First published at 20:34 UTC on November 9th, 2019.
What makes a protein powder high quality? There are three layers to dive into when figuring this out. The type of protein should be the first thing you evaluate. There are protein supplements from countless sources these days. You have whey, casein,…
MORE
What makes a protein powder high quality? There are three layers to dive into when figuring this out. The type of protein should be the first thing you evaluate. There are protein supplements from countless sources these days. You have whey, casein, pea, beef, soy, hemp, egg, rice, and many more. So what makes one source better than another? Generally it’s the amino acid profile that each source brings to the table. Luckily many products these days list out that profile right on the label.
The key aminos you should be concerned with are branched chain aminos. These would be leucine, isoleucine, and valine. Leucine being the king of the 3. They are essential amino acids which means that your body can’t produce these, you need to consume them. There are 9 essential aminos, but what makes these 3 special is that they are mostly responsible for stimulating muscle protein synthesis and producing a positive nitrogen balance or anabolic state. The reason you are buying a protein powder in the first place is to gain or retain muscle mass, am I right?
When we compare these various sources of protein we find that whey packs the most branched chain aminos. This is why you hear so much about whey protein so much from the health community. Now the next layer is about the different forms of whey. There are multiple levels of refinement that whey can go through. This is where we see terms like concentrate, isolate, and hydrolysate. Concentrate is of lesser refinement.
Generally these are less than 80% pure protein and in the supplement realm it is the cheapest whey out there for companies to buy.
The isolate is usually around 90% purity and is probably the most common form you will find. But sometimes they will mix in concentrate with the isolate and you don’t want that. Isolate is a good purity and actually will contain less lactose if you have a sensitivity there. It will be faster and easier to digest than just about every other protein there is.
Which brings us to th..
LESS