I want the vegan protein holy book

[flyingforjesus]

[This overlaps slightly with a previous post of mine from >1 month ago, so sorry about that.]

My goal is to gain muscle mass and want to do this in the most effective, efficient, cheap, lazy, and tasty way possible.

Here are my beliefs as of now:

• I want to hit at least 130 g of protein every day. I'm a man, 5'9", 170ish pounds but should be 150 lbs, have some visible muscles but nothing to write home about, and am planning on doing weight training ~300 days a year. It may be the case I should be aiming for >150 g/day.
• But I also don't want to put on fat weight, and so I can't just overeat in order to hit those numbers. I want to do this on a fairly low-ish calorie diet, maybe 2k kCal/day. I have a good 40+ lbs of body fat to draw on to fuel metabolism so I'm not that concerned about a lower calorie diet while gaining...as long as that high protein intake is there.
• I want to get a complete set of the necessary amino acids for optimal anabolic results at essentially every meal. I do not want to rely on my 11am lunch combining with my 7pm dinner.
• I want to space my protein consumption out to about once every four hours under the assumption that I can't store excess protein.
• Most vegan protein powders are insultingly overpriced.
• Pea protein is a pretty good option, but it's low in methionine and cysteine.
• Rice protein has higher values of those two amino acids, but rice protein powders concern me because of arsenic in rice, particularly brown rice from the U.S. But I have no idea how much to be concerned about this and based on what data.
• I've read that wheat gluten has high methionine (and cysteine?) but that it also has absorption issues.

I've managed to gain muscle eating a metric ton of tofu, but I want to have other options and use protein powder shakes as a supplement.

There has to be a best answer for all this out there somewhere, either on the web or in a book. Is there?

 

[yeshuabless1]

@flyingforjesus There is no lazy way to do this. Working out and putting on muscle without putting on fat is hard work. Just like losing weight. There is no cheat code. Google is your friend.

 

[flyingforjesus]

@yeshuabless1 There could be, easily.

And Google is so not your friend here.

 

[yeshuabless1]

@flyingforjesus There is no easy way to fitness. Whether you want to gain muscle, lose fat or both, there’s no easy way or backdoors. And yes, Google is your friend.

 

[flyingforjesus]

@yeshuabless1 I don't think you're reading what I wrote. What about what I wrote made it look like I am after anything easy? I'm in the gym 300 days a year and am trying to math the hell out of this.

That said, would it be bizarre, in a world in which the most unbelievable amount of information on every possible little detail of every arcane corner of the world exists, that someone would have already done that math and it's available somewhere?

If it's not, I might do it. And then I might publish it. But it would be stupid to reinvent the wheel without researching the possible existence of this.

Edit: The downvoting is really disappointing here. I've asked a legitimate question and treated everyone respectfully.

 

[justaguy1212]

@flyingforjesus Your first two bullet points are a contradiction. “I want to put on weight.” “I don’t want to put on fat.” The two go hand in hand, you can’t put in muscle weight without putting on fat. I suggest looking into lean bulking, which minimizes the fat gain.

You’re also micromanaging your diet. If you want all of the nutrients that you mentioned, maybe look into supplements such as EAA. I found that they help my gym recovery.

 

[flyingforjesus]

@justaguy1212

The two go hand in hand, you can’t put in muscle weight without putting on fat.

Great, you can link me to the studies that establish that?

 

[kjkc]

@justaguy1212

Taken together, the studies (Longland et al., 2016; Mettler et al., 2010) discussed here demonstrate that higher protein intakes combined with structured resistance exercise training are effective at promoting fat mass loss and enhancing LBM retention and can even result in gains in LBM during severe caloric deficits.

 

[dubschanging]

@flyingforjesus My advice? Spend less time trying to optimize and go start lifting. Lift heavy thing and put it down. Eat lots of protein. Get strong.

I made my best progress when I pushed myself harder in the gym and ate a lot of food consisently.

This is a good article though: https://www.strongerbyscience.com/vegetarian-and-vegan-athlete/

 

[flyingforjesus]

@dubschanging As I said in my post, I'm doing 300 days in the gym.

 

[dubschanging]

@flyingforjesus You mean you are planning on doing 300 days in the gym. And that number doesn't mean anything. Someone doing 150 days in the gym can make more progress than someone doing 300 days if they're working harder.

My point is that you are putting a lot of effort into the 2% incremental benefit that this approach will give you, when hard work and a good diet consistently over a long period of time will get you 98% of the way there.

 

[flyingforjesus]

@dubschanging Thanks. We just hold different views here. I appreciate you taking the time to respond.

 

[carra]

@flyingforjesus Just bulk. Don't fall into the recomping/maingaining trap.

 

[leudoca]

@carra No don't fall into the bulking trap XD

 

[carra]

@leudoca Bulking is the only way you can gain reasonable amount of muscle in a reasonable amount of time.

 

[leudoca]

@carra No it isn't, and it depends how you define it.

 

[carra]

@leudoca It is. Recomping is incredibly slow and maingaining is a nonsense term.

 

[leudoca]

@carra No it isn't. Recomping is slow because it's raw progress not apparent progress like bulking.

Maingaining is within the set that is bulking. You are consuming excess calories to gain mass. The exclusion is that when maingaining you keep body fat percentage fairly constant.

You are still gaining fat though, otherwise the percentage would drop with muscle gainied. If you are gaining fat, ie have excess energy, why do you need even more energy?

 

[carra]

@leudoca Recomping usually means eating at a slight deficit and if you're not a total noob you won't gain much if anything.

Maingaining is dumb term used by that yelling dude to sell stuff. It's just plain bulking. The total pig out bulks are stupid, no one should do that, that's why they are called "dirty bulks" and "dreamer bulks".

 

[leudoca]

@carra Recomping is used when you are higher than your ideal bf%. Someone at say 30% bf can easily eat in a slight deficit and gain muscle just as efficiently as anyone else.

Your body will tell you when your calories are too low. If you have energy for the workout and feel good you will build muscle.

Maingaining is just another word for clarification purposes. I mentioned it earlier, but all bulking/cutting discussions depend on definitions. "Bulking" means many things for many people, just like how "dirty bulks" are also use to describe non-pig out, but unhealthy food choice bulks.

So many people argue the terms, but with different definitions in mind.