Oh and as for your question about energy levels.

For breakfast I'll go for toasted/untoasted wheat flakes, you might have them with milk or soy milk, perhaps stirring in raisins. Uncooked, they'll take longer to digest, so will provide longer lasting energy, so I am told. I'll also eat a couple of bagels and maybe an apple and a banana, and some raisins.

During the ride I eat loads of bananas (fresh and dried*), prunes, dried apricots, raisins, that sort of thing. Also mix 3tsp glucose powder into my water bottle, maybe add some orange juice (50%) too.

If I'm going on longer rides I'll take some flapjacks (Ma Baker's Giant Bars - cheap and tasty, except the apple flavour - yuk)

does anyone have a list of protein related items that can be substituted for animal protein?

I'm considering going vegetarian but want to be able to eat the same amount of protein I do now.

well, consuming the total amount of protein is easy... there's 7g per slice of bread, so eat 5 sandwiches and your at 70g. no prob.

now, quality protein, ie not limited by low lysine, means you'll want to eat our pal soy:

http://www.nutritiondata.com/facts/l...roducts/4467/2

scroll down to the 'amino acid score' section. over 100 is a really good score, but over 70 is still okay. soy is a big winner here.

and there's also quinoa

http://www.nutritiondata.com/facts/c...-pasta/10352/2

this stuff is absolutely awesome. cooks like rice, eats like rice (better, i think) and jam-packed with goodness.

i would say that, if you're really concerned with protein, those are the two really big winners. there's also a third: hemp seed. hemp seed has a similar protein to soy and comes with more efas and has an awesome nutty flavour... however due to the mind numbing paranoia about anything that even vaguely sounds related to drugs that stuns the common sense out of every american politician to be elected to public office since 1973, it's impossible to get in the united states (where i assume you're from). nutritiondata.com doesn't even have a listing for it. sigh.

there are also a lot of runners up in the protien category too, most notably wheat gluten (found in all wheat products to one degree or another), legumes and grains.

ultimately, after 22 years of veganism, and a whole lot of reading about attendant nutrition, i've come to the conclusion that if you eat some soy with some degree of regularity, don't fill your diet with crap (ie candy and sugar-fat flavoured convenience or 'snack' foods) and eat enough calories, you'll get more than enough protein to maintain your muscle mass.

Ovo-lacto for the past 10 years, and for 15 years before that, except for a 3-year hiatus. No problems with maintaining muscle mass (I lift and bike), and I routinely ride metrics and imperials. For protein, I include seitan in my diet, maybe 2 servings/week and after a heavy lifting session or long ride I'll drink a protein shake. Other than that, I have no problem keeping my pro levels at around .75g/lb of body weight- a reasonable maintenance level when I'm not bulking.

for reference, seitan is a wheat gluten product.... and a damn tasty one, too.

Thanks- I should have clarified that! One of my favorite recipes is ridiculously easy- marinate chunks of seitan in barbeque sauce for a couple of hours and then roast on an oiled cookie sheet in the oven at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes, turning once.

If you can't find seitan, it's likewise ridiculously easy to make by hand- all you need is good wheat flour and water, and a certain fondness for kneading dough. There are lots of recipes for making your own seitan on the web.

i wouldn't call making it 'ridiculously easy'... it certainly can be time consuming and can make your triceps sore if you're new to the process. however, it is a good protein, super cheap if you make it yourself, extremely versatile.

it can also be bought at chinese groceries for those long on cash and short on time. it can come in both canned and dried format and is often just called 'gluten' or 'veggie beef' or, and this is my favourite, 'wheat steaks'.

I was raised a vegetarian, and haven't ever been interested in doing anything else. About 8 months ago I did however take one step and start eating fish occasionally. But that's as far as I plan to go.

-Jeremy

I'm not vegetarian by any means (well i am for breakfast only hehe) but i switched my protein powder from whey to hemp. I can buy it either packaged in 1 litre containers or in bulk from a local organic food store, close to my place but im in Canada not the US. I use it in my smoothies and so far prefer it to the whey protein i used to use.

If you do any research on it with google it does have some amazing facts to it. A superfood thats hard to buy.

Quite right- I guess I was speaking from experience in making it myself that I forgot how tiring it was to make when I first started! Now I use a Kitchenaid to help with the first knead, and that's really where the muscles are needed. And if you knead the dough *under* water, it can get unnecessarily messy too.

Here's a recipe that I've had great success with- yields about 8oz:
1. Mix 1lb wheat flour with 2c water to make a stiff dough (here's where a machine with dough hook really helps).
2. Knead the dough for 5-8 minutes (machine), 10-12 minutes (by hand).
3. Submerge the dough under water for 30 minutes.
4. Drain the dough and set in a colander in the sink.
5. Gently rinse the dough under running water (not to fast, or you'll break up the dough). Allow the rinse water to go down the drain- that's why you do this in a collander. Keep rinsing until the water runs clear- generally about 5-8 minutes or so, but this varies with the grade of flour you're using.
6. The dough should be a sticky, well, glutinous, mess. It looks ugly and totally unappetizing, but that's OK- it will look much better after you cook it. Form it into a ball or flat shape and let it rest on a cutting board for 30 minutes.
7. Steam the dough over vegetable broth or water and shoyu or other soy sauce for 30 minutes. It helps to lightly oil the steamer where the dough sits so it's easier to get it out when the steaming is done.
8. Let cool and break into chunks or leave in a roast shape, and store in the remaining broth for up to 7 days in the fridge or a month in the freezer.

Or, you can, as frymaster suggests, you can buy it ready-made. But if you don't worry too much about the "time is money" thing, making it yourself is far cheaper. Store-bough seitan is about the same price as steak in my area. The Chinese stuff in the cans is much cheaper, but very, very high in sodium.