Jonathan Steedman (00:01.764)
Hey team, welcome back. We are gonna talk about protein today, just for something different. I'm sure you've never heard General and I talk about protein. But before you skip, we're probably gonna talk about it in a little bit of a different light than you maybe think. And certainly this has come off the back of, General and I have been getting a lot of the same questions from clients and on social media. And we know that protein is important and we know that protein is like the big topic of the day.

or one of the big nutritional topics. But we wanted to maybe give a little bit more nuance around, I guess what a high protein diet is, how much protein is enough protein, and also maybe make the case for being mindful of how much we're eating and not overdoing it and why that could be important as well. I guess what you wrote down, high protein diets, why you don't need that much. That's what we're gonna be talking about today. So.

Jenna (00:48.693)
Okay.

Jonathan Steedman (01:00.579)
What do you get us? You gave me the example before sometimes with new client gets a meal plan. So yeah, talking through that.

Jenna (01:02.318)
Jenna (01:07.542)
Yeah. So the, the, guess the, we said, the thing that's inspired this podcast episode was the questions that we get and majority of the time, I see a lot of clients that are either in a weight loss phase or they are very active. They're willing to build muscle. And sometimes I see clients that are trying to do both and it's managing, I guess expectations and, the reality of war.

how much protein do I actually need to eat? And when they're faced with, you know, what is the amount of protein that they need to eat, it might be a little bit different to what they've seen on social media as to how much protein one person should be having. And it starts sparking that question of like, well, this doesn't feel like enough protein. I'm going to lose my muscle mass. I'm not going to build muscle eating this much. And

Yeah, exactly like you said moments ago that we've almost overcorrected when it comes to our view on how much protein we should be eating.

Jonathan Steedman (02:15.341)
Yeah, I was going to say, so why do you think that is? Why do you think they are coming back at you saying, coming back at you? Why do you think they're seeing that meal plan and thinking, oh, this is not what I was expecting. I was expecting more.

Jenna (02:27.416)
I don't want to blame social media, but I'm going to social media. And look, the, again, like the number of clients that I've had that have like, look, I've saved all of these high protein recipes off Instagram and look, it's like 50 grams of protein in my meal. And, and, know, all of these kinds of things. it's like, yeah, that's great. Like that, that's a really cool thing to have a 50 gram, you know, protein recipe.

Jonathan Steedman (02:29.281)
No, you can.

Jenna (02:54.348)
But there's more to it than that. If you're in a weight loss phase, okay, it might be 50 grams of protein, but how many calories is that? Is that within your budget, within your deficit? Cool. Yes, it's within my budget for my calorie deficit, but then it's lacking in the other, there's more than just other macros and just protein. There's carbohydrates and there's fats and I know that. And they actually do some really cool things too. It's not just protein.

Jonathan Steedman (03:16.204)
No.

Jenna (03:23.054)
so yeah, like I said, I think, I think it's social media and I also think it is dietitians and other nutrition professionals are a little bit to blame because we did see that there was, this was an issue for a really long time that people weren't eating enough protein and we pushed it quite a lot of making sure every meal has protein, you know, what are your protein sources, all of that kind of stuff that it's gone, it's just kind of taken off and gone.

too far. So now we're seeing these meals that are predominantly protein based and when you are faced with the reality of, well actually how much protein do you need to eat? It's different to what people's expectations are.

Jonathan Steedman (04:06.452)
Hmm, yeah, I...

I think a lot of nutrition as well suffers from that more is better mentality. That's where supplements come from. If these vitamins are good for me, then more will be better. If this thing is good for me, then more will be better. I think protein, a lot of the people are doing the same thing. Protein is good for me, so the more protein I have, the more muscle I will grow. The more protein I have, the more recovery I will have. We know that that is not the case. We know that with

literally everything in nutrition, maybe. It's about what is the, you you've got not enough and then you have enough and then you have too much. And sometimes too much is dangerous, which is the case for some supplements. Too much protein isn't really dangerous, but too much can also just mean like useless or suboptimal. You you said before like, hey, don't forget about carbs and fats and those two wonderful things for you. And if you are having these crazy high protein diets,

and they're much higher protein than you even need, that's typically coming at the expense of something like fats, gives you, it's good for hormone health and absorption of vitamins, or it's coming at the expense of carbohydrates, which is where, primarily where you're getting your fiber, which is good for your gut health. And also it's your preferred source of fuel during, you know, all of these things. So, and I don't want to speak for Jenna, but I will. We want, I want to get as jacked as I possibly

Jenna (05:18.475)
huh.

Jonathan Steedman (05:39.88)
can, right? I, as, yeah, as a, like, and I want to do it naturally. No, no, no, not saying right or wrong. That's just how I just do it. So I want to get, I want to get freaky big, which is not really going to happen, of course, but I'm going to try and do it. So if eating four grams of protein per kilogram of body weight was going to get me bigger, I would be doing it. No, like easy, but it won't. Yeah. Yeah. I, a, I would be jacked and B

Jenna (05:41.136)
This has been my life long dream.

Jenna (06:02.52)
Mm-hmm. I'd be jacked.

Jonathan Steedman (06:09.125)
I would be eating whatever meant like an absurd amount of protein. But we see in the literature, particularly when comes to muscle recovery and muscle growth, going over 1.6 grams per kilogram of body weight doesn't really change much. There's a few weird overfeeding studies, but I would also say for most people that's not really relevant. And like you said, sorry.

Jenna (06:30.712)
I think if we're talking to like, sorry, I was just gonna say like general population too, like, you know, there is maybe an argument for those people where they are professional athletes and they are, you know, in the gym, they are training multiple hours a day and that is their life. Okay, maybe there could be some arguments of like, all right, we go to 2.0 grams. But even then like going higher than that,

Jonathan Steedman (06:36.144)
Yeah.

Jonathan Steedman (06:43.206)
Hmm.

Jonathan Steedman (06:55.982)
or something. Yeah, yeah.

Jenna (07:00.374)
is not going to get you any extra benefits. If anything, compromising on other things.

Jonathan Steedman (07:06.342)
When I was gonna say typically if they're training that much, they're probably eating 5,000 calories day. And so they can afford to fit in two grams of protein per kilogram of body weight and have enough left over for all of the carbohydrates and fats that they would need. and I often feel like saying gen pop or not athletes makes people feel like Jenna and I train quite a lot, right? We train above average. We are definitely still general population.

Like that is not, well and truly, general population is not an insult, right? Where unless you are earning money from your sport, you probably don't need two grams of protein per kilogram.

Jenna (07:36.414)
yes.

Jenna (07:47.374)
We call you the everyday athlete. You're still an athlete. You're gonna be the everyday athlete. Yeah, yeah.

Jonathan Steedman (07:49.753)
Yeah, I like that. That's so much nicer. Yeah, yeah. But yeah, I think a lot of people, not to be rude, but they maybe think a bit, they think, I train so much. You're not talking to me, but we are. If you're listening, we are talking to you. Yeah, yeah.

So what, just to drive home, if you had a client who was overeating protein, let's say they came to you and they were doing two and a half, three grams, two and a half grams per kilogram body weight, what would you change in their diet and why would you change it?

Jenna (08:27.072)
I have actually have two clients that are probably really good examples of this. So one client I have is a powerlifter and again, like an everyday athlete. And I'm not saying they aren't, you know, they are incredibly strong and powerlifting is a big part of their life, but they also have a full-time job and you know, a partner and, and, you know, life.

So they're not making their money off of powerlifting. It's their hobby. So one of the biggest things that we talked about was dropping down the protein to round about that 1.6. And I guess a lot of it comes from trust and going through the process. But instead, we drop the protein down, reassuring them that no muscle is going to be lost.

And by dropping their protein down, because they're also competing in a weight-based sport. So, you know, we, do have to keep body composition, you know, in, in a certain area place. but by dropping that protein down, we were able to significantly up their carbohydrate intake and by arping their carbohydrate intake, lo and behold, they actually were able to train better because they had the energy. You, we kind of forget.

Protein is great. Protein helps us to rebuild the muscle, which is good for recovery, but our muscles aren't using protein to perform. They're using carbohydrates. And so by adding more carbohydrates in, they were actually able to do more reps, put more load on the muscle and lift heavier and went and had a bigger total, you know, in their competition. So I think that's a really good example of where more protein is not better. And

Jonathan Steedman (10:19.105)
you

Jenna (10:19.192)
having that conversation around what is the actual role of, you know, protein, carbs and fats in our diet and why we would need to pull the lever back on one and not the other. I don't know if that really answered your question, but.

Jonathan Steedman (10:34.549)
No, it did. And I also wanted to say, just so everyone knows, I completely threw that, like we did not talk about that question at all beforehand. And so thank you for, that was killer. Like no warning. And I was, what would you do? Yeah, that's, that's a hundred percent. And I love the distinction that you said of like muscles use protein for growth and recovery, but they don't use it for performance. They don't use it for contraction and movement. They use carbs. And so getting more of that in sometimes ironically can grow more muscle because

You're lifting more weight, you're doing more work. yeah.

Jenna (11:07.468)
The other thing that, you when it comes to people being very precious about, well, you know, this doesn't look like it's enough protein. It's, not super high in protein. And so therefore I'm going to lose muscle mass when in reality, you know, muscle is very important to our body. Our body is very, very, greedy. don't know if that's the right word, but like staunch on like, it's not just gonna like start breaking down muscle because it wants to you.

you do have to be really kind of undershooting it. But if we were to free up, like I said, the calories that we have coming in from the protein, you're going to have the more energy, you're actually going to start lifting heavy enough to build the muscle. That is the piece that people miss is that yes, proteins great for muscle building and recovery, but you also need the progressive overload. You also need to lift heavy and you need to be

challenging yourself in that way in order for the muscle to grow, for then it to use the protein.

Jonathan Steedman (12:12.841)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And a diet really high in protein ironically might be impacting your ability to progressively overload because you're tired.

Jenna (12:21.312)
Exactly. Yeah.

Jonathan Steedman (12:23.069)
Yeah. And then the last, so yeah, really important point about muscle and protein and gym and that and carbs and I guess all of that relationship there. Cause I totally agree. It's always the first argument people, or not even argument, just concern that people have if you lower their protein, like what about my muscle? And then I think the other concern that comes up as well is satiety, fullness, right? And

proteins role in that and we're worried that if I reduce my protein intake a little bit am I going to full, am I going to feel hungrier?

Firstly, if you're enough protein, you're getting satiety from that, right? Eating more protein doesn't always result in more fullness. Secondly, protein's role in fullness is actually not as dramatic as I know, even I used to think, I used to push protein for filling you up way more and it turns out, it's helpful, but it's maybe not as helpful as we once thought. And...

I think much more, something that has a much bigger impact on fullness is fiber, which you find in your carbohydrates. So if you're taking, if you're freeing up 300 calories worth of food because you've lowered your protein and you then eat 300 calories of lollies, yes, you are going to be hungrier. Sure, I'm not gonna argue that point. But if lowering your protein from over the top to optimal frees up 300 calories worth that you spend on fruit.

are starchy carbohydrates, potatoes, whole grain pastas and breads and lentils, beans, legumes, all of those are crazy filling. And so I would argue either you wouldn't see, you wouldn't notice an impact on your hunger or potentially you actually feel even, you know, more, you feel even fuller. And then I think the last little piece of that as well is if you're eating a really high protein diet and low in other things, you can feel a little bit more fatigued. And what do you feel like?

Jonathan Steedman (14:24.208)
What does your body want you to do when you're tired? Eat, right? So I think there's a whole, it's a lot more complicated than just more protein equals more full. I wish that was that simple, but.

Jenna (14:27.438)
Mm-hmm.

Jenna (14:38.006)
I guess adding on top of that as well, when you're talking about like feeling full and, adding more of those like starchy carbohydrates and things like that in like the, the other, I guess, area where feeling full is super important is, is in a weight loss phase when we have, you know, a calorie budget and we, you can spend your calories however you like across the day. There is no right or wrong way to do it. There's some ways that are more,

better suited than saving all of your calories for one meal. But if you use the example of I'm going to make a spaghetti bolognese for dinner and my budget for a main meal is, I don't know, maybe five, 600 calories. If over half of those calories are going straight to your protein, we've got to then add in the oil that you're cooking with, the oil that the fats are going to come in with, maybe that mince.

You're not going to have a lot of calories left for pasta. And I can guarantee you, yeah, like as much as people say, I love meat, I love meat. This is my favorite food. If you were faced with a spaghetti bolognese that doesn't actually have much pasta, you're probably also going to visually be very disappointed in that meal. And it doesn't have to be that way. Like, and it's also kind of reinforcing that, you

Jonathan Steedman (15:39.162)
It'll sad spaghetti.

Jenna (16:02.99)
carbohydrates, you we don't need as much of them when we need to have that balance. It's not all or nothing. It's finding, you know, how much of each thing can I have and still reach my goal. So that's also something to take into consideration when you're looking at, you know, all of these high protein recipes on social media. And while it's great that it's 50 grams of protein, have a look at it. It's probably not, you know, it's maybe one slice of bread.

or maybe, you know, it hasn't got anything else going on with it. It is literally just meat and how you would feel eating that. know. Once you see it, you won't be able to unsee it. If you go back and look through all those high protein recipes that you've saved, you'll see that there is not a single vegetable inside.

Jonathan Steedman (16:34.382)
So there's also never any vegetables, which is a separate conversation as well, but that's yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway.

Jenna (16:51.938)
But if you eat like that, you know, for a long period of time, you're going to feel very restricted because you're not maybe eating as the carbohydrates that you want to be eating. And it's going to get real boring real quick. you know, pasta and rice and breads and potatoes and all of the fruits, you know, and they're there. in. They taste good. And we want to have them in our diet. And if we, you know, sacrifice them for more protein with really like what's the benefit of the extra protein, you're going to you're going to have a pretty miserable.

weeks, months, years.

Jonathan Steedman (17:24.811)
Yeah. Yeah.

So there you go. I did not really ever think I was going to record a podcast on eating less protein. The bros that we both are, just for everyone who, bro is a gender neutral term by the way. But yeah, I agree that it is something that I think for a lot of people would be a positive change. And I've seen a lot of clients who suddenly feel a lot better eating. Well, I was going to say quote unquote less protein, but it's not quote unquote less protein. It is less protein.

Jenna (17:55.244)
It's, yeah.

Jonathan Steedman (17:55.883)
but it's still more than enough protein.

Jenna (17:59.084)
It's enough protein, yeah.

Jonathan Steedman (18:00.915)
Mm. Yep. But how unsexy is enough protein? Even that phrase. But that's... I mean, we're not here for... We just want you to get good results and live your life and be happy and feel fueled and... Anyway. Anyway. Awesome. Well, now we have a podcast to direct people to, so if they're like, is this enough protein? This feels like not enough. Boom. Go listen to this. So was great. Amazing. Thank you. I'm gonna go have a protein. Not really.

Jenna (18:22.242)
Here we go.

Jonathan Steedman (18:28.374)
I'm probably gonna have enough and go because of who I am as a person, but all the stock of protein, but it will still be not too much. It will be just enough. Yes. Amazing. All right. Thanks for listening, team. I'll chat to you next time. Bye.

Jenna (18:36.302)
enough, Yes.

Bye.