Soy Protein

Vegetarians and health enthusiasts have known for years that foods rich in soy protein offer a good alternative to meat, poultry, and other animal-based products. As consumers have pursued healthier lifestyles in recent years, consumption of soy foods has risen steadily, bolstered by scientific studies showing health benefits from these products. Last October, the Food and Drug Administration gave food manufacturers permission to put labels on products high in soy protein indicating that these foods may help lower heart disease risk.
Scientists agree that foods rich in soy protein can have considerable value to heart health, a fact backed by dozens of controlled clinical studies. A yearlong review of the available human studies in 1999 prompted FDA to allow a health claim on food labels stating that a daily diet containing 25 grams of soy protein, also low in saturated fat and cholesterol, may reduce the risk of heart disease.
While not every form of the following foods will qualify for the health claim, these are some of the most common sources of soy protein:

Tofu is made from cooked puréed soybeans processed into a custard-like cake. It has a neutral flavor and can be stir-fried, mixed into "smoothies," or blended into a cream cheese texture for use in dips or as a cheese substitute. It comes in firm, soft and silken textures.

"Soymilk," the name some marketers use for a soy beverage, is produced by grinding dehulled soybeans and mixing them with water to form a milk-like liquid. It can be consumed as a beverage or used in recipes as a substitute for cow's milk. Soymilk, sometimes fortified with calcium, comes plain or in flavors such as vanilla, chocolate and coffee. For lactose-intolerant individuals, it can be a good replacement for dairy products.

Soy flour is created by grinding roasted soybeans into a fine powder. The flour adds protein to baked goods, and, because it adds moisture, it can be used as an egg substitute in these products. It also can be found in cereals, pancake mixes, frozen desserts, and other common foods.

Textured soy protein is made from defatted soy flour, which is compressed and dehydrated. It can be used as a meat substitute or as filler in dishes such as meatloaf.

Tempeh is made from whole, cooked soybeans formed into a chewy cake and used as a meat substitute.

Miso is a fermented soybean paste used for seasoning and in soup stock.

Soy protein also is found in many "meat analog" products, such as soy sausages, burgers, franks, and cold cuts, as well as soy yogurts and cheese, all of which are intended as substitutes for their animal-based counterparts.
Soy protein is approved for those who are lactose intolerant, and can be used as a meat substitute. Much more than just an ingredient for a protein shake, Soy protein can be used for cooking instead of flour, producing high protein foods that are extremely low in fat, a bodybuilder's dream come true! Soy protein is derived exclusively from soy beans.
Soy protein provides a healthy way to get non-animal protein into your diet. It is great tasting, natural and can have a plethora of healthy effects on the body. It is ideal for high protein/low carb diets! It's valuable constituents include saponins, phytosterols, and isoflavones. This is one of the best things about soy protein! Saponins support healthy immune system function and combine with cholesterol to reduce it's absorption into the body through the small intestine. Phytosterols have also been shown to help maintain cholesterol levels already within normal range.
The anabolic isoflavones in soy (genistein and daidzein), not only have exhibited effects as powerful antioxidants, but have been shown to exhibit positive health benefits for both men and women.

Egg Protein

A large egg provides 6 grams of protein.Protein content of egg white=3.6g, protein content of egg yolk=2.7g.Because of their high protein content, eggs are included inthe meat, fish, poultry, nuts and beans group of the US Food Guidance Systems. Eggs have the highest quality protein in the food supply with the amino acid pattern almost matching the human requirement for essential amino acids (FAO protein value=100).Digestibility of egg protein is 97%. This means that 97% of the egg protein is absorbed as amino acids, which are availablefor new protein synthesis and replacement of lost protein.Cooked egg protein is more digestible than raw egg protein (cooked egg protein digestibility=90.9%+/-0.8, raw egg protein digestibility=51.3+/-9.8) The biological value of egg protein is 94%.
Biological value is a measure of the rate at which the protein in food supports growth. Eggs and milk have the highest biological value and provide more amino acids for growth and tissue maintenance than even meat, including beef, chicken, pork.
The protein in eggs has a biological quality greater than any other natural food. In fact many manufacturers of protein powders often base their products on egg protein such as albumin because of its protein quality. Egg protein contains all the essential amino acids in the exact proportions required by the body for optimum growth and maintenance of lean, metabolically active tissue.
Quality of proteins can be an important factor in weight loss because protein of poor quality forces the body to either use it as fuel or convert it to fat for storage. Many processed foods contain protein levels of poor quality plus they often contain high calories which increases the chance protein will be stored as fat!

Milk (casein) Protein

Casein is the predominant protein in milk. For example protein in cheese and cottage cheese is casein. Casein is the slow digestive protein in the family of proteins that keeps you full longer. Casein also has a naturally protein high glutamine content, higher than whey, egg or soy. It is one of the best protein in building muscles. Casein is also very low in lactose.
While whey protein may increase protein synthesis to a very high degree, higher than casein, scientists are now recognizing that micellar casein is much more important in preventing muscle breakdown. In fact, additional research is demonstrating that the slow and sustained release of amino acids from micellar casein can cause a 'timed release' trickle of amino acids into the bloodstream which can last for as many as 7 full hours after ingestion.
Micellar casein is the natural, undenatured form of casein found in milk. It is separated from milk by means of ultrafiltration, without the use of chemicals, which increases the amount of bioactive milk peptides that support immune function as well as enhance muscle growth. A property of micellar casein is that it may have the ability to form a "gel" in the gut. This provides a steady release of amino acids into the blood stream, which makes it an excellent choice for a long lasting anti-catabolic protein.


Benefits of Casein Protein:
* Casein is digested very slowly thus helping to regulate (slow down) transit time of other proteins through the intestinal tract. This slowing of transit time helps increase the absorption of amino acids, peptides, and whole proteins. This helps to prevent lean tissue breakdown during sleep or between meals.

* Casein is very high in the peptide form of the amino acid glutamine (20.5%) – higher than whey, soy, and eggs. High concentrations of this amino acid can help spare lean muscle tissue, something extremely important to us boomers.

* Casein contains high amounts of glucogenic aminos (threonine, glutamine, arginine). These aminos assist in glucose production for energy during exercise and other physical activities. Similar to glutamine, they also have been shown to slow down muscle breakdown.

Whey Protein

Whey protein has been described as “nature’s perfect protein”. One of the most heavily researched nutritional supplements, whey protein has been proven to provide numerous health and fitness benefits in dozens of scientific studies.
Whey Proteins are the rich source of protein. When fresh milk is changed into cheese, then whey protein is split out. Whey protein is useful in offering the human body with the essentials building blocks for producing amino acids that are utilized to build muscle tissue.
Why are whey proteins scoring more as compared to other sources? The answer is that it is contained the right combination of all amino acid to make the concentration. Whey proteins are very beneficial for the immune system of body by playing an important role like an antioxidant.

Why whey protein?
Whey protein is very beneficial for everyone, use of whey protein, makes the body healthy. Although, bodybuilders and athletes are in require of whey proteins. Because of they do workout for a long time period.
Whey proteins absorb with physical exercise and give result as muscle building. As well as, it is useful for muscles to grow and recover rapidly. If one wants to lose more fat, whey protein is useful as a good intake of whey proteins balance the level of blood sugar, however carbohydrates cause the levels of blood sugar for fluctuating.
In fact, it is useful to loss extra fat and prevents out of control intake. Basically whey proteins are useful for people to control the diet efficiently.

What are the Benefits of Whey Proteins ?
There are large numbers of benefits of whey protein

Physical Performance:
Whey protein is beneficial for athletes to maintain a muscular and distinct figure. Since numbers of athletes need double as much protein in the diets.

Cardiovascular Health:
There are specific bioactive elements in whey proteins. They can lead for reduction of cholesterol. It is beneficial to decrease the risk of getting heart problems.

Diabetes:
Whey protein is useful for those people who are suffered from diabetes to control the diet eating. It offers more value as compared to equal quantity of low quality proteins that are mainly high in cholesterol and fat.

Wound Healing:
During the healing procedure, increased whey proteins are needed to set up the expansion of the original skin. Whey protein is the highest qualitative protein. It is mainly used in high protein products, which are recommended, by surgeons or health care providers.

Weight Management:
Whey proteins are useful for stabilizing the levels of blood glucose by decreasing the digestion of glucose in the bloodstream. Due to this, the levels of insulin are decreased and the human body can easily burn fat.

Protein:
It is very easy to absorb whey protein. It is rich source of protein for those people who are suffered from cancer.

Healthy Ageing:
Whey proteins with the highest quality in proper amounts can maintain muscles in aging.

Muscle Builder

Protein is known to be a best muscle builder:
Protein is made of amino acids. Amino acids are the basic building blocks of muscle. Therefore, protein is an essential ingredient for muscle building. You can't build muscle without it! You will want to take in about 1-2 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight throughout the day. So an average person who weighs 150 lbs would want to consume between 150 and 300 grams of protein in a day. Protein shakes and bars are convenient and provide high quality protein.
There are several forms of protein including: Whey, Soy, Egg, and Casein. So which kind is best? Well that depends on how and when you want to use them.

Whey - Basically, whey protein is awesome for post-workout supplementation because that's the time when your body needs protein the most, and whey is digested very quickly (about 30 minutes).

Casein - Casein, on the other hand, is digested very slowly (over 2 - 7 hours). This means it's great to use a protein supplement with casein before bed because the longest time your body goes without protein is during the night while you are sleeping.

Egg - Egg protein (albumen) digests at a medium pace (1.5-3 hours) so it's a good anytime protein to provide a good sustained release of aminos to the body.

Soy - Soy protein is the vegetarian's friend because it's one of the only complete protein sources derived from plants. Soy is a good overall protein, although it's not as effective in terms of absorbtion as whey or egg albumen. Additionally, soy has many recognized health benefits for women.

Blends - Either protein supplements are straight whey, soy, egg, or casein; or they are a combination of any or all of these kinds of proteins. What can a blend of proteins offer that a straight protein cannot? Basically, different rates of digestion. This means you can take a blended protein any time to get quick, medium, and prolonged absorption of protein.

Low Carb - Of the many protein supplements, the two other main categories are weight gainers and low carb protein shakes and bars. These two are on opposite spectrums of each other. Yep, you guessed it low carb protein shakes are good for those dieting or trying to lose or maintain weight.

Weight Gainer - Weight gainers are high calorie protein products that are great for people who are looking to bulk up. If you are having trouble gaining weight, taking in extra high quality calories will usually do the trick.