The promises of Paleo had been mulling about in the back of my mind for a while. I have a few coworkers who swear by it and the more I looked into going “primal” the more intrigued I became. In high school I had always been athletic– a peppy cheerleader, an avid lacrosse player and over the summer I conditioned regularly to maintain my tenacity. Regular practices and strength training helped me build muscle and working at our hometown gym instilled the importance of a healthy, balanced diet. Needless to say, I was in much better shape than I am now.
When I left for college I did well at the beginning, doing everything I could to stave off the dreaded “freshman fifteen.” I hit the treadmill, signed up for group fitness classes and took in Boston by foot. However, as the weeks waned on and classes picked I started missing a gym class in order to study, and quickly became too tired to get up at 5AM to hit the gym when I’d been out until 3AM the night before. I didn’t just slip, I fell–hard.
Five years of bar food and beer later, it’s time to find that place in my brain where I stored all of those healthy eating habits– and maybe learn some new ones.
On June 10th my boyfriend, J, and I decided to kick start our new healthy lifestyle by going Paleo. Basically Paleo (or Paleolithic) is a modern nutritional plan based on the presumed ancient diet of wild plants and animals that various hominid species habitually consumed during the Paleolithic era. In layman’s terms, we are going to eat what a caveman (or cave-woman) would eat!
To get started we researched, talked to our Paleo friends, ordered a cookbook and, of course, went grocery shopping!
Now I’m about to go on a side tangent for a minute and I apologize in advance…. but, have you ever been to Wegmans? If not, you should! We were like kids in a candy store– except it looked more like two adults getting way too excited about produce. We got great deals on everything we were looking for and they had a great selection of Paleo-friendly foods, like grass feed beef. Even though we live about a forty minute drive away, we plan to make the trip AT LEAST once a month–probably more–since we had such a great experience!
Okay, back to the topic at hand. We researched, made a list, and got everything we needed to start our Paleo life–spices, veggies, fruit, and LOTS of meat. We also picked up a few extras while we were out, like Dole’s Yonanas (more on that later).
So you may be thinking– “Thats all peachy kean but how was the food?.” Well, our first Paleo meal was dry rub burgers (from Everyday Paleo) and they were Ah-mazing!
Next we plan to try our hand at chicken piccata and yam spears. Maybe then we will actually remember to take a picture!