The Caveman Diet is a nickname for the Paleolithic Diet (Paleo Diet for short). On a Paleo diet, you eat the kinds of foods our remote hunter-gatherer ancestors ate, such as meat, fish, eggs, nuts, vegetables, fruits and mushrooms, and avoid most cultivated grains, dairy products, salt, refined sugar and processed fats.
Who Promotes It?
In 1985, radiologist Dr. S. Boyd Eaton and anthropologist Melvin Konner of Emory University attracted media and academic attention when they published a paper on paleolithic nutrition in the "New England Journal of Medicine" and followed up with a book, "The Paleolithic Prescription: A Program of Diet & Exercise and a Design for Living." Loren Cordain, a professor in the Department of Health and Exercise Science at Colorado State University and author of "The Paleo Diet" and "The Paleo Diet for Athletes," is another well-known promoter of the Caveman Diet.
Philosophy
During the 2.5 million years of the Paleolithic Period, people ate only wild plants and animals that they hunted. About 10,000 years ago with the development of agriculture and animal husbandry, the human diet changed--for the worse, says Cordain. He claims that genetically, we have never adapted to a modern agricultural and industrial diet of grains, refined carbohydrates, dairy products, trans fats and sodium-heavy processed foods.
Foods
Eaton advocates getting about 35 percent of your daily calories from fats, 35 percent from carbohydrates and 30 percent from protein. Cordain recommends eating whole, natural foods rather than processed foods. Avoid or greatly reduce your intake of sugars and refined carbohydrates, such as white bread, and high-fat dairy products. Get plenty of omega-3 fats from fish, plant foods such as greens and flax, and/or fish oil supplements. Eat plenty of lean protein, such as skinless chicken and grass-fed beef. Replace saturated fats with monounsaturated fats such as olive oil and canola oil. Avoid trans fats--found in many packaged baked goods and hard margarine--entirely. Eat plenty of fruits and vegetables.
Exercise
Cordain advocates exercising daily, preferably outdoors, varying your routines among aerobic, strength and stretching exercises.
Benefits
The Paleolithic diet resembles other reduced-carbohydrate diets that studies have shown may help promote weight loss and protect against heart disease, diabetes and other "diseases of civilization." A small Swedish study reported in the July, 2009 "Cardiovascular Diebetology" showed that Paleolithic diets may reduce cardiovascular risk factors in diabetics.
Cautions
The Paleolithic Diet is low in vitamin D and calcium. Promoters of the diet suggest taking a vitamin D supplement. Meat-heavy diets can be high in saturated fat, which has been linked to an increased risk of heart disease. And eating a lot of fish could expose you to environmental toxins such as mercury and PCBs. Fish oil supplements are distilled to remove contaminants.
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