Some people who contact me about Nutrisystem know (or have read) that it is a diet that consists of a relatively high amount of protein and a relatively low amount of carbohydrates. This is true even when it comes to eating comfort foods and snacks, as well as sweet-tasting desserts. Therefore, some people are skeptical of these ratios and claims and want to know how much protein you actually ingest or eat each day with Nutrisystem.
This will vary depending on the Nutrisystem foods you choose, as well as any side items you choose to add on your own. But I can give you an idea of this by taking three random days of diet meals and averaging the daily amount of protein. I’m going to do this next.
First day protein example: To keep things simple, I’ll put the amount of protein for each meal in parentheses after that meal. For breakfast, I have chosen the very popular and highly rated blueberry pancakes (5 grams of protein), the roasted vegetable pizza for lunch (8), and the roast turkey for dinner (18). You are required to have a Nutrisystem snack and dessert each day, so I chose Buttered Popcorn (4) and Carrot Cake (5). My protein total (before adding any garnish) is 40 grams. However, they ask you to add a healthy side to each meal. So you could add milk to breakfast, carrots to lunch, and tomatoes to dinner. This would probably give me a good amount of extra protein that day.
Day Two Protein Example: For the next day, I’ll choose a ham and cheese omelet for breakfast (13), a turkey hot dog for lunch (5), and the chicken enchilada for dinner (17). I’ll be choosing the herb snack mix for my appetizer (6) and the mint cookie burger for dessert (6). This gives me a total of 46 grams of protein for the day, but that’s before I add my sides for each meal. So you might add fruit for breakfast, grapes for lunch, and a salad for dinner. These sides would increase my protein total.
Day three example: For Day 3, I’ll choose Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal (4) for breakfast, Melted Meatballs for lunch (11), and Steak Lasagna for dinner (18). My snack will be cheese balls (8) and my dessert will be a frozen caramel sundae (3.) My total grams of protein on this day before adding my sides is 44.
The average of three days: So my average daily protein for these three days (not counting sides) was 43 grams. Now like I said, this is not a complete number because you would be getting more protein and the amount would depend on which sides you choose. But it’s probably safe to say that you’re probably eating at least 9 to 15 grams more protein or more per day, again depending on what you choose.
How much protein is recommended for weight loss? Is this a healthy or advisable amount?: The Dietary Reference Intake recommendations from the Institute of Health allow a protein intake of 10-35% of your calories, and many believe that eating large amounts of protein contributes to weight loss. Considering that most people eat between 1,200 and 1,500 calories per day with Nutrisystem, these protein levels are in line with the higher end of that range. Some very strict high protein diets include even higher amounts, but I personally believe that Nutrisystem keeps its ratios safe but effective.