Cracking the Paleo Diet Code: Lose Weight Fast With Primal Eating & Intermittent Fasting (How to Lose Weight Your Way) (4 page)

What to include:

Nuts and seeds are great additions to your Paleo diet, however they can easily be over-consumed and it is important to be mindful of how many you eat per day.

They
also make handy snacks, and most people should consume 1 – 1.5 ounces a day. If you are buying commercially roasted nuts, avoid the ones that have peanut or canola oil listed in the ingredients. Most Paleo dieters prefer to dry roast their own, or just consume them raw.

If you experience digestive issues when eating nuts and seeds
, you can soak them overnight in salty water which should help aid in digesting them. After you have finished soaking them make sure to rinse them thoroughly and dry them under the sun, in the oven with the temperature set to the lowest possible setting, or in a dehydrator. If you do not dry them, the remaining moisture makes it easy for mold to grow.

Examples of nuts and seeds
include:

If you wondered where the peanuts were they
are not actually nuts; they are classified under legumes, and legumes are not recommended in the Paleo diet.

What to include:

Your sources of red meat should always be fresh and organically grass-fed. You can take your pick from the conventional sources of red meat, such as:

●
Beef, bison, goat, lamb, pork, rabbit, veal, venison and all wild game.

Organ meat
s:

● Beef bone marrow, b
eef liver, beef tongue, pork blood, pork bone marrow, pork liver, sweetbreads.

The odd bits:

● Animal and fish heads, feet, tails, stomach, spleen, tendons and tripe.

● Trims are the meat that is left
over after all the pretty display case meat, such as roast and steak, is made. They are basically hunks of meat that you can use for stews, soups, grind into hamburger, and even made into jerky. The beauty of it is this meat is great and usually cheaper than the fancy display case meat.

What not to include:

All processed items are banned from the Paleo diet. This would include convenience food, particularly items that are flavored, marinated, and pickled; also avoid ready-to-cook and ready-to-eat food items, like:

●
Bottled meat items, canned meat items, frozen meals with meat, microwave-ready meat-based snacks, ready-to-eat meat in tube forms, toaster ready snacks with meat.

These are usually made from the
by-products of different food processing plants, extensively treated and then artificially flavored. These are the perfect epitome of unhealthy food.

Borderline:

Cured meat can be incorporated in your Paleo diet, just do so sparingly. Many of these items are treated with brine and sodium nitrate to preserve both their flavors and colors. If you can, try making your own at home: Home-cured meats always taste better, and you get to control the salt and sugar level in the flavoring or pickling solutions.

Examples of which
include:

●
Bacon, beef jerky and salted pork, beef and pork sausages, cold cuts, cured hams.

What to include:

When it comes to poultry products, it would be best to use only those labeled with organic, free-range, free roaming, or pasture-raised
birds. Some of the poultry you can safely include in your Paleo diet are:

● Chicken,
duck, goose, pheasant, quail, turkey

Chicken organs like gizzards and liver, as
well as duck liver also fall under this category.

What not to include:

All processed food items that “supposedly” contain poultry meat should be banned from your diet. It is more likely that the desiccated pieces of meat come from other animal sources and are sprayed with chicken flavor.

These include:

● Breaded chicken fingers, chicken noodle soups with chicken bits, chicken-based instant stews and sauces, chicken nuggets, ready-to-cook turkey burgers, soups with turkey essence, marinated chicken pieces, etc.

Borderline:

Chicken ham and turkey ham are borderline cases. These too are cured meats, but are better alternatives than their processed counterparts. These items use actual whole chickens or whole turkeys, while more processed items only use the leftover bits and pieces of numerous chicken or turkey carcasses.

What to include:

Fresh or dried edible mushrooms can be safely incorporated in
to your diet. Some may be harvested from the wild, but those that we find on supermarket shelves are usually cultivated in mushroom farms. Fortunately, there is very little nutritional difference between farmed and wild mushrooms.

You can basically eat any type of mushroom
, and I stopped counting at 100 varieties, so try as many as you want and see what you like best. Make sure to always prepare them properly and don’t do what my wife’s dad would do and just eat them straight off the manure pile. Mind you, he probably had a healthier gut than most people.

Natural truffle oil is included in this
list; however make sure that the truffle oil contains actual truffles. Check the product labels: If these contain truffle essence, then you are getting nothing but a few drops of chemicals that smell like mushrooms, and nothing else.

What not to
include:

Any mushroom that you don't see whole or in solid components should be removed from your diet. These
desiccated pieces of mushrooms have lost all their nutritional value. Worse, these are re-hydrated in brine solutions.

Examples of which would include:

● Mushroom soups with mushroom bits, instant mushroom-based instant stews and sauces, instant mushroom gravies, ready-to-cook mushroom burgers, oils with mushroom essence, frozen food items that contain mushroom bits (e.g. mushroom pizza, mushroom dumplings, etc.).

Borderline:

You can use canned mushrooms in your recipes, but you need to rinse these before using. This is to remove the excess salt. Use these only when fresh mushrooms are not available.

This topic is
a gray area. There are some Paleo enthusiasts who advocate the use of condiments, gravies, jams, marinades, sauces, soups and spreads as a way of supplementing the flavor base of their diets.  But others prefer to avoid condiments altogether due to their nutritional value.

I would recommend using
homemade condiments whenever possible. Homemade items do not have artificial flavors or preservatives, and you can control the amount of salt and sugar they contain. And the great thing is you can make any flavor you want.

Of all the commercial
ly made condiments, mustard is one of the best. It is lightly processed and does not need food additives to improve its flavor or to preserve it for long periods of time. Your best option would be to buy commercial mustards that are labeled: organic and gluten-free. Other healthier alternatives to commercial condiments are:

●
Chipotle

●
Fruit-based chutneys and salsa

●
Guacamole

●
Vinaigrette

● Hot sauces – as natural as possible

● Spices – just make sure they are not full of sugar. Paprika, rosemary, sage, chili powder, cinnamon, cloves and many others are great choices.

What not to include:

It would be safe to say that 99% of all ready-made condiments, gravies, jams, marinades, sauces, soups and spreads are not Paleo safe. Aside from the fact that they are obviously processed, they also contain high levels of oil, sugar, salt and preservatives. If possible, avoid using them, or use sparingly the following products:

Flavor your food in a way that stays healthy and also makes it taste great. You will not last long on any diet when all the food you eat is bland and boring
. There are thousands of healthy Paleo friendly sauce recipes available out there.

What to include:

Right off the start before you read the list
, I have to make a disclaimer: While the Paleo diet does recommend the use of bacon grease, tallow and lard as your cooking oils, you need to do so with some restraint. They are high in fat and can still be harmful to your health if over-consumed.

Keep in mind that certain oils respond better to high heat
, and you will want to research the best oil for the cooking at hand.

Flax seed oil is not ideal for cooking but is great as a source of Omega 3
s, which is worth mentioning.

Here is our r
ecommended list of cooking oils/fats:

What not to include:

Here is a list of cooking oils to avoid or use sparingly:

I am going to make a disclaimer and that is
: Depending on your belief on Paleo, the two lists on oils will be controversial. You will have to use the oil you are comfortable using. Most of the research I did turned up a lot of conflicts over what people believe is Paleo-approved oil. Animal fats would be the closest thing to real Paleo, and if you are comfortable then use lard or bacon fat. The choice is yours based on how Paleo you are choosing to be.