I have SO many friends who are on the Paleo Diet now. It seems a day doesn’t go by that I don’t see some new picture of their steak dinner or bacon wrapped something posted on Facebook.
As a Vegan, I want to comment so badly…..but I don’t.
They wouldn’t listen to me anyway – I’m just ‘that weird vegan guy‘.
Yes, they may be feeling better. They have TONS of energy, and the pounds will be melting away effortlessly. But…. this is expected once we cut out all of the junk food!
Switching to a Vegan diet will make you feel the same way!
But what they DON’T realize is what all that saturated fat and cholesterol is doing to their arteries. Sadly it’s only a matter of time before the effects of a high protein – all meat diet kick in.
There are so many studies that have shown beyond a shadow of a doubt – that the more meat you eat, the higher your risk for kidney stones, gout, diabetes, and especially our number one killer – heart disease.
They think, according to their paleo propaganda, that our neanderthal ancestors were actually healthy eating this way. The meat was 100% all natural they say. There were no hormones, no antibiotics, etc etc etc. And we hadn’t invented agriculture yet so there wasn’t any neatly tended crops of wheat, barley, or rye. We were meant to be low-carbers,
This is their thinking.
But for one, we don’t actually know what our neanderthal cousins ate. All we can do is make an educated guess. And two – we don’t have to go back nearly as far in our history to see the exact same diet, and it’s effects.
Let’s go back just 500 years….to the middle ages….and take a look.
The Wealthy
Look at the art and written history of the past, and what you see is obese people with gout in their feet. If you’re going to eat rich foods, you’re going to look like those people who ate rich foods, like the Kings and Queens of old. – Dr. John McDougall
In the documentary Processed People, Dr. John McDougall says that the more “rich food” you eat, the fatter and unhealthier you will get. You will end up looking like the Kings and Queens of old.
Unlike our Paleo Ancestors, we actually have literature and paintings that show exactly what our Kings and Queens of old looked like.
Let’s take King Henry VIII as an example.
King Henry VIII died at the age of 55, he had gout, possibly Type II Diabetes, and a 54″ waistline. It is said they had to use mechanical inventions just to move him around.
In other words, he was obese.
Why was King Henry, and so many other wealthy figures of the past so heavy? They ate meat – and lots of it!
They basically ate a Paleo Diet!
Not only did they have the domesticated animals from the local farms to eat, they had all the wild game from the surrounding forests and fish from the streams. Eating meat (and being overweight) was considered a status of wealth.
And remember, just like our Paleo Ancestors – this meat was all natural, free range, cage-free, blah blah blah organic meat. No antibiotics, no preservatives, and no factory farms.
Bread was another big staple, even used as bowls for their meat-rich soups and stews.
Most bread made back then was dense and heavy, made from buckwheat, barley, oats, or rye. What we would call “whole grain” today. But the rich were the only ones who could afford wheat. The wealthy used it to make their breads lighter and fluffier.
And what about fruits vegetables? Not hardly. You see vegetables were considered peasant food – unworthy of eating by the rich. And fruits were only used in pies, tarts, and pastries, hardly ever eaten raw for fear of contamination.
The Peasants
For the poor, grains were the main source of nutrition, namely buckwheat, oats, barley, and rye in the form of bread.
They also ate a lot of turnips, onions, garlic, and what other vegetables they had time to grown on their own small plots of land. Basically they ate whatever they could find, grow, or scavenge.
Very few peasants were allowed to own their own animals – maybe a chicken or two – so what little meat they did have was eaten very sparingly. If you got caught poaching live game, the punishment was usually brutal, like cutting off a hand.
Pottage was very popular. The word pottage – a thick soup or stew – comes from Old French and in fact means contents of a pot. A typical pot of Pottage would typically include ingredients such as peas, carrots, leeks, onions, cabbage and beans, oats, herbs, saffron and sometimes meat.
Since dairy cows were rare and then only for the wealthy, almonds were ground up and made into Almond Milk.
Their diet was predominantly what they could grow on their own when they weren’t toiling the land for their lords or the church.
In other words, basically a vegetarian diet, with lots and lots of exercise.
Who was Healthier?
Sure, they had to worry about things like plague and pestilence, but aside from that – peasants in medieval times lived healthier lifestyles than we do.
According to BBC News, a new study finds that their low-fat, vegetable-rich diet, washed down by weak ale, was much better for the heart than today’s starchy, processed foods.
Dr. Iona McCleery teaches medieval history at Leeds University in England. In a 3 year program she developed to help children learn how to eat healthier she said,
“Interestingly it was the peasant class, whose diet would class today as healthy. The poorer you were, the higher your chances you ate more vegetables and had more mixed grains in your diet. The poor were semi-vegetarians who simply could not afford meat and social status. Wealth is very much associated with diet.”
Food historian Caroline Yeldham agreed, saying that.
“The medieval peasant diet was very fresh food. There were very few preservatives so everything was made fresh and it was low in fat, salt and sugar. There are some very famous people who became obese such as Henry VIII and Wolsey. But you did not see young people who were obese.”
It seems we’ve done a complete 180 degree turn.
Back then it was the wealthy who ate poorly and were predominantly obese and sick with chronic diseases while the poor thrived on a vegetarian diet rich with grains, fruits, and vegetables.
And today only the wealthy can afford to eat healthy while the poor are getting obese and sick from eating their high fat, highly processed American Diet.
Makes you wonder….
Photo Source: Flickr/Hans Splinter
