I am a new member of the list and have just finished reading the archives
 (both fascinating and at times confusing). I would like to comment on
some of the points raised:

Honey-
Since here in Australia native bees produce about 1.5 kg of honey compared
to around 50 kg from an introduced native bee (1) perhaps the usage wasn’t
as great as we might think. (Although Jenny Brand Miller would be much more
knowledgeable on this).  I am aware that honey was something of a ‘staple’
of Aboriginal people in the Kimberleys (2), yet Meehan (3) gives figures
for the Anbarra diet of Arnhem Land of  6 kg of honey consumed out of a
total diet of 2280 kg of food consumed for April, 1973: and 2 kg out of 2101 for May, with none consumed in January.  Of course store bought sugar and other factors may have affected traditional consumption patterns. Meehan also cites Bose (4) with a figure of 15 kg of honey out of 1144 kg total food consumed in one month for the Onge people of Little Andaman Island.

Perhaps an overlooked form of sweetness is the nectar of flowers, widely used by Australian Aboriginal people. In my experience large amounts of nectar may be obtained from Grevillia  spp, banksia spp and Xanthorrhoea spp and others. The flower is generally tapped on to the palm of the hand and the nectar licked off.  This use of flowers leads to my next subject

Alcohol
-complicated technology is not needed to produce alcohol.  Roth (5) mentions an alcoholic brew,  prepared by soaking blossoms (of Banksia from memory) in bark containers.  Isaacs (4)
mentions a drink called mangaitju which was made by soaking the flower heads of grass trees (Xanthorrhoea spp.) in water and allowing it to ferment for several days.  Basedow (6) also mentions a cider like drink from Pandanus spiralis.  The cider gum of Tasmania (Eucalyptus gunni) is known to have supplied a potent alcoholic drink for  Tasmanian Aborigines (7).

Nutritional Stress and Famine
Loren Cordain and others mentioned a lack of evidence for famine.
I am not sure how common famine was, but nutritional stress does seem to
have been fairly common as evidenced by harris lines in bone, dental
hypoplasia and Cribra orbitalis (8) indicating inadequate food supplies
at certain times of the year, anaemia and other nutritional stresses.
Perhaps this would have some bearing on the thrifty genotype debate
in that those able to withstand the greater nutritional deficiencies
survived compared to those who died from nutritional stresses.
Simplistic I know but others more knowledgeable than myself might comment.

Cooking
The simplest cooking method I have used involves simply heating rocks
in a fire, digging a hole, lining it with paper bark.  In 2 hours
(or sooner depending on heat of fire) the rocks are placed in the
whole with tubers and meat. The tubers are sliced in 2 cm thicknesses
to cook them through and the meat (animals such as chickens, ducks,
or rabbits are gutted) has hot rock/s put in the abdominal cavity
as well as around it.  The pit is covered with bark and sealed with
dirt. The food is ready in 2 hours allowing other work to be done
in the meantime without having to watch the food. I don’t know how
much archaeological trace this would leave, since no ashes or coals
are in the pit, and the rocks can be reused till they break up.  I have
also used this method in the initial stages of detoxifying Moreton Bay
Chestnut (Castanospermum australe) a rainforest Aboriginal food.

Poisonous plants
Cycads (Cycas spp.) were a ‘staple’ but very poisonous unless processed.
Beck (9) mentions that naturally aged seeds of cycad were sometimes eaten
after careful selection (without processing) since ageing diminished the
poison content.  If this is the case then our ancestors may have been eating
what appear to us to be poisonous plants but in reality are not if the seeds
are aged.  The selection of less toxic seeds involves smelling them. Since
no processing would be involved nothing would turn up in the archaeological
record.

Insects
As to insects in the diet...many people around the world consume insects
but not so much in the west. In a classic study by Bernton and Brown (1967)
extracts of seven common food infesting insects were utilised in skin
sensitivity tests of subjects with and without known allergies.  The
insects were the rice weevil, Indian meal moth, lesser grain borer,
confused flour beetle, red flour beetle larvae and adults, sawtoothed
grain beetle and the fruit fly (I can supply scientific names for those
interested).  The results were as follows:

Of the 230 allergic patients, 68 (29.6%) reacted positively to one or more
 of the dialized insect extracts.  Surprisingly of the 194 non-allergic
subjects 50 (25.8) showed sensitivity to at least one extract.  A total
of 333 positive reactions were observed.  The degree of overall sensitivity
was practically the same for both groups, with the Indian meal moth extract
eliciting the most positive reaction...these allergies (of the ‘non-allergic’
group) are (likely) the result of ingesting small quantities of insect
material in food over a lifetime.”

So does this mean that insect eating is in the same boat as lactose
intolerance (although to a lesser/greater degree) in that we have not
been eating them long enough to have adapted to the proteins etc
contained in them?.  Also are other people around the world with a
longer history of insect consumption better able to handle them.?

Thanks for a great list.
Sean McBride
Australia

References
1) Heard,  Tim (1996).  Stingless Bees.  Nature Australia, Spring 1996:51-55.
2) Isaacs, J (1987)  Bush Food.  Weldons. Sydney
3)Meehan, Betty (1982). Shell Bed to Shell Midden. Australian Institute of
Aboriginal Studies. Canberra.
4)Bose, S.(1964)  Economy of the Onge of Little Andaman.  Man in India 44:289-310
5)Roth  W.E. (1903)  Notes of savage life in the early days of West Australian
   settlement..Proceedings of the Royal Society of Queensland 17: 45-69
6)Basedow, H.(1918)  Narrative of an expedition of exploration in North West
Australia.
   Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society. XV111
7)Low,  T.(1988)  Wild Food Plants of Australia. Angus and Robertson. Sydney.
8)Webb, S.(1995)  Palaeopathology of Aboriginal Australians.
Health and disease across a hunter gatherer continent. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge.
9)Beck, W. (1985) Technology, Toxicity and Subsistence.  Unpublished PhD thesis,
   Division of Prehistory, LaTrobe University, Victoria
10) Bernton  H.S. and H. Brown (1967).  Insects as potential sources of ingestant
allergens.  Annals of Allergy 25:381-387.