What is the Paleo Challenge?
It’s a 6 week period during which you are going to experience the way of eating of our ancestors that were walking the earth 500 thousand years ago. The way they ate was the one of hunter-gatherers and this diet has been built into our genes.
The point is to get as close to the hunter-gatherer diet as possible in our world with such a vast variety of products that fill the shelves of the supermarkets. The good news is that we are going to spend as little time around those shelves as possible. You’ll have to set yourselves in a hunting-gathering mode and judge with the guidelines provided here to retrace this way of living. We can achieve this by choosing to buy fruits and vegetables in season and locally or frozen. As for the meat try and get wild, free-range and lean.
We will provide you with addresses to local farms and markets that have good quality foods
What to expect?
By restoring the food types that we are genetically programmed to eat we will loose wight and restore our health and well-being. Although the challenge lasts only 6 weeks we can start to grasp the full effect of this way of eating after 2-3 weeks. The effects should be good mood, mental clarity throughout the day, fat loss, no fatigue through the day, intestinal regulation, no bloating, increased performance and increased health. And this is just for 6 weeks.
What to eat?
Lean meats, fresh fruits and vegetables, good fats, seeds and nuts.
Protein
Protein must be included at every meal. Try and vary to get the best variety of vitamins, minerals, fat and protein sources out there. It’s good if you manage to get wild, grass fed or free-range. If not chose lean cuts and trim off all visible fat. During cooking you can improve the Omega3 ratio of the meat or fish by rubbing olive oil on it before putting it on the pan or roasting it.
Regarding the quantity try and eat a portion the same size as the palm of your hand of meat, a third more for fish.
Here are a few examples:
Lean beef (trimmed of visible fat)
- lean pieces of beef
- minced meat < 8% fat
- lean veal
- and other lean cuts
Lean pork (trimmed of visible fat)
- pork loin
- pork chops
- and other lean cuts
Lean poultry (white meat, skin removed)
- chicken breast
- turkey breast
- partrige
- pheasant
- wild duck
Eggs
- chicken free-range if possible
- duck
- goose
Other meats
- rabbit
- bison
- caribou
- elk
- goose
- kangaroo
- venison
- ostrich
- wild boar
Fish
- salmon
- tuna
- trout
- turbot
- bass
- cod
- mackerel
- perch
- and many others
Shellfish
- shrimp
- mussels
- oysters
- scallops
- crab
- lobster
- and others
Fruits & Vegetables
All you can find, go for variety and mix and match. Better in season, if not possible frozen is a good alternative. Wash them thoroughly to minimize pesticides. Try and skip the long travelled ones because they are usually picked very early and matured with carbonic gas.
Nuts & Seeds
Good source of good fats to be used in limited quantities: not more than a handful for a meal or snack.
- walnuts
- macademia nuts
- almonds
- cashews
- hazelnuts
- pecans
- pine nuts
- pistachios
- pumpkin seeds
- sesame seeds
- sunflower seeds
Fats
There are different types of fat:
- monounsaturated fats – olive oil, colza oil, nuts, avocado – they help lower blood cholesterol and help prevent artery or arteriosclerosis
- saturated fats – meats, whole dairy products – raise cholesterol
- polyunsaturated fats : Omega 3 – fish oil, flaxseed oil,fish – improve blood chemistry
Omega 6 – vegetable oils, baked goods, processed foods – not good.
It’s the monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats we’ll try and get through the Paleo diet. It’s a very good source of energy and helps us to feel full. There are some bad ones, they are called the trans fats. They are obtained by overheating the good fats. Such as burning olive oil over 180°C makes it turn into trans fat. A lot of commercially processed food contain them, such as stock cubes, dehydrated sauces and even some nuts are covered in them to preserve them. You can check the labels for info. Use your own home m
ade salt free stocks you can freeze.
Examples of good oils to use:
- olive, canola, flaxseed, walnuts, avocado oils, mustard seed oil, – in moderation 4 tablespoons or less a day.
Other foods to use in moderation (especially if weight loss if desired)
- condiments containing salt, commercially treated foods such as pickeled goods, marinated products, smoked
- Drinks: coffee, tea, wine (1 glass)
- Paleo sweets: dried fruits, nuts mixed with dried and fresh fruits. (trail mixes).
What not to eat?
No dairy, no cereals, no legumes, no sugars, no salt, no processed food.
In essence we’ll be avoiding:
- all processed foods because they are almost all containing sugar, salt, some starch (wheat, potatoes, corn, rice), unhealthy fats and oils, dairy. Ex: Ketchup contains corn, sugar and salt as well as all the processed commercial sauces. Just read the labels and you’ll see.
- cereal grains: barley, oats, corn, quinoa, amaranth, rice, rye, millet, wheat, wild rice.
- dairy products, cheese, cream, ice cream, yoghurt, milk, margarine, butter,
- vegetable oils such as sunflower oil, hazelnut oil, peanut oil, grapeseed oil, corn oil are all too high in Omega 6 with little to no Omega 3, therefore not interesting in the Paleo sense.
- starchy tubers like potatoes, yams and sweet potatoes.
- legumes: all beans like black eyed peas (except in your ears, of course. Go Fergie!), green beans, peas, lentils and peanuts are legumes so no go for Paleo.
- salt containing foods: all commercial salad dressings and condiments (except herbs and particular spices), salami, salted nuts, sausage, except home made.
- soft drinks and fruit juice because high in sugar and lacking in fiber. Go for home made smoothies (fruits/veg blended with a bit of water).
- sweets, candy and chocolate (I’m really sorry about that one!)
What about supplements?
Vitamin D
Because we exclude all dairy products for at least 6 weeks and probably don’t get enough sun in the day (at least 15 min everyday!) we will need supplement with vitamin D. The RDA is 400IU international units. You should try and aim between 400 and 800 IU a day.
Antioxidants
The Paleo Diet is rich in antioxidants nevertheless we may add some vitamins along the way:
- Vitamin E: between 200 and 400 IU a day
- Vitamin C: between 500 and 1000 IU a day
- Selenium: between 200 and 400 IU a day
Fish oil
Omega3 fish oil plays a vital role in our diet, not only for building the structure of nerves, supporting brain messengers and building the brain itself, but also for fat loss and muscle maintenance.
Omega3 fish oil consists of long-chain fatty acids EPA (Eicosapentanoic acid) and DHA (docosohexanoic acid).
We need to supplement in Omega3’s because it’s deficient in our foods. In the past nearly every animal, being herbivores, would feed on grass and plant based foods, keeping their Omega3’s nice and high. Nowadays though, the majority of animal products we purchase have been grain fed (cheaper for farmers) and this unfortunately has a negative effect on the animals’ fatty acid profile, the Omega6 increases, and the Omega3’s decrease. So what once was a ratio of 2:1 – 3:1 Omega6 to Omega3, it is now a ratio of 20:1 – 30:1.
The daily dose we suggest to take is 2-3g of Omega3, that would be 4-5 capsules of the 300mg concentration. These you could find at our gym.