You're Consuming Your Protein Wrong, Experts Offer Tips for the Ideal Protein Plan
So you’ve decided to prioritize protein in your diet. Congrats! You’re one step closer to building muscle and boosting satiety all day long.
It’s not quite as simple as adding an extra smear of peanut butter to your PB&J or throwing another patty on to your cheeseburger to make it a double. No, you’ll need to consider a few best practices as you embark on a protein journey and be strategic about it. That's what WH is here for! First, some common questions....
How much protein should you eat?
While the Recommended Daily Allowance, aka RDA, has long held at 0.8 grams per kilogram of body weight, experts like Kelly Jones, RD, a board-certified sports dietitian are now saying people who regularly exercise likely need 1.4 grams per kilogram or slightly more to aid tissue growth.
Working with an expert can help you figure out the best amount for your lifestyle and fitness goals.
Are animal or plant-based protein sources best?
Depends what you're eating and how you go about it. What you should know is that meat provides all of the essential amino acids your body requires in one fell swoop, but you’ll need to mix and match plant-based sources in order to get the optimal amount of these nine essentials. (Check out some of the best plant-based options if you go that route.)
Meet the experts: Kelly Jones, RD, is a board-certified sports dietitian and the owner of Kelly Jones Nutrition. Tracy Anthony, PhD, is a professor of nutritional sciences at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey.
Ok so what’s the ideal time of day to eat protein?
Generally speaking, the time of day during which you consume protein doesn’t matter, in and of itself, as much as how you distribute your intake throughout the day.
If you’re like most Americans, you’re probably getting the bulk of your protein at dinner. Women between the ages of 20 and 49 were found, on average, to consume about 42 percent of their daily protein at dinner and just 17 percent at breakfast, per a survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agriculture Research Service.
What we should be aiming for instead is an equal distribution of protein throughout the day, say experts.
“Research shows spreading out protein intake every three to four hours or so into moderate doses versus a lot at once is associated with more optimal muscle repair and for those who are looking for growth, more optimal growth too,” says Jones.
Indeed, evenly spreading protein consumption among meals, rather than skewing it towards dinner “stimulated 24-hour muscle protein synthesis more effectively,” according to researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch.
Why is it smart to eat protein all day versus in one sitting?
This could be due to the way our body metabolizes protein and its building block, amino acids. Whereas surplus carbohydrates are stored in the body as glycogen and surplus fat as body fat, amino acids aren’t squirreled away as amino acids to be used later.
Rather, after our body has used what it can of the protein we eat at a meal—by supporting metabolism, producing hormones, maintaining bones and, yes, aiding muscle protein synthesis—it is then converted into either fat or glucose.
Research seems to indicate that around 20-25 grams of protein at one time is the upper limit that our body can use in muscle synthesis (though one study put the number closer to 30 grams). Essentially, anything in excess of 20-30 grams at a single meal may not make a huge difference as far as protein actions in the body go.
Another reason you may want to consider equal distribution throughout the day? You’ll probably just get less hangry.
“People notice that when they start to emphasize protein at breakfast and they ensure that it's there at their snack too, they feel more satiated throughout the day,” Jones says. “They're less likely to be distracted by hunger, they're less likely to have blood sugar spikes and crashes.”
Do I need protein right after a workout?
Perhaps you’ve heard the term anabolic or metabolic window (they’re often used interchangeably), which refers to the time period after a workout in which your muscles are repairing themselves and nutrition can play a role in aiding that process.
Depending on who you talk to, you may be told that time period is as brief as 15 minutes. Which would essentially mean you’d have to sip a protein shake while showering in order to get the timing just right.
Thankfully, research has led experts to widen this window considerably, to three or four hours (sometimes even five or six if you’re really pushing it). But both of the experts WH spoke with agreed that within two hours is optimal.
“Don't go longer than two hours, and if you have big goals for gaining muscle and repairing muscle, get it closer to your workout, if you can,” says Jones.
As for the amount of protein, aim for 20-25 grams post-workout, recommends Tracy Anthony, PhD, a professor of nutritional sciences at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey.
What about pre-sweat protein?
Now, if all of this talk about post-workout fueling has you wondering about pre-workout fueling, we have that answer too. If you’re exercising for an hour or less, you probably don’t need to worry about protein intake ahead of time and can simply focus on getting high-quality protein after, says Jones.
However, if you’re going for, say, a two-hour run or you tend to feel peckish if you don’t eat before exercising, grab a carb-rich snack with a few grams of protein first.
“It will help a little bit with your energy levels and reducing the amount of muscle damage you're going to have go on there too,” Jones says.
What might a day of protein look like?
Keeping with the principle of spreading your protein out, Jones recommends three meals (and potentially two snacks) to keep amino acids steady throughout the day:
Morning: If you’re planning on waking up and getting an early workout in, nibble on a banana beforehand to stabilize your blood sugar. For a post-workout breakfast (or your first food of the day if you didn’t exercise), Jones suggests a veggie omelet and a slice of avocado toast. If by three hours later it isn’t time for lunch, nibble on a snack of peanuts or pistachios with a side of crackers and hummus, or pair the nuts with a small piece of fruit.
Afternoon: Cook up either a chicken breast or a salmon filet (or, if you prefer a plant-based protein, tofu), and prepare accompaniments of cooked vegetables and quinoa. (Or you can throw the protein and quinoa on top of a bed of lettuce for a salad and add a little dressing.) If you’re someone who eats a later dinner, you’ll once again want a snack in between meals. Jones suggests roasted edamame with some raisins.
Evening: For your final meal of the day, opt for a protein you haven’t had yet (either one of the above or shrimp), paired with farro (which is a higher-protein grain) and some roasted broccoli. Since you’ve ensured your protein is spread throughout the day, you hopefully shouldn’t need an evening (or midnight) snack.
Of course, these are just suggestions and everybody’s body will respond to protein amounts and timings differently. (Check out this powerlifter's grocery shopping strategy; she aims for 130 grams of protein per day.) Anthony suggests a little experimentation to find out what works best for you and your specific goals.
“You can try timing; you can try dosing a little higher and a little lower within that range and see how you feel,” she says. “That's the beauty of personalized nutrition: You have that flexibility because each person is an individual and you don't know until you know.”
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