On Fri, 24 Jul 2009 10:15:32 -0600, Andrea Hughett <[log in to unmask]>  
wrote:

> Granted, a possible working definition of paleo diet is, "My best guess  
> at what paleo man actually ate under optimum conditions, adjusted  
> according to what reliable scientific studies (as defined by what fits  
> my preconceived notions) have shown to be healthful or otherwise and  
> subject to what my individual body appears to work best on." Is this  
> what we are talking about, or am I missing the point?
Actually, we:
1. don't know very much about what paleo man ate except that
there was a lot of meat;
2. the fruits and vegetables, roots, herbs, etc. that
paleo man ate are mostly not available to us, and the
fruits etc. that we eat were certainly not available to them.
3. the animals that paleo man ate, in general, are
not those that you can find in the supermarket, in
the feed lot, or even on farms.

So, although it would be ideal to eat as paleo man
ate under optimum conditions, that is not an option
that we really have.

Ray Audette said in "Neanderthin": "I determined, therefore,
to eat only those foods that would be available to me
if I were naked of all technology save that of a convenient
sharp stick or stone."

Although he stretched that point some in his recipes,
for example calling for olive oil (crushed with a stone?!),
the basics as described are:

1. Eat only foods that do not require modern technology to
prepare (that leaves out all forms of HFCS, preservatives,
and a huge list of things that I don't need to repeat here).

2. Don't eat foods that MUST be cooked to be eaten
(in order to avoid antinutrients).  That's not the same
as saying that all food must be raw, though that's OK if
it's your decision.  (this knocks out legumes and some roots)

3. Don't eat dairy products and grains, since they would
have been unavailable (of course human milk before weaning
is as paleo as you can get).

Some people won't eat new world foods, on the principle
that they would not have been available to our distant European
ancestors (that's assuming that all of us HAD European
ancestors).  But by the same token, modern fruits and
vegetables were not available to anybody's distant ancestors,
because they weren't invented yet.  And if you took it far
enough, you wouldn't eat anything except what grew in Africa,
which is kind of silly.

And we've had spirited discussions on dairy (bambi cheese),
grains (can be collected in fairly large quantities in
natural stands in some areas, and processed with stones
and fire), and root veggies (readily available with that
sharp stick).

So the second step, given the initial choice of
non-technological foods, is to find out what works
for you.  Perhaps that's all-meat, perhaps it's
all-raw, perhaps New World foods work for you,
or they don't, perhaps you use butter, perhaps you eat
baked roots (without the marshmallows on top).  Perhaps
it's only foods that grow in your region.  Vanishingly
few of us can eat only wild foods that grow in our
region, however, though that's closer to paleo than any
other food selection we can make these days.

So, the answer is, there is no cut-and-dried answer.  But
we do have to realize that the range of food selections made by
paleo man are not available to us, and just do the best we can.

	Lynnet

PS in my book zucchini is paleo: can be planted and collected by
hand (don't even need that sharp stick), and eaten raw.