average consumption of meat

hej everyone,

I was just curious how much, how often and what kind of meat us omnivores on here typically eat during the weak.

i have started eating the way I want again thanks to life settling down again. This diet consists of 5-6 feedings a day of organic veg of all kinds, occasional fruit and a mix of kangaroo, beef, lamb and seafood, all grass fed/ wild caught.

I eat a couple kilos of veg and about 500 grams or so of meat on any given day along with some whey protein powder on workout days.  500 grams of meat a day is starting to seem like a lot though after some things I have been reading about meat consumption.

anyway just curious about others diets in general as well as what people think of mine.

cheers =)

I think if you're averaging a 4:1 ratio of veg to meat, you're probably okay.

Why do you say that?

I don't think anyone can come up with a clear cut answer about how much meat you should be eating.  That sounds like a lot of meat to me, but to somebody else it might seem like a small amount. Recommended intakes are averaged across massive populations, so I don't think a fixed number is really plausible.

I think the real question is, what have you read about meat consumption that concerns you? Based on those concerns, I think a more productive conversation could be had.

I'd say I probably eat about .75-.15lb (330-660g) of meat per day, depending on the day. I couldn't tell you whether that will cause problems in the very long term, but it doesn't seem to have any detrimental effects. 

Joshua Slocum said:

I'd say I probably eat about .75-.15lb (330-660g) of meat per day, depending on the day. I couldn't tell you whether that will cause problems in the very long term, but it doesn't seem to have any detrimental effects. 

during the time i began josh's nutrition recommendations, i was frequently checking my acidity, digestive and blood levels and nitrogen never went crazy, nor did homocysteine levels. proteineura was normal the days i drank adequate water, one thing for sure though, fiber had to be on point or there was constipation. (that's what i found on my end) 

KeilaniG said:

proteineura was normal the days i drank adequate water

Could you expand on that? Was it significantly higher on days you drank less water?

Edgaron said:

Could you expand on that? Was it significantly higher on days you drank less water?

I'm going to talking about things i don't fully understand right now, so i might use improper terminology or POV. 

as i implimented the meat consumption, i had not taken into account the excess nitrogen being broken down from the meat, so i it's like i hadn't set up my chemistry set exactly the way i needed it to test how the meat consumption would make me feel. i noticed on days i didn't take enough water, i had higher proteinuria and when i did(have enough water), my kidneys and my blood were cleaner. it's interesting to think about how much water i sweat daily because it's so humid where i am and it's almost as if as soon as the water goes in my stomach, it comes out my pores.

I also noticed it happened when i took quite a bit of water that day.(above normal proteinuria levels, is what im refering to here)

so it happened during two phases: when i incremented meat levels and when i took excess water. so i still don't know if it has something to do with the meat consumption to water consumption ratio. 

all this is speculation because i'm not learning this through curriculum, only on the fly, with referal notes to biology books, google and using the road map of food consumption to help me pin-point a trend. so in essence, all in the above is speculation(by my part) at this point. 

doesn't discard that these were the levels that i found, while i implemented a controlled diet regime and took into account as many variables written and mental as i could.

Joshua Slocum said:

I'd say I probably eat about .75-.15lb (330-660g) of meat per day, depending on the day. I couldn't tell you whether that will cause problems in the very long term, but it doesn't seem to have any detrimental effects. 

Just to be clear, is that based on theoretical protein requirements?

thecolin said:

Just to be clear, is that based on theoretical protein requirements?

It's based on meat is delicious.

Joshua Slocum said:

It's based on meat is delicious.

Best answer ever.

Haha meat is delicious! And I could probably quite easily eat more of it and as I am trying this nothing but meat/fish ( some people don't think of fish when I say meat) veg Nd some fruit for the next month at least I guess I'll just see how it feels. I plan on slowly bringing in some dairy after the month to see how it goes. I am experimenting on my body ATM and I have to say I feel good on this diet but things like what Keilani is talking about with excess nitrogen in the body I have no idea about those things and how to counteract them or whether its good bad or ugly.... There is so many mixed reviews about meat consumption and although I definitely believe meat should be in my diet it is simply a matter of how much and how else can I get enough quality protein without upping the powders.

ausswe said:

There is so many mixed reviews about meat consumption and although I definitely believe meat should be in my diet it is simply a matter of how much and how else can I get enough quality protein without upping the powders.

I figured that was probably the case, and it's a very complicated issue. And there seem to be two separate problems, one is protein intake and one is around meat consumption.

Protein intake is a tricky issue, and I think most active people obsess about it a bit too much. Getting too far into this particular issue risks derailing the whole conversation, so I'll keep it brief. My opinion is that protein is important, but meeting a certain minimum in the quantities that most body builders strength trainers recommend is not necessary. If you want to eat meat because it's delicious, then rock on and don't worry about it. If you want to eat a lot of meat that you wouldn't eat otherwise just to meet a certain minimum, then that's probably not very productive in my opinion. If you want to discuss further, we can, otherwise just ignore this part as my personal opinion and we'll move on.

As far as meat consumption, I'm not sure exactly what your concerns are, so it's hard to respond specifically. Is it about the supposed long term health effects of saturated fat consumption perhaps? If you're interested in going into more detail, I can talk about any concerns you may have point by point. Since I'm not sure what your specific concerns are, I'll just resort to posting some links that I've found informative.

A good starting point that is fairly long, but full of excellent details can be found here: http://rawfoodsos.com/2011/01/06/vegetarians-and-heart-disease/

There's lots of good stuff on her site. If you want to dig into the history of the bad science that started this whole controversy, she has an excellent analysis of that as well: http://rawfoodsos.com/2011/12/22/the-truth-about-ancel-keys-weve-all-got-it-wrong/