Thursday, August 23, 2007

Captain Caveman

While Krista is playing with sprouts and our triathlete continues to make delicious sounding meals like lemon blueberry waffles and tuscan bean polenta, I've been on my own for a week (girlfriend has been canoeing in Algonquin Park) and I've basically regressed into a single male's diet (although a vegan one). I started off well, eating the leftovers in the fridge, such as spinach salads with walnuts etc. But last night I was down to two veggie burgers and thank God Anna is back today because it might have come down to me eating all the sunflower seeds in the house, along with some raisins.

Thankfully I haven't fallen this far. I found an article in the Independent newspaper about the "caveman's diet." Basing his diet on some stuff he read by Arthur DeVaney, this Independent writer spent a month eating a Stone Age diet:
Rule of thumb: If you can't gather it from a bush or tree, or spear it, it's probably best not to eat it. What you can eat: Lean meat and fish. Fresh fruit and vegetables. Eggs. Dried fruit (without added sugar or vegetable oil). Nuts and seeds. What you can't eat: Sugars, grains (no oats, wheat, barley or rye, etc.), beans, peanuts (a bean, not a nut) and starchy vegetables (such as potatoes). Dairy products.

To the writer's credit, he quotes a few people like Dean Ornish who state that the emphasis on meat in this diet will lead to heart-disease, and he also mentions some interesting stuff about how all the refining that has happened to food over the last hundred or so years is what has actually caused such a massive drop in the quality of our food (and therefore an increase in illness).

I don't know - it sounds like a fairly good diet to me. I'd obviously switch the meat for the beans (and some B12 pills), but I can see it being healthy for you (though still terrible for the animals - I wonder if he tries to get free range/organic eggs & chicken etc).

At least it isn't like like Owsley Stanley's diet. Apparently this guy ONLY eats meat.
Stanley recently posted his seven rules for healthy eating on the Internet. They are:
* Eat only food from animals
* No vegetables
* Limit liver intake
* Avoid milk (except for butter and cheese)
* Eat as much fat as you like
* Don't cook your food much
* Avoid salt
Stanley had a heart attack in recent years, but he blames it on the broccoli and other"poisonous" vegetables his mother used to feed him as a boy.


Y.I.K.E.S.

P.S. - I noticed that the Independent has an entire section of their site (and maybe their print newspaper?) devoted to the environment. Well done dudes!

3 comments:

Marathon Maritza said...

I guess you haven't heard about the undercover operation, where all the veggies are holding secret meetings in order to plot poisoning us.

What an absolute joke. I'm gonna guess the heart attack stems more from the "eat as much fat as you like" rule than from broccoli.

Thanks for always posting intriguing tidbits!

sp said...

As far as I'm concerned the word "diet" being equated with weight loss is a big problem. A big part of his "diet" was the exercise. If go from poor eating habits and a no exercise to making a conscious effort to eat healthy foods and combine that with generous exercise well lo and behold you will lose weight. It's a simple formula.

I suspect that the author's initial reaction to not losing weight was probably due to him eating more because he was running. We often eat more after running or exerting ourselves in such a way because we feel hungrier or even that we can eat a little more because we ran a little more. Certainly once he gave up the refined foods that would have made a big difference as well.

Also (if I can just keep commenting here -- sorry it's so long) maybe the dieters following the caveman way should actually have to "spear it" and then we'll see how many eat meat.

p.s. sunflower seeds and raisins will probably get you through breakfast (hey, it was good enough for the cavepeople right?), but man you'd better find something more after that.

Smudgemo said...

"no oats, wheat, barley or rye, etc."
That would mean no beer. What kind of sadistic diet is that?

I agree with sp. At least just once, kill it before you eat it.