If you have any interest in food and health at all (which you obviously do or you wouldn’t have found yourself here at Saving Dinner), then you’ve been hearing the word “Paleo” being tossed around a lot.
You may even associate the term with an extreme way of eating, much like the low-carb Atkins diet. A fad that will disappear like so many trendy diets that have come before it.
But, at the risk of sounding like a cliché, going Paleo really means adopting a new lifestyle for the rest of your life. Once you go Paleo, you’ll physically feel so amazing that it will be very hard to go back to the way you used to eat.
Let me explain.
First of all, the word Paleo is from the word Paleolithic. If you want the science behind this way of eating, you can spend some time on Google, but I’ll share the general concept with you here.
A Paleo lifestyle means eating the way our ancestors would have. The premise behind this diet is that our bodies haven’t adapted to eating modern-day foods (those that weren’t available 10,000 years ago). The theory is that digestive disorders and diseases that are so prevalent today are running rampant because our bodies don’t know what to do with the foods we’re putting in our mouths.
What do Paleoistas eat?
This lifestyle means eating a diet of:
• wild-caught fish
• seeds, nuts, and berries
• locally sourced, free-range, grass-fed meats and poultry
• free-range organic eggs
• local, organic produce
• saturated fats
It also means eating according to what’s in season where you live.
Paleo people love their fats. But vegetable oils, as I’ve mentioned before, weren’t available to our ancestors, so those are out. Paleo folks eat lots of saturated fats because those are the fats our cells need.
Those fats include organic butter from grass-fed cows, ghee, coconut oil, and olive oil. It also means animal fat, which means bacon is a friend and not a foe.
What do Paleoistas avoid?
When you eat a Paleo diet, you don’t eat:
• refined sugar
• processed foods
• grains (including rice, oats, and pasta)
• dairy
• legumes
• vegetable oils
• soy
Now you all know me, and you know I’m not about extreme diets, so don’t worry. I’m not going to tell you that Paleo is the be-all and end-all! I do, however, believe that we should all explore the guiding pillars of this way of life: eating an organic diet free from processed foods and limiting grains.
I, personally, eat a Paleo diet and I’ve never felt better in my life. But it’s all about balance. Going Paleo doesn’t mean sitting down to a platter of steaks and chicken wings for dinner every evening. You have to eat lots of veggies, too. Your vegetable intake will actually naturally increase when you go Paleo because you won’t be filling up with starchy grains!
If you’re interested in going down the Paleo path, I would recommend trying it for about a month and seeing how you feel after that. You may find it to be easier than you thought it would. We now have the 30 Day Paleo Challenge to make it super simple!
Some Paleoistas never go back because they find that the lifestyle is not difficult to adapt to, but others follow the Paleo diet about 85% of the time.
Do you currently eat Paleo? Are you dead against it? Leave a comment and let’s chat about it on our Facebook page!
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