I’ve been a fan of the paleo diet for a while.  Tonight, I’ve started another paleo challenge.  Anyone catching me breaking the paleo rules between now and Christmas wins themselves $100.  I allow myself the following affordances to the rules: coffee, an occasional social glass of wine.

For those unfamiliar, with the paleo diet, you essentially eat what presumably those in the paleolithic era would – lean meats, vegetables, fruits, and nuts.  Refined foods, sugar, dairy, and grains, are a big no-no.  The “science” behind the diet states that we haven’t been able to evolve to digest these non-paleo foods.

According to S. Boyd Eaton, “we are the heirs of inherited characteristics accrued over millions of years; the vast majority of our biochemistry and physiology are tuned to life conditions that existed before the advent of agriculture some 10,000 years ago. Genetically our bodies are virtually the same as they were at the end of the Paleolithic era some 20,000 years ago.”

That said, I’m a fan of this diet, not because of the quoted science.  It’s a bit wonky.  I’m a fan because if forms the basis of what any good diet has:

1. Simple rules:  They don’t get any easier than “eat only vegetables, lean meats, and fruit”

2.  A diet consisting of mostly vegetables, lean meats, and fruit.  It’s really hard to eat unhealthy just eating that.