Normally I don’t advocate supplement use, especially not all the crap marketed to fitness buffs. In addition to a dizzying array of protein powders (soy! whey! pea! rice! hemp! vegan! insane!), you’ve got pre-workout beverages, post-workout beverages, beans, gels, gus, and a bar for every occasion including – and I kid you not – menstruation. Not to mention all the pills available. If one actually ate, swallowed or guzzled everything some doctor (defined as anyone in a white lab coat) or guru (defined as anyone with an Amazon ranking) recommended then you’d gain weight no matter how much you worked out.
But researchers save the day by discovering a new sports supplement that works just as well as all those pricey drinks. Breakfast cereal: whole grain, with milk, spoon on the side. I know! That carby crunchy goodness that you feel so guilty about eating? Now you have permission. From people with letters after their names!
Exercise physiologist Lynn Kammer reports, “Our goal was to compare whole grain cereal plus milk—which are ordinary foods—and sports drinks, after moderate exercise. We wanted to understand their relative effects on glycogen repletion and muscle protein synthesis for the average individual. We found that glycogen repletion, or the replenishment of immediate muscle fuel, was just as good after whole grain cereal consumption and that some aspects of protein synthesis were actually better.”
Not only does your Kashi Crunch (with flax!) taste better than Gatorade and replenish glycogen faster but it’s also more economical. “Cereal and non-fat milk are a less expensive option than sports drinks. The milk provides a source of easily digestible and high quality protein, which can promote protein synthesis and training adaptations, making this an attractive recovery option for those who refuel at home”.
This is good news for me since I have long harbored a love of breakfast cereal. Up until I got pregnant when the only thing I could stomach for the first 3 months was bowl after bowl of Cheerios, I hardly ever ate boxed cereal. Normally I’m an oatmeal kinda girl – and I do love my cooked oats/groats/wheat berries/other random plant parts – but some days you just want Miniwheats in the a.m. you know?
The one downfall, for me, of this study is that I don’t really buy the theory that people other than hardcore athletes really need to worry about pre- or post-workout nutrition. I think if you are conscious to eat several healthy meals (and snacks, if you’re the snacking type) then you’ll have all your glycogen repleting/protein synthesizing bases covered, no extra effort needed. Plus, I’ve seen too many people burn 200 calories on the treadmill and then suck down a 500 calorie “recovery shake.” For most of us the math isn’t friendly. But hey, if you are the kind of exerciser who needs a post-workout snack or if it’s just meal time, bring on the cereal! And if you need suggestions, Barbara’s Peanut Butter Puffins are my personal fave (and my kids fight me over who gets to hold the box):
Man, now I just gave myself a craving! Curses. These bad boys are like 5$ a box.
What’s your favorite cereal? How do you feel about post-workout refueling – necessary or just another marketing opportunity? Click here to check out more hilarious photoshopped cereal boxes.
There seems to be more and more stories touting milk to be superior to sports drinks or protein shakes for post-exercise nutrition. webmd has one article: http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercise/news/20060224/chocolate-milk-new-sports-drink
Here's another article saying chocolate milk works better than sports drinks: http://www.physorg.com/news163070284.html although I don't know how they got chocolate milk vs energy drink to be double blind?!? I also don't know why all these studies have such a small sample size.
The problem is it seems like the dairy industry is behind all of those studies 😛 and the cereal study was partially funded by general mills. Go fig.
Oh my gosh, where did you find those cereal pictures?!! That first one really killed my appetite…
I don't really eat cereal that much anymore (I like oatmeal though…), but I'm all about not using supplements or fancy sport recovery drinks/bars. I've actually heard that chocolate milk is really good for post workout recovery!
i like your article,i want to know how to fitness
mmmm chocolate milk, must have some…..
My "treat" cereal is Kix. It is so flippin hard to find a regular cereal with no high fructose corn syrup! We rotate through Kix or Cheerios or sometimes Oatmeal Squares.
Oh gosh, I love Kix, but you can't buy them in Canada, they're my favourite thing to smuggle over the border when I'm coming home from the US. I filled half a suitcase with them once on a flight from New York to Toronto- I'm sure the suitcase inspectors thought I was crazy. If anyone knows if they're available in Canada, please let me know!! I also really love Oatmeal Squares, and pretty much all the hot cereals that Bob's Red Mill makes.
Cereal is the ultimate snack food as far as I'm concerned. I frequently have about 7-10 different kinds sitting around, even when I'm living on my own at school. Though I do also love Luna bars… in a showdown, cereal totally wins.
And in regard to people drinking 500 calories after burning 200, I find it very common at my gym, since they have 2 'juice' bars. It's entertaining when people walk into Hatha Yoga with a protein shake- it is so unnecessary.
I don't really 'get' all this protein shake malarkey to be honest, BUT I always eat cereal after I've worked out just coz it tastes good and is low in fat and what not and I'm always blinking starving afterwards but want something light so as not to undo all the good work I did by working out in the first place…….works for me anyhoops! I prefer Weetabix at the minute. Do they have that in the US? I'm sure they do…..what i would REALLY love is Cap'n Crunch or that peanut Butter thing you talked about – mmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!!
Hi.
My name is MizFit and Im an oatmealaholic.
That said, Id easily slip back into old CRUNCHBERRY habits were I to allow myself.
or rabbit droppings.
There's prolly more nutrition on the Crunchberry with Rabbit Droppings
love love loce cereal! faves include: kashi heart to heart (with actual mini hearts! i mean, not ACTUAL hearts, but heart-shaped cereal); kashi honey almond flax; Corn Pops (other end of the spectrum, I know); Honey Nut Cheeerios; Special K Red Berry (sorry, Char)…
What a great study, thanks for finding this!!!!
I too think that if for the average exerciser, all this focus on the precise formula for "refueling" is a little silly. I just love it that breakfast cereal works as well as anything!
As soon as my almond butter and banana sandwich obsession abates, I will probably be eating more cereal again. Am partial to Raisin Bran, and, on special occasions, Lucky Charms. They're magically delicious!
When it's warm, I love Kashi Heart to Heart. It looks just like cat food, but tastes really good with vanilla soy milk. (Not kidding, ask my kids.) In the winter, I love steel cut Irish oatmeal. My older kids HATE oatmeal, but they love this. Perfect with a little milk and honey or brown sugar.
If your kids like the Puffin PB but it's pricy, you may want to try Mother's Peanut Butter Bumpers. It's frequently $2.99 at Target and the whole ingredient list is…Corn flour, molassas, peanuts, oat flour, rice flour, salt, honey, vitamin E. It is hands down the most coveted cold cereal in our house.
In my family, we're all a bunch of cereal junkies. In college I lived off of Cocoa Puffs (I'm cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs). Now we try to keep it to Cheerios or Kix, but my husband's fave is Froot Loops, so occasionally I'll buy it for him. I had to limit our cereal consumption when we started going through a gallon of milk per day – that gets expensive!!
Wow, good study Charlotte. I've found that replacing the normal breakfast sandwich (which contained bacon, egg and cheese) with a hearty bowl of Grape Nuts I was able to reduce the size of me in rather quick fashion. The exercise helps too.
I go on a cereal kick every once in a while. I like Kashi Honey Almond Flax, Multigrain Cheerios and Oatmeal Crisp. Someone else mentioned Corn Pops – love 'em, but hardly ever buy them.
I can't handle that much milk though, so if I'm eating cereal I usually have soy or rice milk. I do love yogurt with granola though (and thank you Charlotte for sharing that article on making yogurt at home – I'm loving the homemade yogurt these days).
Cereal is my favorite food! Steel-cut oatmeal or shredded wheat are top of my list. Anything that doesn't have cocoa in its name will do, though. I used to do whey protein drinks but found they weren't much fun after a while.
cammi99
I love cereal, but usually stick to oatmeal since it's cheaper and doesn't have a bunch of stuff in it. I like plain shredded wheat, Cascadian Farms Multigrain squares, Kashi H2H, and a whole bunch of others, too! Too bad cereal is pricey when you buy the good stuff. Lucky me I don't have to pry it out of the hands of my children to get a bite, though, only my cats.
I only read the last part of the blog — those pix traumatized me!
My favorite cereals is Barbara's Shredded Spoonfuls. When I can't get that, I like Life.
In my previous life as a sugar junkie, my cereal of choice was Golden Grahams. If anyone put a box of this cereal in our house, it would be gone in less than 24 hours.
My go-to is Shredded Wheat & Bran with warm milk, but the kids usually eat it before I remember it's in the cupboard.
I adore cereal. We keep a box of cinnamon life and a box of raisin bran here for snacking purposes. And I eat a decent amount of oatmeal.
I am kid at heart. My favorite was (it's been discontinued for years) Pacman cereal… the milk would turn pink! Now I am mainly a Lucky Charms or Cinnamon Toast Crunch kind of girl. I enjoy them mainly as dessert but interestingly they can contain more nutrional stuff and have less calories per serving than so called "healthy" cereal like honey bunches of oats. I have yet to try soy milk (i am really in denial about how milk and I disagree, sometimes violently)… does it work well with sweet kid cereals?
I used to be a total cereal-holic! I think for a while (when the kidlets were younger, as was I) I would eat it for breakfast and lunch… maybe sometimes dinner, I think! (Hubby was in the navy so away a lot and I was left to my own devices.)
My system kind of flipped out, though, so now I have to be really careful about what I eat. Pretty much nothing processed at all is on the menu anymore, so cereal is persona-non-grata!
Ah well.. I'll have to just live on the memories!!
LOL!! Very funny!! Not being a breakfast eater, I don't do much cereal. I do have serious good memories, however, of Tony the Tiger and me doing Frosted Flakes as a kid together 🙂
I think milk is the weirdest concept. It's like nursing from a cow.
That said, I love Golden Grahams. I don't buy them because they're loaded with sugar…but..but..they're whole wheat now, right???
If you happen to live anywhere near a Trader Joe's, they have all the Puffin varieties of cereal for only about two to three dollars a box. Trader Joe's has unique and healthy foods at such great prices that my husband and I, when we lived in Indiana about 75 miles from the nearest location, purchased a second freezer and took monthly 150-mile round trips to restock. They're that good, I promise.
Mmmmmm….peanut butter puffins!
I don't generally have pre/post workout snacks, unless I've taught a bunch of classes in a row or something. I'm with you; I don't think most of us need it.
(LOVE the cereal boxes!!!!!)
KIX!!!
Oh, wait. I don't think those are whole grain.
I'm not a big cereal eater, I have to admit. And immediately post-workout, I find that the harder I've worked out, the less able my system is to handle food. A really hard workout means half a glass of chocolate soymilk (if I feel hungry AT ALL), and then the 10-minute period when I wait with bated breath to see if it will stay down.
But I really, REALLY love Kix. (I also have an irrational fondness for Original Special K. That's the kind of family I grew up in: Kix and Special K were the "junk food" cereals in my family. Even Frosted Mini-Wheats were verboten, LOL.)
Like someone else wrote, I have been reading about the benefits of chocolate milk being just as good as other things post workout.
I love the Kashi Go Lean that I eat plain as a mini snack since I can't do milk & I just like cereal dry! Their Kashi Granola Crunch is way good but my "willpower" will not let me bring that in the house.. too good & I have a hard time with my portion control with that one but like that it has decent protein too like the Kashi Go Lean.
I agree with the fact that unless you are an elite athlete, sports specific a athlete, fitness competitor or something like this, as long as you have a good mixture of protein, carbs & healthy fats after the workout, you should be fine.
The way I work out, I break the rules & do fine with what I have post workout. I have a whole grain piece of bread with power PB and a protein bar & it works for me rather than a protein drink with fast absorbing protein which would be recommended after my workout. Has not hurt me to break the rules.
Find what works for you & go for it.
Love the cereal boxes!!!!
Oh jeez now I really really want those peanut butter puffins. I've never had those.
I never buy cereal but sometimes I walk down the cereal aisle just to marvel at it all in all it's tasty colorful glory.
And totally agree with you that it's only the hardcores who need worry about the pre/post workout snack.
I have actually grown to like Fiber 1 (with a banana and really cold milk – I even stick an icecube in the bottom of my bowl to keep my milk cold). If health didn't matter, it would be Life cereal all the way – I just love that stuff! To snack on, Oatmeal Squares are the best but I just can't stop eating them so I had to stop buying them.
AHH! Puffins is my fave too!
I also love cinnamon toast crunch. I usually use cereal as a sweet snack of dessert instead of something "worse." I hate milk so if I do eat it for breakfast it's sans milk.
I agree with you Charlotte – unless you're running or doing some form of cardio for over 90 minutes, you probably don't need a recovery meal. However, if I did need one, it would be a big bowl of Cracklin Oat Bran – I grew up on the stuff, and it will always be my favorite. Also love the PB Puffins. 🙂
I have been on a cereal kick lately too! It started in my second trimester, then went away for a while, and now it's back post-partum. I've been mixing Kashi Go Lean with Kashi Go Lean Crunch and some blueberries. Delish.
Cereal is something I've been craving with this pregnancy, but with gestational diabetes it's not something I should have as even the healthy ones can spike my blood sugar. Which is just wrong in my opinion.
I have had a teensy, tiny little bit every once in a great while, because sometimes you've got to have a little yummy snack or go completely bonkers! At least I'm not hitting the icecream.
Thanks so much for firing up my craving you evil fitness maven! 🙂
When it comes to post workout snacks, I've got to wonder why my Y doesn't have any healthy options in its snack machines!?
I'm glad to read this – because I love cereal. as a student I pretty much lived on cheerios, and now it's my default breakfast and quick meal with some fruit when I'm busy or just tired. It's good to know that I don't need to resort to protein suppliments if I just take the time to eat well…
Love the Puffin box…:)
I really like kashi go lean cereal, but since I'm running to work and I don't usually keep milk around (we just don't drink it and it goes bad), I usually either eat a Kashi Oatmeal dry (go figure, I like my cereal with milk but my oatmeal dry)or a zone bar. I went on a bar kick, trying a bunch of different ones, and think I've settled on those as my fave.
In a perfect world where I could have whatever I want I'd be chowing down on Cinnamon Toast Crunch or Frosted Flakes though! 🙂