I wake up starved in the middle of the night. What should I eat?
ANSWER
Before you go to bed, take in slow-digesting protein. Eat whole-food protein sources or drink a shake with casein and fiber in it. (Adding some fiber to a shake will slow down digestion.) If you’re already doing this, and it doesn’t stay with you until morning, have a middle-of-the- night snack. During the day, you probably eat about every three hours; so, it only makes sense that your body isn’t going to stay full for the seven to 10 hours from your late-night meal to breakfast.
When you wake up in the middle of the night, have another meal like the one you had before bed. Eat some cheese (low fat or regular), meat (even a little fat won’t hurt, as that will help the calories stay with you a little longer), two or three boiled eggs, or drink a casein protein shake. Don’t neglect carbs — you need them to prevent your liver from converting muscle amino acids to glycogen. Try to get in an equal amount of carbs and protein, with the carbs coming from complex sources such as oatmeal, brown rice and whole-grain bread.
Here’s a good rule of thumb: Take in one to one and a half calories per pound of bodyweight during this middle-of-the-night meal. If you weigh 200 pounds, eat 200-300 calories. – FLEX
