Does anyone not eat pasta, rice, bread, potatoes for health reasons rather than to lose weight?

[nappyaddict]

I have read a few articles about people who have either totally cut out these foods or cut down on them for health reasons because they believe that human's are not meant to digest potatoes and grains. Until recently (the last 10,000 years or so), humans existed primarily on meat and vegetation, as things like grains and potatoes were too difficult to grow and cook until the dawn of the agricultural and industrial revolutions. Most of the animals eaten at this time ate grass and vegetation, and as such had a high nutrient content.

I am considering cutting down on these things to see if it makes me feel better and then possibly cutting them out totally.

If you have cut them out, have your DP and DC also cut them out?

I have eaten ribbons of squash before as an alternative to pasta but I am struggling with what else to eat with chilli, bolognese, curry, quesadillas, burritos, tacos, fajitas etc? DP doesn't like courgette which I have also seen as pasta-style ribbons. Do you just eat a plate of it with no accompaniment or do you serve extra veg with it as well as the veg that's already chopped up and mixed within the meat mixture?

Also we love pancakes. Any ideas for pancake alternatives?

What do you eat with soup, boiled eggs, burgers and hot dogs if no bread, pasta, rice or potatoes?

What about packed lunches if no sandwiches, wraps, pittas?

I am hoping there is someone out there who was as mad as me to consider
this and has already tried and tested this way of eating :)

Apparently almond and coconut flour is OK, so if I buy a breadmaker I suppose I could find some bread recipes using those.

potatoes and rice are both carbs that are known to be very gentle on the digestive system and most nutritionists will tell you that the human gut has evolved enough to be able to cope with wheat/grains/starches.

If you think you eat too much wheat then I think you'd be better off cutting down rather than cutting out. I definitely wouldn't make growing kids cut it out - they contain fibre and important B vitamins.

Remember that the ancestors you are talking about probably have a life expectancy of around 28 years and suffered from all sorts of vitamin deficiencies!

I rarely eat bread, never eat pasta, small amounts of potatoes but eat rice every few weeks.

They just make me feel shit. It's hard to explain - I just get sluggish,constipated and tired when I eat them. So I avoid.

I eat steamed broccoli with bolognase. I like cous cous. I don't eat sandwiches - I eat salads instead. I end up taking food in my bag to eat but it suits me.

I don't encourage dh or the dc to eat the same as me as those foods don't bother them.

I have cut down (but not out) on these. This is due to IBS.

I eat a lot of lunches without carbs at all - in winter I take stews (chill, winter veg stew, etc, mostly with lots of protein) into work to microwave. In summer it's salads - I don't mean greens but for example a roast vegetable salad with balsamic dressing and rocket. I pre prepare a lot of food.

I have not cut out any carbs but I do try to rotate them as I do find if I eat too much bread (for example) it does upset my digestion.

So in a week I would meal plan to have something like potatoes one day, couscous with a stir-fry the next, quinoa with a warm salad the next, rice and curry the next, pasta the next and then two days on repeat. As dh eats what I prepare he also eats this. The dc don't.

I think trying to go completely grain & carb free is a bit barmy. Too much hard work unless you have to. And I don't really accept the Stone age Diet hypotheses about ideal human diets being 30% meat or whatever; you can read up online how folk make Stone Age type diet work for practical tips. Bunch of zealots by and large, though.

It's not that hard to cut down, to have carbs as a small part of the meal, not the main source of calories in it. I just have a gut feeling that this is healthier (not too many carbs, especially not too many simple carbs).

Apparently DD got teased if she brought in anything but a sarnie for lunch, so I dunno how others make child lunches work if they aren't compelled to for health reasons.

Blimey - teased for not having a sandwich . Really?

We have smaller portions of carb foods because my DD has type 1 diabetes and we find too much carb makes blood glucose control more difficult. We haven't cut out carbs, just more careful about how much we serve. For example with pizza and pasta we'll serve a salad with it rather than eating a larger portion without a salad. We'll add more ragu sauce and less pasta, lasagne has fewer pasta sheets and more filling. Roast dinners we'll have a larger serving of meat and veg with a smaller portion of roast spuds. Breakfast cereals we have in smaller portions but then add a yoghurt and/or fruit salad. We don't opt for low fat anything as usually low fat means more sugar/carb. We try to balance our meals like this as a family rather than only for DD.

yeah, I was surprised, but things like boiled eggs or just having the wrong sandwich bag can attract an unkind comment. Kids are cruel!

That is weird Don'teatthevoles. Mine have never had that.

Kids are weird [smoke]

[smoke] ?

that would be weird.

It's called the Paleo diet isn't it? Rather trendy at the mo so I hear.

In terms of a rice replacement I use grated cauliflower all the time. Simply grate or chop a handful of raw cauliflower in a food processor or on a hand grater and microve for 3-4 mins - easy, tasty and practically zero carbs. I use this with bolognaise, sweet & sour/stir fry dishes, and anything in that vein. I also use cauliflower as a potato replacement when served as whole veg so meat & 2 veg type dishes I just do a portion of cauliflower for me.

People are evolving to thrive on the agricultural diet, but it's not complete. Potatoes and white rice have very little against them from a digestability perspective and there's few populations who can't digest them well so more rarely cause a problem. Other grains, particularly less processed versions have more people who cannot digest so well and fail to get good nutrients and get IBS etc.

The stone age diet argument is very dubious though - if you're a northern european, you're evolved from farmers who likely had extreme pressure to thrive on farming. If we were really like stone age people none of us would have lactase persistence yet most of us do.

You may be someone who does poorly on grains, try excluding them and see what happens - it's not that difficult!

Carbs give me insomnia, also we have a high incidence of type 11 diabetes in the family so limiting starch and sugar will help me avoid getting that dreadful disease. We have had the problem of dcs being teased about their weird lunches too, my dcs find sandwiches to be too dull to eat every day. I have spoken to the HT because I feel children should learn good table manners in a school environment and I feel making negative comments about someone else's food is rude and it should not be allowed to continue. Dcs are learning to brush it off too.

I have insomnia and always feel tired and sluggish. I wonder in carbs could be the reason ...

Pagwatch, that's odd, cous cous and pasta are the same thing.

No. Not odd.
I eat a tablespoon of wholewheat cous cous rather than the bowl of white pasta I used to eat.

And I was talking about how white carbs affected me. I wasn't telling others how they should eat.

I have often wanted to try this out. just to see if I would feel better. Do you get any withdrawals from reducing carbs?

I use lettuce leaves when I have chilli or fajitas instead of the wraps.

I did the food doctor diet a while back.DH amazingly did it with me. We both felt like shit for the first 3 days, then we both felt absolutely amazing, really well, bouncy, energetic, just really really amazing and positive. I was astonishing. Among other things, one of the things he cut out was wheat, and says to avoid grains, but when you do eat them, to vary them a lot, so quinoa, spelt etc. Very interesting. We both drifted back to our old ways, and both feel terrible again, and in fact dd and I are being tested for coeliac disease, I certainly have a very strong response against wheat, so I am returning to food doctor and strongly recommend it to anyone. It is great.

ihatethecold That's a good idea - sort of like yuk sung!!

Any ideas for the other things?

I don't eat any wheat, and any carbs I do eat are as unrefined as possible.

I get bread from www.artisanbread-abo.com. Its great stuff - not cheap, but gives you the answer to the lunchtime feeling that you must have some bread! It freezes well, too. Their glutinis are lovely. Mostly gluten free and all yeast free, I believe.

I eat kamut pasta once or twice a month, brown rice and very occasionally a new potato or two.

I've tried the cauli 'recipe' for "rice"and that works very well.

I've tried quinoa which I can't say I adore, but need to persevere, and I have a bag of amaranth which I need to try.

Cous cous and pasta are not the same thing at all. Cous cous has a far lower GL and is far far more nutritious, with double and quadruple some vitamins and nutrients. And a lower fat to calorie ratio.

I find that when I cut out wheat, my IBS improves. I also seem to experience hunger more often when I eat it . I know the thread isn't about weight loss but that's an issue for me because I do need to lose weight and being hungry all the time doesn't help. The only thing is, I love my bread and pasta so I find it very hard to not eat it. Although the unwanted after effects are beginning to have a good deterrent effect so I eat bread/pasta less frequently now.
I seem fine with potatoes and rice. I like quinoa a lot too and will substitute it for pasta in any cold pasta salad type recipe.