Vegetables and everything else
Peas on a GLP-1: protein, portions and how to actually eat it
About 5 g of protein per 100 g (3.5 oz), frozen, cooked, for around 80 calories. Half a cup, about 80 g (2.8 oz), gives roughly 4 g of protein for 64 calories.
To reach 30 g of protein from peas alone you would need about 600 g (21.2 oz). On a small appetite that is often more than one sitting allows, which is why we pair it rather than chase the whole target from one food.
How peas sits on a GLP-1
Green peas are about 5 g of protein per 100 g (3.5 oz), the highest of the ordinary green vegetables, and they are sweet, soft and small, which on a GLP-1 makes them one of the easiest vegetables to get in. Half a cup is 4 g, so they are a side with a bonus rather than a protein, and their real use is that they go into other food, a soup, an omelette, a bowl of rice, without adding anything that has to be chewed.
When your appetite is small
Keep a bag in the freezer and throw a small handful into whatever is cooking in its last two minutes: the soup, the scrambled eggs, the pasta water, the fried rice. A handful is about 3 g and a vegetable ticked off without a separate serve. Mashed with butter and mint they are also a soft, sweet base under a piece of fish for someone who has gone off potato.
Three ways to prepare it
A handful into soup or eggs at the end
Frozen peas straight into the pan for two minutes. Sweetness, colour and a few grams, and nothing to prepare.
Crushed with butter and mint under fish
Peas cooked, drained and crushed with a fork, butter and mint. A soft, sweet base that carries a fillet of white fish for a 30 g plate.
Pea and ham soup, blended, in a mug
Frozen peas, stock, shredded ham, blended smooth. A bright green mug of about 15 g with the ham in it.
What to eat it with
Ham, fish, eggs, feta, mint, butter, a little lemon. Peas sweeten a plate, which helps when savoury food has gone flat, and they need a real protein beside them.
How it compares
| Food | Protein per 100 g | Energy per 100 g | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Peas | about 5 g | 80 kcal | this page |
| Edamame | about 11 g | 120 kcal | See the page |
| Broccoli | about 2.8 g | 35 kcal | See the page |
| Split peas | about 8 g | 120 kcal | See the page |
All figures are typical values for the food as eaten, frozen, cooked, not laboratory figures for a particular brand.
Australian, US and UK names
Peas, green peas or garden peas in all three countries, frozen being the standard. Petits pois are the smaller, sweeter grade. Snow peas in Australia and the US are mangetout in the UK, and sugar snaps are the same everywhere; both are eaten pod and all and carry less protein.
Questions people ask
Are peas high in protein?
For a green vegetable, yes: about 5 g per 100 g (3.5 oz), so half a cup is 4 g. That is the best of the ordinary vegetables and still a side dish. Edamame, at about 11 g, is the green vegetable that gets close to counting.
Your number comes first
Knowing what is in a food only helps once you know how much you are aiming for. The target is 1.2 to 1.6 g of protein per kg of your goal weight, not your current weight, which for most people is 90 to 140 g a day.
Work out your protein targetMore on eating well when your appetite is small: high protein foods for a small appetite, how much protein on a GLP-1, and every food we have written up. The whole system in five documents is the Keep Muscle Kit, A$47 / US$29 / £23.
EverStrong provides nutrition and strength coaching and education. It is not medical advice and does not replace your prescribing doctor.