Muscle Building Miracle: Here’s What You Need to Know About Chocolate Milk
Touted as a “super drink”, chocolate milk, in the last few years, has undergone a major renaissance as it is now being claimed as being a greater post-workout recovery drink than the sports drinks and protein powders that the market has been guzzling down for decades.
But why? Are we being fed lies and half truths? Is it marketing hype from the dairy industry? What are the facts? And why chocolate milk? Seems too good to be true, why not just plain milk? Lets begin there.
Chocolate Milk vs Plain Milk
Both are similar in most categories, so much so that opting for plain milk over chocolate, or if its your only option, isn’t going to be a major loss. Where chocolate milk distances itself from plain milk, and why it gets all the glitz and glamor, is in the carbohydrate department.
Comparing 1% plain and store bought chocolate milk, the chocolate milk has nearly 14 additional grams of carbs, comprised almost entirely by the additional sugar, obviously for the chocolate flavor. These extra carbs are vital in restoring glycogen stores that were depleted during exercise.
Glycogen is a readily available energy source stored in the muscles and liver and made up of glucose which comes from carbs, whether they be starches or sugars. After an exhausting workout, the body needs to replenish these stores as quickly as possible, and the more we can get the better, which is the reason why chocolate milk is preferred to plain. The extra potassium and sodium (our electrolytes) is just an added bonus.
Store Bought vs Home Made
Is there a difference between buying it directly from the grocery cooler and making it ourselves? Absolutely.
Using the plain 1% milk from the graphic above, we’ll combine that with one serving of Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup. This syrup contains 100 calories, 24 carbs (20 from sugar) and 1 gram of protein which leaves our home made chocolate milk looking like this:
- 205 calories
- 36g carbs (33g from sugar)
- 9.5g protein
Compared to store bought, this is an additional 47 calories, 10g carbs, and 1g protein. So, if you really put in the work that day, go for homemade.
What about sports drinks and protein powders?
So let’s tackle sports drinks first.
Compared to Gatorade, chocolate milk crushes it in every single category. Gatorade’s made its money off being an excellent source of fuel for athletes to refuel after an intense workout where they lose large amounts of electrolytes as a result of large amounts sweat lost. If it weren’t for marketing and branding, they’d be losing market share to chocolate milk right now. The above shows us that, while the sodium levels are in the same realm as chocolate milk’s, it severely lacks another key electrolyte — potassium, by a whopping 395mg. It also fails to supply the same amount of carbs per serving as chocolate milk does.
Down goes Gatorade.
As for how it measures up to protein powders, I’ll use my favorite brand “Six Star” as its opponent.
When comparing these two, you can’t just look at the raw numbers because protein powders are designed for the specific task of rebuilding muscle after an intense resistance workout. These workouts don’t produce much sweat so electrolytes don’t matter as much. Carbs are still vital in replenishing glycogen stores that are routinely demolished in any good resistance workout.
With that being said, in the case of heavy resistance workouts, our protein powder is optimal as it provides way more protein than chocolate milk does which, remember, is absolutely necessary for the muscle rebuilding process as protein is made up of amino acids, the building blocks of muscle, and helps aid in the protein synthesis (muscle rebulding) that occurs after weight lifting. You can always blend in some oats or a banana to add in some additional carbs to your protein drink, the banana also packing some massive electrolytes.
Chocolate Milk for Resistance Exercise
I hadn’t planned to, but I essentially covered this right above. Chocolate milk would be preferable to consuming nothing after a big resistance workout, but it doesn’t stack up to a solid protein powder.
Chocolate Milk for Aerobic (Cardio) Exercise
Chocolate milk gets the nod from me when it comes to recovering from a heavy cardio session. It’s jam packed with electrolytes to replace those lost from heavy sweating, it provides adequate protein to help the muscles recover, and it has the carbs to replenish your depleted glycogen stores.
The Final Tally
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About The Author: I’m Zach Newman. I’m an ACE Certified Personal Trainer. Conversation is insanely important to me. Its why I love creating things because creation sparks discussion and discussion is the best way to learn from each other. Whether its about fitness and health, what books to read, or what’s going on in the world today, my goal is to build the best community around conversations that better the lives of everyone involved.
