Posted by Gillius | Posted in Paleo Diet | Posted on 12-07-2010
The Paleo Diet book was written a number of years ago by Loren Cordain. This book has been the most common one falling into the hands of people who are just discovering the diet, or want to learn more. While I still recommend it to people as a great starting point, there are a number of things that have changed following further research that must be pointed out.
1. Saturated fat: Cordain labeled all saturated fat as bad due to the possibility of raising your” bad” cholesterol (LDL). It is now known though that however much it may raise your “bad” cholesterol, it also raises your “good” cholesterol (HDL). Additionally, the risk for heart disease and other illness isn’t based on the amount of a certain cholesterol, but is based on whether or not you are likely to oxidize it.
Risk factors for oxidizing cholesterol include lack of exercise, smoking / drug use, excessive alcohol, and eating a diet high in sugars and other blood sugar spiking foods. Basically, if you are following the primal lifestyle avoiding high glycemic foods, drugs, and getting exercise, saturated fat is not something that needs to be worried about. The only reason to avoid saturated fat on the paleo diet is if you are struggling to lose weight even with a very low carbohydrate diet. For those of you following a standard american diet with lots of grains, dairy, and sugar in it, saturated fat is not something you should be eating (along with the other 3 things too).
2. Fatty Meat: The issue with fatty meats was primarily for the same reasons listed above for saturated fat, so the same rules apply. If you are following the paleo lifestyle, then you can eat the fatty cuts of meat. This being said, I would ONLY recommend eating fatty cuts of meat if you are sure it is 100% grass-fed. If it is not entirely grass-fed, still go for the leanest cuts available since they will have a poor ration of omega 3 – 6 balance. If you have free ranged chickens, the skin doesn’t need to be tossed.
3. Eggs: Same issues as above, as long as you are following paleo lifestyle and buying cage free, free ranged, pastured raised, omega 3 enriched eggs, you don’t need to limit to 6 per week.
4. Canola oil: Cordain liked Canola oil due to its good ratio of omega 3′s to 6′s. Unfortunately, Canola oil is heavily processed and far from anything that was available in the Paleolithic era. Additionally, with all the heat unstable omega 3′s that are in there, cooking with it can be much more likely to damage it, creating cancer causing free radicals. With so many other options to cook with, there isn’t any place that canola is necessary.
5. Low heat oils: Extra virgin olive oil, nut oils, and flaxseed oil should never be exposed to much of any heat. Cordain initially said to cook with flaxseed oil however has retracted that statement.
For the good oils for different temperature ranges see here
6. Vinegar: is fine, as long as it is not malt vinegar, which is grain derived
7. Salt: salting food to taste is fine in controlled amounts (ie when cooking a steak). The issue with sodium is more from processed foods that you should be avoiding anyways. Try to go for sea salt containing all the electrolytes as well as iodine.
8. Fruit: It was written that you can have as much fruit as you want and still lose weight. Unfortunately for many this is not true. If you are stalled on the paleo diet, it is time to start cutting back on fruit in take. In the end, sugar is sugar.
9. Starchy Carbs: In addition to fruit, carrots, tomatoes, squash, and other starchy vegetables should be avoided if total stalled weight-loss is occurring.
10. Maintenance: If weight loss isn’t a concern, the yams, sweet potato, fruit, carrots, squash, etc are fine (no regular potatoes though)
11. Cheat Meals: Cordain said that any cheat meal is fine up to 3 times per week. We now know that you must try to stay gluten free during these times. The best and worst cheat meals can be found here.
12. Artificial Sweeteners: Cordain had said the occasional diet soda is ok. While it is better than regular soda, aspartame and other sugar free sweeteners are bad news.
Are you following Cordain’s plan verbatim with stalled results? Try these changes and let me know how it goes.