going bananas
With the recent flurry of paleo-related discussions that have taken place at Fourth Power Fitness, it seems necessary for me to organize my opposition to a deceptively high-glycmeic fruit, the banana.
The vast majority of our ancestors did not inhabit tropical areas; therefore, these bright and colorful, yet saddeningly sugary fruits like mangoes, pineapples, and bananas should not be a part of the paleolithic diet.
The average banana has about 30 grams of carbohydrates. To compare this glycemic index with a few other fruits, it would take 3 cups of strawberries or 1 and a half cups of blueberries or 21 cherries to equal the amount of sugar in what amounts to roughly 1/2 cup of banana. The banana and its tropical friends have slipped into the category of “healthy foods” when their actual macronutrient compositon will reveal their nutirional proximity to such insulin spikers as bread or potatoes. While I haven’t ever heard about any studies that linking banana consumption to the cancers and autoimmune diseases associated with starches, nightshades, or legumes, it seems that the high-glycemic load which serves as the common bond between these non-paleo foods is shared by tropical fruits.
These days everyone seems to know that if you are having muscle spasms, then you need bananas in order to get some potassium into your system to fix the problem. Well, there happen to be two problems with this line of logic. First, bananas typically contain the same amount of potassium as the other most popular fruits do. And some fruits, like kiwis, contain nearly twice as much. The second problem with thinking that bananas will cure cramping lies in the fact that muscle spasms are more related to sodium, magnesium, and the usage of protein for energy during excercise. The “common knowledge” that bananas are a miracle cure for cramping is an unfortunate example of how the general public can be misled about which foods are healthy.
Post thoughts to comments.
16 responses so far ↓
Chris // August 5, 2008 at 3:01 am
Hey Will…. Seriously?
Look, they are paleo. Admit it. I freely admit that they suck, and that I avoid them whenever possible. HOWEVER, they were, albeit only in specific areas, readily available foods.
Out ancestors probably wouldn’t have been able to find kiwi, strawberries, blueberries, chicken, beef, turkey, almonds, olive oil, lettuce, apples, and fish all where they lived, but what keeps us from including those in a single paleo diet? Nothing. Just like it should be for bananas
Maybe it would improve paleo to track down where our ancestors lived and only eat foods native to those areas, but i digress.
I believe that the purpose of the paleo diet is to avoid the breads, etc that you cited and to eat what our bodies were designed to. Banana do this. So what’s so not-paleo about them?
Chris // August 5, 2008 at 3:05 am
I’d also like to add a like for you.
http://altmed.creighton.edu/paleodiet/Foodlist.html
“Below is a list of foods that are encouraged or discouraged in the Paleo diet. This list was obtained from the book Paleo Diet by Loren Cordain (Wiley and Sons, New York 2002 pages 104-112).”
And if one looks down the list to fruits:
“Banana.”
P.S. Bananas are still terrible as far as fruit go.
willsacto // August 5, 2008 at 3:20 am
If they suck . . . and they are still terrible . . . then why still try to make a case for them? You should be able to say “Eat these paleo diet foods and it’s a safe bet that you’ll be healthy.” If you introduce the banana, then you have disrupted the purity of the diet. The question remains: if it is a bad fruit, then why defend it?
I can see how it may deserve the title of “Not-so-bad Cheat Food”, but it’s still not paleolithic. The fact remains that “kiwi, strawberries, blueberries, chicken, beef, turkey, almonds, olive oil, lettuce, apples, and fish” are much closer to the foods cavemen ate than tropicals, grains, legumes, etc.
Chris // August 5, 2008 at 3:27 am
The diet, while suboptimal, remains both safe and healthy with the inclusion of bananas. Furthermore, it fits the definition of a paleolithic diet.
Rather then “Not-so-bad Cheat Food,” the banana should be called a “Second-Rate Paleo Food” and should be consumed as such.
The way I see it, the hierarchy looks something like this:
Paleo Diet (high glycemic foods (eg. bananas) sparingly)
Paleo Diet (high glycemic foods whenever)
Modern “healthy” recomended diet.
Actual Modern Diet
Ice Cream
willsacto // August 5, 2008 at 3:43 am
Where would a diet that excludes high glycemic foods fit on your hierarchy?
Chris // August 5, 2008 at 4:07 am
Right next to the one that uses them sparingly. There’s something to be said for diversifying your foods. Maybe some low fiber banana sugar bombs would be good for your “30 minute post workout recovery window.” After all, you can’t have all that fiber slowing down the digestion of your necessary nutrients.
If lettuce were your only carb, would you be better off then someone who ate a variety of fruits?
Let’s remember that the argument started as whether or not bananas are paleo. And I think we have come to the conclusion that they are. I said good day!
4th Power // August 19, 2008 at 12:48 pm
You guys are funny. It’s just a banana. What about the monkeys. They are more functionally fit than you will ever be. Some of them even smoke! ( I saw it T.V. on one my rest days.) Besides, without bananas what would those cartoon characters slip on and make me laugh.
Laughing makes me happy. When I am happy I don’t want to kill people-LEAVE THE BANANA ALONE!
jimmyjames91 // August 19, 2008 at 1:49 pm
– 4th, I think you mean “This sh|t is bananas”
Anyway, like you kind of said…those monkeys, especially the flying ones, especially the flying ones from The wIZARD oF oZ, are complete functionally fit bad-asses. True true.
And they do it on bananas!
They are no where near achieving peak performance!
4th Power // August 19, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Bananas are pretty.
Ode to the Banana « Bubble Tea // August 26, 2008 at 1:19 am
[...] will finish with a quote taken from an online discussion about the merits of the banana (link). It is written by an unknown author with the screen name 4thPower. It’s just a banana. What [...]
criticisms // August 26, 2008 at 1:20 am
http://criticisms.wordpress.com/2008/08/26/reflections-on-the-banana/
jimmyjames91 // November 19, 2008 at 9:12 pm
Shopping for fruit has never been the same. I see the bananas at the store…
“Potassium!” says I.
But then I hear Nicole Carroll saying “Sure, tell yourself you’re eating it for the potassium.”
Then I think of this thread.
I wind up with grapes and Rome apples.
pnw fitness // April 22, 2009 at 10:58 pm
I’m trying to be paleo as possible, but I really do love bananas. The are priced right a lot of the time also when other fruits are not.
John A // May 4, 2009 at 5:02 pm
I have been on and off the paleo diet for about 8 or 9 years. Lately I’ve had some digestive issues. Something made me evaluate whether the 2-3 bananas I ate every day was healthy or not. So I looked on the web and found an article about the fact that eating too much can adversely affect your digestive system and cause an imbalance in your calcium levels. At any rate, I cut out the bananas as a test and I feel better than I have in many months.
I have also read that bananas originated in one small place and was then propagated and hybridized starting around 2,000 BC. I think this makes a case against bananas if only to be used sparingly.
Of course everyone’s body is different so your mileage may vary.
Nat Arem // May 14, 2009 at 9:51 pm
The whole underlying theory behind the paleo diet is that we’re supposed to eat the foods we’ve been eating for millions of years. Bananas are even newer to our digestive system than wheat and other cultivated grains.
John Jaeckel // September 23, 2009 at 6:51 am
Ever seen a chimpanzee improvise tools to get into a beehive? Or what a bear will go through to do the same thing? Not to make excuses for sugar, but our ancestors, pretty much regardless of where they lived had a certain degree of access to sugar at different times of the year. So to me splitting hairs over bananas seems a bit counter-intuitive to the whole “what our ancestors ate” rationale.