Steve Meyers writes (8 Nov):

<<Presumably there is considerable data on this issue with respect
to 20th C. hunter-gatherers. I thought that it has been not uncommon
for a main meal to consist of both meat/fish from the hunt and plant
foods that had been gathered that day or before.
Could anyone who is up on the literature comment?>>

I'm not "up on the literature," but Marvin Harris, in his _Our Kind_, pp.
306-7, writes:

"The first priority of a hungry person's body is to convert whatever food
it consumes into energy.  Supplied with nothing but lean meat, the body
uses the protein in it for energy rather than for body-building and
body-rugulating functions.  One way to 'spare' the protein in meat is to
eat it along with calorie-rich starchy foods....  Among the Yanomami the
protein-sparing combination is meat and plantains.  Kenneth Good has told
me that the Yanomami absolutely refuse to eat meat if it is not accompanied
by plantains, although they will eat plantains without meat.  The best
protein-saving combination of all, however, is fatty meat, since fat
contains twice as many calories per gram as starch....
  ... the conversion of calories into body fat during good times is
essential for survival during bad times.  In order to build up fat
reserves, the body has to expend calories.  If the food to be converted to
fat is a strach, almost a quarter of of its caloric value is wasted as a
cost of the conversion and storage process.  But if the source of the
stored fat is fat itself, only 3 percent of the ingested calories are
lost...."

So there you have it: the Yanomami anyway eat their meat with starch, even
if generally speaking meat with fat would be more efficient..  I would
imagine this would be true of cultures in the Pacific Islands where yams
and seafoods are staples -- but I'm not that up on the literature.

Hope this helps.

John Blank
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