Extract:
"What is of most interest to me, is the construction of a daily menu, based on the foods available, and the eating patterns followed each day. Keep in mind, these comments and the data I will also present are well over 40 years old, and as such are likely far closer to 'tradition' than perhaps might be found on these islands today;Every meal contained coconut in some form: the green nut provided the main beverage; the mature nut, grated or as coconut cream, was cooked with taro, breadfruit or rice; and small pieces of coconut meat were an important snack food. In Tokelau, coconut sap was used as a sweetener...
Fish was boiled, broiled on coral embers, and occasionally fried. It was rarely eaten raw except as a snack by small children and fishermen.Preparation and cooking of foods followed similar patterns in the two islands. The only marked dissimilarity between the two groups, apart from the quantities used, was the meal pattern. The Tokelauans followed the traditional Polynesian custom; an early morning snack, often a drinking nut, a more substantial meal at midday, and another main meal in the late afternoon. The Pukapukans followed no kind of routine except for feasting on Sunday and would sometimes eat little or nothing for a whole day or more.Now we start to get a bit of context around the traditional Pacific Island-type diets that everyone holds up as examples when citing how many carbs we should have, or that their diets are rich in saturated fat. Yes, they do eat carbohydrates - starchy ones, always cooked in and eaten with coconut cream, which itself is a source of saturated fats - medium chain saturated fatty acids, to be specific. They eat little fruit, little protein (around 1g/kg of body weight), they intermittently fast, and are relatively active. They no doubt rise and fall with the sunlight, and generally don't have to fret about such things as mortgages, troublesome smartphone apps, annoying work colleagues, or tippy-tapping half the night away to write a blog post to fulfil one's narcissism. Context.
All plants and fruit were cooked in coconut, seafoods such as octopus were cooked with coconut oil, and fish balls were made with banana. Surely all of that arterycloggingsaturatedfat would see them having cholesterol coming out of their ears, their cardiovascular systems set for implosion? Tokelau males ranged between 4.7-5.6 mmol/L, and females between 4.5-6.3 mmol/L across a 50 year age spread. Pukapukan inhabitants were generally 1.0 mmol/L lower across the board."
