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Where Do Vegetarians Get Their Proteins?

15th August, 2010 - Posted by health news - No Comments

Though most vegetarians consume a great deal of protein, they often don’t absorb as much as they would over a non-vegetarian diet. The reason being plant proteins are substantially less digestible than animal proteins, that have amino acid chains that are closer or identical to human amino acid chains.

Eating animal proteins might yield near to a 1:1 absorption ratio, while consuming plant proteins, such as wheat, may well only yield 50% of the amino acids essential to build a “complete protein” or a protein that can readily be assimilated into the human body. In order for vegetarians to absorb a proper quantity of protein, they need to consume various plant proteins to create complete amino chains. By eating vegetables,legumes, seeds, nuts, fruits, and whole grain products, vegetarians can increase the amount of complete proteins they generate by combining several varieties of amino acid chains. One useful plant that you can think about is stinging nettle. It is thought that stinging nettle contains 25% protein, dry weight during the peak season. You can learn more on this by checking out this post regarding stinging nettle (ortie) as it contains some helpful point.

Vegetarians must also consume more foods that contain proteins because plant proteins are usually difficult to digest. While a nutritional label may suggest that pasta has 5 grams of protein per serving; you might only have the capacity to digest 2-3 grams of that protein, which means you must match the pasta with other sources of protein.

Vegetarians must also consume more foods which contain proteins since plant proteins are usually difficult to digest. While a nutritional label may indicate that pasta offers 5 grams of protein per serving; you might only have the capacity to digest 2-3 grams of this protein, and that means you must match the pasta with other protein sources.

As well as natural protein sources, vegetarians must also seek foods which are “protein-fortified”–or artificially-infused with protein.

For instance, many supermarkets offer a variety “protein-fortified” pasta and bread. I have seen pasta which has around 12 grams of protein per serving. Soy milk is also a good source of protein for vegetarians. Studies on isolated soy protein show that it may be assimilated nearly as well as animal proteins, yielding near to a 1:1 protein absorption ratio.

For non-vegan vegans, yogurt, milk, and eggs (that have complete proteins) are excellent protein sources. As a vegetarian you have a number of options to boost your protein intake – and you should consider taking advantage of them all. You should diversify your food selections, consume more soy products, and prefer “protein-fortified” breads and pasta.