On Thu, 1 Mar 2012 16:19:49 -0800, Ray Audette <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Potatoes are not healthy to even the Incas. ...."

Domesticated white potatoes are one thing, but what about the tubers of the Hadza hunter-gatherers of Africa?


(English name) - Scientific name

Matukwayako - Coccinea surantiaca or aurantiaca

Penzepenze - Vigna sp. (Papilionoidea Leguminosae)

//Ekwa hasa - Vigna frutescens

Do’aiko/Shakeako - Vigna macrorhyncha Tuber

Shumuwako - Vatoraea pseudolabla


(Sex Differences in Food Preferences of Hadza Hunter-Gatherers
http://www.epjournal.net/filestore/EP07601616.pdf)


And what about Australopithecus?

"Australopithecus occupied a very similar environment to Paranthropus but had a varied diet all year round - including fruits, [b]tubers[/b], probably some insects, termites and animal prey,' says Dr Gabriele Macho, honorary professor in palaeoanthropology at the University of Bradford." (What did early humans eat? 10 August 2009, http://planetearth.nerc.ac.uk/news/story.aspx?id=502)


Even chimps eat raw tubers: 

"Chimpanzees prefer to dig for tubers and roots even when aboveground snacks are plentiful. ... Anthropologists had thought the roots and tubers only served as fallback foods for chimps during the dry seasons when sustenance was scarce." (Did our ancestors prefer meat, or potatoes? Findings show that our relatives liked to dig up underground foods, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21775270/ns/technology_and_science-science).


Perhaps even more interesting, the tubers consumed by African hunter gatherers and wild animals tend to be, more often than not, legume tubers, violating another common assumption in Paleo diet circles about the evils of all legumes.


Since wild African tubers can reportedly be eaten naked, with nothing more than a sharp stick, they appear to be Paleo per NeanderThin rules, right?