Justify? I don't know about that. I eat it because I love it and can't be without it (addiction). Once I cut the dairy I go nuts eating everything in sight.. trying to find a substitute I guess, but just a little cottage cheese and cream puts me on the straight and narrow again.

Personally I don't care even in the slightest what people ate 50 years ago or 5000 years ago. I feel like I know what I need to eat to accomplish my goals. Mostly I was curious if you modified your diet to more closely match what people have done in the past.

I'm afraid it's just my own wild conjecture. Nobody who is truly concerned about paleo purism should be moved by it.

Still an interesting idea. They had to start making cheese at some point.

I believe the first mention of cheese in history was by Homer. It is also mentioned in the Bible (BC era).

Great "food" for thought. I am very interested in food history (see my profile).

That is fine, but the subject of paleo eating was brought up in this string of posts.

As for me personally, well I am 60 years old and have probably already surpassed the average lifespan of most stone-age humans. So at this point, I think it is, for me at least, irrelevant if I eat like them or not. Although I do find discussions about the paleo diet interesting from an anthropological viewpoint, I am mainly concerned with losing weight---a problem I am sure few if any stone-age humans had to deal with.

I just recently cut out cheese and butter! the ONLY dairy i am now consuming is 2TB of Hood Carb countdown a day in my coffee! i just CANT drink black coffee. So for me its a preference! maybe i can switch to almond milk or coconut milk in my coffee and get rid of all dairy..ill think about it..i like the HOOD cuz its so low cal and low carb though!

If you go to paleodiet.com this month's newsletter (Vol 2, Issue 1, I believe), Dr. Cordain covers why Northern Europeans have different responses to milk than any other group on the planet and why they are so 'dermally depigmented.'

[url]http://www.thepaleodiet.com/newsletter/newsletters/PaleoNewsletterVol2Issue1.pdf

Here's the link for the pdf version.

Interesting article in today's BBC News about Neolithic peoples and perfectly preserved figs and grains including barley findings.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5038116.stm

And they probably wouldn't "choose" to if there were no dairy lobby to actively distribute propaganda.

Ha, ha, ha!!! Marketing has a powerful persuasion on people!!

There's also casein intolerance which I seem to have, that's one of the proteins in milk. I just find drinking milk, or eating milk products, causes a lot of bloating, diarrhea and gas. Not fun.

As a "dermally de-pigmented" blue-eyed red-head, I have no problem with lactose, but do have problems with casein and wheat. I had colic as a baby (on cow's milk) and was put on soymilk & am intolerant of that now, too.

Once I partake in higher casein dairy, like yogurt, cream cheese, sour cream, I crave more and more. It causes no problems with digestion, I just can't breathe and often get hives. I seem to be OK with a touch of cream in my coffee and lower-casein cheeses (in moderation).

Ubizmo, I don't think the Bambi cheese idea is that far-fetched; rennet's properties must have been discovered by people examining the guts of the animals they ate. Our paleoancestors made use of everything, and a stomach full of curdled milk would not have gone unnoticed. I suspect the Scots got the idea for haggis after cutting open a sheep whose stomach was full of grain and whatever else they ate. They probably cut it out, filled any extra space with the other "variety meats", tied off the ends and threw it on the fire and then hung the rest of the carcass to cure it. In many cultures the stuff we North Americans don't eat are considered to be the best parts.

This is an interesting thread. I've recently been wondering about my 'addiction' to cheese and butter, and have come to a probably premature conclusion they are beneficial for me after all. I think it is actually the fat I crave, because it's not every day I can render down a load of lard crispies (which are the one thing I adore and then I don't eat any fatty cheeses etc). Also, based on what I've read from other people's posts - I don't have the bloating/gas/diarrhea from dairy. I think it is very hard to get enough fat on a low carb diet without using dairy fat - and I think this is what most low-carbers crave no? I am talking about more than 70% fat from diet.

However, if I wasn't taking magnesium tablets I might have an issue with constipation from too much cheese. I also might have big cravings for chocolate - Mg tabs are the only thing that get rid of chocolate cravings and also pmt and depression for me.

This is interesting - because an all animal diet wouldn't really have much magnesium unless you eat a lot of fish - and the ratio with calcium would be screwed even more if you ate a lot of cheese.

I know this is contraversial and I could be very wrong - but it seems to me a lot of people on very low carb end up craving mag rich foods after awhile - chocolate for example. Nuts is another one. Odd though that no-one craves spinach or kale - but then they don't contain much fat.

If I have taken magnesium on its own for awhile, I notice I crave cheese much more - probably due to the calcium/magnesium balance which my body desires (just a theory).

I have also noticed a lot of complaints of pms and cramping at TOM from low-carbers - don't worry - I'm very low carb myself but I do think we probably need more minerals than is probably available from the soil these days. I can actually fend off cramps by taking mag, cal and vitamin E - but then - should I really have to take these things??

Anyway - that ramble was to say that, although I do actually do better from a mostly animal-product-based diet, I do supplement, and might do better eating more greens for instance.

I just play around with this stuff though - experimenting and seeing how I do best.

I really love cheese though. I am half English half Scottish and I assume we have eaten dairy for a long time??

I think it's always the fat we crave. I can't think of a single food that people crave that doesn't have a large amount of fat in it, or else doesn't have a fake fat texture, like licorice/Red Vines-type candy.

What I've discovered is you can get to 70% + fat by keeping protein down. Once you start thinking about restricting protein, it's amazing how the fat percentage of your diet naturally goes up -- you start looking for the fattiest cuts of meat, cooking with oil (I use butter, but oil would work if you are trying to eliminate dairy), and so on.