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>Fascinating theory, and it makes good "horse" sense. I
>have a question, however. What about those times when
>the "food of choice" is not available? Throughout the
>year the availability of different foods can change
>dramatically (in the natural world, that is). What if
>the slab of beef (or specific fruit or veggie) is what
>the body desires, but is not available. Does the body
>then signal a "second best" choice, or do you just
>skip the meal?
At the beginning of instinctive nutrition practice , and even more so when
affected by disease, the need to find the right food at a specific moment is
great and almost vital (for recovery in case of acute condition).
Once,  thru this practice , our metabolic state are more balanced because
not so much in urgent need for specific nutrients, the importance of having
the right food at the right moment is way less.
At the beginning myself i was crazy about filberts, eating huge quantities
to catch up with past deprivations, other nuts could not give me the intense
pleasure of eating them.
After years now of practice ,if i don't get filbert today ,it is not a big
deal ,something similar in nutrient content could replace it., and my
specific need for filbert can wait a long time to the point when it will
become very necessary to have them.
For 8 years that i am living in Canada  , i don't have access anymore ,to
unprocessed olives(ripe from the tree), the first years i didn't think about
them, i had avocados or coconuts to replace them ( those three foods have
the rare caractheristic among plant foods that are rich in fat without being
rich in protein like other nuts or seeds)
But those last year my craving for olives is growing big and hopefully i am
going to be able to get them from a friend.
In the mean time ,i made an exception to the rule of no processed foods , by
eating olive oil , it helped a bit but that's not it, i really feel the need
for the real stuff.
So yes if you can't get the best you get the second choice , in fact it is
how we eat we present ourselves in front of a wide choice of foods , smell
them one by one ( blind eyes is usefull for novices to bypass the
conditionned interpretative part of the brain, and allow the primitive brain
to take other) and choose the most appealing food  , the one that make
salivate, we eat it til the taste change then go to an other choice .
The interesting thing is , if at the first round 2 foods were specially
atractive s, after one have been eaten , it is unlikely that at the second
round the 2nd will be chosen, it could be a 3rd one that got unnoticed at
1st.
This instinctive recognition of food is amazingly accurate and precise

for the in season aspect of availability of foods , i became very much in
tune with the seasons and could not get attracted by grapes in the spring,
but in the fall i could spend days eating only grapes (with seeds).
Part of it ,is because of my lifestyle as an harvester of my own food, i
would enjoy way more the fruit that i am harvesting that buying a similar
quality ( hard to beat the quality of my food anyway).
The most convincing reality of this phenomenon of instinctive knowing of
what the body want comes from the obsevation of my 2 ,5years old son,
pattern of eating.
He have free access to all the undenatured food that we can gather, and i
found still surprising how his choices are so precises, if i give him beef
when he want lamb i can't cheat with his sense of taste, he will spit out
the morsel. he have day where marrow or fat are eaten ,other days it is the
lean meat and ask me to trim the fat or spit out the fatty part....

to answer wally post in the same topic

    a.. The assumed direct activity of the archipallium in (3):

<There's a major difference between Humans and horses, <or between Humans
and any other species for that matter:
<Humans are the only species in which the archipallium is <completely
"overwhelmed" by the much bigger neopallium <( the center of our
non-instinctive behavior, of our <individuality, and, therefore, of our
acquired tastes for <some foods or for others).
<In a word, in Humans, instinct doesn't have the right to say <a thing when
individuality has spoken, and this last one <surely speaks a lot when our
brain addresses issues <related to cultural and individual matters (such is
food).
<Science seems to say "You're human, so for topics <related to culture you
can't know what your instinct is, <since you've been educated ".
that is the old belief in the dichotony between Nature and culture, despite
that it is experienced in our split mind as antagonists drives, they can't
be separated.
For ex there is an instinctive drive to sugar. In a naturel environment this
need will be met thru the consomption of fruits and vegetables or even meat
( because in my experience of instinctive eating every kind of food is
experienced as sweet when the body is in need of them).
Imagine , that during the learning stage of fine tuning the still incomplete
, inborn instinctive widsom , the genetically expected food is not
available, the instinctive need for sugar will get partially met by the
what's there , the processed sugars and starch.
So later on , the part of the brain that direct us toward sugar or bread
will be  still responding to the primitive brain demand for naturel sugar,
The instinctive brain is not overwhelmed by the cultured brain, it is still
the diving force of our behavior that get lost in the wrong answer .( the
artificial sugar being not completly satisfying to the cells point of view
they are going to ask for  more, addiction is born.
Once i got the fruit in my diet the craving for french bread and other grain
food just disappeared, same with meat replacing the old french cheese...

  <  a.. The relation between 1, 2, 3 on one side and 4 on <the other:

<, it's only concerned with the nutrients, not with the types of <food
eaten:
<For instance, your hypothalamus doesn't know wether you <ate a low-carb
cheese or a high fat cut of meat (nutrients <resulting from digestion don't
differ much in this case: <amino-acids in well balanced proportions and
saturated <fats).
And minerals and vitamins, and oligo elements and... (what 's left to
discover)
The hypothalamus might be able to respond to macronutrients levels only , in
that case something else have to "measure" the subtil differences in similar
foods.
When i need a pear, an apple might satisfied my present need for sugar but
will leave me with an unfulfilled feeling that, something is missing,. If i
get the pear, the satisfaction of all my cells is so great that the
experience is blissfull.
It is hard to describe the experience to somebody who didn't get the chance
to find the right food at the right moment.

<This makes it hard to understand how eating raw and <"paleoapproved" foods
would regulate food intake <differently (the same resulting nutrients in the
same <proportions being given).

<Any scientific explanation would be greatly appreciated <concerning this
whole post, as well as personal <experience comments dealing with the last
point.
i am afraid that there is not that much research done in that direction ,
because of the prevalent belief that culture override nature and that we
human have lost our instinct.
On top of that,  finding scientists ready to question the composition of
their usual lunch, in such a radical manner might be difficult to say the
least. Discovering that the body can know the difference between a molecule
of sugar coming from bread and the one coming from fruit can be unsettling.
"bien que" i heard a study linking schizophrenia with the misshaped molecule
of glucose ( denatured by heat where all the atomes are there but in a
slightly different geometric arrangement). The brain cells being unable to
fully utilised this glucose.
Sorry for being so long , i could go on and on on the subject
thank you
jean-claude
The  all knowing instinct is there , it is just shut down and left unused
if not presented to  its naturel condition of expression.