Paleolithic Diet

Coach Palfrey

Coach Palfrey

0
As my last thread regarding calorific values wandered off topic slightly I though I'd start a thread specifically about the Paleo diet.

I'm a keen advocate of it and regularly recommend it to people hoping to lose weight and stabilise energy levels. I follow a strict Paleo diet but eat well and don't feel as though I'm missing out on anything - generally starchy carbs just make me feel sluggish anyway.

What are others experiences of following Paleo?
 
I think we had a whole big debate over this diet before. If my reading is correct, if it wasn't something a caveman ate, then you can't have it. I disagree because it eliminates whole groups of foods, doesn't actually address calorie amounts, and it really isn't a reasonable life long diet plan for most. Understand that it is labled a fad diet by the National Health Service of England and the American Dietetic Association. It has some advantages in that you will likely lose weight since you are (singalong long time forum users) 'eating less than you are burning which is the basic concept of weight loss'. Also this diet is gluten-free which is fine for some people as well.


But I'm sure you will try to convince people that it will work for them, and that is their choice to follow or not. All in all..it's a nitch diet.
 
Jericho said:
I think we had a whole big debate over this diet before. If my reading is correct, if it wasn't something a caveman ate, then you can't have it. I disagree because it eliminates whole groups of foods, doesn't actually address calorie amounts, and it really isn't a reasonable life long diet plan for most. Understand that it is labled a fad diet by the National Health Service of England and the American Dietetic Association. It has some advantages in that you will likely lose weight since you are (singalong long time forum users) 'eating less than you are burning which is the basic concept of weight loss'. Also this diet is gluten-free which is fine for some people as well.


But I'm sure you will try to convince people that it will work for them, and that is their choice to follow or not. All in all..it's a nitch diet.
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The Paleolithic diet doesn't work because you're "eating less than you are burning" - it works because the foods recommended are digested at a slower rate.

I can't speak for the ADA but the NHS is not an authority on nutrition so I don't care what they have to say on the matter.

And I'm not trying to convince people that it will work for them I just think there is a lack of understanding on this forum and I'm trying to address it.
 
Just checked it on Wikipedia, since I had honestly never heard of it.

Looks like just another fad-diet to me - you'll probably lose weight short term, but I doubt it's sustainable.

It excludes important food groups and is way too limiting to be something that people in general will be able (or willing) to stick to. Also, there is no calorie control at all, so it would be very easy to overeat even if you're following the 'diet'.

In addition, most of the claims about it being able to 'improve your health' or 'reduce serious health risks' have not been proven at all.

If it works for you, great. Don't think it will for the majority of people though.
 
San said:
Just checked it on Wikipedia, since I had honestly never heard of it.

Looks like just another fad-diet to me - you'll probably lose weight short term, but I doubt it's sustainable.

It excludes important food groups and is way too limiting to be something that people in general will be able (or willing) to stick to. Also, there is no calorie control at all, so it would be very easy to overeat even if you're following the 'diet'.

In addition, most of the claims about it being able to 'improve your health' or 'reduce serious health risks' have not been proven at all.

If it works for you, great. Don't think it will for the majority of people though.
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What 'important food groups' does it exclude?
 
Refined Sugars
There is a long list of ingredients which are essentially "sugar". Some allow small amounts of honey or pure maple syrup - but this would have been a rare treat.

Grains
Yes, there were wild grains, and a few roasted kernels have been found in ancient fires. But really - how much wild grain could have been collected at a time? Answer: not much. Corn is a grain.

Starchy Tubers
No starchy tubers, including
Potatoes
Sweet potatoes
Yams
Cassava
Manioc
Some say beets
Legumes (Beans, Peas, Peanuts)
These are usually outlawed on the premise that most of them can't be eaten without cooking. Much is made of the lectins in legumes, which some people may be sensitive to (research into lectins is in its infancy and not a lot is known about this with any certainty).

Dairy ProductsEarly people did not eat dairy products before animals were domesticated. It has been pointed out that there has been adaptation to dairy products in some genetic lines, but no author of this type of diet endorses eating dairy including milk, butter, cream, yogurt, ice cream, cheese, etc.

Some Meats
Most processed meats (made with nitrites and additives) are not allowed, including hot dogs, bacon, sausage, and lunch meats, although sometime more healthy forms of these can be found. Cordain does not allow fatty cuts of meat, including poultry skin and dark meat.

Oils
Definitely avoid the following:
Corn oil
Cottonseed oil
Peanut oil
Soybean oil
Rice bran oil
Wheat germ oil
This includes products, such as mayonnaise, which include these oils.
Cordain has a long list of preferred oils in his book based on their ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3 fatty acids. He also is down on tropical plant oils (coconut and palm) which have high levels of saturated fats. Other writers definitely include these tropical fats as fine to eat.


Most authors of this type of diet advocate not adding salt to food or buying heavily salted food.

Vinegar - Lemon or lime juice is preferred over vinegar; no pickled products.

Yeast is not allowed

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Seriously? It's just another version of a low calorie diet. The claim that it works cause the food is digested slowly might be part of the reason..cause you feel full longer...which means you eat less...which means you eat less calories.

But again, if someone wants to try this, go ahead but it's not some miricle cure. It is the same message under a different label. Calories in vs Calories out.

It's really not going to be for most people, or something long term. As San said, if it worked for you, great.
 
It is NOT a low calorie diet.

And the list of foods that you copied and pasted still doesn't answer my question - what "important" food groups does it exclude? If you can tell me why these foods groups are important I'll listen.
 
Ok. If you want to say it isn't low calorie, that is fine. As far as the important ones..depends who you ask on if it is important. They might not be fore you but I consider them important. It could be cause I rather not fear the foods I eat. Instead of saying 'Oh no, can't have that', it should be 'I can, but not too much of it'. Moderation is a bigger key. I personally try to stear people away from fad diets that cuts out complete food groups. Food itself isn't bad, too much of it (as too much as anything) is.

Now, if you would like to throw some medical studies or published test cases to the value of the diet, I'd love to read them.
 
Dairy products, for one thing.

You're telling me that a diet without any kind of dairy is healthy?

Hmmm....would like to see you raise a kid on that 'diet'.
 
San said:
Dairy products, for one thing.

You're telling me that a diet without any kind of dairy is healthy?

Hmmm....would like to see you raise a kid on that 'diet'.
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Breastmilk is quite far removed from cows milk. And dairy is a relatively new addition to our diets so we certainly don't need it as a source of nutrition.
 
Because 9000 BC (roughly when we started domesticating goats which we got milk from) is recent. It has only been 11,000 years.
 
Jericho said:
Ok. If you want to say it isn't low calorie, that is fine. As far as the important ones..depends who you ask on if it is important. They might not be fore you but I consider them important. It could be cause I rather not fear the foods I eat. Instead of saying 'Oh no, can't have that', it should be 'I can, but not too much of it'. Moderation is a bigger key. I personally try to stear people away from fad diets that cuts out complete food groups. Food itself isn't bad, too much of it (as too much as anything) is.

Now, if you would like to throw some medical studies or published test cases to the value of the diet, I'd love to read them.
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I don't like to quote studies because they are often so easy to take out of context - and the majority are now funded by drug companies or other private businesses. But Robb Wolf and Loren Cordain are good sources of infromation on that front.

And there is a wealth of empirical evidence via those two sources as well.
 
So..instead of attempting to give an independant source, you quote the people pushing the diet. No offense, but that is usually what fad diet people say.

But don't quote the study out of context, link the location of the whole studies. Feel free. We have time for learning things.
 
Way I see it its just another low carb variant with a fancy name and more restricted list. No thanks for me, I'm sticking with my meat from the fridge and not from a dead animal, cheese from the fridge, eggs from the egg carton, and milk from the plastic jug. :patriot:
 
Also forgot to mention that the vary basis of this diet is in dispute due to debate about evolution.

Yes this is from Wiki but we can go deeper into this if you want:

Katharine Milton, a professor of physical anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, has also disputed the evolutionary logic upon which the Paleolithic diet is based. She questions the premise that the metabolism of modern humans must be genetically adapted to the dietary conditions of the Paleolithic. Relying on several of her previous publications, Milton states that "there is little evidence to suggest that human nutritional requirements or human digestive physiology were significantly affected by such diets at any point in human evolution."
 
The following articles will make good reading:

Cordain L. Cereal grains: humanity’s double edged sword. World Rev Nutr Diet 1999; 84:19-73.



Cordain L, Brand Miller J, Eaton SB, Mann N, Holt SHA, Speth JD. Plant to animal subsistence ratios and macronutrient energy estimations in world wide hunter-gatherer diets. Am J Clin Nutr 2000, 71:682-92.



Cordain L. The nutritional characteristics of a contemporary diet based upon Paleolithic food groups. J Am Nutraceut Assoc 2002; 5:15-24.



I really want to make it clear that I am not in any way associated with Dr Loren Cordain and I'm not profiting from my Paleo lifestyle (apart from being fit and healthy that is).
 
Ok..now how about something not by someone profiting on the pushing of the diet. That is what I ment by independant please.
 
Jericho said:
Ok..now how about something not by someone profiting on the pushing of the diet. That is what I ment by independant please.
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If you can find a truly independent research article on anything, let alone the Paleo diet, then good luck to you. Why are you so opposed to the Paleo diet? Have you tried it?
 
As I said before, it's a nitch diet which is actually based on disputed information that isn't for everyone. It cuts out whole food groups and honestly? It doesn't actually teach the principles of weight loss that one needs when you are, like almost all of us here, overweight and trying to learn the correct choices.

You have yet to actually defend the diet, instead you push us to give you information as to why we don't agree. When asked for studies about the diet, you give the links to the guy who is so financially involved that I can barely find any site about the diet that doesn't go to one of his books.


Here is the funny thing, there are some parts that make sense..it's the construction of the whole. We don't need to stop drinking milk, eating potatoes or having that yogurt. We need to stop drinking a big glass of chocolate milk, eating a supersized french fries and having a large scoop of frozen yogurt. The biggest part of weight loss is learning portion control. We (mainly Americans) eat food that would shock many around the world in the amounts. It's not that we are drinking 1 small coke, it is that we drink several large cokes a day.

Overdoing anything is bad. This diet also doesn't address other reasons we are overweight like emotional bonds that we created with food to feel better. It doesn't address lak of knowledge. It's a fad diet.
 
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Jericho said:
As I said before, it's a nitch diet which is actually based on disputed information that isn't for everyone. It cuts out whole food groups and honestly? It doesn't actually teach the principles of weight loss that one needs when you are, like almost all of us here, overweight and trying to learn the correct choices.

You have yet to actually defend the diet, instead you push us to give you information as to why we don't agree. When asked for studies about the diet, you give the links to the guy who is so financially involved that I can barely find any site about the diet that doesn't go to one of his books.
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I follow the diet and I'm no longer overweight. My clients follow the diet and they're no longer overweight. I don't get sick and the diet has supported my athletic endeavours perfectly, as has it for my clients.

I don't see the need for scientific studies defending the diet and would rather base my opinion on empirical research.

I am genuinely interested in helping people on the forum and I couldn't care a less if anyone goes out and buys the book or not. I just urge everyone to try it - the overriding problem though is that it goes against conventional wisdom to start removing things from the diet. It, like you say, makes people think it is a fad.

But there is no getting away from the fact that most of the foods we eat now were not available a few thousand years ago. So, surely that is an issue worth addressing?
 
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