native Bread', which is a fungi.
- Emu
- Crocodile
- Goanna
- Witchetty Grubs
As you can see, the foods found in the Bushman diet are different than those found in the European Paleolithic diet. This is why you need to know where your Paleo Diet is pulling its menu options from. And depending on when your Paleo Diet takes place affects the kind of tools you would use, as well as any chances of primitive horticulture, or animal domestication.
One other factor to acknowledge about the Paleolithic diet, not the "Paleo Diet", is that it had lots of options. Paleolithic humans moved from one place to another in search of food--they were consumers, not producers (much like most people today)--so the introduction and consumption of various fruits, nuts, meats, fungi, and other plants allowed for a greater variety of nutrient intake, thus limiting famine and malnutrition.
Perhaps this last fact is one we should focus on the most. Why? Because we could go on and on about this long stretch of human history--the Paleolithic Age stretched from 2.6 million to 10,000 years ago--but it's not necessary. The lifestyle of humans in the Paleolithic Age is all we need look at, and what was the lifestyle? Lots and lots of exercise, and healthy food choices. That's it.
The rigorous exercise the "paleos" performed were daily, outside in the elements, not three times a week in a gym or living room. In short: Paleolithic humans worked off the foods they ate, and what foods they did eat were natural. Not natural foods in the way food companies advertise, which incidentally, the FDA has no particular definition of what natural means, therefore food companies can label it however they wish.
Why do we go to the gym? To simulate the exercise we'd normally be doing without the presence of modern technology. Things like bicycles, cars, trains, and airplanes to name a few. We walked wherever we needed to be, whether the distance was a few yards or a few miles.
If you want to be a true Paleo Dieter then don't pick from a list of a few things suggested by a Paleo Dietician. Go to the grocery store and pick various items from the produce department. Remember, Paleolithic people ate a huge variety of things.
Get some legumes, lentils, apples, carrots, squash, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, mushrooms, etc. If you want bread, get some, but make sure it's not filled with preservatives and additives. In fact, you may even want to start making your own bread from scratch. That way you always know what's in your food.
Eat right, exercise. That's Paleolithic. Nothing more.
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