Sheryl Canter <[log in to unmask]> posted this:
>>I love tomatoes and peppers--I eat them all the time, and they are
growing in my garden.  What is wrong with these foods?

My reply:
I have met people with autoimmune disorders, including rheumatiod arthritis,
who have noticed increased pain and/or swelling of joints after eating
nightshade vegetables.  You may want to experiment to see how eating or not
eating these foods affects you.

Sheryl Canter said:
>>>I have not been able to find hard information anywhere on what percent of the
>>paleolithic diet consisted of carbohydrates.  Does anyone know?

My reply:
Here is what professor Loren Cordain, a noted paleo diet says:
"There was no single paleo diet -- diet varied by season and
geographic locale.  However there were universal characteristics of all
paleodiets.  This is the essence that needs to be captured in modern diets
attempting to mimic stone age diets.  All Stone age diets were extremely
high in protein by modern standards (20 to 40% energy vs. 12 to 15%); they
were quite low in CHO (22 to 40% energy vs 50 to 55%) and they were always
of low glycemic loads.  Succulent fruits and veggies rather than starchy
grains comprised the main plant foods."

"Salt was not a part of the diet, hence K/Na ranged between 5 to 10.  The
net renal acid load was almost always slightly alkaline whereas the western
diet and vegetarian diets yield a small net metabolic acidosis.  The
phytochemical, fiber and antioxidant loads were typically high.  MUFA was
the predominant fat, but PUFA levels were considerably higher than western
values and SAT was lower, the n6/n3 was typically between 2 and 3 whereas
its about 10 in the western diet."

Sheryl Canter said:
>>does the paleolithic diet allow any starchy tubers?  You can't eat white
potatoes raw (the eyes are poisonous).  I don't think you can eat beets raw.
I'm not sure about parsnips or turnips or sweet potatoes.  I love roasted
roots.  Didn't paleolithic people roast roots in winter?

My reply:
Some paleo experts include tubers in the list of paleo foods.  Again, you
may want to experiment.  Btw: sweet potatoes, often sold as "yams" (red
garnets, jewels, jersey sweets) are tubers.  Beets ARE NOT tubers; they are
roots, like carrots.  Beets may be eaten raw, grated into a salad or
"juiced" in a Vita-Mix---a machine that leaves all of the fiber and pulp in
and all of the vitamins and antioxidants, many of which are lost with
conventional juice extractors---with carrots or other vegetables.

Sheryl Canter said:
>>I've gained 5 pounds recently, much to my distress, and I believe it's from
eating a lot of nuts, which are high in carbs as well as fat.

My reply:
Nuts do not contain much in the way of digestible carbohydrate; however they
contain an astounding amount of calories in a small portion.  One handful of
nuts (1/2 cup) contains 400 calories.  For that, you could eat 4 cups of
blueberries or grapes or 8 cups of strawberries, or many times more spinach,
lettuce, cucumber, celery, or other fibrous veggies.

It's easy to exceed your calorie needs when you eat nuts as anything more
than a condiment, particularly if you are not doing heavy manual labor all
day or do not have an unusually fast metabolsim.  Ray appears to have a
special (fast) metabolism, in part due to his height (surface area) and also
his diabetic condition.  Many people find that they gain fat or experience
other side effects if they eat calorie dense foods such as nuts, seeds, nut
butters, bacon, sausage, or other fatty foods in quantity. It is best to
keep nuts and seeds to a minimum; you can create a fatty acid imbalance
(excess omega 6s, which can lead to inflammatory disorders, among other
problems) by eating large amounts of nuts.

As for pickles and lacto-fermented foods, they are an agriculturaly
invention; although some agrarian people (nomadic sheep herders etc.) may
have made use of yogurs and other cultred dairy foods.  Modern milk (even
grain fed organic) contains too much omega 6 relative to omega 3 fatty
acids.  Although not paleo, if you want to keep using dairy products, you
would be wise to find a source of 100% or nearly 100% pasture raised milk to
turn into yogurt or kefir.  Check out www.eatwild.com to learn more about
grass fed (pasture raised) animal producs.

As for lacto-fermented veggies, they are also a product of agriculture.  If
you are adding salt, you can easily create an unfavorable potassium to
sodium ratio.  It does not take much salt to take you out of the desirable
range.  If you ferment vegetables with apple cider vinegar, which Sally
Fallon calls for in many recipes, bear in mind that paleo purists do not
consider vinegar "kosher" (meaning paleo!)

Here is what Cordain has to say about vinegars:
"Vinegar is a very bad idea for autoimmune patients as well because of its
influence upon tight junction physiology in intestinal epithelia."

Eating a diet rich in fresh produce will provide anti-inflammatory benefits,
as well as vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and plenty of potassium.
Eating ample animal protein (preferably grass fed, or at least hormone and
antibiotic-free) will provide protein to boost immune function.  Chewing
well will certainly help.  If you have leaky gut syndrome and/or candida
overgrowth, I have read that taking psyllium daily (2 or 3 teaspoons
dissolve in cold water and consumed with an additional 2 cups of water,
first thing in the morning), may help to rid you of candida and heal the
leaky gut (provided you also remove the offending foods, such as beans,
grains, soy sauce, and other things that can irritate the intestines.)

Good luck!

Rachel