Animal vs. Plant Protein

This is an article I wrote for a friend about benefits of animal proteins (particularly the powerhouse of protein shakes: whey) and plant proteins.

Now, before you read this, keep in mind that I do not pass judgement on animals' or plants' proteins as they are equally effective, but different and serve different purposes... I am not making any recommendations for anyone's diet, etc. This is just my thoughts on the subject and how I arrived at these conclusions.

Think about how many pounds of food you eat per day… the average is between three and five pounds per day for the average american. Now times that by ten.

A human would eat, by weight,  1.5 to 2.5 of these quarts per day.

Cows are large animals and eat tons of feed per year, (i.e. alfalfa, hay, grass). Dairy cows, on average, eat fifty pounds a day. Fifty!!!  

This bale of hay is and approximate one day's ration for a dairy cow.
Those are some dedicated munchers. No wonder their jaws are so defined.

Of course, measuring simply by weight does not account for density of calories, in a diet. However, even if you measure with calories consumed, cows consume tens of thousands of calories every day. Not only that, cows need 2 or 3 times more water than food. 

At minimum, they consume 100 pounds of water per day (http://www.holsteinfoundation.org/pdf_doc/workbooks/DairyCattleNutrition.pdf - page 8).

Cows do give a lot of milk. One gallon of milk (8.6 pounds) could make 1 pound of cheese. That’s an 8.6:1 ratio of weight milk to cheese. However, compared to how much water and food they drink... that's a small return.

Whey is a common protein supplement that is derived from milk, naturally, and as a by-product of the cheese making process.That means it is a good complete end-use of a dairy cow’s milk.

Whey has lots of amino acids (good), protein (good) , some fat and cholesterol (less good).

Animal derived proteins and foods (in general) are quite expensive because cows are expensive to raise, care for, and process. No wonder those who raise them try to extract every useful compound from their animals: it increases their return on investment in every step of the chain.  It’s good that they use every component the animal can provide…

Now, think about what cows eat: plants. All the plants they eat include protein. We’re getting our protein through them from what they eat…

Why don’t we just use what they use directly? There will be less waste (and cost) in the whole process, saving water, transportation costs, and processing energy which makes it more sustainable for our planet.

Although one plant alone does not produce all the amino acids a human needs (like an animal protein can), a variety of plants easily accomplish this. Plus, plants contain more minerals, vitamins, fiber (which is good at slimming one’s waistline), and are processed less than whey products, so they may maintain more nutritional benefit.

So, why do we focus so much on consuming the by-product of what cows eat when we humans can utilize plant proteins just as effectively as cows? Because animal proteins are deemed ‘superior’ with no evidence to support their superiority over plant derived proteins.
In fact, plant proteins are actually much healthier in some ways than animal proteins. The proteins themselves both have benefits.

Don’t get me wrong. I love cheese (I have a few varieties in my fridge that I’m thinking about right now… mmm… white cheddar). However, a varied diet is important to one’s physical health, so I rely on the plants, and splurge on the cheese. Because relying more on plants is more manageable for my budget,  and the environment.