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This diet is concerned primarily with health issues, as opposed to ethical or economic concerns. Advocates of paleolithic nutrition believe that the best foods for the human body are those that humans are best adapted to eat. Proponents argue that dietary related diseases are caused by straying from this approach.

Foods which are not edible raw and unprocessed are excluded from the diet. The foods falling into this category are mainly starchy vegetables (e.g. grains, beans and potatoes). Foods which are included in the diet are meat, fish, fruits, vegetables which are edible raw, mushrooms, nuts, eggs and honey. The single exception to this rule is dairy products. Dairy products are excluded despite being edible raw since they are nevertheless a post agricultural food.

Some closely related diets, such as that recommended by the Weston A. Price Foundation, are more lenient: They mainly exclude foods developed in the last few centuries, and claim to improve upon the Paleo-diet by studying specific factors that contribute to health and longevity. Dairy, whole grainsCereal crops are mostly grasses cultivated for their edible seeds (actually a fruit called a grain technically a caryopsis . Cereal grains are grown in greater quantities worldwide than any other type of crop and provide more calories to the human race., legumesThe term legume has two closely related meanings in botany, a situation encountered with many botanical common names of useful plants whereby an applied name can refer to either the plant itself, or to the edible fruit (or useful part). Thus, "legume" can, and potatoes are therefore encouraged insofar as one's specific ancestry allows them to be tolerated, and culturing of foods is encouraged.

The non-animal foods available on the diet are the same as those available in raw veganism. However, there are two fundamental differences between raw veganism and the paleodiet: Firstly, paleodieters consume meat and other animal products (in fact usually more is consumed than on a standard modern diet, in some cases substantially more). Secondly, any and all food can be cooked if desired.

The generally prescribed proportions of proteinmyoglobin, showing coloured alpha helices. This protein was the first to have its structure solved by X-ray crystallography by Max Perutz and Sir John Cowdery Kendrew in 1958, which led to them receiving a Nobel Prize in Chemistry. A protein is a complex,, fatThis article is about lipid molecules, for FAT see File Allocation Table. In biochemistry, fat is a generic term for a class of lipids. Fats are produced by organic processes in animals and plants. All fats are insoluble in water and have a density signif, and carbohydrateCarbohydrates (literally hydrates of carbon are chemical compounds that act as the primary biological means of storing or consuming energy, other forms being fat and protein. Relatively complex carbohydrates are known as polysaccharides. Carbohydrates are are approximately 1/3, 1/2, and 1/4 by calories (these don't sum to 1 because each figure was averaged and rounded independently), although it's important to note that consuming more than 35% of calories as protein may lead to protein toxicity . Alternatively, because of the large amount of water in fruits and vegetables, the diet is, by weight, roughly 2/3 plant products and 1/3 animal products.

Normally, this approach is considered low carbohydrate, though perhaps not to the extent the Atkins DietThe Atkins Nutritional Approach popularly known as the Atkins Diet or just Atkins is a fashionable but controversial high-protein, high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet. It was popularized by Dr. Robert Atkins ( 1930- 2003) in a series of books, starting with D and certainly only as a consequence, not a cause, of the diet. Unlike Atkins, fruit and vegetables are consumed in large amounts. The vitaminVitamins are a class of essential nutrients that cannot be synthesized (either at all or in sufficient quantities) by a given organism and must be taken (in trace quantities) with food for that organism's continued good health. Humans require 13 different and mineral content of the diet is very high compared to a standard diet, in many cases a multiple of the RDA.