How to Make Muscle Building Drinks

Muscles love to be fed properly. They actually thrive on it for proper functioning and recovery, so in order to keep your muscles happy, you need to feed them often and feed them the right stuff. A way to do this is to make muscle building drinks, or smoothies as they are sometimes called. The key to success in this department is to create them with a balance of protein and carbs. The protein will help with recovery and growth while the carbs will deliver the protein to the muscle cells.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Blender
• Shaker cup
• Protein powder
• Honey
• Fresh and frozen fruit
• Yogurt
• Peanut butter
• Milk/milk alternatives

1. Choose a protein powder. The foundation of a muscle building drink is protein powder. Protein is important because this is what muscle is built from. Make sure to get a protein powder that you like before buying a big container. Buy a single serving packet and try it out to make sure it meets your expectations.

2. Select some fruit. Fresh or frozen fruit works well in shakes to add more vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and fiber. Some examples are bananas, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries and pineapple.

3. Get some nut butter. Nut butters such as peanut butter, almond butter and cashew butter have essential fatty acids, a decent amount of protein and even some fiber. They also add a good flavor to drinks when blended with other ingredients.

4. Choose a liquid. When you make a muscle building drink, you need some form of liquid to blend all the ingredients together. Water, milk, milk alternatives, juice or any combination of these can be used. It really depends on your caloric requirements.

5. Get some yogurt. Yogurt makes a good addition to a muscle building drink because it has protein and calcium. This can also give your drink more consistency if you like them thicker. You can get it regular or frozen and also in fat free versions.

6. Put it all together. Now it's time to try one out. Here is an example of a muscle building drink. This particular drink has a good balance of protein, carbs and essential fatty acids. Put 8 ounces of vanilla soymilk into a blender. Add in a chopped up banana, 1/2 scoop of vanilla protein powder, 1 tbsp. of honey, 1 tbsp. of peanut butter and 3 ice cubes. Blend it until the desired thickness is reached.

7. Make a post workout drink. This is going to require a shaker cup. Take it with you to the gym. As soon as you're done working out, put 2 scoops of protein powder in it, 8 ounces of water and 1 tbsp. of honey. Shake it up and drink it. Whey protein is a good option to use because it digests well in the system.

Tips & Warnings

• In the event you have an allergy or you are vegan, there are a lot of protein powders to choose from. Some of these include whey, egg white, rice, soy and hemp. This goes for milk as well. Instead of the regular kind, you can choose soy, almond, rice, goat or hemp. For the post workout drink, you can also use a flavored milk such as chocolate milk. At this point, fast absorbing carbs are what you want. This will help to shuttle protein to your muscles faster.

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