Deficient Vegans
The podcast for anyone who’s ever been told vegans can’t get strong, stay fit, or live fully. A mix of science-backed nutrition, exercise advice, vegan food and recipe tips, and just the right amount of chaos to help you thrive on plants and laugh along the way.
Deficient Vegans
Should you eat before your workout?
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This week we talk about pre-workout carbs, and when they make sense to prioritize. Our myth of the week covers soy-free vegan options.
Chapters
0:02 Welcome to the Deficient Vegans Podcast
0:16 Forks Over Knives Closure
2:17 Animal Rights Activism
4:47 Plant vs. Animal Protein
7:05 Pre-Workout Nutrition
21:10 Carbs During Workouts
24:28 Myth of the Week: Soy Allergy
How to Get In Touch
- ⭐️ Deficient Vegans Discord ⭐️
Deficient Vegans
Muscle Deficient Vegan - Fitness & Nutrition
Protein Deficient Vegan - Food & Recipes
Welcome to the Deficient Vegans Podcast. This is episode 46. I'm the muscle deficient vegan here with the protein deficient vegan. You want to say hi? Hi. Hi, everybody. So this week, we're going to talk about whether you should eat before your workouts and also discuss our myth of the week, which is that you can't be vegan if you're allergic to soy.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Hmm. Hmm.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:But first up, new news.
Protein Deficient Vegan:New news.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:First piece of news we have is that Forks Over Knives, which is an organization that had a documentary probably 10 years ago at this point, maybe more. They also have like a meal planning app, a recipe app, recipe website, a book. They got a lot of stuff like that. Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Mostly focused on like plant-based and whole food plant-based, not necessarily like vegan.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Right. So, they are going to be closing down their operations. They sent out an email to all their subscribers and course members and things like that saying that they're shutting down. They're not going to be giving me funds because there were, like, lifetime subscriptions and annual subscriptions and stuff like that. And then I think you were subscribed to one of their courses, and you got an email basically saying, this course is going away forever in a week. Good luck.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah. There was, like, no notice, which, frankly, very annoying. Yeah. They were like, you have 10 days. Good luck.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Right. Yeah. So.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Fuck you, forks over knives.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:It's unfortunate. I think I saw that, I guess they were sold to an organization called The Beat back in 2021. And since then, they had been softening the lines on some of their whole food plant-based stuff. Like originally, they were really strict about no oil. They started to kind of say, oh, okay, maybe you can have oil, maybe you can't. And a couple of other things to kind of make it more palatable for a wider audience. You know, I guess this is just a kind of a continuation of that decision. They did take their mailing list and their subscribers and some other things, and they sold that to Food Revolution Network, who they said is a trusted partner they worked with for a long time.
Protein Deficient Vegan:How do we feel about that? I feel like you shouldn't be allowed to sell your subscribers unless your subscribers agree to be sold.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I don't know. I feel gross. Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I think you should get a choice. Yeah. For sure.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I looked at their social media before we got on here, and it doesn't look like they've been active on that since, like, March. So I don't know if they're just like leaving there.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. It doesn't look like they're active, but the website's still up. Their Instagram's still up. You can still download the apps right now. Yeah. I don't know.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I don't know either.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. We'll see. Next up, there was a large group of animal rights activists that recently tried to break into Ridgeland Farms in Wisconsin to release some beagles, dogs that were specifically bred for biomedical research.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, like 2,000, I think.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, 2,000 dogs. This event was publicly organized and advertised for several weeks. We saw it a lot on social media leading up to it.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, I'm seeing it everywhere. On Instagram, on Reddit.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Being advertised by a bunch of people that didn't end up going to the event.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I was surprised by that. I saw it advertised by a lot of, like, influencer types that didn't even end up going.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. So the police were there and ready, obviously, because of the public nature of this thing. and the police stated that this was not a peaceful protest and they responded with tear gas pepper spray sandbag guns I think you saw rubber bullets were deployed to try to disperse the crowd.
Protein Deficient Vegan:It's interesting because I saw some first hand accounts on like Reddit and some other places where people were saying that they were being peaceful so it's like some conflicting information
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I think there always is in situations like this yeah there was one report in the news about somebody driving their truck very quickly potentially like breaking through a fence with it yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:That's what I read too it was like a truck got driven quickly through a fence and kind of like maybe endangered some police people that were there.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. And some of the protesters, I think.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Oh, yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:But, yeah, I mean, it seemed like the stated mission here was to break into this place and free the dogs. So I'm not sure that that really aligns with a peaceful protest, but I wasn't there. Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, because what I saw is it wasn't really advertised as a protest. It was advertised as like a saving the dog's mission.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Right. So the organizer of the event, along with a dozen or so other people, were arrested. The organizer had actually been arrested at the same farm for another event like this like a month ago. So I guess he's been pushing on this farm specifically pretty hard. The farm itself is losing their breeding license in July as part of an ongoing investigation that predates this event and is not related to it as far as I know.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Tangentially, something interesting that I had read in the news article the U.S. Weekly put out yesterday. But basically it was saying something like a very significantly large amount of money was offered to the farm by anonymous donors to just buy the dogs. And I don't know where that stands, but maybe that'll get them out.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. We'll see. As far as this event goes, no dogs were actually rescued. They definitely didn't make it that far.
Protein Deficient Vegan:They did end up in U.S. Weekly, so they're definitely getting some press from it.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:All right. And then the last piece of news we have is that there was a new meta-analysis, which is basically just a review and kind of analysis of a bunch of studies comparing plant protein to animal protein supplementation. And they looked at 18 different randomized controlled trials, which is kind of the highest form of evidence-based study. And those covered 1,900 participants.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Wow, that's a lot of people.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. So the results for comparing the animal protein supplementation to plant protein supplementation were that they did not show any significant differences in lean body mass, fat mass, total body mass, upper and lower muscle strength, gait speed, some short physical performance tests, lipid profiles blood pressure fasting blood glucose fasting blood insulin or an assessment they did for insulin resistance so.
Protein Deficient Vegan:This was basically just like people swapping out their animal protein powder for plant protein powder not necessarily a plant diet right like a plant-based diet
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Right yeah i don't think they were necessarily even like vegans or vegetarians it was just comparing effectively like a like probably a whey protein yeah to a in this case it was actually mostly soy proteins for the plant protein.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah so like maybe an omnivore that would normally drink away protein powder
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah is.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Now drinking like a soy based protein powder
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Right exactly yeah so that's just another you know data point to show that your muscle growth is not compromised by using vegan protein sources and um you know this one you can there's only so much you can take away from this because it was just comparing like supplementation like protein powder right So it doesn't have all the other things you might expect to come along with the actual food, maybe. Like animal foods or stuff like that.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. What's interesting about this, though, is like I'll see a lot of people like on Reddit and various other places where people are saying like, oh, like whey protein powder gives me a stomach ache. Yeah. But they're saying like I'm not necessarily dairy intolerant, but it makes me feel like bloated and disgusting. And it's like, well, maybe those people can now be convinced they can switch to a plant-based protein powder.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, for sure. I think there's a lot of cases where, you know, people just don't tolerate dairy very well for whatever reason. Yeah. They should probably use vegan sources for a lot of things. Yeah, definitely.
Protein Deficient Vegan:We always like science-backed studies that prove our point. Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:All right. Into the main segment here. So let's talk about should you eat before your workout?
Protein Deficient Vegan:What do you do personally?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I don't eat like going into my workout. I just work out after I've eaten for the day at some point.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Okay.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, typically. Exactly. The main reason that it is recommended often to eat before a workout is to replenish what's called your muscle glycogen stores. Muscle glycogen is the way that your body stores carbohydrate energy inside of your muscle tissue. So it's actually inside the muscle itself. And you can think of it as a local energy reserve that your muscles tap into during exercise. So like if you're doing bicep curls or something, your biceps are using the glycogen stored inside the bicep to do that exercise, okay? Um, when the glycogen stores are full, you perform better in various ways, whether that's like getting through your whole workout, doing extra reps, not feeling fatigued, things like that. Uh, and when it's depleted, you get more fatigued and you have noticeable drops in your performance. So the main way to replenish your muscle glycogen stores is to eat carbohydrates to get glucose.
Protein Deficient Vegan:They're simple or complex carbs. Is one better than the other?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Uh, basically just in terms of speed. If you want to have it happen pretty quickly, you can go with a simple carbohydrate kind of on its own.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Just sugar?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, sugar.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Straight up sugar?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Straight up sugar.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Pixie sticks?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:If you're doing low carb for some reason that I will never understand, your body also has a less efficient mechanism to create glucose from non-carb sources like protein called gluconeogenesis.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Wow.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:You'll see carnivore people talk about gluconeogenesis a lot because they don't eat carbs.
Protein Deficient Vegan:They can spell that?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Well, yeah. They copy and paste it pretty well. But it's not ideal because it's limited in how much glycogen it can create. It's a pretty slow process in general, so it's not ideal for performance. But in a situation where you're pretty restricted on carbs, your body can create its own glycogen. Just so you know that. And now that the science-y gobbledygook is out of the way, let's talk about whether or not this means you need to eat before your workout. So generally speaking, as long as you've eaten at some point in the day before your workout, you're probably going to have enough glycogen stored up to be able to make it through a lifting session. So when you ask kind of what do I do? Yeah. I typically just, I work out later in the day anyway, like usually in the afternoon or evening. So I've already eaten by then. So this isn't something I really have to consider because my sessions are only like an hour, hour and a half long.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So as long as you have had some carbohydrates at some point in the same day as you work out, But your glycogen stores are almost definitely sufficient enough to just make it through a short, like, lifting session. It might be different if you're going for like a marathon or a bike ride or something like that.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Or like a long hiking trip.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah. Anything that's like a long duration, you definitely probably want to, you know, that's why runners do carb loading basically is to make sure those muscle stores are full as much as possible. So where you might end up making a decision about how much to eat before you do a workout is if you're somebody who likes doing fasted workouts, like first thing in the morning, because at that point you've basically gone from dinner all the way to the next day. So you might go into your workout, your glycogen stores are a little low, you start doing your workout and they get like much lower and you start noticing the performance impact. So in that case, you might perform a little better if you have some carbs before your workout intentionally. And that can kind of be a balance. I know some people just don't like food in their stomach when they go to work out.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Especially if you're doing stuff like deadlifts and you're like bending over and I don't know.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Right. So yeah, if it makes you feel better, then you don't necessarily have to eat beforehand. But if you notice, like, you're getting pretty tired halfway through the workout, maybe try eating some carbs and you feel a little better. How much time you need to do this before your workout kind of depends on the type of carb, like you were talking about earlier a little bit, kind of simple carbs, complex carbs. Protein. Protein.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Protein that goes through glycogenesis.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, you'll need, like, 12 hours for that one. I wouldn't.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Like, what is it? Gluconeogenesis.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Basically, creating new glucose. gluconeogenesis okay yeah segagenesis um yeah and then so simple carbs which means a sugar something or white.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Bread white bread what about
Muscle Deficient Vegan:White rice white rice is a simple carb.
Protein Deficient Vegan:What about apples
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Um well so it's tricky with an apple because the fructose in an apple would be a simple carb so it's both yeah but it's not really going to act the same because there's a lot of fiber in an apple okay, Um, but yeah, a simple carb like sugar digest quicker and they restore your glycogen faster. Uh, but a complex carb like a brown rice or a sweet potato would take a little longer. So if you're doing simple carbs pre-workout, I'd give it 30 to 60 minutes to digest and absorb and do what it needs to do. And that's not going to fill your stores up completely, but it's going to kind of top them off. It's got you enough to get through the workout session. And then the closer you are to the training, like if you're really in a pinch, you're like 20 minutes out from training and you are fasted and maybe even worked out since the last time you ate something like that, you think maybe your glycogen is really depleted, then I would take these simple carbs with as little fat and fiber as possible because both of those will slow down the absorption. And then as far as how much carbohydrate, 20 grams to 40 grams is probably good. It depends on basically how hard you think the session is going to be and how long it's going to be. If you're just going in for like a 30 to 45 minute lifting session, 20 grams is probably going to be fine for you. It also kind of depends on body weight. So if you're bigger, maybe you take a little more.
Protein Deficient Vegan:So like a snack, probably not a full meal. Okay.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Um, a simple solution is like a fruit, like a banana. So you can do that. That doesn't have a whole lot of fiber in it. So you end up getting a pretty big, you know, insulin spike, which is a pretty good sign of a simple sugar, uh, from a banana and a banana has almost the right, a big banana has the right amount of carbohydrates really that you would want for something like that.
Protein Deficient Vegan:And potassium.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:There you go. Um, another option is that people do is like rice cakes with jelly on top. So rice is kind of a simple carb and then jelly is definitely just basically sugar.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. You can also just do cookies. That's pretty common. I see a lot of people just do a handful of cookies as a pre-workout card.
Protein Deficient Vegan:A handful of cookies?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:It's probably like, I mean, it depends on the cookie, right? If you're talking about like mini Oreos, it's probably like 24 cookies. I don't know. I don't know.
Protein Deficient Vegan:What? Don't eat 24 Oreos before your workout, guys. He's giving you bad information.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:It's an example. Giving you inspiration.
Protein Deficient Vegan:He ate 24 cookies.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Mini Oreos.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Mini Oreos. Okay.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I don't know what the right number is. It's definitely not 24.
Protein Deficient Vegan:How many calories worth of cookies?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:20 grams of sugar worth of cookies.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Okay.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So probably two cookies.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Not 24.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:You can dream, right?
Protein Deficient Vegan:He's not good with clocks either.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:There are also a supplement called maltodextrin, which is glucose that is specifically made for workout shakes.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Are those the things that come in the little packets?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:They can come in packets. It usually just comes in a...
Protein Deficient Vegan:Like a gel? Yeah. What are the gel things people eat?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Oh, I think those are just sugar. They're gel. They might be maltodextrin. I'm not sure. There's probably different forms, but those are just carb gels.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, I've seen like pre-workout gummies and stuff too. I've never seen vegan ones,
Muscle Deficient Vegan:But. Yeah. There's a lot of options. The runners like the gels just because you can like keep them in your pocket.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So probably bike riders too.
Protein Deficient Vegan:But like if you're at home. Yeah. A cheaper solution is like a banana or an apple or two cookies.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah. Oh, no. Yeah, the banana is the best option. The maltodextrin supplement is also really cheap, but you got to go through the... Like if you're making a pre-workout drink anyway, you could throw it in there. But if you're just like, I just care about the carbs, just grab a banana.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Couldn't you just throw a couple tablespoons of sugar in your pre-work? Yeah. And for the same effect and way cheaper?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, I guess you could, but I think it's not quite as sweet.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Oh, okay. So you get no benefit.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So you could use sugar, but maltodextrin actually converts quicker because it's already broken down. So it's actually a more pure form of simple carbohydrate than sugar is even.
Protein Deficient Vegan:What does it taste like?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I don't know. I've never actually used it. I just know it exists. I've never had a need for it. I like bananas.
Protein Deficient Vegan:That's what she said.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Okay. Oh, man. This is also a good opportunity to add some protein if you are using something like a maltodextrin or even a banana.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Do you get protein from your bananas?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:No, but when I used to go to a gym, I would always have a banana in the car waiting with a protein shake. And I'd eat the banana and drink the protein shake right after I got out of the gym.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Okay. After you worked out? Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:That was post-workout.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Okay. Should you eat protein before you work out? Is that what you're saying to you?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So you don't have to eat protein before you work out, but you do probably want protein around your workout somewhere. So if you're already, like, eating a banana or making a shake or something, you could just throw the protein in there, and then you won't have to really worry about it after the workout.
Protein Deficient Vegan:So a shake before you work out and after?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:No, I only did it after.
Protein Deficient Vegan:So when would I eat protein with my banana?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:You could do it before and then you don't have to do it after.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I thought you had to eat protein after.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:No, you don't have to eat protein after. Okay. Just either before or after. As long as you eat your protein like two hours before to two hours after your workout, it's pretty much the same. There you go. Now you know.
Protein Deficient Vegan:The more you know.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I hope that's not trademarked.
Protein Deficient Vegan:The more you know, TM.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah. And as a general rule, the harder and longer the session is going to be, the more pre-workout carbs might help you. And especially like if you're already going into it, like we were saying, fasted or something crazy like that. And it will almost never hurt. Other than people who have like stomach discomfort, don't like food in their stomach, there's not really any downside to having a bunch of carbs before you work out as long as you can go through the workout without feeling uncomfortable.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, it doesn't make you nauseous or icky.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, and after your workout, especially if you have a pretty high training volume in general, like throughout the week or you need shorter recovery times, maybe you're working out like every day for six days in a row or something. It's good to try to get some carbs in as well after the workout to replenish the stores you just used during the workout. Some people do two workouts a day, whether that's like two lifting sessions a day, or you just do cardio in the morning, lifting in the evening, something like that. And I would say, you know, after your first workout, have some carbs and probably a lot. I'd have like a meal, right, with real carbs. And then, you know, you fill the glycogen sores back up for whatever you have coming later in the day. Or if you're working out before you go to work and your job is like a really physically intensive job, it's another use case for that. You're going to want to have, you know, your muscles available to you during your job.
Protein Deficient Vegan:So basically, you should eat carbs. Right.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Bonus tip, there's also something interesting called carbohydrate rinsing. This isn't probably super practical for most people, but I think it's an interesting thing to know about. If you're very depleted on glycogen and you have like a pretty intense and long workout, you can actually just take a carbohydrate source like the maltodextrin we talked about and rinse your mouth out with it. And it'll trick your body into thinking you have more glycogen than you do.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Why would you do that instead of just drinking it?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So the only real good reason I can think of is if you're trying to conserve calories, you don't actually have to ingest the sugar.
Protein Deficient Vegan:But you're like working out enough to need glucose, right?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. And in the case where this actually makes a measurable difference, you're working out like a lot. Like a really long bike riding session is I think the part of the study. And, you know, you would probably want the extra calories and the extra actual glucose and probably the water.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah. I'm just thinking like, okay, I've been biking for a long time and I'm so tired and I have this beverage, right, that has water and like some form of sugar.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:But instead of drinking that and getting hydrated and getting energy, I'm just going to rinse my mouth out and spit it.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah. That was the study. Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Okay. you know what there's this phrase of like if i don't understand it that just means it's not for me so it's probably for someone else
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah some some biker out there is like yeah that makes a lot of sense yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:If you're that biker let us know sure
Muscle Deficient Vegan:But either way like i said in the beginning it's not super practical but it is kind of cool to know and it's like a placebo thing where your body can react and perform better just based off of like a quick swish of some maltodextrin the.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Flavor or can i do it with
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Gum i don't think you can do it with gum because the way they did the study was the people who actually got the maltodextrin they had a maltodextrin that was sweetened with sucralose and then the control group the placebo group was just sucralose so the group that just got sucralose it didn't work on it had to be actual maltodextrin or actual carbohydrate so.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Then if your body's like absorbing that do you get calories from a swoosh
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I don't think your body's absorbing it because you're not drinking it.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I don't get it.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Okay. It sounds like some woo-woo shit. I don't know. It works.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I do think it's interesting that it works with the maltodextrin and not the sucralose because you would think that your mouth is just like, oh, sweet. I have trouble having it. But that's apparently not how it works.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Interesting. Completely unrelated, I saw this TikTok of this lady that was completing a marathon, okay? Yeah. And I guess now I've never completed a marathon. I don't like running, but I guess my understanding is you'll give snacks to people that are maybe like they're supporting you at different mile markers. Yeah. And so she gave snacks to her husband for her to eat at like a certain mile marker.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I know this story. Okay, go ahead.
Protein Deficient Vegan:That motherfucker ate those snacks and she got to like the mile marker and was like, can I have my snacks? And he had the audacity to be like, I was really hungry so I ate them I can't even imagine immediate divorce right like what what are you doing but she did finish the marathon that's cool and I hope she immediately went to the courthouse but that's just after
Muscle Deficient Vegan:She got some snacks.
Protein Deficient Vegan:After she got some snacks from not her husband that's very disappointing I would be shopping around at the finish line for a new husband that had pockets full of snacks for me yeah
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So as long as we were talking about drinking during a bike ride or something like that, we can also talk about carbs during a workout. So intro workout shakes and intro workout carbs are something you might commonly see. That basically just means drinking carbs during your workout.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Can you eat carbs during your workout?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Sure. Yeah. Ingesting carbs during your workout. It's just most people don't stop the workout to eat. They'll just do it in a drink. But, you know, they could.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Well, isn't that like I see people with the gummies and shit?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, the gummies, I think, have kind of blurred the lines. You won't see most people eating a protein bar in the middle of their workout, but they definitely do gummies. So, yeah, that makes sense. And the gels like you were talking about for like the runners and bikers. These are marketed pretty heavily. You can use intra-workout carbs, but you're only likely to really need them if you are doing a real long-distance thing, like maybe a marathon or a triathlon or something like that. Or in some cases, if you have a lifting session that's two, two and a half hours long, it might help a little. But even on long lifting sessions, it hasn't been shown to do much. So if you're just somebody who's like going to the gym, I probably wouldn't think about intra-workout carbs too much. But if you're somebody who's doing like long-distance cardio or some kind of sport or something like that, then, you know, carbs during the event tend to make a lot more sense.
Protein Deficient Vegan:A nice golf trip.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Yeah, you're really burning the calories out there on the golf cart.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Hey, I disc golf and that shit's actually, it's pretty physical because you're like hiking around.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:No, disc golf for sure because you're like walking through the woods.
Protein Deficient Vegan:But yeah, golfing. Does anyone golf without a cart? Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I mean, a lot of people do. But you're still walking on sidewalks and stuff.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Sure. You could be doing like a double golf day.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:That's not entirely true. I guess I've only been to like one golf course, so I don't know how they all work. But they probably don't all have sidewalks.
Protein Deficient Vegan:You're not a prolific golfer? No. I've went golfing twice and I did that top golf thing once.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, no, I think I could be a professional.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I think whatever the situation is, I think it definitely doesn't qualify as hiking like disc golf does.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, disc golf is like out in the woods and shit.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Not manicured golf lawns.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:My thing is, like, if you're wearing khakis and a polo, you're probably not working out.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Right? I don't know.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:The takeaway there is that you definitely don't need to eat before every workout. You don't need to necessarily do anything special with carbs before every workout. But eating beforehand, and especially carbohydrates, can improve performance for some sessions, particularly if you're training hard, you're training for a long time, or you're training fasted.
Protein Deficient Vegan:But if you get, like, nauseous or feeling gross, if you eat before you work out, maybe you don't need to do it? No. Okay.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:And I'm kind of the opposite way. Like, if I don't eat before I work out, I feel pretty weird. So I have to have, like, something in my stomach when I go to work out. So there's a huge part of personal preference. But if your personal preference is I don't really care, maybe you could lean towards some carbs before the workout. All right. Let's talk about our myth of the week this week, which is that you can't be vegan if you're allergic to soy.
Protein Deficient Vegan:I see this one a lot. Like people on Reddit will ask in the vegan subreddit of like, oh, you know, I just like watched this documentary and it was really awful. But I'm allergic to soy. Can I even do this? Like what would I eat?
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. It's a very common question. I think soy allergy is one of the more common allergies. It's not like common as far as people go. Yeah. But as far as people with food allergies go, soy is pretty common.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Like there's definitely, and spoiler alert, there's a lot of soy-free vegans and a lot of gluten-free vegans. Yeah. You can definitely do it. You just have to find alternatives. Right.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:And soy is kind of tricky, actually, because they put that soy lecithin in a lot of things.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, a lot of packaged stuff.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. So there are alternatives for actual protein sources, like vital wheat gluten. You can even get some protein from beans, lentils. You can do various forms of, like, pea proteins, stuff like that. So there are definitely options out there. And as far as, like, building meals around it, what do you think some of the best replacements are for soy? Like, the best replacement is for a tofu, I guess.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. So, for tofu specifically, they actually make a lot of soy-free tofus that you can find in grocery stores even. I've seen the fava bean one seems to be the most popular, and that one's, like, 90% protein. So, it's actually, like, almost twice as much protein on a calorie basis as, like, a soy tofu anyway. So, like, a lot of people are eating the fava bean tofu— Even if they're not allergic to soy, because that one was so popular. But they also make a pumpkin seed variety and a chickpea tofu. But I think you can make your own tofu out of any bean or lentils and stuff at home.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:And then for TBP, TBP is another big protein source that comes from soy, but they make a TPP, textured pea protein.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:I forgot about that one, yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, and you can pretty much use it exactly the same way.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah, that's probably a real good go-to. Yeah. And then also, if you look at, we were talking about Forks Over Knives earlier, if you look at, like, whole food plant-based communities and stuff, they don't tend to use a lot of soy anyway. They minimize tofu to a certain extent. Yeah. So maybe you can get some ideas on, you know, what to eat there, and that's totally vegan. Yeah. It's going to be, spoiler alert, it's going to be beans and lentils for the most part. Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:And then the other one is like edamame puffs, which I use a lot in recipes. They actually make a pea protein puff that has like similar macros and can be used the same way. Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So a lot of pea swap-ins for soy-based products coming out. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, it's definitely something you'll have to plan around, but you can certainly be a vegan without eating soy, especially if you don't necessarily care about protein all that much. It's going to be pretty easy.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. And the other thing that I like about having like TPP and like pea protein puffs and various non-soy tofus is that it makes substituting ingredients in a recipe to make it soy-free really easy.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. It's pretty much the same thing.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Like pretty easy swaps. If you are soy-free and need some high protein recipes, I have a soy-free tag and a soy-free option tag on the Protein Efficient Vegan website. So it makes it easy to find things for your soy-free needs.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Also, in your protein database, you have a soy-free button. I do. Yeah.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah, maybe you can find some new soy-free options for protein sources. So, yeah, definitely can be vegan and soy-free.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:There you go. You heard it here first.
Protein Deficient Vegan:It might be harder at restaurants is my only thought.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:That'd be tricky. You probably just have to say no. Well, I don't know. You'd have to probably ask what they use in everything.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. I think especially the soy sauce is used a lot in various vegan foods.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:You know what's funny is for a long time, I don't know why, but I'd never thought of soy sauce as actually having soy in it. That sounds pretty stupid. But I just thought it was, I don't know what I thought it was.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. So does soy milk.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:That makes sense.
Protein Deficient Vegan:And miso paste.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Because I know you can milk soy.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah. Soybeans have nipples, so you can milk those.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:So that made sense to me, right. Anyway.
Protein Deficient Vegan:But yeah, I do think eating out could be trickier. But I think if you're doing that, you'd probably just look at the menu ahead of time and hopefully be able to find some options.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:There you go. It seems like a lot of restaurants lean into seitan more than they do soy options these days. I'm always kind of excited to find soy options. Yeah. But most of them do have some kind of seitan.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Or like Beyond or Impossible, which a lot of the meat alternatives that you'll find in the frozen food section are soy-free and sometimes even gluten-free. Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Yeah. There you go.
Protein Deficient Vegan:Yeah.
Muscle Deficient Vegan:Lots of options. You just might have to hunt around for them a little bit. Cool. Well, I think that is it for this week. If you guys could rate and review us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, that helps us out a lot. Also, you can leave comments on Spotify and YouTube. That's pretty cool. We like interacting with people there. And then we have the Deficient Vegans Discord server. If you want to come in and hang out with our community and chat with us, we talk about a lot of different things in there. And you can find the link to the Discord in the show notes, as well as links to our websites and our Instagrams, other social media, things like that. All right. You want to say bye? Bye, guys. Bye, everybody.
