Quick Tips for Finding the Right Protein Balance:
2. Find out which foods are rich in protein and whether or not you eat these foods on a regular basis already.
3. Remember that too much protein results in a buildup of calcium.
4. Understand that vegetarian daily diets already contain enough protein.
5. As long as you are getting enough calories to meet your energy needs, it’s practically impossible to lack a decent amount of protein
Protein-packed Foods:
Bean burritos
Oatmeal
Cereal and hemp milk
Veggie burgers
Red beans and rice Black beans Vegetarian chili Vegetable soup Lentil soup
Falafel
Pasta with marinara or pesto
Black bean burgers
Boning Up on Calcium
Calcium is vital to avoid bone-threatening diseases like osteoporosis, yet in countries where people eat the highest amount of calcium and protein, the highest number of hip fractures, a symptom of osteoporosis, have been recorded. Scientists are coming to the conclusion that there’s more to osteoporosis than just the amount of calcium we eat; overall lifestyle plays a large part, including physical activity levels and environmental factors. Just eating four to five servings of calcium-rich foods each day is no guarantee that you’ll avoid osteoporosis, but it’ll certainly be a step in the right direction.
Dairy industry propaganda tells us that milk does the body good, but that’s simply not true. Over two-thirds of the people in the world are lactose intolerant and find it difficult to digest milk. The cause is an insufficient amount of lactase, the enzyme that breaks down the sugars in milk, in their metabolic system. Undigested, the mucous lactose coats the lining of the colon, bacteria interact with it to cause gas, and the result is cramps, flatulence, and diarrhea. All mammals are born with a sufficient amount of lactase, but it decreases as we get older. Once we’re out of infancy, we’re not meant to be drinking milk any longer.
But while we don’t need to drink milk, we still need calcium. Almost all of the calcium in our bodies at any given time is stored in our bones and
teeth, with about 1 percent in our bloodstream. And that’s the calcium that’s the key to good health; it’s needed to send messages between nerves, especially those that contract our muscles. It’s also a vital component in the clotting of blood. Our kidneys filter most of our bodies’ calcium and return it to the bloodstream, but some of it is lost in our urine. We also lose some through sweat and bowel movements.
Our bones are constantly breaking down (don’t worry—they build back up) replenishing calcium into our blood. Somewhere around the age of thirty, our bones stop growing and reach maximum density. This is why calcium is most important when you’re young; the denser your bones are when they reach this stage of development, the less is the chance of your getting osteoporosis when you’re older. That’s because after the age of forty-five, our bones break down faster than they’re rebuilt; at this point, we start to lose as much as 0.5 percent of our bone mass each year. So by the time we hit sixty-five, bone loss can start to be a real problem. Women lose even more bone mass when they reach menopause, as they stop producing estrogen, the hormone that protects our bones.
We can’t increase the density of our bones once they stop growing, but we can slow the rate at which calcium disappears from our bones by making sure that we eat calcium-rich foods. This holds true whether you eat an omnivorous diet, an ovo-lacto diet, or a completely vegan diet—there is no firm evidence that vegetarians have stronger bones than people who eat meat or weaker bones either. But some nutritionists believe that vegetarians may actually need less calcium to keep their bones strong.
How can that be? Well, protein from plant sources are metabolized by the body in different ways than animal proteins. Meat contains more sulfur- containing amino acids than plant proteins, which makes the blood more acidic. To neutralize the acid, your body needs more calcium—and what it doesn’t find in the bloodstream it pulls from our bones. That calcium then leaves your body through your urine, taking even more calcium from your kidneys along the way.
In addition, sodium takes a heavy toll on your body’s calcium supplies, and along with table salt, sodium is added to canned foods, cured meats, soft drinks, condiments, and snack foods. When you think of the amount of protein and sodium your average American consumes during a day full of bacon cheeseburgers, ham sandwiches, sodas, and French fries, it’s not hard to see why they need more compensatory calcium than does your average vegetarian!
So how much calcium do you actually need? Well, a good rule of thumb is to eat between two and five servings of calcium-rich foods—leafy green vegetables, broccoli, beans, and, yes, dairy products are among your choices—while keeping your protein and sodium intake moderate. The recommended calcium-to-protein ratio is 16:1, so if you want to calculate your calcium needs, you’ll need to estimate your protein consumption first.
Surprisingly, even bread can be a good source of calcium. It was once thought that fiber and phytates, substances found in grains and nuts, bind to calcium and the human the body lacked the mechanism to absorb it. However, when yeast is present, it breaks the bond between phytates and calcium, allowing it to be used by the body, so yeast-raised breads, especially whole-grain breads, can provide a substantial amount of calcium. Also, some leafy greens are less effective sources of calcium than others—Swiss chard, spinach, beet greens, and rhubarb contain substances called oxalates, which limit the absorption of calcium (but they’re still chock-full of iron, so eat them anyway).
Eating a variety of foods every day makes for a more interesting, enjoyable vegetarian way of life, so it makes sense to get your calcium from many different foods. Adequate calcium is especially important for growing children (we’ll address vegetarian kids in chapter 17) so they build the strong bones they’ll need when they’re older. But you don’t need to get your calcium from milk. As we’ve discussed here, milk isn’t even good for you! Plant foods like leafy green vegetables, rice products, fortified orange juice, and dried beans are loaded with calcium. And they make your menus much more fun!