The paleo diet is, in essence, the diet that hominids, going all the way back to Australopithecus Afarensis, have evolved to eat. That's a period stretching back to around 4 million years ago. These beings are our great, great, great, great, great... grandparents and the foods they ate allowed us to evolve as a species and, especially, increase the size of our brains. This led to higher level thinking and planning and, well, the rest is history. Our ancestors were not farmers but hunter-gatherers, which meant their food could normally run/swim/fly away from them. They were able to walk huge distances every day in search of food. They sprinted, jumped, carried heavy objects (like wildebeest, which weighed up to 600lbs), climbed and swam. This wasn't just the men either, but the women in numerous tribes also hunted and had to be as physically fit as the men.Wow, I hear you say, they must've had a great supplement range or heaps of carbs like today's elite athletes to do all that every day!
I hate to disappoint you but, no. Our ancestors ate a huge variety of foods depending on their location and what was available but it can be basically summarized in a few words.
They ate: Lean meat, seafood, nuts, berries, fats, vegetables, fruits... and that's about it.
Lean meat: This includes anything with a face that could run or fly away from you. Why lean meats? The meat we get today is vastly different to the meat that was hunted 100,000 years ago. That meat was free to wander around, ate nothing but what it was meant to eat and wasn't pumped full of chemicals to make it grow faster. The closest thing to that sort of meat is Kangaroo or other game meats.
Seafood: We're beginning to see the importance of seafood in our diet again. The fatty acids (FA's) found in seafood are essential FA's, which means that our body can't produce them. Without them, your body doesn't work properly, you feel crap, you then eat crap and end up as a contestant on the fattest loser. They make you feel good, both physically and mentally, as they are essential for brain growth and development as well as a whole range of physiological processes.
Nuts: Tree nuts. This doesn't include peanuts as they are a legume grown on a vine and hence have no place in the paleo diet or for proper health. tree nuts are ones that could be gathered, shelled and eaten without the need to cooking or fermenting, like legumes.
Berries: In short, berries are awesome! They are powerhouses of nutritional value and contain less fructose (a type of sugar) than normal fruit. They are also seasonal and so weren't eaten all that often.
Fats: The taboo topic. Our ancestors ate different sorts of fats. They ate nuts, oily fish and seafood and animal fat, like organ and marrow fats. Animal fat in particular is a hugely rich source of nutrients like vitamins A, D, E, and K (fat soluble so they're not found elsewhere). This was an important part of our ancestors diet as it gave them the energy they needed to chase down or gather the next day's meal. Saturated fat, that has been successfully daemonised by our 'public health' advocates is not bad for you, eat away.
Vegetables: Remember the green leafy things that grow in the ground? Lettuce, spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus just to name a few. There is evidence that our ancestors ate some roots and tubers like carrots and sweet potatoes (not normal potatoes) when they were able but this wasn't an everyday thing.
Fruits: Fruits are a seasonal plant and so weren't eaten all the time. When they were it was in small quantities as the fruit we get now is vastly different to the fruit from 100,000 years ago. Again this is to be used sparingly.
And that about covers it. They ate real foods, unprocessed and as fresh as you can get. These are the foods that are good for you and are the reason we are here today.
If you'd like any more information, don't forget about our nutritional counselling. If you really want to geek out on this stuff we can certainly do that too!
