Paleo Is, Like, Superhard, Y'all

Duh, y'all. Dinner with no starch is like
 a short skirt with no panties. At first you're all
like, "Who'll even notice?' and then, like,
EVERYONE TOTALLY DOES.

So, remember 2 days ago when I said Paleo was pretty easy to work into your everyday life? I'd like to reconsider.

Two things:
1) If you don't grocery shop and do most of the cooking on the weekend, you are totally screwed. I intended to make a Paleo granola to eat for breakfast all week, which takes an hour plus to cook.

But I did the grocery shopping on Monday. By the time I got home from work, it was too late to cook. So we ordered Thai (very easy to do Paleo) and didn't cook the granola. Tonight, surprise dinner plans came up and again, no cooking.

I am holding out hope for tomorrow and the granola, but by then, Ron will have had 3 mornings of "Paleo" scones- which are like regular scones, in that they are actually just regular scones that he is calling Paleo.


2) Meals just don't feel complete to me without a starch. Steak? Delicious. Broccoli? I love it. Asparagus? Awesome. Those 3 together? A grocery list, not a dinner.

Paleo means no grains, starches or legumes, so no rice, bread, tortillas, white potatoes, pasta, beans or lentils. No quinoa or couscous or tabouleh or barley or bulgar wheat.

from NomNomPaleo.com

I've looked up some recipes for side dishes on Paleo recipe sites, and found a couple of promising ones. Mashed cauliflower, and fried "rice", also made of cauliflower, are high on the to-try list.

But it seems kind of silly to me, to be playing with your food and trying to trick your body into thinking it's eating something it's not.

Ron and I were debating whether or not that sense of incompleteness is  just a cultural construct.  Is "Protein + Vegetable + Starch = Complete" a formula we've been taught, or created for ourselves and reinforced through social cues and habit? Or is it a cultural norm because that's the way humans are built to eat?

I feel the latter is more likely, mostly because I can't think of a single culture that doesn't follow that formula pretty closely. Asia has rice and noodles, the Indian subcontinent rice and bread, Europe lots of pasta and bread, Africa rice, bread and starches like fufu and manioc, and bread, rice and grains in Latin America.

I'm sure I'm oversimplifying, but can you think of anywhere where they don't eat any starches? Maybe the Inuits, who live where nothing grows.

In general, if people leave out one part of that equation, they leave out the protein- most people in the world don't eat anything like the amount of meat we do even when we're not eating Paleo.

What do you think? Have we taught ourselves that meals have to have a starch? Is this a craving that will pass? Or is it somehow incomplete not to include some rice, potatoes, or pasta with your meal?