Ancestral Food Pyramid / grains

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Sonja wrote:

> That ancestral food pyramid didn't include grain at all...do you see a

problem > with that?

No, I don't. It wouldn't have included grains or legumes. Neither of these

were nutritionally significant contributers to early human diet, which is

what is meant by ancestral. Both were added only in approximately the last

10,000 years. They were undoubtedly muched on an occasional grain or bean

from time to time, but they were not a regular part of their diet. That's

not even really questioned in archaeological circles. There's a lot of

debate about what else was in their diet prior to the agricultural

revolution, but virtually everyone agrees that there was no grain, legumes

or dairy until about the last 10,000 years. Just goes to show how

ridiculous the current common practice is of getting well over half the

calories from " complex " carbs which usually means grain or legumes.

However, the ancestral food pyramid doesn't really matter that much unless

you're trying to eat according to one of the paleo diets. If you do fine

with grains, legumes and dairy, there's no reason to exclude them. I

personally, try to eat fairly close to the ancestral way. However, I seem

to do great on dairy, and I'm from a fairly long line of dairy farmers, so I

definitely won't remove dairy. I don't exclude grain and legumes entirely

either, but I've greatly reduced the amount of them that I eat. I try to

get most of my carbs from fruits, veggies, nuts, etc. Since my wife and I

made the switch about 5-6 months ago, the changes have been fairly dramatic,

and I'm still working at incorporating many of the NT preparation principles

into our life. I can only assume it's going to get even better as I

continue to do more and further tweak what we're eating and how we're

preparing it.

Minneapolis