Meet the Pegan Diet: The Better-for-You Child of Paleo and Vegan

[KamaAina]

https://www.yahoo.com/health/what-is-the-pegan-diet-120042617487.html

Let’s face it: The paleo diet has held onto popularity for longer than anyone would have imagined (thank Jeb Bush and Matthew McConaughey for that). Now, it’s joining hands with the longstanding go-to diet for health nuts: veganism. Individually, they can be hard to stick to in the long run, leaving wannabe healthy eaters skipping from trendy restrictive diet to trendy restrictive diet.

Enter: the pegan diet. Coined by Mark Hyman, MD, in a January 2015 blog post, the diet combines the best of paleo and vegan into one easier-to-follow superdiet. You might think combining two notoriously restrictive diets would leave you with about five foods to eat, but the pegan diet focuses more on what each diet includes, rather than leaves out, allowing more options. “I wanted to combine the very best aspects of a paleo and vegan/vegetarian diet rather than cherry-pick studies and pick sides,” Hyman explained to Yahoo Health. “Combining research with my several decades working with patients, I pulled together this plan. Once you get the hang of it, the pegan diet becomes easy to stick to and delivers fast but lasting results.”

The diet is centered on fruits, vegetables, and healthy fats — plus meat in small, condiment-size portions and small amounts of gluten-free grains and legumes. Dairy is out (if you just can’t give it up, Hyman suggests the occasional sheep’s or goat’s milk yogurt), as are gluten and added sugars.

So what makes the pegan diet unique? Most obviously, it includes meat and eggs — strictly banned for vegans. Hyman acknowledges that meat is a “sticky subject,” but adds that grass-fed, sustainably raised meat can provide valuable nutrients and makes it easier for participants to stick to the diet. The solution: Try meat like a side dish or condiment, adding it to dishes for flavor and nutrients, but don’t eat it as the dish itself.

[Avalux]

1. There is no scientific reason to exclude gluten unless it's physically intolerable to eat it.

I agree with some of what they're saying, but honestly, exclusion of anything for long periods of time is difficult to do, hence the word 'diet'. This is just another gimmick.

[astral]

3. I think you are mistaken on the gluten.

I tried avoiding gluten for six months once convinced it was the cause of my sudden problem with skin rashes, which it wasnt. While i found it hard work to exclude gluten from my diet til i got the hang of it (gluten is in most things now, and not necessarily labeled as such, you do have to REALLY go unprocessed everything). I know it felt better, and especially with my digestion and regularity, as well as feeling less sluggish. I intend to get that way again, but i keep needing little reminders about it, like this thread.

Not everyone NEEDS to go gluten-free, but anyone who does it to a large degree i believe will really feel the benefit.

[MH1]

10. Similar experience, but my conclusion is "less gluten" rather than

"gluten-free".

I think the problem with a stereotypical "American" diet is that there is just too much of it for some of us. It's not that I can't have a slice of bread now and then. I just can't have the equivalent of 4 slices of bread a day, every day for a long period, without a negative effect on my health.

I'm sure gluten tolerance or intolerance is a spectrum just like almost everything else in the human body. So some people can live on hamburgers, pizza, and pasta with no issues whatever. Others of us, just need to moderate it a little, and even if we don't, the "worst" that can happen is some digestive issues. But I say it's better to limit troublesome stuff in the diet than to try to resolve those issues with medications. So, a little less gluten seems like a good plan. (And I bet the makers of OTC digestive aids really don't want the majority of people figuring this out. They might have to go into a sideline of selling leafy vegetables.)

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Another fad diet...

Eat whatever you want in moderation and relax.

[Wolf Frankula]

4. Do Paleo Diets include Mammoth, Wooly Rhinoceros, and Glyptdon?

If you want to eat a paleolithic diet you have to include those. And carrion, lots of carrion. And you have to use stone tools you make yourself.

Wolf

[KamaAina]

5. DUzy!

[Wounded Bear]

6. I guess it's better than the Piggan diet...

All bacon, all the time.

[KamaAina]

7. Well, better for you, maybe.

[Wounded Bear]

8. Actually, I hardly ever eat bacon. :) nt

[Adrahil]

9. Eat good quality food in moderation. DONE. n/t