Paleo Diet and Paleolithic Diet Questions & Answers

Question

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So, yesterday was an epic fail of a day eating. I am just curious which part of my day was worse. (I would just like to take a brief second here to say that I am relatively new to eating this way, and that I don't generally suffer from any major gluten intolerance. Just trying to be fitter and healthier.)

Breakfast - bagel with butter and american cheese Lunch - commercial beef jerky and organic almond butter (so I can be healthy...wink-wink) Dinner - 2 slices pizza and small Caesar Salad (adding salad makes dinner healthy, right (( smirk ))) Around dinner was also 2 beers.

Anyway, I know why I failed, but I am also pretty sure that for the next few months I am not going to have the time or energy left to focus on my nutrition and exercise as much as I would like and I just want to know which part of the day I should direct myattention the most.

Thanks!

flag	asked Sep 9 2010 at 13:31 Joey Manicotti 389●1●11

	Most likely the almond butter, depends how much you ate. Nutritiondata has it at about 30:1 n-6 to n-3. – Chris Sep 9 2010 at 17:58
	Almond butter worse than a bagel? Well I guess it depends on your goals. – Bread-Eating Beelzebub Sep 9 2010 at 19:38
	100g of almond butter contains around 12 grams n-6. For the celiac end of the gluten spectrum, the bagel might be worse, but for everyone else the almond butter is the worst. – Chris Sep 9 2010 at 20:14
	Did it taste good? – Gone Sep 10 2010 at 6:43
	The Almond Butter? Or the rest...because the almond butter was just OK...I mistakenly thought it was healthier...the beer was deeeee-licious. – Joey Manicotti Sep 10 2010 at 14:17

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Glenn · Answer 1 · 2010-09-09 13:59:01Z UTC

Not sure which is worse, the bagel or the pizza. I think if you try to start the day right, it can help set the tone for the rest of your meals. If you are rushed for time in the morning, make some mini egg fritatas the night before (and stuff them with whatever you like: spinach, ham, cooked bacon, etc.) Kept in air-tight bags, these can last you several days. Just warm up one or two when you are ready for breakfast (or you can even eat them cold).

Recipe (along with some other good ones!) from Mark: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/10-primal-meals-in-15-minutes-or-less/

Kikilula · Answer 2 · 2010-09-09 13:50:39Z UTC

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Focus on breakfast - if you start your day with enough protein and fat: that keeps your blodsugar constant, so carby crap won't be so tempting... Then you are probably able to skip lunch and prepare a nice paleo dinner in the evening.

answered Sep 9 2010 at 13:50

Kikilula
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Bread-Eating Beelzebub · Answer 3 · 2010-09-09 13:52:19Z UTC

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How about trying to do 2/3 meals paleo? I think dinner is the obvious choice for non-paleo because it tends to be social. Breakfast and lunch are comparative low-hanging fruit.

answered Sep 9 2010 at 13:52

Bread-Eating Beelzebub
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CT · Answer 4 · 2010-09-09 14:49:09Z UTC

Not directly answering your question (to which I would say "dinner", because the pizza and beers together are worse than the bagel), but - fasting a bit can erase some small sins - chuck in an IF from time to time.

I also find that regular fasting, a condensed eating window starting after lunch, makes me eat better. If I have a bad start to the day, I go downhill all the way.

MikeD · Answer 5 · 2010-09-09 15:44:01Z UTC

Haha, sorry but you can't fail if you didn't try. I am not seeing anything very paleo about your day at all. (Ok, maybe the beef jerky)

My advice is to go to the supermarket/farmers market and pick up eggs, meat, fruits and vegetables and concentrate on those. Maybe skip a meal one day and take that time to cook a bunch of dinners, lunches or breakfasts for the future.

I just don't think eating a paleo breakfast will give you results if you are eating pizza and drinking beer every night.

JJ · Answer 6 · 2010-09-09 19:03:08Z UTC

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There is no real answer to this question.

If you had said "after a decent lunch I had some ice cream and chocolate, and after a decent dinner I had some store-bought brownies" we could talk about the merits of dairy + sugar vs. gluten + hydrogenated vegetable oils. (Hint: dairy and sugar are the lesser evils here.)

I know for a fact that on this board we have single parents, workaholics with 40-100 hr jobs, poor college students, whatever. Some of us struggle more than others to keep eating well, but most of us don't really have good excuses compared to some of these people.

Eating Paleo is not that hard. Buy real food. Keep real food in your house. Don't buy anything else. If you're so busy that you don't have 10 minutes to throw some ingredients together, you may want to re-evaluate your life.

Best of luck.

And ditch the almond butter.

answered Sep 9 2010 at 19:03

JJ
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	To be honest, these last couple of posts got me feeling a little defensive...and then I thought about it - calling a spade, a spade is not an insult, it is a fact. I wasn't trying that day. In my head I decided that what I ate that day wasn't my priority...and I don't feel that I was wrong. However, I am also now trying to figure out what I really want. Exactly where on my priority list is my nutrition? – Joey Manicotti Sep 10 2010 at 18:07
	I've realized that what I REALLY want is to defy CW without rocking the boat. My wife is newly pregnant and VERY non-paleo, and we have a two yr old that wishes she could live on milk, grapes and cookies. I want to change my eating without forcing them to change theirs. Impossible? Maybe, but I sure as hell am gonna try...and try harder than I did on Wednesday! – Joey Manicotti Sep 10 2010 at 18:07
	Ah. Having a non-Paleo family can make things a lot more difficult, that is true. There's nothing wrong with epic fail days (I do it myself on rare occasions, so I definitely was not judging you on that account), and there's nothing wrong with not making nutrition/health your #1 priority. Some people just want to "lose a little weight" or whatever. But once you decide what your priorities are, don't let anything get in the way of achieving your goals. – JJ Sep 12 2010 at 18:37

Eva · Answer 7 · 2010-09-10 02:51:44Z UTC

I can usually find paleo and less harmful choices out of almost any meal. Skim the cheese and toppings off the pizza and throw out the dough. For breakfast, just eat the cheese and skip the bagel part. Ironically, I have found that the same numbers of pizza slices satiate me now as in the past, except now I am only eating the top half. The dough adds very little to the taste but a lot to the calories and unhealthfulness. The mind twisting part is that my xboyfriend, not wanting to 'waste' the dough part of the pizza, used to often save the dough and then later add tomato sauce and cheese back onto it and eat it. He said he didn't like wasting, but I think also he was a huge carboholic. In the past, my method of not wasting was to give the dough part to my dog, who is also a carb addict, but after reading GCBC, I am reluctant to give my dog too much wheat and grain as I am sure it is not good for her either. I wonder what the incubation period for metabolic syndrome and/or autoimmune response to wheat might be in a dog..perhaps much shorter than it is for humans.. -Eva

Epic fail of a day - but which is worse?

7 Answers