Eating Frisian

Now that my workout schedule is curtailed, I have had extra time to delve into some cooking, European football, rowing, and socializing.

This life is kind of nice, actually; I don't feel like an extremist anymore. I am able to walk pretty well now, swim and bike for up to 60-90 minutes without too much pain, so I can keep some level of fitness. I haven't gained any weight (in fact, those 10 pounds are staying off... just wait'lll you see my 6-pack!), I've met some great people, and I've learned quite a lot about nutrition.

For the last few weeks, I've been eating a mainly Paleo diet (meat, vegetables and fruit, plus some seeds, nuts & natural fats). While it's tasty and keeps the weight off, it's darn expensive, time-consuming, and leaves me low on energy sometimes. I'm quite a firm believer in the "Whatever works for YOU" theory of nutrition, because once you cut out the obvious stuff (junk food, processed food, refined flour and sugar, excessive alcohol, etc) I believe there are many variants of a successful "diet". People can be healthiest and happiest eating vegetarian or omnivore; low-fat or high-fat; high-carb or low-carb depending on their bodies and genetics. Brendan Brazier does well on his mostly raw vegan Thrive diet, for example, while others subscribe to Paleo or Atkins ideology. Michael Pollan seems to advocate a more environmentally-conscious plan for eating (based on plants and whole grains) which is equally laudable.

To each his own.

With my middling success on Paleo, I've decided to take it as a base and modify my diet to focus more on what my ancestors ate... not in prehistoric, ancient or even medieval times, but rather from about the 15th or 16th century AD.

Why? Well, I am in a somewhat strange position here in North America, in that I am born of two Frisians, whose parents were Frisians, and whose parents, in turn, were Frisian and Dutch. I am able to trace my ancestry back in the Netherlands for many generations. Oh, very probably there is some cross-mixing somewhere, as my name has been traced to South Africa and inevitably, the Frisian communities in Germany, as well as the Polish, co-mingled to some extent. But what I am saying is that, for the most part, my particular set of genes may have developed to thrive on food common to that region of the world.

Thus, I am really very curious to see how well I do on a traditional Frisian/ Dutch/ West German diet. Or maybe I really do have too much time on my hands!

So what are these traditional foods? Well I did some research, and I found a good starting point at www.medievalcooking.com; there is a document specifically outlining Frisian cooking during that time period. As I said, that is a bit too far back in time to be practical for me, but I'll try to start there and add /subtract later as I learn more...

Meat:
We are looking primarily at fish, pork, beef, lamb, and goat... pretty much in that order. I know that fish, fishing, and sailing were the prime focus of the paternal side of my family for generations. Poultry was also available (goose, duck, chicken). I had the idea that cows tended to be used for milk and dairy foods (first?).

Dairy:
In a word: lots. Why do you think they call those dairy cows "Frisians" anyhow? In fact, Northern Europeans are one of the few groups of people who can actually digest milk and milk products into adulthood. This is a notable deviation from the Paleo and Atkins prescriptions.

Vegetables:
Root veggies reigned supreme... potatoes, turnips, beets, onions, parsnips, carrots. Pumpkin, cucumber (lots of pickles!) cabbage, spinach, kale and collards were also used.

Fruits:
Apples, pears, melons, and various berries were predominant.

Grains:
Rye or pumpernickel bread was a staple of the diet for centuries.. and I mean the supremely dense, dark stuff (Westphalian pumpernickel). It is pretty much like the German Volkornbrot or Roggenbrot. I was exposed to it growing up but always hated its bitter, dense texture; now I'm going to give it another go... I found Volkornbrot at Loeb and I'm eating it with raw goat cheese now! Other available grains included (but were not limited to) oats, millet, and barley.

Nuts, seeds & legumes:
Hazelnuts, almonds, walnuts, and some varieties of beans

Wish me luck... I'm going to post pictures if I can...

Oh... beer, wine, coffee and tea were all copiously consumed!