Author Topic: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets  (Read 20806 times)

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Offline TylerDurden

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #25 on: March 05, 2012, 09:57:10 pm »
Some fruit trees can grow in pretty cold climates, like apples/pears. And then there's the fact that palaeo peoples all went in for great migrations over very large areas in search of herds etc. So they weren't necessarily always in glacial regions. Plus, damage to health can be severe enough to force one to follow a variation of a particular diet. Maybe if I'd been healthy from birth, I could have done RZC without any problems, for example.

Lastly, I too am suspicious of diet being used as a means to explain behaviour. Sure, some behavioural changes may well be somewhat likely to be due to diet, but by no means all.

"During the last campaign I knew what was happening. You know, they mocked me for my foreign policy and they laughed at my monetary policy. No more. No more.
" Ron Paul.

Offline van

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #26 on: March 06, 2012, 11:08:42 am »
I can remember when I first started eating raw meat in good amounts.  I felt the anger come on.  My partner also noticed it.  Iguana might chime in here.  I really think there are two reasons.  One is that it was often said with the Instincto group, Nicole especially, that raw proteins are much more aggressive as cleansers than raw fruit sugars.  Hence, the raw meat proteins were (in theory) cleansing my body of all the years of eating denatured cooked proteins from meat.  The other reason is too often we eat more than our digestive ability can handle, hence undigested proteins leading to putrification in the large intestines, which in my experience can make me irritable.  Now, when respecting my limits, not overeating protein, I believe I am many more times calm than having up and down blood sugars. 

Offline Löwenherz

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #27 on: March 07, 2012, 04:51:11 am »
Some fruit trees can grow in pretty cold climates, like apples/pears.

Hey, please don't cheat!  :)

Paleo people have NEVER eaten apples and pears. BTW: Wild apples are inedible..

Löwenherz
« Last Edit: March 07, 2012, 04:56:25 am by Löwenherz »

Offline Löwenherz

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #28 on: March 07, 2012, 04:55:56 am »
I can remember when I first started eating raw meat in good amounts.  I felt the anger come on.  My partner also noticed it.  Iguana might chime in here.  I really think there are two reasons.  One is that it was often said with the Instincto group, Nicole especially, that raw proteins are much more aggressive as cleansers than raw fruit sugars.  Hence, the raw meat proteins were (in theory) cleansing my body of all the years of eating denatured cooked proteins from meat.  The other reason is too often we eat more than our digestive ability can handle, hence undigested proteins leading to putrification in the large intestines, which in my experience can make me irritable.  Now, when respecting my limits, not overeating protein, I believe I am many more times calm than having up and down blood sugars. 

I get angriness from raw red meat, always. If I eat the same amount of protein from white meat sources like fish, seafood and wild fowl I feel calm and relaxed. But the most critical component for me regarding mental reactions is fat from domesticated animals. I'm not sure if meat and fat from grass-fed but domesticated animals is safe in the long-run if you eat it regularly. There could be some factors involved we still don't know or expect..

Löwenherz


Offline cherimoya_kid

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #29 on: March 07, 2012, 10:45:39 am »
Hey, please don't cheat!  :)

Paleo people have NEVER eaten apples and pears. BTW: Wild apples are inedible..

Löwenherz


Wild apples are sour, but not inedible.

I guarantee you plenty of paleo people ate blueberries, blackberries, persimmons, pawpaws, raspberries, strawberries, and plenty of other fruits.
« Last Edit: March 07, 2012, 02:47:23 pm by TylerDurden »

Offline Löwenherz

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #30 on: March 08, 2012, 02:20:30 am »
I guarantee you plenty of paleo people ate blueberries, blackberries, persimmons, pawpaws, raspberries, strawberries, and plenty of other fruits.

PLENTY of fruits? In warm regions: Yes, of course. But I was referring to cold regions..

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Offline cherimoya_kid

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #31 on: March 08, 2012, 11:35:12 am »
PLENTY of fruits? In warm regions: Yes, of course. But I was referring to cold regions..

Löwenherz


Define "cold".  Pretty much all those fruits I mentioned grow in northern Maine. Are you saying northern Maine isn't cold?

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #32 on: March 09, 2012, 09:35:11 am »
I can remember when I first started eating raw meat in good amounts.  I felt the anger come on.  My partner also noticed it.  Iguana might chime in here.  I really think there are two reasons.  One is that it was often said with the Instincto group, Nicole especially, that raw proteins are much more aggressive as cleansers than raw fruit sugars.
For me it is the opposite, raw red meat and raw (long chain) animal fatty acids (suet, fatty fish, etc.) calm me more than anything I've ever tried, including raw organic fruits. They have been a godsend for me. I suspect that it is because I have a damaged gut and gut flora that don't enable me to digest fruits properly. I'm trying to heal that.
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

Offline aLptHW4k4y

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #33 on: March 10, 2012, 05:46:32 am »
I suspect that it is because I have a damaged gut and gut flora that don't enable me to digest fruits properly. I'm trying to heal that.
I don't think you need any specific gut flora to digest fruits.. fruits are basically simple sugars and free amino acids in water, that's as easy to digest as it can be.

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #34 on: March 10, 2012, 10:25:55 am »
Well, I can understand you're thinking that based on your experience, I have no doubt that's true for many people (such as Denise Minger, whose blog I find quite interesting, and Danny Roddy, with whom I have had amicable correspondence and whose ebook I purchased), and I adore fruits/berries (don't most people here?), and oh how I hope that some day that will be my experience too. I wasn't trying to suggest otherwise (my general approach is to ask questions and experiment, not tell other people what to do). All I meant is that in my experience I seem to need something (if not improved gut flora, then apparently something else), because many raw whole organic fruits (including both "sweet", like bananas and dates, and "fatty", like avocados) cause me chapped lips, dry skin on the face and scalp, toe and foot cramps, acne, and dental crud when I eat too much, despite eating plenty of carbs for quite some months now (which is part of the reason why I changed what I was calling the diet I was eating from "facultative carnivore" to "adaptivore"--I added note of my current adaptivore approach to my sig, so I hope that will make it more clear that I'm not currently following a very low carb approach).

That experience of mine with fruits doesn't seem like optimal digestion and absorption to me (unless you think that those symptoms are normal for fruits, which I highly doubt that you do), so I'm not sure that you can necessarily assume that everyone easily digests all fruits (see also discussion aid #4 in my sig--I accept that you're telling the truth when you say that fruits are easy for you to digest without problems, I wouldn't presume to tell you what your experience is, and I hope you will show me the same courtesy). However, raw organic or wild berries and raw organic fresh figs don't do this to me unless I eat what seems like quite a lot.

It's an interesting coincidence that Tyler also reports preferring berries to other fruits and, IIRC, I think he mentioned getting some negative effects from tropical fruits, yes? ... Sure enough, a quick search produced this:
I also do badly on  tropical fruits, whereas fruits from more northerly climes(berries, apples, pears and the like) I do fine on.

http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/instinctoanopsology/instinctos-tropical-paradise/msg46448/#msg46448
Plus, fermented raw honey causes me much less of these problems than unfermented raw honey. The only apparent difference between the two that I'm aware of is the fermentation, and thus the flora and some predigestion of the honey that the flora does, so I don't understand why you would assume that flora and/or the predigestion that they do are not a factor in fruits. I've noticed that many raw vegans, including especially 80-10-10ers, recommend letting fruit get super-ripe (and thus apparently predigested into simpler sugars and maybe even partly fermented) before eating it, so even they appear to recognize that the predigestion into simpler sugars by microbiota make fruits easier for even longtime vegans to digest. Thus, one possible reason that some people get negative symptoms from fruits while others don't could theoretically be differences in flora in the body.

Side note: I buy and gather the absolute best quality fruit that is available to me in the local markets  (healthfood markets, farmers markets and supermarkets) and nature, and test various fruits to see which cause the least problems.

Believe it or not, I actually receive some contradiction at low carb forums and blogs for being too positive about fruits and honey. That plus the contradiction and even insults (not from you, of course) I receive at times in this forum for reporting less than optimal results from certain fruits and unfermented honeys tells me that I'm not being at all dogmatic and probably striking a pretty decent balance, which suits me fine.
« Last Edit: March 10, 2012, 12:46:41 pm by PaleoPhil »
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

Offline cherimoya_kid

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #35 on: March 10, 2012, 01:09:38 pm »
Phil, I would eat my bananas and other fruits practically rotten during my 80/10/10 days. I still do, usually, and they are much easier for me to digest that way.  My digestion is much stronger now, but I still digest fruit better when it's very overripe.
« Last Edit: March 10, 2012, 02:48:54 pm by TylerDurden »

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #36 on: March 11, 2012, 12:11:17 am »
Thanks for that experiential confirmation, Cherimoya. One running theme I've noticed in discussions of the world's healthiest foods is "raw fermented." Again and again it comes up, and across every food category (raw fermented fruit, raw fermented honey, raw fermented cabbage--aka sauerkraut, raw fermented meat--aka high meat, raw fermented fish--aka stinkfish, raw fermented cod liver oil, etc.). It's interesting that ripening, raw fermenting, freezing, cracking and pounding (such as a monkey cracking a nut shell with a rock), and biting/chewing are the main, maybe the only, types of processing of food in wild nature (other than the occasional cooked food from forest fires). When I stick to mainly those natural forms of processing, I notice I tend to fare better.

I too notice that I seem to digest fruits and all foods better when they're "rotted"/"over-ripened"/fermented, though there may be an initial adaptive period to get over, such as I seemed to experience with sauerkraut. This ties into the thread topic in that I think the ripening aspect is one factor that could enable many low carbers to consume more carbs than they do with little or no ill effects. However, even ripening and fermenting fruit doesn't seem to get rid of all the issues for me, so I suspect that my system is damaged in such a way and to such a degree (and I think it traces back to before I was even born, because my mother and father had some chronic health issues too and I suspect that my mother's gut flora were rather suboptimal) that even "over-ripening" and fermenting fruit is not enough to completely overcome all those issues.

There seems to be a broad spectrum of ability to digest and generally handle fruit. Some people seem to thrive on any fruit, even not heavily ripened fruit, others need to thoroughly ripen it, or avoid certain fruits, like tropical fruits, say, and then are fine, and for still others like me, even that may not be quite enough. I do find I handle berries and fresh figs reasonably well, and I experiment with other fruits. I notice that some fruits seem to lend themselves well to heavy ripening & fermenting, like bananas and cherimoyas, so I do let them go pretty far before I eat them, whereas others, like berries, do not (I searched on fruit ripening and found this video explaining that certain fruits like strawberries, raspberries, pineapples, and honeydew melons do not ripen further after being picked, whereas others, like bananas, peaches, pears, avocado, cassava, canteloupe, do: Ripening fruit: How to ripen fruit at home--and this list of fruits that do and don't ripen after picking: http://about-food.livejournal.com/59037.html). This is one of the few areas that Durianrider was actually helpful in, when he showed the partially blackened state that his bananas are in before he eats them. This is one tip about how to eat fruit that most people who aren't vegans don't seem to know about. I know I was unaware of it.

Now I'm the only guy in the cafeteria who reaches for the black-spotted bananas that everyone else passes up (on those rare occasions when I do eat one--not only do I handle berries better than tropical fruits, I also try to eat mainly fruits that are raised in the local region and ripened mainly on the plants, which includes berries and excludes tropical fruits).
« Last Edit: March 11, 2012, 12:40:02 am by PaleoPhil »
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

Offline cherimoya_kid

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #37 on: March 11, 2012, 03:47:17 am »
Yeah, doing the 80/10/10 thing will really turn you into a fruit expert.

I generally only eat organic bananas, or the Thai bananas that I can get at the Korean Super G mart.  They have much more flavor than the conventional supermarket bananas, and and also higher Brix.

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #38 on: March 11, 2012, 05:51:46 am »
Yeah, I almost always buy the best of whatever is available to me. I've never seen bananas labeled as "Thai bananas" here. One potential downside to organic bananas is that they have been alleged to be the most destructive food crop in the world, according to DanKoeppel, author of "Banana: The Fruit that Changed the World" http://www.amazon.com/Banana-Fate-Fruit-Changed-World
and Zak Martin-Kilgour, raw vegetarian diet practitioner and promoter Bananas: The Worlds Most Destructive Crop #288
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

Offline Löwenherz

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #39 on: March 11, 2012, 06:43:04 pm »
... and fermenting fruit doesn't seem to get rid of all the issues for me, so I suspect that my system is damaged in such a way and to such a degree

PP, could fructose malabsorption in some degree be involved in your case?

Here is my own experience with fruits on a raw paleo diet:

In the last years I noticed (again and again) that I can't handle more than one or two pieces of fruit per day AS LONG as I eat very saturated animals fats (usually from beef and lamb) on a regular basis. And I know several low carbers with high animal fat consumption who cannot eat even one piece of fruit without negative reactions. I think that this is not necessarily a malfunction. I can program my system to process fruit carbs in any amount OR animal fats but never ever both.

On the other hand fats like coconut milk and olive oil actually improve my ability to digest fruits. Furthermore fats from wild animals like wild boar and wild pheasant don't have negative impacts on my GI system.

Löwenherz

Offline cherimoya_kid

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #40 on: March 11, 2012, 10:12:24 pm »
Yeah, I almost always buy the best of whatever is available to me. I've never seen bananas labeled as "Thai bananas" here.

You probably can't get them at a local store in your area.  You have to have a large Korean/Chinese/etc. market to find them, usually. I'm really lucky to have Super G mart, they have an incredible selection of tropical and temperate fruits, both domestic and foreign, and their prices are extremely low, below cost, I think, actually.  They're trying to drive all the other ethnic foods markets in Greensboro out of business, and then raise their own prices. Meanwhile, I benefit from the price war.  I don't know what I'll do when they win, though.  I'll be screwed.


Offline aLptHW4k4y

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #41 on: March 11, 2012, 11:54:36 pm »
PP, could fructose malabsorption in some degree be involved in your case?
That's what I was thinking of, I mean I associate digestion problems with bloating, cramping, diarrhea, etc.
The symptoms Phil is listing indicate something like an allergic reaction, I'm not sure how's digestion connected here.
Quote
On the other hand fats like coconut milk and olive oil actually improve my ability to digest fruits. Furthermore fats from wild animals like wild boar and wild pheasant don't have negative impacts on my GI system.
How are fats from coconut milk and from coconut oil different?

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #42 on: March 12, 2012, 01:24:29 am »
Sorry for the lengthiness of this post. There's much to ponder here.

PP, could fructose malabsorption in some degree be involved in your case?
It's possible and I have read up on that in the past, and reviewed it again to refresh my memory, but the symptoms don't match well to mine, as aLptHW4k4y pointed out. However, there is an interesting fair amount of correlation with which fruits trigger the most symptoms for me, though not perfect correlation.

Wild Maine blueberries seem to be my best tolerated fruit. I found that my local market carries frozen wild Maine blueberries, so I decided to really put them to the test. I ate about 3/4 of the 17 oz carton at a single sitting and it only triggered a brief very minor bit of sinus mucus, which I suspect was due more to the coldness of the frozen berries (cold food and weather trigger sinus mucus in me, though more so when I'm regularly eating carbs than not) than the berries themselves. It didn't trigger any of the other common symptoms I get from certain fruits (chapped lips, dry skin, acne, dental crud, ...). So I seem to handle wild Maine blueberries rather well indeed, and blueberries do reportedly contain a decent fructose/glucose ratio, though far from the best. This makes me curious about whether many of the most vocal and combative LC dieters who demonize fruits would handle uncommon fruits like wild Maine blueberries or other wild berries relatively well. It might help them see that all fruits are not poison for everyone.

On the other hand, I haven't noticed bad reactions to fresh figs, and "figs" are usually listed in the lists of fruits that fructose malabsorbers should avoid, due to allegedly having high fructose/glucose ratios. However, those lists don't specify whether the figs are dried or fresh, and it's fresh figs that I handle pretty well, so I did some searching and found this:

"Ninety-two percent of the carbohydrates in dried figs are sugars (42% glucose, 31% fructose, 0.1% sucrose). "
 About Figs, http://www.asianonlinerecipes.com/vegetables-guide/figs.php

...which indicates that dried figs actually have an excellent fructose/glucose ratio! So maybe it depends on the variety of fig, or maybe the high fructose claims for figs are just wrong?

Then there's the puzzle of my getting negative symptoms from unfermented raw honey, but much less negative effects and even some amazing positive effects from fermented raw honey. Is fermented honey lower in fructose than unfermented?

Quote
Here is my own experience with fruits on a raw paleo diet:

In the last years I noticed (again and again) that I can't handle more than one or two pieces of fruit per day AS LONG as I eat very saturated animals fats (usually from beef and lamb) on a regular basis.
It's a plausible possibility and I explored this somewhat in the past and reported my findings, which didn't match up well with that. I actually seem to fare just as well or better with fruits on days and weeks that I include plenty of animal fats, including those rich in saturated fats, than when I don't, and I have done stretches where I didn't eat much animal fat. I do often eat fruits by themselves, rather than with a lot of animal fat in the same meal, which coincidentally matches the GAPS diet recommendation, but I don't notice any ill effects when I do eat them together, such as in my versions of Eskimo agutuk (mixtures of animal fat with berries and other foods--even mixing honey with animal fat didn't cause any noticeable problems) or putting olive oil on a salad that contains fruits. Coconut and avocado are the exception to this for me. They contain both fats (though not animal fats) and sugars within the same food, and they both give me some negative symptoms, including when I eat the portions of coconut that contain both carbs and fats and when I ate some berries with coconut milk, but it's the case even when I eat the coconut fat separately from any carby foods. I haven't noticed any negative symptoms from avocado oil, so I suspect that something else in avocado is causing me the mild symptoms from it.

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On the other hand fats like coconut milk and olive oil actually improve my ability to digest fruits.
I am currently experimenting with coconut milk and coconut water, so I hope that will work for me too. It looks like my tolerance for coconut milk is still limited. I thought I was handling it well, so I increased my intake and ended up vomiting when eating raw cheese and some berries with plenty of coconut milk, which is a very rare occurrence for me and took me sufficiently by surprise that I just barely made it to the toilet in time to avoid a mess. I seem to be handling coconut water rather well (perhaps because it is lower in the MCT fats that seem to generate nausea in me?) and can mix it with other foods with no problems.

Quote
Quote from: Löwenherz on Today at 05:43:04 am
PP, could fructose malabsorption in some degree be involved in your case?
That's what I was thinking of, I mean I associate digestion problems with bloating, cramping, diarrhea, etc.
The symptoms Phil is listing indicate something like an allergic reaction, I'm not sure how's digestion connected here.
Except that I don't get the typical allergic reaction symptoms like anaphylaxis either. Plus, fructose malabsorption isn't the only issue with digestion and absorption. Maybe my use of the word "digestion" is causing the hangup here? Absorption or processing or some other term or a mixture of terms may be better when it comes to fruits than digestion. I just meant that I don't process fruits as well as most people and I and my mother and other relatives have multiple issues that have been tied to suboptimal gut flora, so it seems possible that that may be a factor. I didn't mean to imply that I think it's the only factor, but didn't word it clearly. I hope this clarifies things better.

Interestingly, Sally Fallon says that fermented honey "is an even better aid to digestion than regular honey." Since the only differences I'm aware of between fermented and unfermented honey are the microbiota in the fermented honey and the predigestion/processing they do of it, why wouldn't differences in microbiota be a potential factor in differences in handling honey and fruits between individuals?

I would be surprised if fructose malabsorption and food allergies were the only factors involved in those that don't handle fruits as well as others. For example, I suspect my zinc deficiency may be a factor. Coincidentally, I stumbled upon this while reviewing fructose malabsorption:

"Some effects of fructose malabsorption are decreased tryptophan, folic acid[5] and zinc in the blood.[6]" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fructose_malabsorption)

Thanks for the ideas, Lowenherz and aLptHW4k4y. They have led me to some confirmation of one of my hypothesized factors (zinc deficiency) and caused me to think about that some more. Now I'm curious whether increased supplementation might improve my fruit toleration.
« Last Edit: March 12, 2012, 01:46:20 am by PaleoPhil »
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

Offline aLptHW4k4y

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #43 on: March 12, 2012, 02:25:19 am »
Most probably the bacteria consumed some of the sugar in fermented honey (just as it happens in yogurt) so it's lower than normal honey.
If you eat red meat you'll get plenty of zinc. How do you know you're zinc deficient?
I still think it's some sort of an allergic reaction to something. Histamine is usually released as a response to an allergen, here's some of the symptoms, are they similar to what you get? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histamine#Effects_on_nasal_mucous_membrane

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #44 on: March 12, 2012, 03:45:19 am »
Most probably the bacteria consumed some of the sugar in fermented honey (just as it happens in yogurt) so it's lower than normal honey.
It seems likely, though not absent. It would be interesting to learn what the sugar content is in fermented honey.

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If you eat red meat you'll get plenty of zinc.
Quite right. I found raw red meat to be the most beneficial food of all with regards to my symptoms that are connected to low zinc.

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How do you know you're zinc deficient?
Years ago I found that there was a strong correlation between multiple of my symptoms and zinc, including scientific studies, medical reports, patient anecdotes, etc., so I tried supplementing and found that it helped greatly with some of them, and also found that when I stopped supplementing that the symptoms returned to their original full extent. I learned that a cousin of mine was also found to be very zinc deficient. Recently I confirmed the connection with a zinc tally test, which a Chris Kresser podcast tipped me off about when he mentioned that a study found it to be an effective test, as did some of his patients.

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I still think it's some sort of an allergic reaction to something. Histamine is usually released as a response to an allergen, here's some of the symptoms, are they similar to what you get? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histamine#Effects_on_nasal_mucous_membrane
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Effects on nasal mucous membrane
Increased vascular permeability causes fluid to escape from capillaries into the tissues, which leads to the classic symptoms of an allergic reaction: a runny nose and watery eyes. Allergens can bind to IgE-loaded mast cells in the nasal cavity's mucous membranes. This can lead to three clinical responses:[9]
- sneezing due to histamine-associated sensory neural stimulation;
- hyper-secretion from glandular tissue; and
- nasal congestion due to vascular engorgement associated with vasodilation and increased capillary permeability.
I experience no runny nose or watery eyes and no sneezing whatsoever after eating fruits, despite a past history of "hay fever" type "allergies" which resulted in me being put on a long-term course of allergy shots as a child. I sneeze so rarely since going raw Paleo that it's now a notable event when I do sneeze (and it's extremely rare for me to sneeze more than once at a time), whereas many of my coworkers sneeze at least a few times a day, often in bursts of two, three or more sneezes, and think nothing of it. I joke when they sneeze three times or more that it means there will be rain (my mother used to say that when I was a child and sneezed repeatedly quite a bit).

I found this that suggests that zinc deficiency is very common in fructose malabsorption:

"[F]ructose malabsorption is associated with lower serum zinc concentrations; in this study, 10 of 147 subjects (6.8%) had zinc deficiency, and all 10 suffered from fructose malabsorption. Although this is probably not attributable to a shortened transit time of a defective DMT-1-transporter, the exact mechanism still remains to be elucidated. Fructose malabsorption may thus reflect only part of a more complex malabsorption syndrome. Because fructose malabsorption can be seen in approximately one-third of the Western European population, fructose malabsorption could be a major etiology of low zinc status." http://www.clinchem.org/content/47/4/745.full

I don't appear to have typical full-fledged fructose malabsorption, but the connection is interesting. Now that I find that it's questionable whether figs really do have a high fructose/glucose ratio, which was one of the things that caused me to doubt the importance of fructose absorption in my case, that is more back on my radar again. I wonder if some people get different symptoms from fructose malabsorption than the standard clinical symptoms? Or maybe zinc deficiency alone can explain most of my fruit-related symptoms and higher fructose fruits are somewhat more of an issue for zinc deficient people despite their not having full-fledged fructose malabsorption? I haven't found a lot written on zinc and fruits, unfortunately.
« Last Edit: March 12, 2012, 03:57:04 am by PaleoPhil »
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

Offline PaleoPhil

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Re: Macronutrient ratios in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets
« Reply #45 on: March 12, 2012, 05:16:09 am »
In my searching I learned that another of my past symptoms, chronic intermittent canker sores, is associated with zinc deficiency: "We've also found that a Zinc deficiency can cause canker sores." (Canker Sores
http://www.ashcenter.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=102&Itemid=74)

I also found the following possible links between zinc deficiency, fructose intake, hydrogen peroxide, inflammation, tissue oxidative damage, and mucous membrane irritation:

Zinc deficiency induces hydrogen peroxide release in human cells (Role of reactive oxygen species in zinc deficiency-induced hepatic stellate cell activation. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16085181 and Zinc deficiency in neuronal biology, onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1080/15216540701225966/pdf).

Zinc deficiency is associated with oxidative stress and tissue oxidative damage:

> "Zn deficiency can lead to a condition of oxidative stress which has been consistently observed in cell and animal models (24 – 27). Zn deficiency is associated with higher than normal levels of tissue oxidative damage, including increased lipid, protein and DNA oxidation (24, 25, 28) and with altered activity and concentration of enzymes and other components of the oxidant defense system (27, 29)." (Zinc Deficiency in Neuronal Biolog, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1080/15216540701225966/pdf)
> In neuronal cells, Zn deficiency induces oxidative stress...." (Zinc deficiency in neuronal biology, onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1080/15216540701225966/pdf)

It looks like zinc deficiency and excess fructose intake (at least for the heated and refined fructose used in studies) both can contribute to "protein oxidative damage" and that zinc deficiency may make one more prone to this damage from fructose. (Influence of dietary carbohydrate on zinc-deficiency-induced changes in oxidative defense mechanisms and tissue oxidative damage in rats, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10493186)

Chronic inflammation can induce and worsen oxidative damage (Chronic inflammation and oxidative stress in human carcinogenesis, http://www.livingmed.com/pdf/ChronicInflammation.pdf). In turn, protein oxidants like hydrogen peroxide "may activate inflammatory molecules, further worsening tissue damage" and people who are zinc deficient may be prone to accumulate high levels of hydrogen peroxide (Intestinal damage induced by zinc deficiency is associated with enhanced CuZn superoxide dismutase activity in rats: effect of dexamethasone or thyroxine treatment. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10381190).

The oxidant hydrogen peroxide is "mildly irritating to the ... mucous membranes" (What Are the Dangers of Nasal Irrigation With Hydrogen Peroxide? http://www.livestrong.com/article/184779-what-are-the-dangers-of-nasal-irrigation-with-hydrogen-peroxide/).
>"When some one eats an Epi paleo Rx template and follows the rules of circadian biology they get plenty of starches when they are available three out of the four seasons." -Jack Kruse, MD
>"I recommend 20 percent of calories from carbs, depending on the size of the person" -Ron Rosedale, MD (in other words, NOT zero carbs) http://preview.tinyurl.com/6ogtan
>Finding a diet you can tolerate is not the same as fixing what's wrong. -Tim Steele
Beware of problems from chronic Very Low Carb

 

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