My roommate is currently on the "Caveman Diet," or the "Paleolithic Diet" if you prefer. So back in the 70's this dude theorized that the "ideal" human diet is the one that the pre-agriculture hunter/gatherers ate. He felt that a lot of our health problems came after man's diet changed with the development of agriculture and "animal husbandry." Proponents claim that we are "genetically adapted" to eat as our first ancestors did. There's a whole philosophy behind it that I won't get into, but the basic gist is you should cast aside the indulgences of those reckless Neolithic gluttons that ruined everything, and start hunting and foraging in order to live longer.....unless you plan on living past the age of 35, in which case I do not recommend this diet.
On the Paleo Diet...
you cannot eat: legumes, grains (anything with gluten), dairy, potatoes, refined sugar, anything with preservatives, salt, processed oils, etc., etc. Basically you can't eat anything fun, it's like the G.F. diet in hell.
you can eat: meat, seeds, berries, plants (not to be confused with vegetables which are "farmed," while plants can be "foraged"), meat, some nuts (NOT peanuts, those are legumes silly), oh and meat.
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| Featured on the Paleo Diet website under "Footwear for Hunting and Gathering." For those times when shoes are too much, but feet aren't quite enough. Do it like the cavemen would have (if they'd had access to nylon and Chinese factories). |
To be clear, my roommate is not doing this diet to connect with his inner Troglodyte. The Paleo Diet has been embraced by a lot of athletes and fitnessy people. It is supposed to be a great way to help gain and maintain muscle quickly and healthily when you are training or doing aggressive fitness routines. Roomie is on a get-ripped-quick-kick right now, and while I am not a proponent of fad diets, I get why he's into this. Frankly it could be way worse, and my house is always stocked with fresh fruit and vegetables. Also, I do love steak and I've gotten to eat a lot of steak lately, so that's cool.
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| Tyra knows. |
I am learning that people who can't eat certain things get frustrated with people who won't eat certain things. Since Paleo is the uber gluten-free diet, of course I talked to my favorite Celiac Scientist, Amy, about it. It was kind of hilarious. Amy's response to me explaining the Paleo Diet: "well there were obviously caveman doctors that made really good notes about how healthy cavemen are." AWE SNAP! Celiacs are sassy. (PS- I did not know I was saving my gchats until I remembered this conversation and did a search. I will no longer be saving them and will be deleting all previous gchats after this because I am not a creep).
Anyways, the moral of the story is: people seem to keep finding reasons to not eat bread when there are people in the world who can't eat bread. I say, eat a cracker for a Celiac. Because every time you pass on a wheat product for no reason, a Celiac kicks a kitten (that is a lie).
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| eat the croissant or this kitten gets it. |
