What you eat after your workout is, in my mind, the second most important meal of the day after breakfast. However, this meal is far less complicated than breakfast is.
I’ve experimented with every post workout nutrition recommendation around. My verdict?
Just something with protein after a workout is fine. Carbs are absolutely unnecessary.
My absolute best results came when I drank two glasses of raw milk after my workouts. (Like I’ve mentioned in previous articles, I only drink raw milk — if raw isn’t available, I leave the milk out of my diet.) Although raw milk has carbs in it, it is almost all lactose which is digested by the bacteria and enzymes present in the raw state.
I don’t always have raw milk, though. If I have BCAAs, I just take in about 15 or 20 grams of them post work out and then have a whole meal 40 minutes to an hour later. If I don’t have BCAAs, I just eat three or four whole eggs (usually raw, in a shake with half a cup of water and a quarter or half scoop of protein powder for taste), still followed by a whole meal 40 minutes to an hour later. The main idea is to get about 20 to 25 grams of protein immediately post-workout — this is all it takes to help your body optimally recover. I feel best when my immediate post-workout nutrition is relatively light as well, but the meal 40 minutes to an hour later is huge. I would rank the big meal after the post-workout meal as nearly almost as important.
My results eating carbs post-workout vs. not eating carbs shows absolutely no difference. This is also the experience of many other lifters I’ve met, talked to, or read online. Try it out yourself — you’ll get the exact same results leaving carbs out of your post workout shake.
