Questionable Items

Vinegar. Vinegar is made by the fermentation of alcohol (i.e. ethanol) into acetic acid by bacteria. This sounds Paleo, but it depends on the source of the alcohol and whether or not there are other additives.  Distilled or white vinegar is derived from a process in which corn (or potato) is used to produce alcohol, the alcohol is distilled, diluted, and finally fermented into acetic acid. In the end it is gluten free, not very tasty, and highly processed. A lot of vinegars are derived from grains (e.g. rice/mirin/malt), excluding them from the Paleo pantry.  The more grain-free varieties would include apple cider/red wine/sherry/balsamic/kombucha, but a number of these have a significant amount of sugar in them and/or other additives. By the way, if the label reads just “vinegar” then it is apple cider vinegar. Try to pick one that is aged because that typically means they’ve added less garbage to try to speed up the process. Eden Organic makes an aged apple cider vinegar that has no sugar – seems a decent Paleo option to me until I can find something better.

Decaffeinated Drinks. Decaffeination is usually done to remove the natural caffeine in coffee and teas. It is not an issue with soft drinks because soda is a totally synthetic product and, in that case, they just don’t add the caffeine to the final product.  Decaffeination can be performed using a variety of chemical processes, some less savory than others. If you cannot find out how a product was decaffeinated, the chances are good that it involved one of the harsher methods. The Swiss Water process is probably the best of the decaffeination procedures, but moving to naturally caffeine-free beverages would be even better.  For coffee drinkers, a nice caffeine-free alternative is chickory root.  It has a bold flavor and you can make it stronger or weaker depending on your preference.  As for teas, there are a variety of caffeine-free options out there, but be aware that many teas contain additives. I was very sad to learn that one of my favorite teas contains barley, so it’s not Paleo and it has gluten to boot! As another example, we just bought the Celestial Seasonings caffeine-free sampler and two of the five teas contain soy lecithin. The lesson here is to enjoy your teas, but always check the ingredients. My favorite supplier of  high-quality tea is Davidson’s Organic  (www.davidsonstea.com), but not all of their products are Paleo.

Coming soon… alcohol.


One thought on “Questionable Items

  1. Thank you a lot of for furnishing these types of a fascinating and exceptional insight into this attention-grabbing and
    debatable subject!

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