Diet and Supplements
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- Last Updated: Wednesday, 15 January 2025 16:02
- Published: Thursday, 01 February 2024 14:57
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Diet and Supplements
There are lots of things that we need in our diet to fulfill our body's nutritional requirement. First there are are amino acids, then Vitamins, minerals, etc. Let's look at some of these.
Proteins:
A more detailed section on Proteins is in "Biology" section. Brief summary is again presented here.
Proteins are needed for body to build muscles. Proteins is in larger amount in meat products, but not so much in plant based products. So, for vegetarians, the big source of Proteins comes from dairy based products as milk, yogurt, cheese. For vegans, even dairy products are off the menu, so they have even limited things to fulfill their protein requirement. It's also in lentils, beans, tofu etc for vegetarian and vegans out there. Our body needs massive amounts of protein to help build and maintain muscles. At a minimum, our body needs 0.36 g of protein per lb of weight or 0.8 g of protein per kg of body weight. Most people around 60 kg of weight need 45g-50g of protein per day. Basically every year you need to consume about 18Kg of Protein, which is 25% of your body weight. This is huge amount of protein, and that's needed just to maintain what you have !!
Link below states 0.8g to 1.2g of protein per kg of body weight. Very active people as body builders, marathon runners may go up to max of 2g of protein per kg of body weight but that's the upper limit. Too much protein may put stress on your kidneys as the by product from protein breakdown is Nitrogen which needs to be excreted out via kidneys.
Link => https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-truth-about-protein-how-to-get-enough-at-every-age
I'm listing below Protein products for a vegetarian diet:
Plants don't have too much protein. Each cup size serving may have max of 2g protein, which isn't going to suffice for your body, no matter how much plant you eat. Here are top vegetables rich in protein => https://www.self.com/story/high-protein-vegetables
Beans are another option for vegetarians, but lot of beans do cause gas and bloating (you might have heard that before from your elders).
Protein based supplements: You will have to supplement with Protein supplements. One of the most popular ones is whey protein. ON whey protein may be had for $10/lb (or $20/kg), which is a good price. It will cost you < $1/day in protein supplement.
Isolate usually has higher protein concentration, but online videos claim there's not much difference b/w isolate and concentrate. FIXME ...
Meals:
- Breakfast: Get 2 bread slices (each 5g of protein for whole wheat bread with multi grain) with peanut butter on it (5 g of protein for 1 tablespoon). Drink a glass of milk (another 8g of protein in one glass) with Protein powder (1 scoop is around 10g of protein) in it. Do take 10 nuts which give you about 5g of protein. This will will give you around 30g-35g of protein in the morning meal.
- Lunch/Dinner: For a vegetarian diet, I don't count too much on protein intake in home made curries, roti
Calcium:
Calcium is needed for bone development, and 1.2g per day is the recommended amount. Basically you need to consume 1/2 KG of calcium every year, which is a lot of calcium.
Vitamins:
Vitamin B12: Very essential
Deals:
2025:
01/03/2025: Amazon Dymatize whey protein for $42 (5 lb)
This is cheaper than Costco, but brand is different. Also, it's concentrate and NOT isolate, which usually has slightly lower protein content. People like their Isolate version. This is cheaper than even Costco ON Whey protein, but this price is only for 1st S&S order.
2024:
12/26/2024: Costco ON whey protein for $49 (5.5 lb) in store => expires 01/20/2025
Costco has 5.5 lb (2.5Kg) ON whey protein isolate for $55 online and $49 in store. Prices are lowest for buying in store. It's 5.47 lb for Vanilla flavor, and 5.64 lb for Chocolate flavor, but both of them have same protein 24g per scoop. Vanilla has 2g protein per 31g, while Chocolate has 24g protein per 32g. Either way, price is < $20/kg which is as low as it can get. So load up.