Kidney Beans - Increase muscle and burn fat

[Johnka]

From Dr. Lonnie Lowery's Down on the Pharm 2

Kidney beans: This entry may indeed be the hallmark functional food of this lineup. Amazingly, kidney beans appear to be unique in that they have been shown to decrease body fat and increase relative muscle mass in animal models.(5, 17) No kidding. Here’s a quote:

"Long-term consumption of diets containing low levels of kidney bean significantly altered body composition of rats. The levels of lipid in the body were significantly reduced. As a result, carcasses of these rats contained a higher proportion of muscle/protein than did controls" (5)

That’s just plain cool.

This interesting effect may have something to do with the bean’s capacity to increase (mostly larger, fast twitch) skeletal muscle insulin sensitivity. Research suggests that both insulin receptor mRNA and glucose transporter (Glut-4) mRNA rise pretty dramatically after eating kidney beans!(10) Of course, a rise in messenger RNA suggests that said receptors and transporters will soon take shape. And due to the potential for temporarily-reduced nutrient availability/feed conversion (i.e. food becoming body mass), I immediately start thinking about dieters. Losing fat, or preventing its gain, while maintaining lean tissue is one of sports nutrition’s holy grails.

Still not interested? Apparently, kidney bean lectin, although a little scary, looks promising enough for researchers to consider it as a "therapeutic agent to stimulate gut function and ameliorate obesity if a safe and effective dose-range can be established for human subjects."(17)

I definitely wouldn’t plan on supplementing with any amount of toxic lectins, to be sure (if you could even find them), nor would I try to use beans of any kind to replace my whey/ casein/ meat/ egg protein intake. But simply eating some well-soaked and then boiled kidney beans as a side dish each week? Yeah, I could do that.

[Ian Kay]

Cool. One thing: when the article says, "some well-soaked and then boiled kidney beans"... does this mean that canned beans aren't going to be as effective?

[LeafofDeath]

The cleaning method has already been applied to canned beans, so they're just fine.

[mqgeek]

So what recommendations is he making as far as consumption?

[steelerfan]

So would chilli made of 93% or higher lean beef and kidney beans make a good PWO meal? Don't the beans also supply a good source of carbs?

[LeafofDeath]

Beans are EXTREMELY low GI and high in fiber. Post-workout, you generally want a quick insulin spike to rush nutrients to the muscles. Beans just don't do the trick. But what makes them bad for PWO makes them good for just about any other meal of the day [img]smile.gif[/img] John Berardi has even said their GI is so low they practically don't even count as a carb when separating your P+C and P+F meals.