Been at a desk for 20-years, now at physical labor. Recently figured out that I’m running a serious caloric deficit, and I’m already a skinny fucker. Also, I’m aiming to build a little muscle and a lot of endurance. How do I eat?!
Back when I was working hard, ate tons of fast food. Too expensive and time consuming, don’t want off the clock to go eat (hour round trip including eating). Took a 12-hour shift today and did OK sucking down granola bars, water and kratom, ate my wife’s kickass meal when I got home.
What can I cook or bring to work to power me? What’s simple and cheap and doesn’t require much on-site prep? (We have a microwave, toaster, all that, I just want calories and protein in my face with no fuss). Afraid I’m half-ass cannibalizing myself.
Ok you need to separate this. You need food options and you need bulk calories.
For breakfast, you need a decent hit of low GI carbs and a protein source. Whilegrain toast with whatever or oats is GOAT, add in a protein coffee (Cold brew/espresso and vanilla protein powder) and you have my breakfast. If you want some more calories and fats in breakfast mix the protein shake on whole milk not water. But this combo burns long and slow.
For the calories at work onsite grab yourself some mass gainer protein and smash a shake with lunch. Lunch can be whatever the hell you want with one of those. One serve of most mass gainers is half of my daily maintenence calories. Unless your job is professional weightlifting, you probably wont out-work this. Although Id advocate for a big boy wholemeal roll stuffed with some meats and a lot of salad.
I think it would be a really good idea for you to track your intake for a few weeks and get a good idea on how much you really need to eat. My Fitness Pal is ok but Macrofactor takes a breakdown of what you put in and your weight and over time dials in how much you need to eat for what physical result you want.
In simplest terms for muscle gain in most grown men the rule of thumb is 1g of protein per lb of lean body mass is a good number to aim for spaced as equally as you can throughout the day in 3 to 5 meals. I could write more about the myths and legends that permeate this shit but for 99% of people 99% of the time - This will work.
Take me for example. My 0% body fat weight would be 155lbs. So 1 scoop of protein in the coffee, 25g. Protein bar mid morning 25g, mass gainer at lunch 50g, even if your afternoon snack is pure carbs dinner only has to be 55g for me to hit the base markers for ideal muscle growth and theres 56g in a double quarter pounder.