I told my trainer this morning at the gym that I changed my diet over the last two days and was feeling a bit less energetic. She'd been on me about not eating breakfast so I added that I ate 1/2 a melon over the two morning hours before our meeting. Then she asked what the other changes were and I told her. She asked How are you getting your protein? Well I added soaked flax seeds to my salad dressing and plan on sprouting various beans - "what about meat?", she asked. I never ate meat so.....I told her that too lol! She is worried for my protein intake cause I'm trying to build muscle around my injured shoulder (that slipped out of socket this morning)
I know I can build muscle without meat 'cause I never ate (liked) and had and still have muscle.But those beans take a couple of days to sprout. For today I'm gonna find something yummy to make with the sunflower seeds I soaked. All/any recipes for that are welcome.

How are you getting your protein? I'm only a 2 day veteran who is seeking help.

Tell her that cooking protein destroys it, so for that and other reasons the protein RDAs were doubled. So if you are not destroying your protein by heating it, you really don't need to worry about protein intakes as much as SADers. Ironic isn't it, you might be ASSIMILATING more protein than the folks who are asking you where you get your protein from. However, rapid diet changes do cause protein levels to be low sometimes as the body adjusts to the new diet.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/13/2009 07:00PM by Lillianswan.

[www.youtube.com]

That video is simply awesome Sapphire!

Try persimonns, cashew, pumpkin seeds etc, they have a complete amino acids spectrum. You wouldn't be missing anything.

Raw Fruit Festival
[www.raw-fruit-festival.net]
Health, Fitness and Fasting Retreats in Spain
[www.fit-in-nature.net]

Excellent video sapphire.....says it all.



grace and peace be multiplied



todd

I'm very sceptical about the protein thing...If we need like a stake everyday to build muscle then we would be able to put on a 100lbs of muscle in a few months...Obviously all that protein isn't being put into our muscles...

Nuts, seeds, leaves are good sources.

If you want to be "impure" you could also add low-temp processed rice and hemp protein powders.

I've also heard of people after initially losing weight on the raw diet, put back more on than they had previously. Even though they've shrunk in dress size.

>How are you getting you protein?<

I haven't really worried about it for months. I don't eat much in terms of protein sources (like greens, nuts, seeds) and lately I've been juice fasting mostly on fruit juice (some veg too). I feel like as the years go by I need less and less protein to be healthy, though at the beginning of my raw journey I definitely had strict protein requirements because I wasn't assimilating well. So I would say I get protein from a very low protein raw diet by keeping my internal toxin levels as low as possible.

Sharrhan:


[www.facebook.com]

A 3.5 oz avocado has 2 grams of protein: [en.wikipedia.org]

Even carrot juice is 9% protein. Humans need 5-6% of calories from protein.

arugula Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Nuts, seeds, leaves are good sources.
>

Is there any science behind the statement: "Animal protein sources are more bioavailable than plant protein sources."?

Yes, Shane, it's two reasons:

1. better amino acid profile for higher utilization
2. lack of dietary fiber for higher utilization
3. antinutrients in plants that bind up some of the aminos but are otherwise protective

Even when you combine plant proteins to make a more "meat-like" amino profile with (grains + beans for example), comparing net aminos gram for gram what gets used still won't be as much with the plant case even if they are the same before you put them in your mouth.

So if you want to be high protein on a plant only diet you have to aim higher.

But I feel that lower protein is more protective, especially raw (please don't eat raw animal products, they are disease vectors and the protein is not as usable as in the cooked case) is more protective not only in the anti-aging stance or kidney health stance but also regarding cancers.

Lower protein diets are linked to lower circulating levels of IGF-1. Higher IGF-I levels are linked to cancers. This is not to say that they are causal, but it probably means that it is a marker for other risks and that keeping it low is a decent way to cut cancer risks.

The best source of protein is the cooked whole egg. Raw egg white is not very usable even though it is almost all pure protein aside from the water.

But you don't have to eat cooked eggs. You can do well with only plants. When I was in the gym a lot I used rice protein powder (nutribiotic) along with my normal raw foods, just 1-2 tbsp per day on top of my usual diet.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/13/2009 11:36PM by arugula.

Hemp seeds and chia and spirulina. Good luck changing the way your trainer perceives reality, gocycle!

Thanks, Arugula, for your great reply. I spend time listening to the paleo people argue that we should eat a small amount of meat for its animal protein benefits. But you're asserting that smaller amounts of protein seem to be more protective than larger amounts, and animal protein may be unnecessary. I admit ignorance, you know a lot, I'm picking your brain. I'm assuming you're basing the lower circulating IGF-1 levels with a diet lower in protein with Pubmed sources?

American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol. 84, No. 6, 1456-1462, December 2006
Long-term low-protein, low-calorie diet and endurance exercise modulate metabolic factors associated with cancer risk1,2,3
Luigi Fontana, Samuel Klein and John O Holloszy
[www.ajcn.org]

Good stuff, Arugula.

.. agreed, another nice "Raw" study by Luigi Fontana.... any thoughts, anyone, on why the (raw) women did so much better than (raw) men (relative to the endurance runner group) in the lean body mass statistic (table 3)? BTW the raw low-protein/low-calorie group ate about 9% calories from protein vs. about 16% for endurance runners.


Lean body mass (kg)2

Men-- 53.2 ± 5.6 (low-protein, low-cal), 59.2 ± 5.6 (endurance runners)
Women 40.1 ± 5.3 (low-protein, low-cal), 38.9 ± 4.7 (endurance runners)


[www.ajcn.org]

Ah, well, the (raw) low-protein/low-calerie women in this (small) study were
taller than the endurance runner group.. that could explain more lean body
mass?.. Subjects were matched for BMI, but not for size..

[www.ajcn.org]

I don't read the higher LBM in the raw group as "better" --lower would be associated with longer life if it were lab animals.

Anyway, that table says the P value for LBM measurement was not significant (NS) for either men or women, which means that it might have been just chance than those values were measured rather than due to the inherent nature of the diets or lifestyles. This is probably because the LBM can be proportional to height, whereas the other measures in that table are not (trunk fat %, body fat %).

The p-value is used to quantify the probability that the same results could have been obtained by chance.

For a result to be considered statistically significant, the "p-value" must be less than or equal to 0.05. This means that, given a p-value of 0.05, if a particular study were to be conducted 100 separate times, the same results would occur 95 times, and different results would occur only 5 times.

> I don't read the higher LBM in the raw group as
> "better" --lower would be associated with longer
> life if it were lab animals.
>
> Anyway, that table says the P value for LBM
> measurement was not significant (NS) for either
> men or women, which means that it might have been
> just chance than those values were measured rather
> than due to the inherent nature of the diets or
> lifestyles. This is probably because the LBM can
> be proportional to height, whereas the other
> measures in that table are not (trunk fat %, body
> fat %)...

..ah, so when it comes to longevity smaller can be better..

..curious that Luigi Fontana used % for body fat and trunk fat, but absolute kg for LBM..

..for the purpose of athletics, or achieving an arbitrary muscular status, % lean body mass might be an indicator?

..my calculation of %LBM for women using Fontana's tables 2 and 3:
(raw sedendary) low protein/low calorie 68%, (omni) endurance runners 75%, (omni sedendary) western diet 55% ....hope I did that right

..so the endurance runners have the highest %LBM, followed fairly closely by the raw sedentary low-protein/low-calorie group, by my calculations with LBM defined:

"Calculating Lean Body Mass (LBM)
Lean body mass is simply an estimation of how much you weigh without the body fat - how much your bones, organs and muscles weigh. As the other factors are assumed to be relatively static, by monitoring your LBM you can get a fairly accurate estimate of the amount of muscle you are gaining or losing."

More on the Fontana study Results....

"RESULTS -- Body composition
"Lean body mass was significantly lower in the low-protein, low-calorie diet group than in the endurance runners (Table 3)." [www.ajcn.org]

..this may be true for %LBM, but in terms of LBM (kg of women) there was very marginal difference in LBM between the raw SEDENTARY low-protein/low calorie (women) and endurance runner groups.. and for that matter with the sedentary western diet group. From table 3..

Women -- 40.1kg low protein/low calorie -- 38.9kg endurance runners -- 41.8kg western diet. (table 3) [www.ajcn.org]

From the study I don't see the disadvantage in going lower protein (in this case 9% for the raw fooders) for those who wish to maintain their muscular status. I know this is a ::cancer risk:: study, but we don't have many Raw groups researched in peer reviewed studies so it is interesting for me to look for other patterns not under review. Very cool study.

BTW I get my protein from a variety of fruits and veggies like carrots and kale averaging 6 or 7% of calories.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/16/2009 02:23PM by loeve.

This article I wrote recently might be of interest:

[debbietookrawforlife.blogspot.com]

Great Debbie - thanks

[.this may be true for %LBM, but in terms of LBM (kg of women) there was very marginal difference in LBM between the raw SEDENTARY low-protein/low calorie (women) and endurance runner groups.. and for that matter with the sedentary western diet group. From table 3..

Women -- 40.1kg low protein/low calorie -- 38.9kg endurance runners -- 41.8kg western diet. (table 3) [www.ajcn.org] ]

The difference was significant (by inspection) only in men, 53 kg low protein vs. 59 kg runners. But the sedentary men were about a cm shorter than the runners, too and that could account for a 1-3 kg difference in itself.

[From the study I don't see the disadvantage in going lower protein (in this case 9% for the raw fooders) for those who wish to maintain their muscular status.]

I don't, either.

I think you can maintain plenty of muscle on the low protein diet if you incorporate resistance training. You will have to increase your calories, though, compared to the sedentary case, and the additional protein you need will be proportional to the additional calories you need.

Another Fontana study:

Aging Cell. 2008 Oct;7(5):681-7.
Long-term effects of calorie or protein restriction on serum IGF-1 and IGFBP-3 concentration in humans.

Fontana L, Weiss EP, Villareal DT, Klein S, Holloszy JO.
Division of Geriatrics & Nutritional Sciences, Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis, MO 63110, USA. lfontana@dom.wustl.edu


Reduced function mutations in the insulin/IGF-I signaling pathway increase maximal lifespan and health span in many species. Calorie restriction (CR) decreases serum IGF-1 concentration by ~40%, protects against cancer and slows aging in rodents. However, the long-term effects of CR with adequate nutrition on circulating IGF-1 levels in humans are unknown. Here we report data from two long-term CR studies (1 and 6 years) showing that severe CR without malnutrition did not change IGF-1 and IGF-1 : IGFBP-3 ratio levels in humans. In contrast, total and free IGF-1 concentrations were significantly lower in moderately protein-restricted individuals. Reducing protein intake from an average of 1.67 g kg(-1) of body weight per day to 0.95 g kg(-1) of body weight per day for 3 weeks in six volunteers practicing CR resulted in a reduction in serum IGF-1 from 194 ng mL(-1) to 152 ng mL(-1). These findings demonstrate that, unlike in rodents, long-term severe CR does not reduce serum IGF-1 concentration and IGF-1 : IGFBP-3 ratio in humans. In addition, our data provide evidence that protein intake is a key determinant of circulating IGF-1 levels in humans, and suggest that reduced protein intake may become an important component of anticancer and anti-aging dietary interventions.
PMID: 18843793

Lillianswan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Tell her that cooking protein destroys it

No, don't tell anyone that.

BTW campers, if you're pregnant or may become pregnant make sure you get plenty of protein. Rats fed a protein weak diet had babies with smaller brains.

SAD people think they must eat meat to get protein. But most all animals, i.e. cows, chickens, etc. are vegetarian fed. How does the animal make protein if they don't eat it? It just goes to show that the body does not need protein in their diet.

Sunlight, everything has protein, and yes, we do need it, but not from meat, dairy, or eggs.

Rat studies don't mean @#$%& when it comes to humans, except that we're selfish and cruel.