Ive seen old articles refer to liver pills and brewers yeast. What does this stuff do?
Talk about a blast from the past! Both are very dated products. Guys like Vince Gironda pushed for their use during the 60’s and 70’s. Desicated liver tabs managed to hang around into the 80’s. They both come from a time when supplements weren’t that great. Considering what we have now, don’t even bother yourself with them.
Sorry, I almost forgot to answer your question. Brewers yeast is supposed to be a nutrient packed “super food.” Kind of a mini MRP. Liver tabs are simply concentrated liver. Hence, they have all the nutrients and protein of liver in a small pill. As I said in my other post, they are both outdated in todays supplement market. Additionally, they both tend to cause gas and stomach problems. You would probably spend more time on the toilet than growing if you tried using them.
liver pills have some b vitamins as well as being a mediocre source of amino acids. Brewers yeast was purported to have several benefits…one thing it does have is a lot of highly absorbably zinc, which may explain why some people benefit from taking it.
liver tablets ARE still in use. i use bev intl tablets and have lost over 35 lbs of fat, with actual strength increases on all my lifts. i think liver tablets are the way to go, if they come from a reputable source.
Allow me to disagree on a couple of points. Brewer’s yeast is the only naturally occuring source of most of the B-vitamins and various minerals. It is a highly nutritious food, although certainly not as nutritionally dense as certain “engineered” foods; the protein quality is as almost as high as casein in milk. It is dirt cheap, low in calories and easily assimilated by the digestive tract. You can buy it for a couple of bucks a pound in most health food stores. Combined with other foods lacking in one or more of the essential amino acids, it can form a complete protein. It is nutritious enough that one could live exclusively on it and water for quite a while and not suffer malnutrition. This is not just my idle opinion, either. Tons of research done back in the early 20th C shows this to be the case.
If you try brewer’s yeast and have problems diegsting it, it means that you have compromised digestive function and a B-vitamin deficiency. A couple of B-vitmains are neccessary for the formation of hydrochloric acid in the stomach. Without adequate hydrochloric acid, proteins and other compounds cannot be dissolved to pass into the blood stream when food enters the small intestines. Now, B-vitamins must be digested in an acid medium to be used in the gut. They form insoluble compounds in an alkaline medium and pass throuhg unabsorbed. If you become B-vitamin deficient, these substances cannot be completely digested in the stomach, and so they pass through the gut unabsorbed. When they arrive in the bowel, the undigested nutrients make the intestinal flora go crazy. Two of the byproducts of their B-vitamin feast is methane and sulfur compounds, which’ll make you fart like mad.
Try this test. Take one tablespoon of brewer’s yeast in water and wait one hour. If your digestion is optimal, you won’t have any side effects. If it isn’t, you’ll blow up like a zeppelin. If this happens, it means that your digestion is generally not great for any proteins you eat and will need some help in the form of hydrochloric acid tablets and B-vitamins/ brewer’s yeast. If you’re a bodybuilder, protein digestion ought to be a priority. BTW, never take baker’s yeast used for bread-making. That stuff is alive and can live in your guts like a parasite. Brewer’s yeast has been cooked and is not bologically active.
As for liver-- liver is one of the most nutritious foods anybody could eat, if you like it that is. Liver contains several as-yet unidentified nutritional factors that make it especially good for people under stress. Dessicated liver contains these same subtances. However, liver may not be the best thing to eat these days, what with pesticides and hormones and antibiotics that are fed to cattle and end up lodged uncatabalyzed in the liver.
If you want more information about B-vitamins or brewer’s yeast, read any book by Adelle Davis. There hasn’t been a non-technical writer who has written about them since she published her books.
Unfortunately, liver has a protein efficiency ration that is about 60% that of a whole egg (meaning it’s a mediocre source of protein). It’s just vacuum dried liver. Nothing magical. I never said these were bogous products, just dated. There are better products available today.
i think they have an anti-catabolic or anabolic effect while dieting (liver tablets) try beverly’s for 1 month, you’ll see adifference in strength, and body comp.
liver tablets contain tiraticol,i read in a vince gironda article one time that he thought they increased blood volume.
Yeah, dessicated liver has been around for a while, and it’s still in use. That should tell you something. My personal guideline for most supplements is: wait a year from the first time you see an ad for it, then if it’s still around you might want to give it a shot. This weeds out a lot of the chaff from the wheat, so to speak. And liver’s been around forever. For some reason, DL tablets have gotten a bad rep here on the T-mag site, the main objection seemingly being that “You have to take a whole handful of them to equal the amount of protein you’d get from one chicken breast”. Well, so what? One chicken breast is a “whole handful” of chicken! And since when have bodybuilders, as a species, objected to taking a whole handful of anything? Personally, I take a handful along with me when I know I’m not going to have time to prepare a meal, or take along a few extra when I feel like the meal I’m going to be eating isn’t going to have enough protein in it to meet my requirements (i.e. practically any time I eat out). Personally, GNC’s Argentine DL tablets are my favorite. They’re cheap and easy. Give 'em a try before you decide that they’re yesterday’s news. (And BTW, anything that Vince Gironda advocated merits a certain amount of respectful consideration.)
Surprised to see a discussion on brewers yeast and liver tabs. What is next? Whole milk and fertile eggs? They were ok in their day, pre 1980. There is nothing wrong with using them, but there are better suplements available.