If you’ve made the commitment to start working on adding more size and muscle mass to your body, one of the must-do things on your agenda is to get a good muscle building diet in place. You can train as hard as you like in the gym, but if you’re not eating the right muscle building foods, you won’t be making any progress.
The foods you eat on a daily basis will be responsible for helping you recover from your workout sessions, as well as provide the body with the raw materials it needs to build slabs of rock-hard muscle mass on your body.
Let’s have a look at some of the best muscle building foods that you should consider so you can do a quick check-up on your diet and make sure they’re included in your muscle building diet plan.
Salmon
The very first of our muscle building foods is salmon. Salmon is absolutely perfect since not only is it going to supply the important amino acids that your muscles need to rebuild themselves, but it also provides the body with essential fats as well.
These fats are going to be important for maintaining good insulin sensitivity so that when you do consume carbohydrate rich foods, those calories are shuttled into the muscle cells for use rather than causing blood sugar highs and lows and then being deposited to the fat stores instead.
Furthermore, since salmon is one of the higher calorie sources of protein that you can eat, it’s ideal for guys who want to gain weight and have high calorie intake requirements.
Oats
The second muscle building food to include in your diet plan is oatmeal. Oatmeal is great when eaten raw like regular cereal since it’s very calorie dense and doesn’t have any sugar at all.
Even though your goal isn’t fat loss at this point, it’s still important to eat wholesome carbohydrates that are low in sugar so you keep steady energy levels and prevent excess fat gain.
Oatmeal is also high in fiber so it will help to keep your digestive and excretion systems working properly.
Try adding oats to protein powder for a quick, well balanced shake or combine oats with protein powder and peanut butter for a quick snack on the go.
Almonds
Almonds are one of the top muscle building foods that contain healthy fats to include in your diet. Almonds make for a great snack any time and since a handful will contain around 200 calories, they make it easy to get your total daily calorie intake up higher.
Almonds work excellent topped over salads, added into a bowl of oatmeal, or combined with some dried fruit and pretzel sticks for trail mix to eat between meals.
Steak
Some people are still in the habit of avoiding steak because they feel it’s too high in saturated fat, but the truth is that some saturated fat in your diet is okay. In fact, it will help you maintain higher overall testosterone levels, so this makes steak one of the absolute best muscle building foods you can eat.
As long as you’re eating it in moderation and choosing leaner varieties of meat, you should aim to eat steak twice a week at minimum. It’ll also supply you with plenty of iron which will help to keep your energy levels higher during your workout session.
Eggs
Moving on, next we come to eggs. This muscle building food is ideal to eat first thing in the morning or any time you need a quick snack because they’re cheap to purchase, easy to prepare, and will supply you with high quality protein.
Don’t be so fast to toss the yolk either – there still is a high amount of protein found in the yolk along with a host of other nutrients such as calcium, iron, phosphorus, zinc, thiamine, vitamin B6, and folate.
If you throw that away, you’re missing out. While you may not want to consume 5 or more whole eggs each day and in that case adding some egg whites is a smart move, having two to three whole eggs shouldn’t be a problem if you’re currently in a healthy state with normal cholesterol levels.
Quinoa
Another good food to have in your meal plan is quinoa. Many people often overlook quinoa and go for brown rice instead but this is a big mistake. While brown rice is also healthy, quinoa is a complete source of protein, so tends to be a step above nutritionally speaking.
You can easily swap quinoa for any dish that calls for brown rice, so start adding this in more often to your diet plan.
Cottage Cheese
The last great source of protein that you’ll want to make sure you’re taking in regularly and that belongs on our list of the top muscle building foods is cottage cheese.
Cottage cheese is an excellent source of calcium in the diet and will also provide a form of protein known as casein protein, which digests more slowly in the body than regular protein does.
This makes it ideal for right before you turn in for the evening as it ensures your muscles get a steady stream of amino acids through the night.
Putting These Muscle Building Foods To Good Use
So now that you see what some of the best muscle building foods are, it’s time for you to get them into your diet. Make sure to take into account how many calories each contains so you can easily achieve the right calorie intake to promote lean mass gains without unnecessary fat gains.Most people will do best eating at least one gram of protein per pound of body weight each day and then a fairly even balance of carbohydrates and healthy fats to round out their calorie intake. Although skinny guys who want to bulk up should aim to get at least 40% of their daily calories from carbohydrates. This will help you gain weight faster.
Of these calories, you should aim to eat a lean source of protein with each meal you consume choosing from some of the top sources on this list of muscle building foods and then pair that with some slower digesting carbohydrates and healthy fats.
If you do this six to eight times per day, you should be all set to see your muscle growth skyrocket.
And if you’re ready to use this info and start cooking some delicious meals but you don’t know where to begin… Then you should grab a copy of the Weight Gain Blueprint program which will show you step-by-step how to build lean muscle fast, no matter how skinny you are now, and how bad your muscle-building genetics are.
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