The first time I heard about the paleo diet, long before this paleo granola entered my life, the concept sounded so outlandish (eating like a caveman? but why?) that I brushed it aside as yet another weirdly punishing fad.

But then I came across more mentions, from sources I trust, and I read some decidedly un-faddish discussions on the excessive amount of carbohydrates — from grains and sugar, mostly — the typical Western diet includes, and how it impacts our health.

If you’re late to the paleo party, here’s the gist of it. According to paleo theory, our digestive system, which has been evolving for 2 million years, hasn’t had time to adapt to the radical changes in our diet since humans invented agriculture some 10,000 years ago (marking the dawn of the neolithic era), much less those that occurred at madding speed over the past three generations.

This realization led me to create this easy formula for paleo granola, an astonishingly tasty and satisfying option when I want to start my day grain-free.

For optimal health, and usually motivated by some health concern or other, paleo eaters decide to focus on whole, unprocessed, seasonal foods in the spirit of those that would have been available to the paleolithic man, who foraged, hunted, and fished.

This means opting mostly for fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds, pastured meats and sustainable seafood — a much more reasonable proposition than the caveman image might suggest at first glance. (As Michelle Tam conveys in her well-crafted Nom Nom Paleo cookbook and Paleo 101 section on her website, the caveman should be seen as a mascot of sorts — not a model for historical reenactment.)

Since I’m neither a doctor nor a nutritionist, my take on this is quite pragmatic: I examined my own way of eating, and although processed foods and empty calories aren’t a concern, I recognized that I have a natural inclination to consume a fair amount of starches — from wheat especially.

And when I tweaked the way I compose my meals to eat less of them, or even none at all, the effect on my energy levels and how I felt generally was very convincing. My purpose is not to go paleo, but to acknowledge that I do better if starches — even the so-called good, whole-grain kind — don’t factor into my every meal.

Paleo granola for breakfast!

This realization led me to create this easy formula for paleo granola, an astonishingly tasty and satisfying option when I want to start my day grain-free. I eat it with diced up fruit and berries, and homemade yogurt from raw cow’s or goat’s milk I get at the organic store. Dairy yogurt isn’t actually paleOK, so if you’re following the rules to the letter you can use coconut milk, or better yet, coconut yogurt.

Whether they would have had granola on the menu in the Lascaux caves is up for debate, but it suits me beautifully.

Join the conversation!

What’s your take on the paleo eating style, and how it reportedly helps with so many chronic ailments? Have you ever felt the need to lower your carb intake, and experimented with that change?

My gorgeous hand-crafted granola scoop by Earlywood.

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Having a two-year-old at home who wakes up bright and (verrrry) early, excited to announce the breakfast item his heart is set on, I have become quite adept at flipping crêpes and cooking one-egg omelettes in a dazed half-sleep.

Beyond crêpes and eggs and bananas, my son is also quite keen on breakfast cookies — who isn’t? — and although I have no qualms against yogurt cake and madeleines and buckwheat speculoos at any time of day, my motherly, nutrition-conscious instincts push me to try and offer things that match the request (“Gâteau ? Gâteau ?”) but provide a little more in the way of quality early-hour fuel.

We can all benefit from a nutritious and portable breakfast cookie, whether it’s eaten on the train ride to work, or while pushing a toy version around the living room.

This led me to create these healthy breakfast cookies, made up of wholesome ingredients — rolled grains, coconut, almond flour, chia seeds — and no added sugar, relying on the sweetening power of mashed bananas and dried fruit instead.

They are extremely easy to make, and if you have a toddler underfoot you can even enroll him/her to mash and dump and stir and scoop (practical life activity, people, so Montessori!).

Healthy Breakfast Cookies for Everyone!

But naturally there is no reason to constrict these to the realm of kid food: we can all benefit from a nutritious and portable breakfast cookie, whether it’s eaten on the train ride to work, or while pushing a toy version around the living room.

The formula is very forgiving, and entirely open to variations: in different incarnations of these cookies I have switched the rolled grains around to use quinoa or rice or millet, I’ve added in finely chopped nuts (especially pecans!) or cacao nibs for crunch, and I once made a version with a touch of cocoa powder thrown in, all to great results.

Join the conversation!

What’s your favorite easy-to-carry yet nutritious breakfast option? And if you have a young child, what’s breakfast like at your house?

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A few of my favorite finds and reads for May:

~ The clean fifteen and the dirty dozen, prettified by Montreal graphic designer Simon L’Archevêque for Bernard Lavallée’s Nutrtionniste Urbain.

~ I took part in a filmed discussion on food blogs (in French; I start talking 17 minutes in).

~ Bee collapse mystery: scientists may have found the culprit; now you can sign the petition to ban it in the EU.

~ Behavioral science is interested in how you eat your sushi: favorite first or favorite last?

~ The resurgence of home fermenting. I myself have enthusiastically experiemented with sourdough bread, yogurt, kefir (tibicos), beet kvass, kombucha, and fermented pickles. What about you?

~ If it drives you nuts how often you’re advised to throw out perfectly fixable appliances, Repair Cafés are for you.

~ The tasting menu at Dovetail in NYC, in 60 beautiful seconds.

~ Eyes are bigger than your stomach? This Swiss all-you-can-eat restaurant will fine you for it.

~ A French crowd-funding platform devoted to food-related projects.

~ In which I learn that my favorite number is, in fact, the world’s favorite favorite number.

~ How to make a salad with a pair of scissors and an exacto knife, by the talented Jessie Kanelos Weiner.

~ Easy-to-peel hard-boiled eggs in the pressure cooker.

~ What happens when you request a doggy bag in France.

As the traveling season gets nearer, maybe you have some lovely, exciting plans to fly someplace distant across several time zones. In that case you’ll have to contend with jetlag, and if you do, I want to share a cool tip I first heard about from my friend Adam, who himself picked it up from Jason Kottke.

The advice is simple: you should fast for 12 to 16 hours before breakfast time at your destination.

The reasoning is that the digestive system plays a significant role in our body’s perception of time. This voluntary fast is meant to mimick an overnight fast (minus the midnight munchies) and helps to set the body’s internal clock to the new time zone.

I happened to read about this just before we left to spend some time in San Francisco in the fall, and since we were about to embark on a round trip of 12-hour flights with 9-hour time differences, I was quick to recruit myself as a guinea pig to test the technique.

And I’m thrilled to report it worked really well: I sailed through the time difference with just about the same effects I get from taking the metro, even though I got virtually no sleep on the plane, thanks to a very sweet, but very alert little boy sitting on my knee.

It was very easy to put in practice, too.

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