You’ve probably read me saying that whole plant foods have more than enough protein—to rival human breast milk, to satisfy the World Health Organization, and even the U.S. Recommended Daily Allowances!
One uphill battle I face as a nutrition educator is those trying to put on muscle mass, especially weight lifters, competitive athletes, and teenaged boys! Another challenge is helping anyone who wants to lose weight, where increased protein is helpful.
I have a teenaged athlete living in my house. He has to live in the real world, where all his friends are drinking raw eggs and cans of tuna and otherwise obsessing about protein. Here’s the good news: you do not have to drink eggs and eat animal flesh to achieve your goals.
If you’re going to eat protein powders, shakes, and bars, I have this important suggestion: DON’T EAT WHEY OR SOY!
Whey is the protein from dairy milk, the casein used in all of the animal studies in the Oxford/Cornell China Project where the animals (and later, people) fed a 20% animal protein diet suffered from all the modern diseases, especially cancer, and had shortened life expectancies. The evidence is enormous that this protein is harmful to your health.
You can request your free copy of my Nutrition Manifesto special report here, debunking falsehoods you’ve been taught about nutrition by the media: 12nutritionmyths.com
You can read in my report about the unhappy consequences of putting refined soy products in nearly everything in our food supply. Also read about why dairy is not the source of calcium and protein our mothers believed it was.
Hopefully you know that whole plant foods are the only true route to minimizing disease risk and living with more energy than all your peers. I have made a very exciting discovery and watched my son’s muscle mass and definition increase impressively in the past year using an incredible new product:
It’s Sun Warrior’s sprouted, fermented brown rice protein. Not only a whole food that isn’t stripped of nutrition–but live, and fermented, too. If you follow 12 Steps to Whole Foods, you know from Chapters 7 that sprouting a grain explodes its nutrition almost exponentially. You know from Ch. 8 that fermenting foods predigests their proteins, massively reducing strain on the digestive system.
The only other protein powder I approve of, nutritionally, is hemp, but it makes your smoothies gritty. And it’s not sprouted or fermented.
My son loves to make shakes with this raw, vegan, sprouted, and fermented protein powder, which is silky and delicious in Natural, Chocolate, and Vanilla flavors. My son puts it in the blender with ice, protein, and frozen bananas, plus almond, rice, or raw goat milk.
Adding high-quality protein to smoothies can help you lose fat, lower cholesterol, get in shape and increase muscle tone, as well as normalize your blood sugar.
If you get your protein powder on the GreenSmoothieGirl.com right now, you get my new Protein Shakes recipe collection FREE–sent to you as a download. (No surprise here: most of my shake recipes feature raw leafy greens!)
Unlike formulators of other protein powders, these guys at SunWarrior know real nutrition. Not false doctrines of bodybuilder nutrition, which promotes food full of chemicals and animal products. This is the superior nutrition I teach on GreenSmoothieGirl.com: where whole foods and live enzymes are important. And the only sweetener is the herbal stevia.
Here it is–I think you’ll love it:
http://secure.ultracart.com/catalog/GSG10/category/products/
Hi Robyn,
As you say, whey and casein are both from milk. But they are not the same protein. Whey does not contain appreciable amounts of casein, as far as I can determine.
Thie China Study definitely has evidence that casein is a cancer-promoter, but I don’t remember any studies using whey protein.
Thanks for your informative blog.
Susan Parsons MD
Hi Robyn,
Love your blog but I just want to correct you on one thing above: whey is not the same as casein, as you indicate. Yes, they are both milk proteins but there are TWO proteins in milk. Casein is the protein that dominates in the solid part of cheese and whey is in the liquid runoff in the cheese making process.
I agree though, neither promote health. I just wanted to point it out, as I know from experience touting wrong information can be alienating to those more ‘sciency’ who know their stuff really well.
Thanks!
The question I have then, is what about unprocessed and organic soy foods? I know that processed soy à la isolates are very bad, but isn’t soy still a complete protein in its whole form? I’m just curious and want to more.
I’m on your mailing list, and have been for a while. I am trying to get the promised 12 nutritional myths, but cannot — it keeps taking me back to this page: http://www.greensmoothiegirl.com/
I would like to be able to access the 12 nutritional myths thing promised.
Robyn,
I make my own yogurt each week and with the liquid whey left over from the yogurt I make my green smoothies. Are you saying this is not a good idea, or are you just talking about whey protein powders?
Hey Robyn, I am really interested in trying the protein drink but wondered if locals can pick it up instead of having it shipped? When your fulfillment center is two blocks away I hate to pay someone to bring it to me. Let us know if that is possible, OK?
My husband likes Sun Warrior Protein and drinks it often. Also, I love Vita Mineral Green. Another interesting product is the Ultimate Meal. I don’t think it tastes bad and my 3 year old loves it. I often make it for her when she won’t drink a green smoothie. (Rare…but it happens sometimes!)
I prefer hemp protein made with hemp milk, bananas and strawberries for added protein if I feel like I need it. I don’t really feel like I need it as I have learned so much from Robyn and our lives have changed thanks to her and her blog! We are so much healthier and my 6 yr old son who goes to a special day class is being tested at 8 years old for speech and 10 years for describing plants, flowers and in complete detail. He went in for speech but is still in a special class for being hyper. He has come a long way from not speaking at all to being tested 4 years behind his age within 2 years of drinking green smoothies. This is the truth and is documented! Thank you Robyn!
Karen, it will give you a local pickup option. Our fulfillment center is now doing that in West Lindon (Elite Operations) as my house was becoming Grand Central. You pay $3.95 for them to do that rather than shipping.
I have been hearing so much about Sun Warrior protein lately, I think I am ready to give it a try. I am debating between the plain/regular and vanilla. I would like to add it to my green smoothies in addition to experimenting with other recipes. Does anyone know how strong the vanilla flavor is? Does the plain/regular have any flavor to it? I am leaning towards the vanilla but would love to hear from others.
Thanks!
Hi Robyn, I am curious about your son’s nutrition and exercise regimen. Could you provide details for a typical day? I have a son interested in adding some muscle as well. We have your 12 Steps, great stuff! Thanks
Hi Robyn, Love your 12 Steps! Curious about your son’s nutrition and exercise regime. What’s a typical day, meals and workout for optimal vegan weight muscle gain?? Thanks!!!
I think whey is far superior to the soy proteins, because the soy is highly estrogenic and with SO many other sources of soy isolates in the diet (unless you’re eating a very unprocessed, homemade diet, you’re getting it from bread, canned, boxed, even health-food store foods). And thank you, you’re right, whey is not a big contributor of casein, so the China Study and whey are not directly linked. I didn’t mean to say whey and casein are the same thing. Whey is the yellow liquid that separates from milk solids when you make kefir/yogurt–it is high in protein and sodium rich as well. (That’s sodium, not sodium chloride or table salt!)
Remember that I promote a 60-80 percent raw, 95% plant-based diet. I myself eat yogurt/kefir and am not a pure vegetarian, occasionally eat chicken or fish. You can read much more about this in other places on this blog, site, and in my books.
Robby, whole-food soy products, esp. fermented, are good foods. But again, we’re just getting bombarded with too much soy. I use them occasionally (tamari, Braggs, etc. as seasonings, occasional tofu or miso).
Patricia, hopefully you got the email with the 12 Nutrition Myths report. We had a little trouble getting it out so we sent out a mass email, sorry!
I believe that fermented, whole-food milks are good food (i.e. kefir and yogurt, preferably homemade as I teach in Ch. 8 of 12 Steps), if you’re not opposed to it being an animal product.
Karen, I am not doing local pickup on this, just too time consuming and difficult to manage–and I had a few items taken from orders during the group buy.
Tonya, I love Ultimate Meal and keep it in my food storage. Split pea protein is another good one (featured in that product).
When it comes to whey protein, the quality needs to be taken into factor.
The very best you can get is a grade 7, anything less than that is just not the best. I know that there is only one company who has that grade in there products, here in the US the next best available is only a grade 3. Something to take into consideration. As for me and my family we have some who have finally been able to release weight and inches and body fat %, while others have been able to gain needed weight and bulk up on their lean body mass. All while using the same whey protein.
Hi Robyn,
I just discovered your site and I like it. I am trying to add more raw foods to our families diet and stumbled upon this site. I use whey protein for myself and my family. It is made from raw A2 milk from grass fed cows. I know that most whey proteins are not good for you, but I believe that this one is. The site where I purchase it is healingchoices.myemeraldstore.com
Can you check it out and explain to my why it would not be a healthy choice. Thanks, Cindy
Hi. I’m a 22 year old girl who is about 20 pounds underweight. I’m a gym finatic and I love to work out! I’ve been trying so hard to put on weight, but it’s very hard for me. I’ve decided to try supplements (powders).
However, everyone has different advice and opinions.
I would appreciate any advice on weight gain, supplements, protein, and building muscle!
Thanks!
Hi Robyn, Literally, you did good try to share about whey and casein but i don’t agree with your thought that whey or casein protein is not benefit for our body and Both are made our from different ingredient…
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whey protein powder :- http://www.7naturallaws.com/products/The-Natural-Whey-Protein-Powder