Jono (00:01)

Hey, food groupies. Today I'm going to be talking about protein water. I realise that I've been talking about protein a lot. I'm going to stop. I'm going to have a break after this. It is important. If you'd listened to last week's episode, you'd understand why. Protein water is something I get lots of questions about. So I just wanted to have a podcast that I could refer people back to or that would hopefully answer all the questions that you have, because it is a bit different from normal protein supplements. Shock horror. I totally understand the appeal. Protein powder.

you know, particularly ways and plant based protein powders have a specific feel, a specific mouth feel and a taste. And that's not a taste that's for everyone. And you might be struggling to hit your protein targets through food. You absolutely can do it through food, by the way. So if you're thinking, do I need a protein supplement? Not necessarily. But if you feel that you do, or someone has, know, dietician has confirmed that you do, and you're looking into protein waters, there's a few very specific things to be mindful of. Now, I'm going to be mentioning some brands today.

Heads up, I'm not affiliated with any of these brands. We don't do that here. I've never taken money from a company nor will I, but these, so I'm just going through, you know, what these brands have on their websites. I reached out to a few of them as well via chat to try and get more information because I needed a bit more information around the ingredients and they were bulk nutrients were very helpful. Muscle Nation were absolutely useless. I'm pretty sure I was talking to a bot.

who just kept telling me the same thing over and over. Let me know if that helped. And it fucking didn't. But anyway, I just realized I swore. I don't swear. I hope you're not listening. Car with kids, I'm so sorry. I usually try and keep my swears to social media where it's safe. I got sidetracked. Yes, so Muscle Nation, useless. I reached out to VPA as well to get a bit more clarity. Couldn't hear anything. So the reason I needed to reach out is because there's two, well, there's three.

different classes of protein water, the three different families of protein water. And they don't talk about what family they are, because these aren't strictly, you know, well-defined. This is just kind of the buckets that I have put them in based on the style and the type of ingredients that they have. Right. And it's very important. We understand which type of protein water we're looking for, because some are much more useful than others. Right. And basically what it comes down to is we have

protein waters that are based almost entirely on collagen and protein waters that are based on either whey protein isolate, WPI, or sometimes an essential amino acid blend, right? I'm gonna go through each of these now. Starting with the collagen one, the collagen style of protein water is easily the most common. So if you're looking at a protein water, highly likely it's a collagen-based one, right?

Unfortunately, that is not the type of protein water that I would be recommending. Collagen protein is low in a few essential amino acids. It's also not going to have quite the other growth factors and things that other protein powders are going to have. And so I wouldn't recommend it as a replacement source of protein in your diet. Now there's a potential benefit for some collagen stuff for skin, hair, nails. We're still very, very early on in that research. But if you wanted to add a collagen supplement to your day to support that, technically you could use

These products, it's just easily the most expensive way to get collagen into your day. I personally just use the bulk nutrients, HCP, hydrolyzed collagen peptides, because it's cheap. I throw it in a smoothie and away I go. Again, no affiliation. just send them money and they send me collagen. They will do the same for you if you send them money. So if you're after a collagen supplement, I would just do that. If you are after a protein water supplement, I would stay away from the stuff from body science, ATP science, muscle nation, and the bulk nutrients, protein water.

And I think probably the VPA protein water. They didn't get back to me. They do have whey in there. And the bulk nutrients protein water is like collagen plus whey. And I was like, cool, how much whey is in there? And it's like five grams a serve, which is unfortunately not much. So body science, ATP science, muscle nation, VPA protein water, and bulk nutrients protein water, are effectively collagen supplements, not protein supplements. And that's an important distinction. Cool. Next in line, we have these essential amino acid blends.

So essential amino acids are the nine essential amino acids that we can't make ourselves or we can't make enough of. So we have to get extra from the diet. I'm not gonna run through what they are. I actually don't know what they are off the top of my head. I know the branch chain amino acids and like histidine. That's it, methionine. Anyway, not important. There's two products that I am aware of that are based more on an essential amino acid blend. That's the MacroMic EAA.

and sorry, the macro Mike protein water and the bulk nutrients future way. Both of those are vegan, which is why I would be recommending them as a protein source. Okay. If you are not vegan or vegetarian, then I probably still wouldn't use them because they are superior to the collagen protein waters because they have a better what's called amino acid profile. I either contain all nine of those essential amino acids in good amounts. So they're going to be helpful from that perspective for providing

providing those. But when compared to something that's based on say modified WPI, something that is essentially a whey protein just in a different form, we're still going to be missing some of the other amino acids, even though they're not essential, it's still nice to get them from our diet to top up, as well as some other potential growth factors and things in the protein powder that might be helpful. So your essential amino acid protein waters, your macro Mike, your bulk nutrients future way.

great options if you are a vegan or you're avoiding dairy for whatever reason, I would go with those. If you aren't avoiding dairy for whatever reason, then the clear winner on this one is Bodies Protein Water, B-O-D-I-E-Z protein water. It is a full serve of whey protein isolate, which is like one of the highest quality types of protein supplements you can get. Doesn't appear to be based on any collagen. It looks like everything that exists in a regular whey supplement.

exists in this protein water, which is why that's absolutely the protein water that I would be recommending for anyone who is okay with dairy. Again, I don't, I feel like I should be giving you a discount code, but they don't even know I exist. I'm quite positive. I've tried it a few times. It's very sweet, but I think that's all protein waters. And so if that's your jam, have at it. Just be careful from memory, the body stuff, they have,

Some that are very much like high protein, low carb, low fat. And then there's some that are a little bit more like a sports drink where there's some extra carbs in there. I'm not saying that's good or bad. Just make sure you're getting the right one for your goals and your context. Awesome. That's it. That's protein water. So round up. Body's protein water is the clear winner in terms of nutritional completeness for a protein supplement. Next, we have our essential amino acid blends.

Still not quite as complete as the body stuff, but definitely containing enough good stuff that I would think, to be perfectly honest, I can't say for certain. We don't have studies necessarily, but just based on the ingredients, I would think it would provide a good protein alternative to protein foods. That's the Macromax protein water and the Bulk Nutrients FutureWay. And then we have our collagen protein waters. Again, remember they're the most common. So if there's a brand here that I haven't mentioned, it's

probably a collagen one. And the easiest way to check that is to look at the ingredients and check the first list. First thing in the ingredients panel is probably collagen. If it is, you know that the large majority of it is collagen. that stuff like body science, protein water, ATP science, protein water. Sorry, it's called NoWay, which is kind of just a collagen thing. Muscle nation protein water, VPA protein water, and bulk nutrients protein water. Awesome. I'm not going to talk about protein for at least 72 hours. So I will talk to you next time.