An ongoing experiment in a primal family... page

[Team Oberg]

My husband and I have started our journey into the cave, I thought tracking our progress would be a good addition. We have a couple of primal pets as well(with some cave babies coming in the near future I hope), a rottweilier puppy and a kitten, they are on a diet of raw beef tripe, which smells horribly, but it actually the most nutritious food for them. Anyone else who is interested in this should look up the company K9 Kraving

K-9 Kraving Raw Diet Dog Food

After christmas at my parents, getting back on track was difficult, a typical day of meals at their house looked something like this:

Breakfast: pancakes and sausage
Snacks: bread dips and processes cheese dips
Dinner: Lasagna

Also, an unlimited supply of pepsi, cookies, candy, and other various junkfood....no wonder why my 45 year old mother already has rheumatoid arthritis!

Upon returning home, we felt like absolutle garbage, we were only on a paleo-style diet for a month or so prior, but I was anxious to return. My husband, who has bucked me quite a bit on this says that I can be "too restrictive," I must apologize if I dont think nitrite ridden lunchmeat is real food! Before going primal we lived a very healthy life by American standards, plenty of exercise, lots of fresh whole food with emphasis on good portions of protien on vegetables at every meal, but still fell prey to the low-fat whole-grain dogma that is shoved down our throats by the FDA. After reading (well only halfway done so far) The Primal Blueprint, and doing extensive research on the health benefits of going primal, we took the plunge. My promise to him was eat my way for 40 days, if you dont like it, you can do whatever you please, but at least try.

So far, our biggest problem to date was him finding healthy selections at work, he is in the Army and the chow hall doesn't offer the best fare and that he is always hungry, so my solution was to make some pumpkin almond "bread", trail mix bars, and put together lots of acceptable, and calorically dense snacks for him to take.

As of right now, I will consider the starting point to be the first of January 2012, I plan to post updates about my progress, some recipies, and health markers.

My stats:
5'7
139 lbs
no health problems to speak of, except a kidney problem left over from when I was a child.

My Husband:
5'10
a muscular 185 lbs
and a bad IT band on his leg as a result of too much running and olympic lifting with not enough stretching, for which he is in physical therapy for as we speak.

I will conclude my post with the pumpkin bread recipie (the one that worked not the one i threw out) which went over so well in our home:

1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1 cup almond butter (I used crunchy)
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp of baking soda
4 tbs melted organic butter

and whatever spices you wish too add, I used generous amounts of cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger because it is what i had on hand, feel free to add cloves or allspice to the mix

Heat the oven to 325
Mix all ingredients together, and pour into a greased loaf pan
Bake 45 min to an hour until the center comes out almost clean (I like it a bit gooey but thats just me)

One great thing about this, it is not actually as sweet as i thought it would be, it could be used in sammiches, which i wanted to try with a curried chicken salad typr of lunch, but my DH took the rest of it to work.

[Cassanina]

Welcome! My pup is on a grain-free diet as well and definitely has benefited! She used to get a lot of skin irritation and that's all but vanished! I also feed her coconut oil everyday and that makes her coat soft and shiny.

Always happy to see another primal family, animals included!

[Team Oberg]

People ask what we feed our puppy, because he looks like he is on steroids! It was interesting to learn that grains aren't for humans, but it's common sense that they aren't for dogs.

[Team Oberg]

After a long day of dehydrating apples and bananas in the oven to add to trail mix for the husband, I figured I would stop for a minute to track our dinner, which will be turkey burgers on lettuce, prosciutto wrapped asparagus, and a big green salad.

My workout for the day was pretty light, since I have a bit of soreness in my thighs, I figured I would give it a rest until tomorrow.

While sitting down to reflect on my day a bit I was reminded of my physical scheduled for the 13th. As of right now I am feeling pretty excited to have an actual medical set point to track my progress from.

[Team Oberg]

Good morning fellow cavemen!!! I woke up this morning feeling absolutley great!! I have an exercise-high just from getting out of bed. I have sworn off carbs and processed food in the past, but continued to eat extremely low fat at the same time, and always hit a "carb flu" after 3 or 4 days. This time, with the increased fat intake I feel a sense of mental clarity. While I hope this lasts, I am prepared for a bit of whiplash as my body purges some toxins.

Todays agenda is a kettlebell workout this morning and some yoga in the afternoon. Also, I am making a creamy coconut milk curry tonight with chicken and lots of veggies!

I have been practicing IF since this summer, but have never done more than about 24 hours, I am thinking of trying an alternate day fast thursday to help my body purge whatever toxic junk is left in my cells. I will be alone since my hubby has staff duty that night (meaning he has to be at work all night). I fount an interesting article on a study of ADF in non-obese patients.

http://azurgames.free.fr/fichiers/hy...%20fasting.pdf

The first day will be fine but sleeping that night might be a little difficult. I will post my results.

Has anyone here tried Quercetin? I know it is a non-essential supplement, but I have been using it for a few days. Ok...truth moment, I bought into the hype, Lance Armstrong and Tebow use it, along with a list of other athletes, so why not me? Two days in and I really feel incredible, not sure if this is diet or quercetin or both, but I like waking up alert, energetic, and focused.

Have a great day!!!

[Team Oberg]

Day five, feeling good starting my fast today. This is a delicate area for me, since over the years I have struggled with weight issues, more specifically unhealthy ambitions to be constantly thinner no matter where that took me. For the first time though I am choosing not to eat for health reasons, instead of superficial ones. The growth hormone realease and improved insulin sensitivity from the occasional fast are well worth it to me now that I am committed to being healthy.

At the lowest there were only 108 lbs on my 5'7 frame, the highest was 165. Today in the 130s I can say with certainty that I am happy with my body. Hopefully this journey

ok...enough with the sob story, the agenda for today is walking to the grocery store (its a pretty decent walk and all uphill the way back), a kettlebell workout, and as always playing with the pup, letting him chase me around for a few minutes gets my heart pumping!

With all this time alone I will have a chance to finish up some books I have been working on, including PB. My kindle says I am 66% done with that, my goal is by tomorrow to make it 100%

[Team Oberg]

I am a bit excited right now, I discovered a few things at the market I like walking to. I love this international supermarket because they have a lot of real food at good prices, I had to go pick up more coconut milk, vinegar, coconut oil, and honey for my pantry and some chicken legs for dinner tomorrow and found a cache of dried mushrooms, yerba mate, dried coconut, and chamomile flowers hiding on bottom shelves that I had previously overlooked. Yerba mate is one of my favorite teas for people who havent tried it, it only has trace amounts of caffine but gives an incredible amount of mental acuity. Well that is all for now, I just wanted to let out my excitement, and only my fellow cave dwellers would understand how exciting it is to find quality cooking supplies that dont cost a fortune

Also, hiking back up hill will a huge tote bag full of heavy groceries kept my heart rate at about 80% max the whole time....next time I will slow it down a bit

[Team Oberg]

What a mistake, my logic finally overtook my constant desire to do better and I ate a sensible dinner and dessert of strawberries sprinkled with coconut.

[Team Oberg]

This morning started off pretty perky, excited about my DH coming home tonight. I plan on making him some broiled chicken legs, sauteed green beans in garlic, and I need to run out and get more strawberries since the ones yesterday really hit the spot. Sometimes you just need that little reminder of summer!!

Also, I am having cravings for chocolate...probably a result of the hedonistic christmas weekend I had. Anyway, I found this recipie...

* 3-4 Tbsp coconut oil
* 1/4 cup carob powder or cocoa (optional)
* 1/2 cups ground nuts (almonds, hazelnuts, sunflower seeds etc.)
* 3/4 cups dried shredded unsweetened coconut
* 1 Tbsp or more to taste honey (optional)
1. Start by melting the honey and oil in a saucepan over medium heat on the stove
2. Grind nuts in food processor, then add carob and nuts and coconut
3. Form into a square by dumping into a small baking sheet and refrigerate or freeze until hard (only about 10 min!)
4. Cut and eat

What a nice treat that will be!!

[MikkiB]

I had never heard of quercetin, but according to it's wikipedia entry may be anti-inflammatory and anti-prostaglandin, so I might try it. Do you get a particular brand?