Introduction!

[kimboo_york]

I'm thrilled to find this comm! \o/

I was informed I am gluten "intolerant" by my nutritionist back in September. I do cleansing fasts regularly (twice a year) so I went on a five day juice fast to clear everything out of my system and was going to go wheat free after that. In the meantime, though, I discovered the paleo/primal lifestyle paradigm and decided to try that instead of re-creating my prior diet with gluten-free processed food.

The changes in my health were astounding - I never realized just how much my problems were linked to my food. I wrote about my experiences in my blogpost My Primal Lifestyle which discusses how going paleo/primal improved my sleep, my energy levels, my skin, and...well, everything!

I'm still overweight and unfit due to several years of self-destructive behavior, but I'm finally seeing changes in how I feel and look. Living this way is easy for me because I don't ever want to feel as terrible as I used to every day.

My biggest hurdle now is incorporating more body movement; I'm a grad school student and my main "job" is writing, so I spend most of my day sitting down. I've picked up yoga again, and I started jogging, but I need to remember to stand up out of the damn chair more often throughout the day! argh!

Personal goals include becoming very physically fit because I want to go hiking and skiing again, and learn to surf (life long dream) and tap dance. There is so much I want to DO, and I know that living paleo/primal is the only its going to happen. I really do feel great.

Look forward to hearing more from people here! ♥


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[axelrod]

1) If you're looking for an alternative to wheat flour, you might consider acorns. Pro: nice nutty flavor, fairly nutritious, if ground finely makes a delicious bread (there's a couple variations here), high in omega 6. Con: work intensive to make (you have to leech tanins out of most varieties) and difficult to source prepared acorn flour, not ideal if you need a diet lower in fat.

2) Has anyone made buckwheat bread? Buckwheat porridge? I really like buckwheat soba noodles, though everywhere I've found them so far they're pretty expensive. Any other suggestions for how to prepare buckwheat? 

3) The book on paleo diets I requested from the library still isn't available, so a basic question: how do people on the paleo diet get enough complex carbs, or is that not really a concern?

4) Cattails seem to be paleo-friendly. You can eat the root, spikes, corms, pollen (which apparently can be used like flour), and seeds. Apparently cattails get incredible yields. There's info here, but I haven't done any research besides (so far). Cattails grow wild in many regions - the concern there is whether there's anything toxic in the soil or water, so if there isn't lots of plant and animal life in the body of water it's growing in or near, you probably shouldn't eat it. Also, there are near-relatives which appear similar to cattails but which are poisonous. The article I link to above tells you what they are and how to identify them, as well as the various parts of teh plant that are edible at different times of year and some suggestions for preparation.

5) Related to #2, what kinds of bread are paleo-friendly? Specifically, I want to make sandwiches and toast.