Clean Protein

CHAPTER 1

What, Why, and How Much?

Sure, everyone has heard of protein. But what it is exactly? Everyone agrees that it’s vital, but, for some, protein means big muscles. For others, protein means energy. Many think that protein means meat. Because protein is the most sacred, celebrated, and misunderstood of all the nutrients, it means a lot of things to a lot of people. So let’s clear up the confusion.

Put simply, protein means life. It is one of six nutrients that are essential for your body to function, the others being water, vitamins, minerals, carbohydrates, and fat. Protein is the building block of life. Just as bricks and mortar form the foundation of a house, protein forms the physical structure of your body and is critical to facilitating growth and development, repairing damage, and keeping you functioning.

Protein itself is composed of twenty smaller building blocks called amino acids, eleven of which your body creates on its own; these are called nonessential amino acids. Your body cannot synthesize nine “essential” amino acids, so you must obtain them from food. When you eat protein, your digestive system breaks it down into amino acids, which are then dispatched to build and repair cells, bones, teeth, skin—anything your body needs.

Protein is critical to your immune response and eliminating unhealthy cells, while proteins called antibodies attack viruses directly and stimulate the natural killer cells that seek and destroy cancer cells. Insulin and growth hormones, which are essential to regulating sugar levels and helping young children grow, are also made up of protein. Meanwhile, all of the key neurotransmitters that regulate your emotions are derived from protein. For example, the famous mood and concentration boosters dopamine and serotonin are synthesized from the amino acids tyrosine and tryptophan, respectively. Put simply, every emotion, every feeling, every thought that passes through your mind is brought to you by protein.

Life cannot happen without protein. But, in our “if some is good, more must be better” culture, this translates as, “Eat as much protein as humanly possible.” Every day we are inundated with advertisements claiming that sculpted muscles, six-pack abs, toned thighs, and size-zero dresses are just a protein shake away. If you talk with bodybuilders, you might think that protein is the only nutrient worth consuming. If you walk into any health store, you’ll see tubs of protein powder with labels featuring muscular models, while brands like Muscle Milk and Pure Protein strive to outdo each other by cramming more and more protein into their products. Given all the products and misleading advertising, a reasonable person might think there is a protein deficiency epidemic in the United States and around the world. However, if anything, we have the opposite problem. The diseases that plague Americans, as we will discuss more in the next chapter, have to do with too much consumption rather than too little.

HOW MUCH PROTEIN DO WE NEED?

The answers to this question can be confusing, and there is a lot of bad information out there—not just on the Internet, but also in books, magazines, and even reputable newspapers. With a little digging, however, the answer is actually quite clear. According to the National Academy of Medicine, the current and best recommendation for protein intake is approximately 0.8 grams per kilogram of healthy body weight per day. This includes an err-on-the-side-of-caution buffer, so most people actually require less. When we say “healthy body weight,” that means that if you weigh 220 pounds but your healthy body weight is 175, you calculate your protein needs based on 175 pounds, not 220.

So a 130-pound woman should consume around 45 grams of protein, and a 180-pound man should be consuming around 65 grams. For moderately active people at those weights, caloric intake should be approximately 1,850 and 2,450 calories, respectively—this means that protein intake should be approximately 10 percent of total calories. Growing kids need a bit more protein: about 1.1 grams per kilogram of body weight. As it turns out, though, American adults and children are typically consuming about 50 percent more protein than they actually need.

As recounted by investigative journalist Marta Zaraska in her brilliant history of humankind’s fixation with meat, Meathooked, protein obsession began in the 1820s with a German scientist named Justus von Liebig, who “glorified protein as the only real nutrient and believed that without it our muscles just wouldn’t work.” Unsurprisingly, the good doctor started a company to market Liebig’s Extract of Meat—the Muscle Milk of its day.

Another nineteenth-century physiologist, Carl von Voit, recommended with practically no evidence that adults consume 150 grams of protein per day. After studying the protein intake of manual laborers, von Voit simply extrapolated that amount to arrive at his recommendation for average adults. As Zaraska notes, von Voit’s methodology was “like observing children stuffing themselves with cookies and concluding that young humans require tons of sugar to grow.” Although von Voit later conceded that protein intake should be closer to 50 grams per day, his first declaration remained conventional wisdom.

Few people challenged this belief until the early twentieth century, when Yale University chemist Russell Chittenden decided to test von Voit’s methodology. Chittenden is best known as the “father of American biochemistry,” but we could also reasonably refer to him as the “father of protein sanity.” Against great opposition Chittenden proved that humans don’t need more than 10 percent of their calories from protein, and what was considered protein deficiency at the time was actually simple malnutrition from lack of caloric intake.

Chittenden arrived at his recommendations after reviewing all of the scientific research on human protein needs. He was surprised by the lack of any evidence to support high-protein diets. Intrigued, he decided to drastically cut protein from his own diet and even convinced his friends and family to do the same. Chittenden figured that if von Voit’s protein recommendations were accurate, he and his subjects would be weaker, have worse concentration, and exhibit lower productivity. On the contrary, their health and alertness improved markedly.

Then, beginning in 1903, Chittenden organized experiments over a six-month period with military men who were beginning their training. These men were accustomed to eating very large quantities of meat, so Chittenden reduced their meat intake by about two-thirds. He also subjected them to fifteen strength and fitness tests. After he slashed their meat intake, these men, who were already quite fit, doubled their average fitness scores. He then repeated the experiment with well-trained athletes, who, just as the military men, were accustomed to high meat intake. Once again, the participants’ performance improved—this time by about 35 percent.

By the 1940s, the USDA protein recommendations were a reasonable 70 grams per day for men and 60 for women—still high, but a fraction of what was recommended by the protein-crazed nineteenth-century Germans. Nevertheless, the protein myth was reborn with a poorly designed study involving rats. The authors claimed—without any evidence at all—that protein needs for rats were the same as for humans. This makes no sense, because rats are natural carnivores and rat babies grow extremely quickly compared to human babies, while rat milk contains nearly four times more protein than does human milk. Alas, we are not rats. And in general, as long as we are getting enough calories, we are getting enough protein.

WHICH PROTEIN IS BEST?

As we will see in this book, just about every whole food has protein, from sirloin steaks to iceberg lettuce to lentils to oranges. For this reason, protein deficiency is extraordinarily rare in the United States. While animal products are the most concentrated sources of protein, people who don’t eat meat, eggs, and dairy still meet the protein recommendation with ease. A study published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics comprising 30,000 meat-eaters and 25,000 non-meat-eaters found that every participant who was consuming adequate calories received enough protein, with even the strictest plant-based eaters receiving 70 percent more protein than they needed.

In short, if you aren’t drastically underweight, then you are receiving enough protein in your diet, no matter what you are eating. Nevertheless, the animal-food industry is desperate to convince Americans that they need more, more, more protein and that meat is the best source. With revenues exceeding $250 billion and an annual advertising budget in the hundreds of millions, the industry can afford to perpetuate this myth indefinitely. Read that again, if you will: revenues for animal protein exceed $250 billion per year. Marketing campaigns such as “Got Milk?” and “Beef. It’s What’s for Dinner,” have convinced millions that animal protein is a normal, healthy, and essential part of their diet. The acclaimed investigative journalist Upton Sinclair famously observed, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” Executives for the American Meat Institute and the National Chicken Council are paid to believe that everyone should eat more beef and chicken, and so it’s sound business practice to spend vast sums convincing people they will waste away from protein deficiency without animal products.

OK, you might be thinking. So we’re eating more protein than we need. What’s the big deal?

Most pressingly, all of those extra calories are leading to extreme weight gain. A study funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and published in the Lancet reports that obesity rates have been rising over the past three decades globally—so much so that roughly 40 percent of the global population is now either overweight or obese. In short, obesity now presents “a major public health epidemic in both the developed and the developing world.” As the authors conclude, “In the last three decades, not one country has achieved success in reducing obesity rates, and we expect obesity to rise steadily as incomes rise in low- and middle-income countries in particular, unless urgent steps are taken to address this public health crisis.” Ironically, according to the food market research firm Mintel, two-thirds of consumers believe that eating high-protein foods is the best way to lose weight.

Major news stories about obesity epidemics are as common as stories about heart disease, cancer, and diabetes—each of which is linked to being overweight. In contrast, when was the last time you read a story about a protein deficiency epidemic? You will not find such an article, because not only is there no protein deficiency epidemic, there is no protein deficiency at all. Period.

But this book is not about how to eat less protein, because protein is not actually the culprit—the culprit is animal protein. So this book is about how to eat better protein. If so many foods can provide you with ample amounts of protein, then which do you eat? It turns out there are vast differences in quality among various forms of protein. Some protein you can eat to your heart’s content, and your body will remain happy—this is what we refer to as clean protein. Other forms of protein are fine in small amounts but can cause serious disease when consumed regularly—we call this dirty protein. In the next chapter we will break down these differences.