3 Tips To Ease Into Paleo / Primal Right Now

Over the past year I have helped convert a lot of people to a Paleo / Primal lifestyle. Recently a close friend of mine, user supacpeon, created a thread in the forums about easing into the Paleo / Primal lifestyle. The only problem is (like most the people I converted) he does not like to cook and is busy with life. If you are someone who is too lazy to cook or too busy with life, here are 3 tips to get you started in the right direction. Be sure to check out the thread in the Forums also.

One thing that I learned after helping so many people become Paleo / Primal is, you have to ease into it. When I first started helping out friends and family I would just throw them right into it. This was very inefficient and caused a lot of people to experience the yo-yo effect of bouncing back and forth between being healthy and binge eating unhealthy foods.

These tips are designed for the everyday person who is too busy or too lazy to cook their own food but will also work for others as a fall back plan. If you do have time and enjoy the cooking process of a Paleo / Primal lifestyle visit our Recipe Blog and whip up your own dishes.

3 Tips To Ease Into Paleo / Primal Right Now

1) Create a “Go To” Breakfast That You Can Easily Make Every Day.

When I first started eating Paleo / Primal I would find myself walking back and forth from my bedroom to the fridge. I would open the fridge, stare hungrily inside the fridge without having any idea of what to eat, then close it to only repeat the cycle again.

At first it helps to standardize your meals. This makes it so you do not have to constantly think about what you are going to eat or spend hours surfing the net for recipes. To this day, I still make my Caveman’s Scramble (you’ll get the recipe one day) every morning. I always know what ingredients I need and since I cook it so much it takes me less than 10 minutes (including clean-up) to make it.

2) Have Your “Go To” Fast Food Paleo / Primal Meals

I know this will cause a lot of anger in some Paleo / Primal elitists but when you first start out… eating some good food is better than eating none.

Note places near your home, work or wherever else you spend a lot of your time that you can create paleo friendly food.  For Example:

Chipotle: Burrito Bowl, No Rice, No beans, Extra Fajitas, Carnitas (the quality of the pork is amazing), Guac, lettuce, and alarming amounts of that tomato salsa.

Find your places. You will be amazed at what you can easily make Paleo / Primal. These fast food meals are good if you’re in a bind or need to grab a quick lunch.

3) Challenge Yourself To Learn The Basics of Cooking.

Let’s be frank... You cannot be Paleo / Primal without cooking your food unless you are a celebrity or are really rich. At some point eating out every meal and paying the extra money to get the meal customized to be Paleo is going to add up (15 bucks a meal x 90 meals a month is 1350 and that is just a conservative fast food guesstimation). Learn the basics of cooking meat, veggies, and cutting fruits. Alton Brown is a good resource on how to cook. His show Good Eats (all episodes can be found on youtube) not only details how to cook but the science behind it so you can apply it to a wide variety of food.

Easiest ways to cook meat:
Slow Cooker (you literally take the large chunk of meat and throw it in the pot with whatever veggies herbs you want and let it cook for up to 8 hours, this is good if you’re lazy and just want to make chili, pulled pork etc.)
Pressure Cooker (its like the Pentium I7 Core compared to the Slow Cooker’s Pentium 2 processor. This bad boy will do exactly what a slow cooker does but better and in 1/8^th of the time)
Roasts (great for making large chunks of meat that last the whole week)

Easiest Ways to Cook Veggies:
Steam them (healthy way if you’ve been eating too many fats)
Pan fry them with butter or olive oil (best tasting way and takes only minutes)

Easiest Fruits to Eat:
Berries
Grapes
Apples
Clementines
Eventually learn how to cut pineapples, mangos, melons

By learning the forms of cooking above you will literally have a full arsenal of food preparation techniques.  Being able to cook your own food will enhance all facets of your life. Remember, the easiest way to climb a mountain is one step at a time!