3000 Clean Calories in 3 Meals Help

So it hit me today that eating 2500 daily is not enough for me to gain strength/size. I can legitimately only eat 3 meals a day consistently based on how hectic work can get for me. I currently weigh 163 @ 5’6 29yrs and would like to build muscle and then cut once I strong/big enough to expose the muscle I built.

This is how I’m currently eating. I had 2 questions:

  1. What can I add in to help me get to my goals?
  2. Should I consume less protein and add in more fats/carbs?

Any advice would be appreciated, thanks!

BREAKFAST
-4 Eggs
-1 Banana
-1 Cup Oatmeal
-2 Tbsp PB

LUNCH
-12oz Chicken Thighs
-1 Baked Potato
-Salad + Bell Pepper
-1 Apple

DINNER
-8oz Salmon/Seafood or Goat or Lamb or Bison
-1 Cup White Rice
-2 Veggies (Broccoli + Tomatoes, etc)

230 Carbs
75 Fat
225 Protein
2500 Cals

This is an easy fix.

  • make your AM oatmeal with whole milk
  • add an extra spoonful of peanut butter
  • drink a glass of whole milk with lunch
  • eat 12 oz of meat at dinner instead of 8

I mean, there are dozens of ways to go about this, but those tweaks - all of which are quite reasonable and should be doable with minimal extra effort - would give you the extra caloric nudge you need to go from 2500 to 3000.

I can’t give you a recipe because I never make shakes but that’s what I would suggest. Something that will give you 500 calories, balanced between protein and carbs. I’m not that familiar with the Biotest line but everyone on here seems to be very pro plazma around workouts. With your own shake consume half before working out and half after. With plazma I believe the protocol is half before and finish the second half during the workout.

Either choice would be easy liquid calories that you could have pre made in the morning and easily consumed on a busy schedule. Sorry if the shake description is vague but you can play around and make something you enjoy.

Shakes with oats, protein powder, peanut butter, etc would be a quick and easy way to get calories in, too.

Easiest way?

Drown your potato, rice and salad in olive oil. I’m currently a college student – this gets me an easy ~400 quality calories daily.

you don’t need to eat as much protein as that

You can’t find time to eat two, 280 calorie packs of peanuts during your work day? if you can’t i’d just eat nuts or peanuts to the tune of 500 before bed.

Eat your meals as per usual and add a shake to it:

2 scoops vanilla PP
1 can (140mL) coconut cream
1 cup 1% milk
1 banana and/or pineapple pieces
1/4 cup almonds (if you don’t like this, you can have a second banana and a bit more protein for less fat/more carbs)
Chilled green tea

That’s 1000kcals (70p, 52c, 62f) right there. Either with dinner/before bed or half at breakfast and half at dinner.

How long have you been seriously training, and how long have you been resistance training particularly with this diet plan?

As for the diet, I cannot say if you should specifically increase mostly the carbs or fats and decrease protein, as we are all different and have different reactions to various macro compositions in diet. But having gone through the process of bulking and cutting myself over many years, I can say this: Whatever you try, take baby steps with the calories first. You don’t want to overstep into major fat gain to increase strength numbers and scale weight, as it’s a self-defeating prophecy (trust me on that).

Your diet looks quite solid in fact; it doesn’t need much changing in my opinion. Try bumping it up by 200-300 calories daily and see where that gets you in several months (yes, a minimum of roughly 12 weeks). That could be as easy as eating an additional baked potato with olive oil at lunch, or a whole avocado at dinner, with your present meal layout.

Another thing that may be beneficial is to try to get that extra amount of calories closest to your training time, both directly before and/or after your workout, if at all possible.

The general rule of keeping your carbs highest in the am to early afternoon and your fats highest in the evening at dinner should also help as well, as this approach seems to work best for most people, in terms of favorable body recomp.

Furthermore, if you see an improvement in body comp and strength, you’re on the right track. You can incrementally increase the calories from there to add additional strength and size for continued progress.

Lastly, I am strongly in favor of gaining the minimum amount of fat while trying to add size and strength, so keep an eye on waist size as you do this, which you can track with a tape measure or (better yet) a Gulick tension tape. You don’t want to have to lose more than 5-10 pounds of fat, when it’s time to lose the added undesirable weight gain, as even the most trivial amount of fat gain means you’re presently at the required calorie range to add as much muscle as you are capable of naturally acquiring. Don’t overdue this caloric aspect of your diet program and you should save yourself the added burden and grief of cutting later on when it’s time to lean out.

[quote]Fyzjin2 wrote:
Easiest way?

Drown your potato, rice and salad in olive oil. I’m currently a college student – this gets me an easy ~400 quality calories daily.[/quote]

x2 FTW

Also just load up on workout supps/nutrition

your workout nutrition on WO days should cover this.

on your off days i’d add more carbs if you are training hard and are having a hard time recovering.

if thats not the case i’d add in a shake or 2 with almonds or another fat source.