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PULSES & PROTEIN: IN BALANCE FOR TODAY'S DIET NUTRITION NOTES Protein con nues to be a trend in nutri on. It started with a focus on the total amount of protein required in the diet but has been shi ing to the type of protein people want to include in their diets. Protein plays an important role in maintaining our health. It's required to build and repair body ssues, as well as build the an bodies we use to fight infec on and keep our red blood cells healthy. More recently, research has shown that protein has benefits for preserving lean muscle mass and promo ng sa ety. But how much protein do we really need each day? In Canada, we've been using the Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI) as a guide, which has 0.8 grams protein/kg body weight as the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for protein for healthy adults. This works out to about 46 grams of protein per day for women and 56 grams of protein per day for men. These amounts reflect the minimal amount of protein we should have to prevent symptoms of protein deficiency in most healthy adults. What does this look like in terms of food? Using the recommended por on sizes in the Meat & Alterna ves group from Canada's Food Guide to Healthy Ea ng, a 75 gram (2.5 oz) cooked serving of meat, fish or poultry provides anywhere from 14-30 grams of protein and a 175 mL (3/4 cup) serving of cooked pulses provides 12-13 grams of protein. The type or source of protein is as important as the amount of protein we eat each day. Protein is made up of building blocks called amino acids. Amino acids make up 75% of the human body. They are essen al to nearly every bodily func on, and every chemical reac on that takes place in the body depends on them and the proteins that they build. There are 20 amino acids that are important to human nutri on, and they are classified as being essen al (indispensable) or non- essen al (dispensable) (see Table 1). An essen al amino acid cannot be made by our bodies, so they must be supplied by our diet. Non-essen al amino acids can be made by our bodies, so we don't have to rely on our diets to supply them. By linking together these different amino acids in a variety of combina ons, we get the protein that we find in our foods. What's interes ng is that our bodies can make their own protein from the amino acids that we get from the foods we eat. The dietary protein we eat is classified as either a complete protein or an incomplete protein. A complete protein is one that contains all of the essen al amino acids, while an incomplete protein may be missing or low in one or more of the essen al amino acids. Protein from animal sources is considered a complete protein while protein from plant sources is o en an incomplete protein. Since pulses are a source of plant protein, they are considered an incomplete protein; pulses are low in Dietary Requirements for Amino Acids in Humans ESSENTIAL NON-ESSENTIAL His dine Isoleucine Leucine Lysine Methionine Phenylalanine Threonine Tryptophan Valine Alanine Arginine Asparagine Aspartate Cysteine Glutamate Glutamine Glycine Proline Serine Tyrosine Table 1 by Debra McLennan, RD, APG Food and Nutri on Coordinator 3 2

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