I try to spread my meals, I am not going too high on calories. If I feel tired or dragging I will up it. I am trying for more protien though to help build the muscles back up. I hope it won't be too counter productive.

I'd say the main idea for the 5 meal thing is just so you are eating often throughout the day to speed up your motabolism. so if meal 5 comes in at 5:30 pm and breakfeast isn't until 8:30 am tomorrow, its conter productive to wait.

best approach IMO is to just calculate how many calories you need and space them out throughout the day in a manner that is satisfying to you... having AT LEAST 5 meals. i just try to eat every three hours or so and come in under my calories for the day.

I'm glad someone asked about the recovery formula. its great. but really pricey. Independant research shows that a post exercise meal with a 4:1 carb to protein ratio honestly does help you recover faster and ultimately perform better. But you really don't need to break the bank to get the propper nutrition. Chocolate milk has a 3:1 carb to protein ratio and its actually the beverage they used in the early clinical studies proving that post exercise nutrition is so important.

What i did was look up the nutritional information on the Beach Body RR drink and did my best to copy it. Its basically whey protien, dextrose and maltodextrin, with a little creatine. I was going to get tubs of the sugar and matodextrin from NOW nutrition (and right there that woud have saved me a ton of money) but then i found them in 50 lbs bags on a baking website!!! I bought the bags like a year ago and i'm not even half way through and i use it quite often. I'm not going to lie, at first its way less convient then just buying a tub of powder with a scoop. you have to get the contents of the 50 lbs bags into more managable containers (or come up with some other solution) and you will need to use a scale to determine propper proportions (then you could make a scoop by cutting a dixxie cup to the appropriate size or something like that) but i spend about as much as you would on one or two tubs of beach body drink on those two 50 lbs bags. I've definetly saved hundreds.

bottom line, eat something before and after your workout. especially after. some would say that your better off skipping a workout then working out and skipping the post workout meal.

I also hear a lot of people say that eating right before bed is bad for dieting, or that all the calories you eat will automatically turn into fat. I've see a lot of articles by self proclaimed fitness buffs that echo this, but i've never seen an actual research article from a peer reviewed journal that presented any emperical research supporting this.

your metabolism is quite active when you're asleep. and if your working your body, thats when it can repair and what not. Energy and nutrients are needed for that, so i really see no reason why one should avoid eating right before bed... assuming you are not exceeding your calorie intake limit. I wake up starving anyway.

200 g of protien sounds like more then you need. I am not sure what my % are. I thought i was going for something like 35C/40P/25F. I'm eating about 2400 cals a day and shooting for 180 grams of protein. i get pretty close to 180 but usually don't hit it. there are formulas out there for how much protein you should get. Its usually like a gram, or 2 grams per kilo of body weight. As long as you get more then the lower estimates you should be fine.

That casein treat sounds very tastey. I wouldn't worry to much about the fat especially if its monounsaturated.

holy CRAP did i pig out yesterday. lol, i should log as i go at these holiday parties, i'd do a lot better.