For this week, I tried out the Paleo diet. As the name suggests, the Paleo diet resembles a diet similar to that of our ancestors. Essentially, I had the diet of a hunter-gatherer from the Paleolithic era.
The idea behind this diet is a way of eating that’s more like what early humans ate because we are genetically built to eat that diet. It is believed that the human body is genetically mismatched to the modern diet that emerged with farming practices — an idea known as the discordance hypothesis.
Farming changed what people ate and established dairy, grains, and legumes as additional staples in the human diet. This relatively late and rapid change in diet, according to the hypothesis, outpaced the body’s ability to adapt. This mismatch is believed to be a contributing factor to the prevalence of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease today.
To abide by the somewhat strict rules of this diet, I was allowed to eat fruits, vegetables, nuts, lean meats (preferably grass-fed animals), and fish such as salmon and albacore tuna. However, this diet restricted me to foods like grains; such as wheat, oats, and barley, legumes; such as beans, lentils, peanuts and peas, dairy products, refined sugar, added salt, potatoes, and highly processed foods in general.
Typically, I would snack on carrot sticks or berries, but one recipe I made that I really enjoyed was “rainbow chicken and veggies” from Delish.
INGREDIENTS
- 2 cups cherry tomatoes
- 3 cups baby carrots
- 2 yellow bell peppers, thinly sliced
- 1 large head broccoli, florets removed
- 2 small red onions, cut into wedges
- 1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breasts, cubed
- 2 cups cooked brown rice
FOR THE MARINADE
- 1/3 cups extra-virgin olive oil
- Juice of 2 limes
- 1/4 cups freshly chopped cilantro
It is a very simple recipe I would make for lunch when I was lazy. You would simply put the marinade on the vegetables and chicken and then bake for about 30 minutes until vegetables are tender and chicken is cooked through.
I think of all the diets I have done so far the Paleo diet is my most favorite. I have noticed an increase in energy and better mood by removing refined sugar and highly processed foods from my diet and mainly eating leans meats, fish, and certain vegetables. I also realized I had better control and management of my appetite. I wouldn’t eat until I was extremely full and I found myself being hungry less.
Overall, I had a great experience with this diet even in just the span of one week. I also didn’t find the diet difficult to maintain other than avoiding grains and legumes. But it was difficult not to cave in and eat my favorite junk foods. I give it a rating of 4.5 out of 5 and I would definitely recommend trying this diet.
This diet seems really cool, and it seems pretty easy to maintain. It seems to allow a really balanced diet while cutting out a lot of the artificial things that make our diets unhealthy. With this diet, it makes me wonder if more people would eat like this if the healthy/organic/lean food wasn’t more expensive than the unhealthy options and if there weren’t food deserts where the only things really available are the unhealthy options.
First of all, the rainbow chicken and veggies look very appetizing; I would definitely like to try a vegetarian alternative of it. The paleo diet does seem like it would be a very healthy option to what most of our diets consist of today. Whether we choose to acknowledge or not, the fact is that so much of our diet is composed of highly processed food. Switching to a paleo diet for some time can certainly provide a sense of freshness.