Inside This Trailer You Will Learn:

In our Westernized, more domesticated society collagen has become seen as more of a fad food and marketing ploy than anything. Companies absolutely love to hop on the bandwagon to make a quick buck, which often comes with corner cutting and shady tactics just to make profit margins bigger.

Yet, when you lay our newly cultivated culture aside, you’ll realize that collagen is so much more than a new fad. It has been consumed for hundreds of thousands of years by every human population, and almost by evolutionary accident has collagen been one of the key components that goes into creating the tissues in our bodies.

Along with that, collagen consumption comes with a host of health benefits:

Improves the health of your skin (1, 2, 3, 4)
Helps to relieve joint pain, especially those with autoimmune issues (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
May prevent bone deterioration (11, 12, 13, 14, 15)
Could boost overall muscle mass (16, 17)
Promotes heart health (18, 19)
Improves the health of your gut (20, 21, 22, 23)
Supports brain function (24, 25)

If you want to learn more about the different types of collagen and a more well-rounded discussion of its benefits, then check out my article The Complete Guide to Collagen.

Inside this short video below I walk you through some of the basic science why collagen can be great, especially for autoimmune issues like psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, and others.

Collagen’s Role In Balancing Our Amino Acid Profile

Not only has collagen been shown in countless interventional trials to promote better health, it also plays a unique role in balancing the amino acid profile in our diet.

Commonly in the Western world, we consume mainly muscle meats - steak, ground beef, chicken, pork, etc. Rarely, if ever, do we consume organ meats or the tendons, ligaments, and bones of animals (which contain a lot of collagen and unique nutrients). If we do consume these foods, it’s usually deep fried in toxic vegetable oils from poorly sourced CAFO animals.

However, when you consume an ancestrally consistent nose-to-tail diet, by default, you get the exact ratios of vitamins and minerals our human bodies need to thrive.

For example, the large amounts of muscle meat consumption in our diets nowadays is largely inconsistent with how we’ve always consumed animals. It’s not only disrespectful on many levels to throw away the parts of the animals we don’t like, but it also sets us up for nutrient deficiencies as well.

Muscle meat is considered a complete protein - it contains all 20 amino acids we need. Collagen only contains 19 amino acids - it lacks tryptophan. Tryptophan is considered an essential amino acid because it is essential we get it in our diets because our bodies cannot manufacture it.

With this being said, muscle meats are consistently higher in certain amino acids, and lower in others. While collagen is higher in some amino acids, and lower in others.

Refer to Figures 1 and 2 below for reference:

Figure 1

Source: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/13/3671

You can see the ratios of amino acids in muscle meats are a certain way in this figure above. Look at methionine, for instance. Red meat is particularly high in methionine which a lot of Westerners typically eat on a daily basis. Yet it is rather low in several others like proline, glycine, and cysteine.

Let’s take a look at the ratios amino acids in collagen.

Figure 2

Source: https://www.hindawi.com/journals/jchem/2015/482354/SC - Slendid SquidCC - Calf Skin — Source: https://www.hindawi.com/journals/jchem/2015/482354/
SC - Slendid Squid
CC - Calf Skin

Collagen across the board is super high in the amino acids that muscle meats commonly are not - glycine and proline.

In particular, methionine and glycine have a very unique relationship. Both of them help our tissues to heal and repair as we grow older. Methionine has been shown to be crucial in the prevention of fatty liver disease. Glycine is important for balancing blood sugar, and promoting deep, restful sleep (one reason why I mix this collagen protein powder in my evening tea every night), among many other benefits.

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As we just mentioned briefly, collagen is especially rich in the skin, tendons, and ligaments of animals. Yet, how often is our culture eating these ancient foods? We’ve been told for nearly 70 years that the skin and dark meat of animals is bad for our health, so we often toss them out or avoid buying them to begin with.

But by incorporating more collagen into your diet and eating with a more nose-to-tail approach, you can get in more of the amino acids your body needs and less of the ones you might be consuming too much of.

What is the Proper Methionine:Glycine Ratio?

The amounts of each of these you will need will be dependent upon many factors - your activity level, whether you’re trying to gain weight, your state of metabolic health, among other factors.

Most omnivores are meeting their needs in methionine as it’s very rich in animal foods. So meeting these needs are usually not the problem. Just ensure your animal sourcing is of the highest quality and look for grassfed and grass-finished cattle.

Glycine, on the other hand, should be of a higher priority just due to the sheer fact most people are not consuming enough of this precious amino acid.

Estimates show that we need anywhere from 10g to 60g of glycine daily in order to promote good, general health. As a general rule of thumb, if you are someone who is of poorer health with chronic health conditions, you should shoot for more of the 60g range, whereas someone who is more metabolically healthy can get away with 10g of glycine per day.

With the overall consensus showing that for every 1g of methionine we consume, we should seek to increase our glycine levels by 0.5-1 gram per day.

For starters who find this data complex, tedious, and maybe a little overwhelming, the best way to start correcting the amino acids in your body is to simply add more collagen in your diet. This is the first step to eating more nose-to-tail as our ancestors would’ve done.

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How to Source a High-Quality Collagen Supplement

Like I mentioned at the beginning, because collagen has become popular (for good reason!) a lot of companies are cutting corners and producing low-quality collagen supplements that don’t work well biochemically inside the body.

In order to save a quick buck, a lot of companies will use bovine hide to source their collagen instead of more bioavailable sources like scapula, trachea, and the joint and tendon tissues of animals.

Perfect Keto is the one of just a few brands I trust when it comes to collagen supplementation because they not only source their collagen from humanely raised cows, but they also ensure it’s third party tested for impurities and they use the appropriate types of collagen for their products.

Not to mention they come in many great flavors like Cinnamon Toast, Salted Caramel, Peanut Butter, and more!

For more info on collagen, tune in and check out this short video below and share it out with someone you feel like needs to hear it most. And to hear the full discussion and get access to a guided program for individuals with autoimmune issues, be sure to sign up for my Ultimate Autoimmune Reset™.

You’ll get access to 12+ hours of video content, a dietitian formulated animal-based recipe book, a recommended supplement list for autoimmunity, sample workouts, and more!