.

[lazyboy]

As I know nuts are big part for most paleo followers.
I try to follow the 80/20 rule, but most of the time I get lost after birthday parties or other celebration days.
Most of my Information come from http://www.marksdailyapple.com. Ok he´s promoting his books a little bit to much, but I like that he is trying to find an scientific approach to his writings.

[oldbeyond]

Advocates of popular diets focus on what sets them apart, so you get these endless discussion about carbs vs fat. Personally I find it more interesting to ascertain what they have in common. Pretty much every major diet recommends that you eat a lot of vegetables and fruit, get enough protein and avoid foods with high energy densities that are low on micronutrients and fiber(basically junk food, sugar and the like). Too many people focus on relatively minute details(carbs or fat?) instead of the basics(an appropriate amount of energy, enough protein and all the micronutrients you need). This is like people with six figure credit card debt having lengthy discussions on EMH vs value investing. In my opinion, if you're not at a high level of fitness, the details won't matter all that much. Nuts are great, and legumes provide protein and dietary fibre. I eat grains too(even white pasta), but I make sure to make it a part of a balanced diet.

[slimicy]

I've been Paleo for about 4 years now. At the beginning I was morbidly obese, had lots of autoimmune problems, and just thought it was "genetics". Now at 31 I'm in the best shape of my life, and constantly improving. The main thing I take out of it isn't that Paleo is right and something else is wrong, it's that everyone is different, and food should be treated as the most important part of trying to optimize one's health. For me it's: no grains, no HFCS or artificial sweeteners, no vegetable oils, no legumes, and I also seem to react poorly to coconut.

If you really want to try and meta analyse yourself and your food reactions you can also try this out: http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyg ... 8.coca.pdf

[5to9]

Advocates of popular diets focus on what sets them apart, so you get these endless discussion about carbs vs fat. Personally I find it more interesting to ascertain what they have in common. Pretty much every major diet recommends that you eat a lot of vegetables and fruit, get enough protein and avoid foods with high energy densities that are low on micronutrients and fiber(basically junk food, sugar and the like).

+1

This has been my approach lately. More green vegetables, less processed food, less sugar, better quality (or less) meat. Some need a more strict approach that they go "all in" with, but this works for me.

[UrbanHermit]

Too many people focus on relatively minute details(carbs or fat?) instead of the basics(an appropriate amount of energy, enough protein and all the micronutrients you need).

I would strongly disagree that this is a "minute detail". There is a well known study out of stanford that compared three diets that differ wildly in macronutrient breakdown: ornish, zone, and atkins (this was a while back). It had two principal findings:

* all three diets were effective, and nearly equally effective on average
* for insulin-resistant individuals however, _only_ the atkins diet was effective

In other words, if you've never been pre-diabetic, then you are correct to be dismissive of carb ratios, since for you they don't matter. For the significant portion of the overweight population that has already messed up their endocrine system, not contolling carbs is setting themselves up for failure.

Prior to watching this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eREuZEdMAVo in 2012, I had been on a strictly calorie counted mediterainean-style diet, working out 40miin per day 5 days per week (3 weight, 2 cardio) and had managed to lose < 10lbs in 6 months. I switched to a paleo plan, cut back to 2 workouts a week, stopped counting calories, and lost 35lbs in the subsequent 6 months.

Carbs mattered to me, far more than any other factor, and I would be very reluctant to tell someone struggling to lose weight that they don't matter until they had at least tried a carb reduction plan.

[oldbeyond]

I'm no expert on insuline resistance, but this overview found small differences between diets, but people eating the mediterranean diet enjoyed the most significant weight loss: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23364002

But there's no harm in trying different approaches. Some people might find a certain diet to be way superior, and wether this is because of physiological or psychological reasons seems beside the point. As long as you eat real food and remain somewhat "diversified"(i.e not only eating carrots for three months) in your choice of food sources, it seems hard to do any harm to your health, and you might find something that works great for you.

[Dragline]

Yes, I mostly do this. But I eat legumes, too, especially black beans.

I think we're ultimately going to learn that certain genetic profiles do better with certain foods, like we already know is true for dairy. But almost nobody is giong to do well with heavily processed and sugary foods.

Here are a couple of the findings that I'm aware of:

"Several studies have shown that rs1801282 (also known as the Pro12Ala variant in the PPARG gene) influences whether an individual benefits from a diet high in monounsaturated fat. (This type of diet is often called a "Mediterranean"-style diet because olive oil is a good source of monounsaturated fat.) In people of European descent carrying at least one copy of the G version of rs1801282, increasing intake of just monounsaturated fat was associated with reductions in body mass index (BMI). In addition, a low fat diet led to an increase in waist circumference in people with the G version but a diet high in monounsaturated fat protected against this effect. The protection was even stronger in people with type 2 diabetes. Razquin C et al. (2009) . “The Mediterranean diet protects against waist circumference enlargement in 12Ala carriers for the PPARgamma gene: 2 years' follow-up of 774 subjects at high cardiovascular risk.” Br J Nutr 102(5):672-9. "

"A study of more than 2,000 people of European descent found that among those who consumed more than 30% of their calories from fat, having two copies of the A version of rs662799 was associated with higher BMI compared to having one or no copies. The variant had no effect among those who consumed less than 30% of their calories from fat." Corella D et al. (2007) . “APOA5 gene variation modulates the effects of dietary fat intake on body mass index and obesity risk in the Framingham Heart Study.” J Mol Med 85(2):119-28.



Here is an interesting site on this topic from an MD that I ran across the other day: http://eatingacademy.com/

The author also has a recent (2013) TED talk: http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_attia_wh ... betes.html

[Chad]

I think we're ultimately going to learn that certain genetic profiles do better with certain foods, like we already know is true for dairy. But almost nobody is giong to do well with heavily processed and sugary foods.

Agreed.

[1taskaday]

I have been mostly Paleo/low carb for many years now.
I never put on weight even though sometimes I don't do any exercise.

For me carbs =weight gain.
To loose it quickly I just drop the carbs and any excess disappears like magic.
I am never ever hungry eating like this and can go through long periods without needing to eat with no energy level decrease.

I follow Robb Wolf,Loren Cordain and Chris Kresser and the grand daddy of it all Arthur de Vany.All have their own websites full of guidance on Paleo/Health.

[Murf]

I've been low-carb since about 2002 and found it quite hard for the first 2 years to avoid bread, rice and pasta. I used to love them and thought they were healthy and natural foods. These days I eat bread once or twice per month, pasta once every 3 months and rice in between the two.

Being in the health industry back then I had no shortage of exposure to pre-diabetics, diabetics and generally healthy but overweight people. I even promoted a weight loss diet advice service that we had available in our pharmacy and had amazing success in educating people (and myself in the process) about the lack of information and just plain bad information that was being disseminated by food companies and the nutrition industry.

Atkins was definitely on the right track and it seems, way ahead of his time. We evolved over hundreds of thousands of years with a diet of about 60% fat 30% protein and 10% carbs. We had intermittent fasting forced upon us. I can't bring myself to stomach 60% of my calories from fat, although it's delicious trying! I have a BMI of about 22 and have started to use intermittent fasting about once every 2 weeks with the intent of getting to once per week. I'm doing the IF mainly for prevention of my cognitive functions rather than body shape. If you want to get a good grip on low carb dieting with an enormous amount of scientific evidence there's a damned scary book called Grain Brain by David Perlmutter which I'm half-way through that has collected too many links between low cholesterol levels and high carb diets with Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and memory decline.

[Felix]

The good thing about the paleo diet is giving up highly processed foods like vegetable oils, sugar, processed meats, milk and cheese and refined flours including giving up on most of the untested additives in food products.

That's a big step in the direction of whole foods. You won't get as much benefit if you turn paleo into bacon cheeseburgers without the bun and paleo protein shakes.

With these rather large changes, starting from a horrible standard american diet you are bound to see improvements in health.

I'm not sure if the removal of whole grains and legumes is based on more than speculation, though. There's still a strong low-carb bias in the paleo world (although it is less pronounced), even avoiding fruit.

One factor common among blue zones is a regular legume intake. Also, lentils are like THE ERE food.

One experiment one can do would be to reduce the meat and fat intake in favor of more fruits, veggies, grains and legumes to see where that goes, especially when you see problems with your cholesterol levels (or if you want to save money).

[slimicy]

I'm not sure if the removal of whole grains and legumes is based on more than speculation, though. There's still a strong low-carb bias in the paleo world (although it is less pronounced), even avoiding fruit.

There's a ton of evidence against modern-day wheat strains being good for anyone. I tested negative for celiac, but if I had a slice of bread I'd probably have to skip work the next day... the effect on my digestive system is that pronounced.

Legumes are more on the fence, and the general consensus in the community is avoid them if you can, sprout and/or ferment them if you must.

One experiment one can do would be to reduce the meat and fat intake in favor of more fruits, veggies, grains and legumes to see where that goes, especially when you see problems with your cholesterol levels (or if you want to save money).

You're showing your bias here. Meat and fat aren't inherently unhealthy, you just need to get good sourced meat and natural unprocessed fats. Fruits and veggies are healthy, but don't have the essential fatty acids necessary for optimal health. That being said, I'd say about half of the food i eat (volume-wise, at least) is veggies and/or tubers.

Cholesterol being associated to saturated fat and meat intake is also a myth. I eat bacon almost every day, red meat 3-4 times a week, chicken every day, and my cholesterol is normal. Before I went Paleo, when I ate like you're suggesting I had: non-alcoholic fatty liver, IBS, gout, eczema, and severe acne. Oh, and an extra 60lbs on me. Those have all cleared up. I still get 1-2 gout attacks a year, but only when i intake too much fructose and/or alcohol.

EDIT: I can provide sources for any of these claims if you'd like, they're all fairly well established in recent research.

[5to9]

EDIT: I can provide sources for any of these claims if you'd like, they're all fairly well established in recent research.

Yes, please!

[slimicy]

EDIT: I can provide sources for any of these claims if you'd like, they're all fairly well established in recent research.

Yes, please!

This pretty much has all my arguments sourced, but again I can provide more on a specific topic if necessary: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-11-m ... ld-2013-11

[Ego]

Echoing what others have said above, each of us has a different disposition and do better or worse on certain diets. Extending that thought, there are diets that are fabulous for losing weight rapidly, diets for endurance sports, diets that are exceptional for high-intensity effort, muscle growth & maintenance, and still others that are best for longevity. Factor genetics, tastes and desired outcomes together and the possibilities are mindboggling.

It is fruitless (literally?) to encourage the weight loss diet for someone who wants to deadlift 500 pounds or the longevity diet for someone whose ultimate goal is to fit into a size 8 swimsuit by summer. I've made this error in the past.

[Felix]

I'm not interested in long discussions about this. I can make the research-based case for either side.

If you are interested in the other side of the argument, I'd suggest you watch this:
http://www.plantpositive.com

[JamesR]

What do the best diets have in common?

Less wheat/gluten.

What do the japan diet, Mediterranean diet, and diets from other parts of the world that have low heart disease, high longevity, etc.. have in common?

Less wheat. (Or less modern flours - flours in the last 50 years are quite a bit different).

[Felix]

Two of the blue zones (Sardinia and Loma Linda) eat lots of gluten-containing grains. Sardinians eat lots of barley and Loma Linda focuses on an Adventist diet with a strong recommendation for whole grains in the form of bread and pasta.

I'm not sure there is much credibility to the claim that modern western society suffers from eating too many whole grains. We hardly eat any.

[Chad]

It always seems that diets that require a full ban of one major type of food work, but work mostly because the banning of that one type of food forces you to eliminate large swaths of the unhealthy processed foods. In turn, this brings the overall calorie intake down and improves the quality of the food you are eating.

Of course, there are people who don't digest certain foods well, such as dairy and gluten. But, if you take those people out of the mix, it appears most unprocessed or very low processed food is at least ok for you.

Once you remove all the crap from your diet (probably 70-90% of the diet battle) then you can start experimenting with the different "micro" theories, such as paleo, vegan, vegetarian, etc. and see what works for you. Some of the "what works for you" will come from the ability to stay on a diet (no way I can stay on a vegan or vegetarian diet), some it from what goals you want (Ego covers this), and some of it will actually be because certain things may not work well with your body. There is no one size fits all.

This is the only way you can truly tell what works for you. If you took anyone on a normal American diet and put them on any of the micro theories it would be a success, because any of those diets would increase the quality of the food and reduce calories. Thus, all of them would appear to be "perfect" to anyone in any given situation (baring allergies and lack of genes).

[JamesR]

Felix, not sure where the whole grain thing is coming from. You don't think modern western society suffers from eating too much bread, pasta, wheat?

BTW, if you care, check out The Wheat Belly, it talks about how modern day wheat is significantly different from 100 years ago.