How many grams of protein and fibre should you have in each meal?

anxietyfairy
anxietyfairy Posts: 141 Member
in Food and Nutrition

Say if you have three, four, five or six meals per day?

Replies

  • nossmf
    nossmf Posts: 13,956 Member

    There's no hard and fast rule or magic number. An old claim said your body cannot digest more than 20g of protein in a single meal, but that's been debunked. And professional bodybuilders may find a tiny degree of improvement in their musculature if they eat protein throughout the day, but for the average person not getting ready to stand mostly-naked on a stage, that edge is meaningless.

    So it largely comes down to personal preference. Some people may find it difficult to eat as much protein as they want, so by spreading it out across multiple meals they may find it easier to stomach (so to speak). Or maybe you get 90% of your day's protein through a thick steak at dinner.

    As long as you get your protein and fiber totals for the day, the rest is probably not going to matter.

  • tomcustombuilder
    tomcustombuilder Posts: 2,466 Member

    I wouldn't worry too much about the timing just the overall daily consumption of each. Whatever your lean weight is, that is your weight without too much fat on it, You want to have around .8 g of protein per pound and for fiber just figure somewhere around 30 to 50g a day depending on age sex

  • anxietyfairy
    anxietyfairy Posts: 141 Member

    I am 102kg and 5'8 female. I don't know what my lean mass is. Goal weight is between 70 and 80kg.

  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 36,366 Member
    edited April 17

    I agree with the guys above that total overall nutrition is the big deal, averaging over a day or even a few. The one exception may be for people who are aging, like 60+. At or approaching that stage, we can begin to absorb nutrients less efficiently, so it can help to spread them over the day instead of in just one meal. Protein is one of those nutrients.

    For sure ignore this link if you're not in that demographic, but in case you are, there's exhaustive detail about it here:

    https://www.jamda.com/article/S1525-8610(13)00326-5/fulltext

    Similar may be true for people with certain rather extreme health conditions, but high odds you'd know if that were an issue for you.

    https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/comment/48571522#Comment_48571522

    Try using this protein calculator and guide, but plug your goal weight into the calculator:

    https://examine.com/guides/protein-intake/

    Tom's 0.8 per pound bodyweight daily for protein would be 1.76 g per kilogram, so 123-141g daily in round numbers at your goal weight. That's probably fine. Extra won't hurt within reason, but diminishing returns for sure.

    Fiber, most resources suggest 25g for women, maybe a little less in later years, maybe a little more if male. Don't suddenly increase fiber dramatically all at once, if substantially below that, because the digestive system may handle a gradual increase better (less chance of triggering digestive discomfort, constipation, diarrhea, gassiness, etc.). As far as I know, there's no generic upper limit, but some individuals may be less tolerant of very high levels. (I do fine at 40g+ and female from food, but I have worked up to that.)

    Fat also contains essential nutrients, so it's a good plan not to lowball that, though a bunch of people don't have any problems reaching a sensible minimum, so that may be true for you. For a woman, maybe something around 0.77-1g daily per kg of bodyweight is IMO reasonable as a minimum.

    Best wishes!

  • nossmf
    nossmf Posts: 13,956 Member

    Your lean mass is, by definition, every part of your body that is not fat: skeleton, muscle, organs, etc. So if we start with a body fat estimate, lean mass is current weight minus the fat. At this point no need to be hyper-accurate, we just need a place to start, so you can look at this website:

    body-fat-navy

    If you're more of a visual learner, you can also estimate from these images:

    body-fat-percentage-men-women

    Let's throw some numbers out for example purposes.

    Current weight: 102kg
    BF%: 35% (35% of 102 is 36kg, so lean mass is 102 - 36 = 66)

    Daily protein goal: .8g/lb (1.76g/kg)
    Daily protein goal: 116g

    Fiber goal: 30g

    If you want to spread evenly across your meals:

    A single meal: 116g P, 30g F
    Two meals: 58g P, 15g F
    Three meals: 39g P, 10g F
    Four meals: 29g P, 8g F
    Five meals: 23g P, 6g F
    Six meals: 19g P, 5g F

    But as I said in my first post, it's the total for the day that's most important, not any single meal.

  • tomcustombuilder
    tomcustombuilder Posts: 2,466 Member
    edited April 17
    https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/comment/48571522#Comment_48571522

    Lean weight is usually what your goal weight it.

    Lean mass is with no fat so goal weight is a less confusing term and strikes a nice balance of forming the equation.

    Some people will suggest to use your current weight for your protein intake. The problem with that is if you have a lot of fat and you're overweight by much you'll be taking in too much protein and it really messes with your macros

  • neanderthin
    neanderthin Posts: 10,643 Member

    Distribution is very nuanced and is more dependent on an individual basis from my research on protein.

    Personally my total consumption of daily food, the need to distribute my protein intake is required and personally getting some protein in the first meal of the day is also advised based on my research and it also works for me considering I'm consuming around 150 to 175 g's a day and generally I eat twice a day and find that fits perfectly into my routine. I do sometimes snack and generally that will be protein as well.

    As far as fiber is concerned, the less I consume the better my gut feels, so I don't worry about getting some arbitrary amount. Your results may vary. 😊

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