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When most of us think about cutting calories, we think about reducing the amount of food we eat. However, cutting out food is not the only way to reduce your calorie intake. You can cut out calories by using alternate cooking preparation techniques.

One healthy way is instead of coating your pan with butter, margarine, oil or meat drippings, spray it with a cooking spray. Replacing one pat of butter with one spray saves on average 35 calories and three grams of fat. Most commercially prepared cooking sprays have about one gram of fat and seven calories for a one-second spray. By comparison a pat of butter has 36 calories and over four grams of fat.

Other Cooking Spray Ideas

Another popular choice for using cooking spray instead of butter is on air-popped popcorn. Your popcorn will still have the buttery taste, but without all of the calories. Cooked vegetables don’t have to be served drizzled with butter. Instead use a cooking spray to coat the vegetables and then toss with your favorite herbs or seasonings. You’ll find you actually will prefer vegetables served with cooking spray instead of butter.

Eating Out

All of this is well and good for meals you cook at home, but what about when you eat out? Most restaurants will oblige your request to have something cooked in cooking spray instead of butter or oil. In most cases, all you have to do is ask. As more people are becoming health-conscious, eateries are adapting to keep your business.

Make Your Own Cooking Spray

Mix together 1 part of olive oil (or a healthy oil of your choice) and 5 parts of water. Pour into a misting spray bottle and shake well to mix the ingredients. That’s it; simple, huh. Make sure your bottle is the mister type. A plant mister bottle works well. Be sure to shake well each time before using so the contents are well mixed. Commercial sprays contain an emulsifier to keep the oil and water suspended, where your homemade spray does not.

Overall, ounce for ounce, cooking oils and fats contribute more calories to your foods than any other ingredient. By using a cooking spray, you are cutting out unwanted calories and fat, but not flavor. It may only be 35 calories that you are saving, but little changes here and there all add up in the end – your goal to reduce calories by 500 per day to lose an average of one pound a week.

If you are trying to lose weight, we know one strategy is to cut calories. However until your body gets used to not getting as many calories per day, you may have occasional pangs of hunger. The good news is there are several strategies that can help curb the urge to eat.

Water

Good ol’ H2O is your friend when trying to cut calories. To keep hydrated, you should drink eight 8-ounce glasses of water per day. One strategy you can use to trick your body is to drink a glass of water shortly before eating your meal. Water fills you up and when combined with a meal, your mind signals you that it is full even though you are now eating less calories than before. Drink the rest of your water requirement throughout the day.

Fiber

Another friend you’ll like is fiber. You’ll find it in such things as legumes, fruits, vegetables and whole grains. Foods high in fiber take longer to chew, so your brain has time to signal that your stomach is full. Most fiber is non-soluble meaning it is not digested by your body. So you get the bulk of fiber, but not the calories. Ramp up your fiber intake slowly and drink lots of fluids. If you notice bloating, gas or constipation, back off your fiber content until your body gets used to the extra roughage.

Protein

Protein is a good food to help satisfy your hunger because it takes longer to digest than other foods, like carbohydrates and fats. When trying to lose weight, be sure to start your day with protein in your breakfast. This gives your body something to use as fuel after having fasted all night instead of burning up muscle mass. And it allows your body to use the amino acids in protein to build lean muscle mass. More muscle mass means your body is burning more calories in order to fuel the increased caloric requirement.

Produce

Produce like fruits and vegetables tend to fill you up, but are low in calories. Because they contain a lot of water, you can fill up on them without busting your calorie goal. With much of the produce, it takes more calories to digest them then the calories that are in them. This is known as a negative calorie food.

By drinking water, eating low calorie produce and eating foods high in fiber and protein, you will be well on your way to keeping your hunger in check while cutting calories. You can cut calories and not be hungry at the same time.

How to Curb the Late Night Urges for a Snack

What you eat for breakfast may very well affect your urge to eat at night. That’s right. Studies based on blood samples and brain activity scans prove that eating a breakfast high in protein in the morning can curb your desire to eat after supper. But what if you have those after-supper or late night overwhelming urges to eat something – anything?

Evening grazers have found these six strategies work at curbing their late night snacking urges:

1) Eat foods high in fiber

High fiber foods keep you from getting hungry by keeping you fuller longer. Also, most foods high in fiber contain fewer calories than lower fiber foods. Legumes, fresh fruits and vegetables, and whole grains are staples and full of fiber.

2) Keep busy

Take a look at why you are eating. Is it because you are physically hungry, or are you eating to quell some emotions or from boredom? If you are actually hungry, then by all means have a snack (by snack we are talking 250 calories or less), such as a small apple, rice cake with peanut butter, or a cup of low-fat yogurt. Be sure to factor in these calories into your daily calorie count.

But if you are not hungry, then keep busy doing something that will take your mind off of eating, such as taking a walk, working emails, calling a friend, going to bed or just waiting for a while. Normally that urge to raid the refrigerator will pass with time.

3) Eat your evening meal later than normal

If you find you actually are hungry, try eating your evening meal a little later than normal. This may keep you full until bedtime, thus eliminating your evening snack.

4) Eat a healthy morning and afternoon snack

One of the biologic functions that can fuel a hunger binge is a drop in blood sugar. Prevent this by having a healthy snack in the morning and afternoon in addition to your small healthy breakfast, lunch and dinner.

5) Plan a healthy night-time snack

There is nothing wrong with eating a late-night snack if you plan the calories into your daily count. Chew on some carrot sticks or celery filled with peanut butter. The fiber will keep you satisfied until breakfast.

6) Only keep healthy foods stocked in your pantry

One way to keep from wrecking your diet through late-night snacking is to not have “bad” snacks in the house. You can’t eat something that is not there. If you must have something to eat, gosh on some popcorn (without the butter of course). It can be eaten slowly and the fiber will fill you up without all the extra calories.

Part of overcoming your late-night urges is setting you up for success. Use these six strategies that other late-night grazers have found to be effective.

If you are trying to lose weight, you have to burn more calories than you eat. As a matter-of-fact, to lose one pound per week, you have to have a daily calorie deficit of 500 calories. But you first have to figure out how many calories you should be eating to maintain your current weight. The first step in finding out is to calculate your Basal Metabolic Rate or BMR.

Basal Metabolic Rate

Knowing your BMR will give you the number of calories you need each day to sustain normal bodily functions like breathing keeping your heart beating. To lose weight, you have to either burn off or avoid eating the extra calories your body does not need.

To calculate your BMR, you have to factor in your height, weight, age and sex. For women the formula is 655 + (4.3 x weight in pounds) + (4.7 x height in inches) – (4.7 x age in years); for men 66 + (6.3 x weight in pounds) + (12.9 x height in inches) – (6.8 x age in years).

For example, let’s calculate the BMR on a 30-year old female 5 ft. 5 in, tall and weighing 150 pounds. Plugging the numbers into the formula 655 + (4.3 x 150) + (4.7 x 65 inches) – (4.7 x 30), we find she should be eating about 1,464 calories per day to maintain her current weight.

Note the formulas are based on a normal adult body. If you are extremely muscular or very obese, then your resulting figures will be underestimated or overestimated, respectively.

Factoring In Your Activity Level

Because how much activity you do in a day affects how many calories you burn, you have to adjust the number of calories in your BMR. If you are basically inactive most of the day, then multiply your BMR by 20%. If you exercise most days, use a 40% figure. For those that are very active, multiply your BMR by 50%.

Taking our example from above and adding in the 40% additional calories needed to support her activity level, the total number of calories she needs to maintain her weight while exercising most days is now 2,049.

Cutting Calories for Weight Loss

Keeping in mind a one pound per week weight loss, our example would have to cut 3,500 calories per week from her current diet. Break that down per day, and she should be eating 1,549 calories.

If you find you are losing more than one pound per week, you may want to add back in a few calories. If you are not losing at least some weight per week, consult your doctor for further guidance.

Buying food is one of the larger expenditures we make each week. But did you know that by cutting calories you can also save money? Use our tips on how to save money both when eating out and eating at home.

Save Money Cutting Calories When Eating Out

We know eating out is much more expensive than brown bagging it, but do you know how much you are spending? Assuming your daily lunch costs $7.00, with an average of 20 working days per month, that is $140 per month or $1,680 per year! Oh … let’s not forget to mention the loads of calories and saturated fat that is in many of the fast-food super-sized lunch choices. Your meal could easily top over 900 calories and 40 grams of fat. That is over half of your daily calorie count in just one meal!

Compare that to a salad of vegetables and grilled chicken with a light vinaigrette dressing, and a cup of homemade vegetable soup and you saved around 550 calories, 34 grams of fat and about $5.00. A healthy lunch you bring from home will nutritionally and financially beat lunch out every time hands down. And if you can avoid having to drive somewhere to get lunch, you can save even more by not spending money on gas to get there and back.

What you drink can really run up your monthly expenses and calories too. Instead of ordering your morning $4.00 latte with 180 calories, order a coffee with half-and-half cream with only 20 calories. Not only did you save $2.25, but you drank 160 fewer calories – and that is if you only have one drink per day.

Save Money Cutting Calories When Eating at Home

Buying your own groceries and eating at home is always less expensive and with less calories than eating out. But how can you reduce calories and food costs at the same time? Cook in bulk.

It costs money every time you fire up the oven. So instead of making one meal at a time, cook up a whole week’s worth of meals, package them in portion-sized servings and freeze them. It takes much less energy to heat up a meal in the microwave than cook it in the oven and with a portioned-sized meal, there will be less temptation to overeat, thus saving calories.

Another tip … watch the sales on healthy items. Instead of stocking up on processed food that is on sale, still expensive and full of calories, focus on buying healthy choices instead, such as tuna, olive oil, beans and brown rice, and lean meats. In the end, both your waistline and wallet will thank you.

Food costs are one of our largest monthly expenditures. However, by diligently buying healthy items in quantity when on sale, you not only save money at the checkout, but in gas by not having to go to the grocery store as often. And by buying natural healthy foods, you are avoiding the unwanted calories in processed foods, not to mention the saturated fat, trans fat and sodium found in many pre-made foods. Buy smart, eat smart and save both money and calories.

To lose weight, you have to cut calories, or exercise more, or a combination of the two. If you plan to cut calories, we rounded up 20 ways you can use to reduce your caloric intake through smart substitution and portion control.

Smart Substitution to Reduce Calories

By making small, but smart swaps, you can reduce your calorie intake substantially. For instance:

1. Swap out a bagel for an English muffin and avoid eating 220 calories.
2. Trade 10 ounces of whole milk for skim and avoid another 70 calories.
3. Make an omelet with one whole egg and two egg whites instead of three whole eggs. Calories saved – 125.
4. Try turkey sausage instead of pork and save another 125 calories.
5. Instead of mayonnaise, use hummus or mustard on your roll and cut 200 calories.
6. Trade your french fries for a salad and save 300 calories.
7. Try tortilla chips with salsa instead of potato chips dipped in a sour cream-based dip; it’ll save you 109 calories.
8. Try replacing oil in your favorite baked dessert with applesauce; four tablespoons of applesauce is 40 calories while two tablespoons of oil is 200. Plus you’ll add more flavor to your dessert.
9. Use 4 ounces of fat-free half-and-half in your coffee instead of regular cream and save 88 calories.
10. Eat 1/2 cup of oatmeal instead of a full 1-cup serving; calories saved: 150.
11. Substitute 1.5 ounces of raisins for fresh grapes and save 98 calories.
12. Snack on baked potato chips instead of the fried ones; save 90 calories for a 1-ounce serving.
13. Put 3 ounces of mozzarella cheese on your sandwich instead of Swiss and save 108 calories.
14. Swap out Alfredo sauce for marinara sauce- 129 calories saved.
15. Eat 1 cup of frozen yogurt instead of ice cream.
16. On your salad, eat either croutons or cheese, but not both and save over 100 calories.
17. For something different, eat 1/2 cup of fresh strawberries topped with 2 ounces of fat-free whipped cream instead of 1/2 cup of strawberry ice cream and avoid eating 102 calories.
18. Portion Control: The size of your plate makes a big difference on the number of calories you consume. Trick your mind into thinking you have more food than you do by using a 9-inch instead of a 12-inch plate. On average you can save up to 500 calories.
19. Do you tend to go back for another helping when finished with the first? You still can, but first wait 20 minutes. Most likely won’t go back and if you do, you’ll take less.
20. When eating out, it is harder to control portions, however, not impossible. Because restaurant portions are significantly larger, eat smart by leaving a fourth of your meal on your plate. Look up the nutritional information before leaving the house. Studies found people ate 52 fewer calories when they knew the nutritional information before ordering.

Cutting calories is easy when you know how to make intelligent substitutions and control portion size. Take charge of your eating with these suggestions.

Desserts don’t have to be loaded with calories (and fat) to taste great. There are many alterations or substitutions you can make to your current recipes, and still have them taste great. Here are four changes you can make that your family won’t even notice.

Reduce Calories with Yogurt

Low or non-fat yogurt is a great substitute for high fat ingredients used in baking such as shortening, oil, butter and sour cream. Not only does it cut fat and calories, but it adds a creamy texture. If your recipe calls for 1 cup of butter, use 1/2 cup or butter and 1/4 cup of yogurt. Replace 1 cup of shortening or oil with 1/2 cup shortening or oil, 1/4 cup yogurt plus 2 tablespoons.

Reduce Calories with a Sugar Blend

A part of a healthy lifestyle, many people are switching over to natural sweeteners derived from the Stevia plant. While 20 times sweeter than sugar, it has 0 calories. If you use pure stevia, then use at the ration of 6 packets to 1/4 cup of granulated sugar or follow the package directions.

Some companies have created a stevia/granulated sugar blend. Use it at the replacement ratio of 1/2 cup of sugar blend per 1 cup of sugar. You still get the great taste of sugar, but with only half the calories and it is all natural.

Reduce Calories with Applesauce

For sweeter quick breads, muffins and cakes along with a creamier texture, substitute applesauce for butter. In most recipes, you can do a one-for-one swap. Use unsweetened applesauce measured in a measuring cup made for measuring liquids. When using applesauce as a replacement, mix the other liquid ingredients into the applesauce, then add in the sugar and finally fold in the dry ingredients. Mix only until well combined. Do not shorten up the baking time.

Reduce Calories with Whole Wheat Flour

White whole wheat flour is a great substitute in recipes calling for all-purpose or white flour. Replace half of the flour requirement with whole wheat flour. While white flour is highly refined and has many of the nutrients taken out in the process, whole wheat flour still contains the wheat seed, germ and bran, making it much more nutritious.

By using healthy substitutes, such as whole wheat flour in place of regular flour, yogurt in place of butter, applesauce in place of oil, and reducing the sugar in your recipes, you can turn your calorie-laden desserts into something healthy, and more than likely your family will not notice the difference.

If you take a peek into some of the advertising copy of “miracle” supplements, you may actually begin to believe that diet and exercise are no longer necessary if you want to become healthy and ripped. You just need to pop a pill, and your fat will magically turn into muscle.

But regardless of whether you believe the hype or not, you have to ask, does fat turn into muscle?

This is a good question, because turning fat into muscle has always been a standard claim in the fitness industry.

But if that’s the case…

Exactly how does fat turn into muscle?

The answer: it depends.

Fat vs. Muscle

If you mean literally turning fat into muscle, then the answer to the question is no. Fat does not turn into muscle, because they’re made from different types of cells. It is physiologically impossible to turn fat into muscle because fat doesn’t have nitrogen which is needed so it can turn into muscle and there’s no way to turn fatty tissue into amino acids.

It’s sort of like trying to turn straw into gold. It can only happen in fairy tales.

Less Fat, More Muscle

Now if we are talking about turning fat into muscle in a less literal sense, then it’s possible. It’s a figure of speech, just like when some advertising copy promises to turn you into Hercules. You don’t actually become the demigod son of Zeus—you just turn into a muscular dude.

But why do some chubby people turn into impressively muscled men in some pictures? You’ve probably seen them too. And then again, some people don’t seem to lose weight at all. They just become more fit and muscular while their flab disappears.

That’s because when you stick to eating right, supplementing with whole food nutrients (Zeal for Life recommended) and a good weightlifting routine, two things can happen:

You will lose weight. When you don’t consume enough calories for your weightlifting activities, your body is then forced to lose burn the fat stored in your body for energy. Exercise burns calories, and combined with a diet your calorie intake can become less than the number of calories you use up.

You will gain muscle. When you lift weights, what you really do is to stress and tear your muscles. Your body then responds to this by rebuilding the muscles, and because you have lots of protein in your diet you have the necessary raw material to build more massive muscle.

You can’t turn straw into gold, but in the real world you can sell straw and then use the money to buy gold. And when we put it this way, we did turn straw into gold.

It’s the same thing for turning fat into muscle. You have two separate results—muscle gain and fat loss—but both are the results of your diet and weightlifting regimen. And they happen generally at the same time.

So does fat turn into muscle? In a way it does, from a certain POV.

When you go online, you’ll probably realize right away that there are millions of websites dedicated to diets. Most diets are about losing weight, others focus on health, and there are even diets for ethical or religious reasons. But if you want to build muscle, you also need the right muscle building diet.

Of course, the “right” diet is open for debate, because many experts have different opinions. What is obvious is that a specific diet needs to be customized to your requirements and circumstances. While a nutritionist can probably help you out, there are some things which you can do yourself when you are looking for the right muscle building diet for you.

A Good Muscle Building Diet Requires Monitoring Your Calories

The first thing you’ll need to do is to figure out how many calories you need per day. For that, you can go online and use a calorie calculator. This calculator estimates the minimum number of calories you need to consume.

If your aim is to lose weight, then you’ll need to eat less than what your body uses up. But if your goal is to pack on more muscle mass, then you may have to consume more calories than what you burn.

You can start by consuming about 20 calories for each pound of body weight if you want to gain weight. After a month or so, you can change this if you’re not gaining weight or if the weight gain is too much.

Now, this means you need to do some research on how many calories each meal will have. Canned and packaged foods have this info on the label and there are also many guides online for calorie content of common food items. Just track the number of calories you consume each day, so you can tweak your muscle building diet accordingly.

Plan on Eating Smaller Meals More Often

Now figure how many calories you need per meal. You should plan on eating 6 small meals a day, instead of three large ones. It’s easy; just take your normal meal and divide it in two, and then eat the other half three hours later. Eating six small meals means you won’t get hungry often because your food intake is spaced out.

Tracking Your “Muscle Building” Protein Intake

Next, track your protein intake. This is just as important as your calorie intake, because protein and amino acids are the building blocks for muscle growth. If your protein intake is insufficient, you won’t be able to grow as much muscle you want.

While some top-level bodybuilding athletes do is gobble up massive amounts of protein, for you it will be different. You can start by taking about a gram of protein for each pound of body weight, although you can go up to 1.5 grams per pound.

Carbs are a Necessary Part of Your Muscle Building Diet

Get enough carbs. Some people forget about carbs and concentrate on protein when building muscle, and then later on they complain why they’re not getting bigger and stronger. What they don’t realize is that carbs should be where most of your calories are coming from.

You can start by consuming about 2 grams per pound of body weight. Some may suggest as much as 3 grams per pound, but it’s a better idea to start low. You can always just increase the carb consumption if when you don’t gain muscle mass after a month.

Generally, you should opt for slow-burning carbs to raise your glycogen levels, which boosts your stored energy. Examples of these include oatmeal and quinoa.

For breakfast and for your post-workout meals, you should switch to starchy simple carbs. These raise your insulin levels, which helps you absorb nutrients more efficiently. You can also choose quick-burning carbs to replace your oatmeal or quinoa if you find it difficult to gain mass.

Fats are an Important Part of Your Muscle Building Diet

Don’t forget fat in your diet. This is also important if you want to build muscle. In fact, the rest of your diet should be fat after protein and carbs.

Fat has 9 calories per gram while protein and carbs have 4 calories per gram. If you weigh 200 pounds, then you may be aiming for 300 grams of protein and 400 grams of carbs, which gives you 2,800 calories. If you are aiming for 4,000 calories a day in your muscle building diet, then the rest of the 1,200 calories comes from about 133 grams of fat.

As you may have noticed, these are not hard and fast rules. Just make sure you track your food intake and monitor your gains. Then tweak your muscle building diet routine when you want to make improvements or if you’re not making any improvement. It’s as simple as that.

Many people seem to think that it’s easy to learn how to gain muscle mass. The problem is that most of them don’t do enough research. So what happens is that they make a lot of mistakes, and then they become frustrated when all their efforts don’t pay off.

There’s a Right Way and Wrong Way to Gain Muscle Mass

To avoid such problems, here are some clear-cut rules you need to follow so that you will gain muscle mass more effectively:

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• Define your focus. Some people think that bodybuilding and weight loss are synonymous, but for workouts, these are two completely different objectives. That’s why high intensity training is good for people who want to lose weight, but it’s actually counterproductive if you’re a pipsqueak who wants to be bigger, stronger, and more muscular. For that, you need heavy weights and lots of calories.
• Eat more. We’ll presume for the moment that you’re on a sensible diet and you’ve actually done your research on what and what not to eat. But when you start learning how to gain muscle mass, you’ll need calories. About 500 more calories than your usual intake should suffice. Do not take too much calories though, because you’ll just turn the extra calories into fat instead of muscle.
• Space out your meals. Instead of three big meals a day, try eating 6 small meals. This keeps you from getting hungry, and the meals also provide you with the protein and carbs you need.
• Drink protein and carb shakes. Whole foods are great, but then protein shakes are good too. With shakes (Recommendation: Zeal for Life Protein Shakes), you make sure you get adequate carbs and protein that your diet may not provide. For the most part, they’re also much easier to digest.
• Don’t forget to stretch. Quite a few people keep forgetting the very important step when they work out. Stretching is not just for yoga fanatics. Stretching before and after a workout makes you more flexible, improves your recovery, and also prevents you from getting injured.If you keep on having pains after working out, that may mean you didn’t stretch properly.
• Limit your cardio workouts. About twice or three times a week of jogging should suffice. And don’t jog for a couple of hours at a time. Instead, keep it to 30 minutes. Your best bet is to sprint for a full minute then alternate with a couple of minutes of jogging.
• Don’t spend too much time on your lifting exercises. Your proper weightlifting workout for the day should last for just 45 minutes. You should make sure you warm up before your workout, and you need a cool-down routine as well. About a dozen sets for each muscle group is okay, but more than 20 sets is overkill. Your reps for each set should range anywhere from 6 to 12, so that you only spend 40 to 70 seconds each set. When you lift weights, after an hour your body will start producing cortisol in response to the physical stress, and this will impede on your progress. Cortisol signals your body to store fat and burn muscle.
• Perform exercises that focus on several muscle groups at once. These exercises include pull-ups, rows, deadlifts, and squats. You can train your entire body or concentrate on either your upper your lower parts, but this is more efficient than working on just a single muscle group per session. By doing this, you reduce the risk of injury when you work out. You become stronger and your muscle development gets better. Besides, it helps you look so much more attractive.
• Change your workouts regularly. The body has a strange way of adapting to various strenuous events. So after a month or so, you may want to vary your workout a bit. Your 45 minutes per workout is enough for about 6 to 8 different exercises, and each one should have alternatives. Or, you can just vary the sequence of the exercises instead.
  You should note down your workout details in your journal, so that you have an accurate record of what you’ve been doing.
• Get enough rest. Make sure that you give your muscles enough time to heal, grow and develop by resting them after a workout. Get enough sleep as well.

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Learning how to gain muscle mass also means appreciating the time needed to attain noticeable results. Shortcuts aren’t recommended because they may eventually become harmful for you. Just make a habit of lifting weights and following your muscle building program. Give it time and dedication and you’ll begin to gain the muscle mass you want.

When you’re trying to build muscle, you need to understand that the process involves two stages. First there is the catabolic stage. You want to encourage muscle protein breakdown with your workout, during which your exercises are used to break down muscle protein.

When you do a workout you basically tear your muscle fibers; the workout increases the rate of the muscle protein breakdown. The catabolic stage is when the rate of the protein breakdown is greater than the protein synthesis, which is when amino acids are used to make proteins to maintain or build muscle.

This is followed by the anabolic stage, which occurs when you rest and the muscle building begins. Your body uses the protein and amino acids to rebuild the muscle fibers that were torn.

It’s not enough that you have a nice balanced diet throughout the day and that you take the best pre workout supplement before you work out. For the best results, you’ll also need to use the best post workout supplement that you can find during the anabolic stage, in order to assist in maintaining or building bigger muscles.

What to Look For in the Best Post Workout Supplement

Identifying the best post workout supplement may be quite challenging, but here are some pointers you’ll want to keep in mind:

• Most post workout supplements contain protein, because you need it to build muscle. This just begs the question of how much protein is ideal. According to the latest research, the answer depends on your age. If you are relatively young, you need 20 grams of protein. Your needs increase as you grow older, and by age 70 you will need 40 grams.
• Amino acids will also be helpful in building muscles. It’s best that you consume amino acids all at once rather than spread out over an extended period of time. Research shows that more muscle protein synthesis results from drinking 20-40 grams in one go, compared to the result of taking small sips in a span of several hours.
• Many workout supplements also contain carbohydrates. This may or may not be a good thing, though. Carbs are also used as a fuel for protein synthesis. Supplements with carbs can also prevent proteolysis, which is the deterioration of protein. At the same time, you may want to hold off consuming carbs immediately right after a workout, especially if your workout goal is to burn fat and lose weight. Your body is still burning off fat, and you should encourage this process by tapering off your carbohydrate consumption. Once you take carbs, the free fatty acids being burned for energy are returned to your fat cells.
• Take note of the calories a supplement contains, as well as the flavor. Obviously, the ability to mix easily with liquid is important as well as the quality and the absence of chemicals and artificial sweeteners. Stevia is a good choice for a sugar-free sweetener.

Timing is important when taking post workout supplements. Obviously it should be taken after a workout and not before. But most research shows that protein and amino acids should be taken right after, instead of hours later or the next day – which is technically still “after” the workout.

According to some studies, the nutrient uptake is much greater when you take the supplements within a half of an hour after you work out, rather than after even a few hours have passed. So, when you finish your workout, reach for your favorite post workout supplement and reload the important nutrients that your muscles need right away. By taking it at this “window of opportunity”, you ensure that you obtain the maximum benefits from your post workout supplement.