Non Meat protein - harder to use

hooplah

I'm vegetarian and making an effort to up my protein intake at the moment. My brother is convinced that the soy and vegetablle / wheat proteins in quorn, tvp etc are less easily used by the body in comparison to meat / dairy.

Anyone know of any sources for this type of claim or how I could find out more?

hooplah

Nobody? I thought this topic might interest people. Anyway if nobody minds I'm going to link here to anything I find online. It'll be handy for me to keep everything together and hopefully it will be useful for others who may want to evaluate their protein intake but don't want to eat meat.

Quorn:
The following two documents are both produced by the people who manufacture Quorn so there's an obvious bias to be aware of.

Dietary Protein in Mycoprotein and Quorn™ Products
This compares the protein, fat and calorie content of selected Quorn products with meat equivalents. It also has a section on the protein qualitiy or 'digestability' of Quorn.

Mycoprotein At-A-Glance
Basically a 1 sheet summary of the above.

Soya:

These studies are about the side effects of soy in relation to testosterone and lean body mass rather than the protein digistability but I figure its all about the quality of protein so i'll add them here.

Effect of protein source and resistance training on body composition and sex hormones.
BSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Evidence suggests an inverse relationship between soy protein intake and serum concentrations of male sex hormones. Anecdotal evidence indicates that these alterations in serum sex hormones may attenuate changes in lean body mass following resistance training. However, little empirical data exists regarding the effects of soy and milk-based proteins on circulating androgens and exercise induced body composition changes.

Clinical and Biological Activity of Soy Protein Powder Supplementation in Healthy Male Volunteers
Study Conclusion: Soy protein powder decreases serum testosterone levels in healthy men and acts as an ER-ß agonist; the significance of this biological effect with respect to cancer prevention needs further study.

If anyone has anything they think should be up here please add it!

emollett

I can't say i know much about how easily different sources are used by the body, but i tend to use beans and lentils to get my protein. I've also started to use quinoa a lot, usually in the place of rice. It has the full set of amino acids you need in it. If you are not a vegan, there is also a fair bit of protein in eggs and dairy products.
Personally i can't really see non meat sources of protein being that much harder to digest, beans you do have to cook properly but once they are you should be fine. Protein deficiancies are fairly rare in western countries.

hooplah

emollett wrote: »

Personally i can't really see non meat sources of protein being that much harder to digest

I think you could be right. I'm interested in learning more about it though and reckon that having a lot of info linked to from one place would be handy for anyone else who looks for it in the future.

missmatty

I can't help really, but in my case I rarely eat red meat anymore. Get my protein from chicken and fish as well as nuts/seeds/dairy sources/lentils/pulses. I now find when i do have red meat i seem to find it harder to digest!