Can vegetarians and Paleoistas co-exist in one cave?

When you make the decision to go Paleo, it could get complicated, especially if you have a vegetarian in your cave to feed.

Speaking of caves–unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ve probably heard of Paleo. Apparently eating the way humans have been eating for a bazillion years is now hot, LOL. (I think it’s interesting that what’s old or even ancient is now new!).

Going Paleo means you’re looking for food you can hunt or gather like our ancient forefathers did. Because of the fact that we are living in the 21st century, we need to shift slightly to reflect our culture, so we center our diets around locally grown fruits and vegetables, sustainable, wild seafood, grass-fed beef, and pastured chicken (chances are good there is no wild game to hunt with your handmade spear). That’s the great stuff you get to eat. What you avoid is dairy, grains, sugar, and anything packaged or processed.

When we eat Paleo (think Paleolithic Age), we eat foods that were around 10,000 years ago, before the advent of agriculture—this is why grains aren’t in the diet and the science behind the omission of grains is long and detailed. But suffice it to say, not eating grains will not make you nutrient deficient. On the contrary!

Now that you know what constitutes “paleo”, don’t make the mistake of thinking, “Oh no, I can’t have pasta, sandwiches, or rice!” The trick is looking at what you CAN have: red wine, butter, and red meat for instance! And BACON. Yes. Bacon my friends!

Going Paleo with a vegetarian

This is going to be easier than you would think. When you go paleo, you eat a boatload of vegetables. In fact, I would go so far as to say that most Paleo eaters probably consume more vegetables than vegetarians. Why? Because we don’t eat grains, so we fill up on tons of veggies! We use lettuce in place of buns, spaghetti squash in place of noodles, and so on and so forth.

I can personally attest to the fact that I have doubled, if not tripled my vegetable intake since going Paleo. And I ate a ton of veggies before!

So that busts that myth that going Paleo means you eat as much beef and bacon as you possibly can every day. Not exactly!

Going Paleo as a vegetarian

Now, if you’re going Paleo and you’re vegetarian yourself, you’re going to have a bit of a hard time. Paleos don’t eat beans or soy which are two pretty major sources of protein for vegetarians. That being said, however, there are many other ways to get protein into you, without turning to animal sources. Granted, it will be more difficult if you’re vegan:

Cottage cheese: 15 grams per 0.5 cup
Yogurt: 8–10 grams per cup (check your label)
Almonds: 9 grams per 0.25 cup
Pumpkin seeds: 8 grams per 0.25 cup
Flax seeds: 8 grams per 0.25 cup
Milk: 8 grams per cup
Eggs: 6 grams per egg

So going Paleo with a vegetarian in the family isn’t that much of a stretch. You go ahead and prepare your meals as you normally would, cooking yourself your animal protein (be it chicken, beef, pork, or fish) and giving your vegetarian a serving with whatever protein s/he eats whether that’s tofu, beans, or whatever. And if you’re a Paleo vegetarian, be sure you’re getting enough protein from non-animal sources.

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0 Responses

  1. Does anyone know where to order organic beef bones to make a pure beef broth? I live in a remote area without access to local butchers. Any online source anyone can recommend for organic only?

    1. Don, I tried to reply to you with a few links where you can find beef bones, but it seems that whenever I post a link to a reply, it says: “Hold on, this is waiting to be approved by Saving Dinner.” I think there were some replies in the past that were never approved because of links. So I’m not sure how to get around this on here. Even if I give you my email address, it might pick that up as as link, as well. Sorry.

      1. This is frustrating. I even tried to send you the names of places to google (w/no links whatsoever), and it still wouldn’t approve it.

          1. Thanks, Phyllis. It didn’t even work when I just listed the names for Don to google. I’ve had this issue before. 2 of my posts from many months ago w/one of these links were never “approved”/posted after all this time, so I’m not really sure anyone from Leanne’s company actually ever monitors this site. I don’t know if it’s on their end, or if it’s a Disqus thing, but I wish something could be done about it. It may be to filter out spammers, but legitimate links are very helpful to many people.

  2. The meat industry is responsible for up to 50% of green gas emissions. Always specify grass fed and organic and perhaps make a point of telling people they don’t need large quantities of it.

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