Cave condiments

Paleo dieting can be dreary if you don’t take care to season your food with some extra flavour. Hunter-gatherers don’t, or so I gather, but they don’t grow up with Heinz the way we did.

So while I’m sticking pretty closely to the Stone Age in my eating habits this month, I couldn’t resist Kozlik’s horseradish for this bison steak and an eensy smear of Jamie Oliver’s Walnut and Red Pepper Pesto for my tuna and avocado salad. After all, I’m a big lover of toppings and sauces; someone once called my fridge “the condiment castle.” Old habits, et cetera.

The problem: Ordinary, store-bought condiments are typically laden with paleo no-nos: dairy, added sugar and salt, unpronounceable ingredients. I knew this when I gave myself permission to eat an occasional glob of condiments to make paleo food more interesting.

However, there are options and resources out there for paleo types who want even their fixings to fit the program.

• Nell “Paleoista” Stephenson offers some simple, commonsense workarounds to jazz up one’s meals without breaking the law of the cave-land (some I’ve also done, like substituting citrus juice for vinegar)

• Paleo Diet Lifestyle has links to several recipes, including paleo versions of ketchup, relish and horseradish

• And for inspiration, check out this Pinterest board festooned with fixings of the primal persuasion. It all looks pretty tasty.

That settles it. I’m going to make some paleo condiments for myself. Stone Age sriracha, here I come.

Modern foods the experts won’t touch

LINK: 7 Foods Even Food Safety Experts Won’t Eat.

Now here’s some “I told you so” fodder, paleo pals.

All seven foods sound scary enough. But I have some caveats: Each food is blackballed on what appears to be the advice of a single expert. Some of them appear to have an occupational interest in sticking up for organic and natural foods. And I’m generally wary of faddish food hysteria.

But still, it’s worth a read and some consideration. This article got me eating organic apples, for one thing.

Some of these foods are all off-limits to me while on the paleo kick anyway. And concerning the corn-fed beef, well, I’m still eating supermarket beef for reasons of cost and convenience. It would be nice to be able to switch entirely to grass-fed, and soon.