Combined Protein Totals?

neosenate

Hi,

Disclosure: I'm not a doctor and I don't play one on TV.

So I've been reading up about protein intake, and how different foods can combine to create what's known as a "complete" protein, i.e. they contain all the amino acids of a total protein molecule. Rice and beans is the canonical example.

But after looking at my protein intake for cronometer, I don't understand how the amino-acids are rolled up into a total. For example…

This looks to be telling me that I've had a huge amount of the main protein amino acids, but they only roll up to a total of 31%?

How does this work? Does Cronometer roll up amino-acids into the total or do only complete protein foods count?

TIA!

Karen_Cronometer

Hello Neosate,

What a great question! We have requirements for essential amino acids that we need for our bodies to function normally, because we can't make them ourselves, or not in high enough amounts to meet our demand. With the essential amino acid requirements met, we also need additional protein to replace losses that occur each day.

There are different types of protein deficiency states:
1. Good protein quality, but not enough to meet needs
2. Enough total protein, but poor quality protein (not enough essential amino acids)
3. Not enough protein AND not enough essential amino acids

The protein value in Cronometer comes from the total protein in the food. Think of your amino acid targets separately, to make sure you are getting enough to meet your essential amino acid requirements as well as getting enough total protein.

Best,

Cloudoftime

The amino acids I've seen shown for pea protein, aren't represented in cronometer. I can put in a ton of pea protein, and it barely registers on the meters. What's going on here?

Cloudoftime

For instance, I put in 8 servings of Bob's Redmill pea protein, and it registers 100% of total protein, but nothing for any of the amino acids. And there are various readings for other brands of pea protein, but they seem very low.

OldHobo

The amino acids I've seen shown for pea protein, aren't represented in cronometer. I can put in a ton of pea protein, and it barely registers on the meters. What's going on here?
...
For instance, I put in 8 servings of Bob's Redmill pea protein, and it registers 100% of total protein, but nothing for any of the amino acids. And there are various readings for other brands of pea protein, but they seem very low.

I don't know anything about pea protein products but looking at Bob's Red Mill Powder Pea Product, the protein quantity is listed but all the amino acids are null.

I see this a lot when entering a foods by brand or UPC code. You often get more complete data by entering a generic from one of the national databases.

More information here.

Cloudoftime

Thanks for the response! That was helpful.