Are you throwing away muscle gains by consuming most of your protein from denatured sources? If so, you’d need to know!
Have you heard the term “denatured protein”? Sounds bad, doesn’t it? DE-NATURED.
You’ve almost certainly heard someone tell you that it’s not nutritionally beneficial, right? Or that your body can’t absorb it. But is that true?
What Is Denatured Protein?
Protein is made up of strands of individual amino acids (think of beads on a string).
Cooking protein alters the STRUCTURE of the protein molecule i.e. the shape of it. It does not, however, alter the amino acid CONTENT of the protein.
Plus…
Denaturation reactions are not strong enough to break the peptide bonds, the primary structure (sequence of amino acids) remains the same after a denaturation process. [1]
The fact is you still get all the amino acids regardless of whether or not the protein is denatured or un-denatured.
This altering of structure is actually a ‘breaking-down’ of the protein. This is a required process; our stomachs do it for us anyway. Breaking down is required because our cells need those amino acids from the protein molecule.
I was asked recently by a guy if he should only buy an undenatured whey protein.
My reply was, “Do you cook your chicken? How about your eggs?” You get the point.
So is denatured protein nutritionally bankrupt? Quite the opposite. It’s nutritionally beneficial. Since it’s already partially broken down, it will help quicken the absorption since there’s less work for your stomach to do.
This is not something worry about. Just make sure you get your daily protein requirement using this formula.
However, the quality of protein in terms of its (1) Bio-availability and (2) Completeness ARE important issues. To get the scoop on this matter read The 5 Best Sources Of Protein For Building Muscle.
Quality Whey Proteins I Recommend:
(1) US – Optimum Nutrition Whey
(2) Europe – Impact Whey from MyProtein
Enjoy Your Chicken.
Your Bud,
Mark
Reference [1] https://www.elmhurst.edu/~chm/vchembook/568denaturation.html
Great article Mark. Glad to get that cleared up!
I bet it’s some supplement company trying to push lies and BS again. Someone should have told the body builders from the 40’s to the 70’s don’t eat meat or eggs it won’t help build muscle.
Who the hell is coming out with this shit!
But chickens are injected with hormones … Are’nt they more dangerous than the protein content they give us ??
Hi Mark, have you ever checked out the bulletproof diet? It’s like more developed than paleo and this guy basically talks a huge amount about the food sources e.g grass fed butter and beef etc and how you should cook the food at low temperatures to avoid oxidising the fats which is apparently bad? I’d love to hear your opinion on this Mark 🙂
Sometimes companies claim whey concentrate is better because it still has retained “growth factors.” And, is ion-exchange whey isolate dangerous in some way say compared to cross-flow microfiltration? Does it matter?
I have wondered about the denatured protein arguments.
Thanks, Mark. Good article.
Hey Mark,
What timing.
I was going to ask you what you thought about getting the majority of your Protein from supplements ie, Whey?
I read an article somewhere, where the guy got most of his Protein from Whey as it was cheaper to get the quantities he needed rather than eating meat and fish which can be expensive.
I’d like to know your thoughts.
Rgds, Graham
P.s great site Mark! 😉
The source of the whey is of primary importance, as is the way it’s processed. Most commercial whey products are derived from pasteurized dairy and processed with heat and acid. Many are also artificially sweetened. Of particular interest is a 2010 Consumer Report study looking at 15 of the most bought brands of protein and tested each for heavy metal content (lead, arsenic, mercury and cadmium), the results were pretty staggering.
Whey from organic grass-fed dairy contains beneficial immuno components, including immunoglobins, bovine serum albomin, and lactoferins, in addition to all the key amino acids and other beneficial nutrients you typically get from a high quality whey protein or natural source.
I think this is a good, better, best scenario. All protein powders are not created equally and I would suggest everyone read the study and then assess their own risk:reward ratio.
Some good guidelines to follow when picking a why protein:
– Whey that is derived from grass-fed cows that are not treated with pesticides or hormones
-Cold processed, since heat destroys whey’s fragile molecular structure
-Whey protein concentrate, not protein isolates
-Sweetened naturally, not artificially, and low in carbohydrates
-Highly digestible—look for medium chain fatty acids (MCTs), not long chain fatty acids
@Bala. All chickens? What hormones? What parts of the world is this happening? What are your sources?
@Michael. Yes grass-fed beef is going to be more nutritionally beneficial. It depends on what you’re cooking with. Use coconut oil as it can be heated to high temps.
@Graham. There’s nothing “wrong” with it per say, but it’s unnecessary and expensive. The vast majority of my protein comes from food.
Hi mark. I am a big fan of your work and i think that you are doing a wonderful job here.thank you.
I am welling to try the M.A.N.S. Dite with a small change to make it work for loosing fat and building some muscles by just manipulating my daily totale calories to make a deficit of 300 to 500 calories by day and using of course HIIT 3 times a week on non weight lifting days (3 days a week full body workouts) and i want to use hydrolyzed whey protine isolate, and becoz i want to train (hiit and weight lifting) in the morning i wonder if is it fine with the MANS diet to use only HWPI first thing in the morning before my fasted hiit morning and then after it and also with some oats and nuts before my morning weight lifting workout i ask this coz i did some reaserch and found that (like you said in previous articales) WPI and BCAAs are a good insuline releasers, so in MANS we should avoid insuline spikes (except after workouts) especialy if we want to loose some fat. so what you think about that. and by the way the only reason why a didnt want to use your TSPA is that iam over 16 percent body fat and i dindt workout its been now almost 2 years so after i go under 16 percent i will go TSPA.
sorry about all this, and happy holydays.thanks.
@Younes. TSPA will get you there faster even if you were 30% body fat.
But you don’t need to pay extra for hydrolyzed whey; it won’t do anything that regular whey won’t. Also, fasted cardio is unnecessary. You can do it any time, see this https://musclehack.com/cardio-in-the-morning-on-an-empty-stomach/