Some oils have been a part of the diet for all time- olive oil being the oil
of an edible fruit- the seed being discarded. Ripe olives are said to be so
juicy that the oil runs out of them before the first squeeze. This is the
very expensive free-run juice that is more treasured than the first press
(the extra virgin oil). Olive oil is definitely as paleo as a vegetable oil
can get. Obviously primitive man didn't deep fry his food or consume the
amounts of oil we do. He probably did eat a lot of olives when they were in
season- so go for it. Olive oil has the distinction of usually being
mechanically extracted, and therefore full of its own natural antioxidants
and no preservatives are used. Unfortunately, seed based oils are often
solvent extracted. This destroys the natural antioxidants, so preservatives
have to be added to stop it becoming rancid. The preservative in Australia
is usually BHT butylated hydroxy-toluene.
Animal fats are also oils. The difference between oil and fat simply being
that oils are liquid at room temperature and fats are solid. Animal fats are
paleo.
I won't discuss Canola (rapeseed) oil as I don't know much about it (apart
from it usually being solvent extracted and dosed with preservative).
Perhaps, someone else can fill us in on it.
Now, the absolute cruncher- seed oils. .................................
In the 1950's, Westerners were dying like flies of heart attack and stroke.
(Notwithstanding environmental poisoning like DDT), researchers soon found
populations who weren't affected so badly- in the Mediterranean, etc.. They
found that these good people were eating lots of olive oil, a
monounsaturate. They concluded that eating monounsaturates would stop the
problem. This of course wasn't good enough, they had to be even better. The
scientists declared that if monounsaturates were good, polyunsaturates must
be even better. This led to the commercial farming of sunflower and
safflower seed for food oil for the first time in history. It's been said
that the farmers of these products sponsored some of the seminal research in
the field. Who knows?
The rest is history, the western world started scoffing margarine by the
bucket. It took another 30 years to realise that the processing of the
polyunsaturates led to formation of harmful trans fatty acids, and that
there are important differences between N-6 and N-3 polyunsaturates, and
that overall polyunsaturated margarine is no better/worse than butter, so
why did they bother?(apart from financial greed and scientific vanity).
Now, of course everyone is changing over to olive oil based margarines
(which are usually largely canola oil as well), or dunking their bread in
olive oil. Which could have all been started in the 1960's. The cost of the
delay?? Millions of people throughout the world developed heart disease 5 to
20 years earlier than they should have! I'll talk more about it in my next
post (oils, heart disease and Occam's razor)
(This is all based on reliable sources but I haven't looked up the original
research myself)
Ben Balzer
----- Original Message -----
From: Daniel Holly <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, July 12, 1999 7:43 PM
Subject: Re: [P-F] Oil--is it paleo?
> Oil bearing seeds and nuts were eaten.
> At a certain point it was discovered the oil could be
> (inefficiently ) extracted. That separate oil was used
> and the left over part was also eaten unless they could
> afford to waste food.
>
> Fat from animals is even more easily separated for future
> use.
> Chicken fat...bear fat.....boar fat....the possibilities are
> endless.
> You cook meat by boiling and oil ends up on the surface of
> the water
> where it can be skimmed off and used for many useful things.
> Such as food preservation and illumination. And cooking
> food. Where there is fire you will find man eating foods in
> unnatural proportions... too much fat in diet.
>
> I personally feel that man has self selected over the last
> 10,000 years so that he is more accustomed/resistant to the
> negative factors of a grain based diet.
> Much of this depends on who you are talking about.
> As one example the Japanese seem to do well. Many
> long lived people. Same with Hunza...Villcabamba
> and some others.
>
> Many American Indians obviously do poorly. When they
> move to a grain/carbo diet they get all kinds of problems
> since they
> were on heavily meat diet even 150 years ago. And with
> modern
> medicine peopel are very unsuitable diets can be kept alive.
> (Insulin being best example)
>
> =========================================
> =========================================
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Wally Day <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Monday, July 12, 1999 3:26 AM
> Subject: Re: [P-F] Oil--is it paleo?
>
>
> | Excuse my ignorance, but I'm not sure I understand the
> | original question. What would be the relevency of oil
> | in a Paleo diet? Because Teflon didn't exist yet? Or
> | Oil of Olay?
> |
> | OK, OK, I'm being facetious. But the point remains. I
> | can see no "need" for oil in a primitive culture or
> | diet. If there is one, someone please enlighten me.
> | _________________________________________________________
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