Just look at pictures of our ancestors from about 1900. They were all thin. They age vegetables and fruits in the summer, but winter they ate any vegetables that would survive in the root cellar. They had milk and cheese year round and probably some meat too. Depending on where they lived they may have had maple syrup or molasses. They did not drink extra large sodas and they did not eat double big macs. Anybody who says it doesn’t boil down to portion size and exercise is failing to look at history.
They also did a hell of a lot more manual labor
Also, starvation wasn't a bad thing — apparently, organisms, while under stress, will produce hormones that protect the organism.
Also, foods that are borderline rotten. Even though the foods might not be that palatable, they might be more nutritional.
For example, meat products might be broken down and easier to digest and maybe more nutritional. Meat is always aged which means that it hangs in a shed for a period of time. Is this an accident.
Of course, the is always yeast fermented fruits and grains. :)
“Anybody who says it doesn’t boil down to portion size and exercise is failing to look at history.”
That is denying the biochemistry found in today’s research, it denies the experience of millions of people today, it denies the reversal of diabetes members of this forum have experienced, and it denies the fact that very low carbohydrate ketogenic diets were used by 18th, 19th, and early 20th Century physicians as a treatment for diabetes occurring in their early American populations.
“Look at pics of our ancestors. . .”
Read some stuff by our ancestors. The Laura Ingalls Wilder books are a good example. Meals are detailed there, and no effort was made to make it politically correct.
They chowed DOWN.
They had salt pork just about every meal in the winter, it seems. Potatoes, lots of them, fried in lard. The best descriptions of food are in “Farmer Boy.” The amount of pie, beef, etc was startling. In one book Almanzo and his brother casually polish of something like 40 or 80 pancakes (with molasses) in one sitting.
They are also cold a lot, which burns calories, or move a lot, during planting and harvest time.
But they were hardly getting along on nuts, seeds, and veggies. They ate a LOT of fat and carbs.