Skinny Minnies Meal Time

Overview

Here’s what Skinny Minnie has to say about them:

MEAL TIME is a premium meal replacement formula designed to enhance your weight-loss regime. It is high in protein, low in carbohydrates and fat and is enhanced by the inclusion of metabolism boosting compounds.

·         Balanced Ratio of Protein, Carbohydrates and Essential Nutrients

·         Convenient Alternative to a Full Meal

·         Long-lasting Energy

Nutritional Information

Calories – 107 Kcals

Protein – 25.2g

Fat – 2g

Carbs – 3.4g

Of which sugars – 3.4g

Fibre  - 356mg

Green Tea - 360mg

L-Carnitine 540mg

These do vary ever so slightly from flavour to flavour but this is a good representation of the Nutritional Profile of Meal Time.  

Low calories, solid protein levels combined with low fat and low Carbs (although 3.4g of Sugar is more than I usually like to see). The fat burning ingredients are both reliable and generously dosed. It’s a simple but effective looking breakdown.

Taste

Meal Time comes in a variety of flavours and we’ve sampled them all! The available flavours are:

Raspberry, Vanilla, Coconut, Choc-o-nut, Choc cookie, Choc mint, Strawberry, Cappuccino, Banana, Black cherry, Mocha, Toffee, Peanut Toffee, Choc Orange.

They were all pretty good but for me the stand out products were Choc Cookie, Banana, Black Cherry and Vanilla. I found the Cappuccino and Peanut Toffee little bit sweet but none of them were unpleasant by any means. They all mixed up very well in a standard shaker and never had any lumps.

Side Effects

None

Price

You buy individual sachets at £1.20 each.

Results

Meal Time is designed for women who want to lose a little bit of weight by replacing a meal (usually breakfast or lunch) with this shake. You obviously need to combine this with healthy diet and a decent exercise plan but these shakes are very good at what they were designed to do. They have all the hallmarks of a good diet product, they taste good, they keep you full and satisfied for absolutely hours and they work.

Skinny Minnies take a slightly unorthodox approach to their product in that you don’t buy a tub of one flavour but rather you select individual flavour sachets which has the advantage of variety but the disadvantage of making it a rather pricey option. That is the only downside to Skinny Minnie but if you invest you will see results. Oh and try the Black Cherry it’s awesome! 8/10

Youcan buy Meal Time here

Efectiv Nutrition AIM

 

Overview

Here is what Efectiv Nutrition have to say:

AIM is an innovative, great tasting instantised Branch Chain Amino Acid formula for maximum delivery and absorption. Stacked with added Glutamine, Citrulline and Taurine to complete the perfect amino complex.

USE PRE, DURING OR FOLLOWING EXERCISE

For best results AIM can be used as a refreshing drink pre, during or post exercise, anytime day or night! Stack with EFECTIV Whey to create the perfect training combination. Get Ready to Take AIM!

Nutritional Information

Amount Per Serving:

Total Calories: 53
Protein: 12g
Sugars: 0
Glutamine: 5.0g
Leucine: 2.5g
Isoleucine: 1.25g
Valine: 1.25g
Taurine: 1.0g
Citrulline: 1g

So asides from the 3 BCAAs  that are always included in “Amino” products you also get Glutamine (used for recovery and improved protein synthesis), Taurine (used for increased athletic and mental performance) and Citrulline (used to boost NO production and fights fatigue).

The Glutamine is effectively dosed as are the other ingredients.

Taste

I used the Cherry Punch flavour and it was very refreshing, some BCAA products can taste a little chemically but this one is spot on. I primarily used it as an Intra product and I am happy to say that it doesn’t bloat or cause any discomfort at all.

Side Effects

None

Price

£39.99 for a 420g tub with 30 servings in.

Results

Whilst Efectiv Nutrition say that you can use AIM at any time of day personally I would recommend that it is used as an Intra-Workout. AIM tastes absolutely amazing, it’s so refreshing that you could serve it with ice to someone and they’d never know it was a supplement. The nutritional profile is spot on and given enough time AIM will assist you with; recovery, growth, maintenance, energy, muscle contractions. I could go on. You can see that the benefits of a product like AIM are too many to ignore.

The price is slightly high for a BCAA product but that really is the only down side to AIM. I imagine that you’ll be able to find a special offer.

I highly recommend AIM to anyone who is serious about training. 9/10

You can buy AIM here

Scitec ChocoPro

 

Overview

Here’s what Scitec have to say:

CHOCOPRO is loaded with 18 grams of a protein blend that consists of high-quality whey protein, casein and complete milk protein. CHOCOPRO’s protein content contributes to the growth and maintenance of muscle mass and also to the maintenance of normal bones. You can enjoy this more nutritious "candy bar" any time during the day to provide nutritional support for your body!

Nutritional Information

Amount	per bar		Amount	per bar
Energy	888 kJ		Carbohydrate	22 g
	212 kcal		Fat	5.8 g
Protein	18 g		Dietary Fiber	1.65 g

18g of protein for a protein bar this size isn’t too bad, the fat content is a tad high but not too dreadful and the Carbs are more or less where you’d expect them to be. The is nothing else to ChocoPro no extras added in.

Taste

I had the Double Chocolate flavour and whilst they tasted very good I found by the last few bites I was struggling a little. It becomes a little bit sickly.

There is no powdery aftertaste or texture, its actually very soft but because of the chocolate round the outside it’s got a bit of bite to it.

Side Effects

None

Price

Single                    £1.89

Box of 20             £32.88

Results

Protein bars are awesome, everyone knows that! They are an excellent way of get extra protein into your diet and as a bonus replacing the unhealthy snack you would have had instead. Double benefit!

The protein content is great for a mid-afternoon boost and since the nutritional breakdown is pretty good you can easily fit this into your macros whenever needed.

I think at £32 for a box of 20 its slightly more expensive than it should be but you could easily shop around for a deal or an offer. You could even stock up because they do taste very nice and it comes in 6 different flavours for you to try.

All things considered it is a very tasty, convenient but pricey method of hitting your daily MACROS. 7/10

You can buy ChocoPro here

Lenny and Larrys

 

Overview

Here’s what Lenny and Larry have to say:

Lenny & Larry’s was founded by two friends with a passion for fitness, having fun and the first to truly bake with protein. Combining a fitness background with an interest in nutritional baked goods and promotional fun, we decided to create and market high protein muffins, cookies and other all natural baked goods.

After months of planning we came up with some great tasting, healthy products and ‘our guaranteed to make you smile logo.’ Guess what? Everyone loved it and away we went! We believe your snack should taste better than the package it comes in.

As executives with a hands on philosophy, the principals of Lenny & Larry’s take an active role in the research and development as well as the sales of their successful product lines. Being family men and sports enthusiasts, they have set a company objective of creating and producing healthy baked goods for both young and old.

Lenny & Larry’s mission is to continue to create and distribute healthy baked goods as well as to encourage physical fitness and a healthy diet. We appreciate everyone’s loyal support. Let’s get healthy together!

Nutritional Information

The Nutritional Information varies very slightly per flavour:

Complete Cookies

Serving Size 56.5g (half cookie)
Servings Per Cookie 2

Amount per Serving

Calories 190

Total Fat 6g

Saturated Fat 1.5g

Trans Fat 0g

Cholesterol 0mg

Sodium 220mg

Total Carbohydrate 27g

Dietary Fiber 3g

Sugars 15g

Protein 8g

So you are only supposed to eat half a cookie at a time, good luck with that! These are actually higher calories than some supermarket offerings but the crucial bit of information is that everything here is all natural ingredients and the majority of those calories are “good” calories. You do only get 8g of protein per serving but taken along with a protein shake it makes a great post workout meal…

Muscle Brownie

Serving Size 40g (Half a brownie)
Servings Per Bar 2

Amount per Serving

Calories 170

Total Fat 5g

Saturated Fat 1g

Trans Fat 0g

Cholesterol 15mg

Sodium 160mg

Total Carbohydrate 20g

Dietary Fiber 1g

Sugars 12g

Protein 10g

Slightly more protein on offer with the Muscle Brownie, although the recommended serving is only half a brownie I have to confess that I always ate the full Brownie. Don’t judge me I built the calories into my daily MACROS. A full brownie will take a rather large 340 calories out of your allowance but provide you with 20g of protein and 40g of carbs (2:1 carbs to protein, sounds like a post workout to me….). Same as with the cookie everything is all natural and the fat levels are low for any treat so the calories are not so much of an issue.

FIT Brownie

Serving Size 50g (one brownie)
Servings Per Bar 1

Amount per Serving

Calories 190

Total Fat 7g

Saturated Fat 4g

Trans Fat 0g

Cholesterol 15mg

Sodium 140mg

Total Carbohydrate 22g

Dietary Fiber 7g

Sugar 9g

Protein 13g

Finally you can eat the whole thing! The lowest calorie/highest protein per serving offering from Lenny and Larry, still keeping the 2:1(ish) carb to protein ratio making it a solid option for a post workout meal.  The fat is the highest here out of the 3 but its still kept fairly low and most importantly 0g of Trans-Fat and all natural ingredients.

Taste

We tried 10 different products so we’ll split them out:

Complete Cookie:

Double Chocolate – Delicious but very sweet, the cookies are huge so eating only half is recommended. This one is perfect for satisfying your sweet tooth.

Chocolate Macadamia – Very light, with a generous helping with white chocolate and macadamia nuts, it’s not too sweet but it’ll certainly take away your cravings.

Chocolate Chip – No surprises about what’s in here, you get a decent amount of chocolate chips and the cookie itself is a mouthful, probably the least sweet of all the cookies. Very nice with a coffee…

Peanut Butter – This is tastes amazing but it gets very sickly, it’s very sweet and tastes, unsurprisingly, like peanut butter. The cookie doesn’t have any of the texture or stickiness of peanut butter but actually quite soft, very ncie.

Oatmeal Raisin – This cookie is perfect, its just the right amount of sweetness and the texture is great, the flavour is spot on and even half a cookie will keep you full for a few hours.

FIT Brownie

Chocolate Raspberry – The FIT brownies are quite flat and a little bit harder and chewier  than most over the counter brownies but that the actual flavour is very nice, there’s the satisfying chocolateyness (that’s a word, honest!) and then you get a little bit of real raspberry which works wonderfully with it. There is a drizzle of icing on top but to be honest you bearing notice it, you could knock it off and save yourself some sugar calories.

Chocolate Decadence – Do you like Chocolate? Good because that’s all your getting. It’s just a really sweet chocolate brownie, not sickly but close to it. If you not a chocoholic then you might want to give this one a miss.

Muscle Brownie

Triple Chocolate – Chocolate brownie, chocolate chips and chocolate icing damn this one is rich. Again if you’re not suffering from an addiction to chocolate this one probably won’t be for you but you would be missing out as it is incredible. The Muscle Brownies all have quite a bite to them, almost like if you put a shop brownie in the fridge, so they are a bit more like a protein bar in texture than a traditional brownie.

Cookies & Cream – This is easily one of the best, it is as filling as a meal and as sweet as a dessert but in the best possible way. Again its quite solid but the flavour can’t be beaten. The actual cookies and cream flavour is perfect.

Peanut Butter – I can see this being a favourite of most people, it’s fairly sweet but not sickly, the peanut butter icing is perfect and the flavour never overpowers but complements the brownie very nicely.

   

Side Effects

Does immediately wanting a second one count as a side effect?

Price

Complete Cookies:

Single                    £2.49

Box of 12             £22.99

FIT Brownie

Single                    £2.29

Box of 12             £22.99

Muscle Brownies

Single                    £2.49

Box of 12             £22.99

Results

Eat Brownies Get Muscles that’s the tag line Lenny and Larry have, damn that’s a promising prospect. Lenny and Larry have made some amazing protein treats that’s never going to be disputed. The only issue anyone could ever have is the protein is a little low but I actually found to be spot on as I used this in conjunction with a protein shake and that made the perfect post workout meal. In fact all of the products make a very good post workout snack.

These aren’t made to be consumed everyday (unfortunately) you are supposed to use them as a snack and a way of “cheating” healthily. You can use these on your cheat days if you are watching your diet or cutting but if you are bulking then I recommend these as a mid-morning snack or part of your postworkout.

I think that these deserve a place in the cupboard of everyone who has been stuck on that strict diet plan and dreaming of cookies or brownies, these can easily be programmed into any diet plan.

If I had to rank them I would go:

Complete Cookie Oatmeal Raisin

Muscle Brownie Cookies and Cream

FIT Brownie Chocolate Raspberry

Muscle Brownie Peanut Butter

Complete Cookie Peanut Butter

Complete Cookie Chocolate Macadamia

Complete Cookie Chocolate Chip

Muscle Brownie Triple Chocolate

FIT Brownie Chocolate Decadence

Complete Cookie Double Chocolate

You have to treat yourselves to some of these. They can’t be praised enough. 9.5/10

You can buy them all here

Trade enquires here

Scitec Steel Rocket

 

Overview

Here’s what Scitec have to say:

STEEL ROCKET is our food supplement solution to contribute to the optimization of many of your body systems so that there are “green lights to launch the rocket”! The 9 component, Tribulus and D-Aspartic Acid (DAA) based sophisticated complex provides many of the popular active ingredients in this category. We included our „TRIBU-X” Tribulus Terrestris and L-Arginine, which is the precursor of nitric oxide (NO). We provide both the Acetyl L-Carnitine and L-Carnitine L-Tartrate versions of L-Carnitine. Zinc contributes to the maintenance of normal testosterone levels, to normal fertility and reproduction, and to normal protein synthesis. Pantothenic Acid contributes to normal synthesis and metabolism of steroid hormones, Vitamin D and some neurotransmitters; and also to the reduction of tiredness and fatigue and to normal mental performance. The 100% recommended daily amount Vitamin D contributes to the normal function of the immune system and muscles, and also to the maintenance of normal bones, teeth, and to the normal absorption/utilisation of Calcium and Phosphorus.

Nutritional Information

Amount per serving			Amount per serving
Vitamin D	5 mcg		Tribulus terrestris extract	500 mg
Zinc	1,5 mg		(standardized for 200 mg saponins minimum)
Pantothenic Acid (Vitamin B5)	0,9 mg		L-Carnitine L-Tartrate	500 mg
L-Arginine HCl	1500 mg		Acetyl L-Carnitine HCl	200 mg
D-Aspartic Acid (DAA)	1000 mg		French maritime pine bark	50 mg
			(Pinus pinaster) extract

DAA is a powerful T-Booster and you get a fair amount of it in Steel Rocket coupled with Tribulus Terrestris you really have all you need. The other ingredients like Zinc, Vit D, Arginine etc all serve to amplify the already strong stack you have.

Taste

None, you take 4 capsules at a time they are all odourless but a little bit big so make sure to take a big gulp of water.

Side Effects

Slight headache on the first couple of days. Nothing too bad.

Price

£25.12 for a tub with 30 days worth in.

Results

Strength is a key factor of a T-Booster, you won’t see a great deal of size from this but expect you strength to shoot up along with leaning out around the midsection.

You do feel a bit more cocky and that “I can do this” feeling is always present in the gym, I never felt aggressive just determined to lift more and more.  My pumps were improved as well, lasted for longer too.

Virtually no side effects is always the sign of a good product and I think it is reasonably priced for a testosterone support product. It easy enough to remember to take the capsules and they aren’t too bad to swallow. I certainly enjoyed the result I got and I would happily recommend this to anyone. 8/10

You can buy Steel Rocket here

Scitec MyoMax Hardcore

Overview

Here's what Scitec have to say:

MyoMax Hardcore is our latest formula designed to provide you with all the ingredients we deemed worthy. MyoMax is a hardcore anabolic muscle mass and high-intensity physical performance enhancer. “Anabolic” is the physiological term for metabolic processes in the body that build up something. First of all, protein and its constituent amino acids are essential nutrients. MyoMax Hardcore contains a whopping 52 grams of those altogether (42 g protein + 10 grams added extra free amino acids)! 

The protein is not from a single protein type, but from a multi-source blend, because the amino acid profiles of the different types are not the same. Dietary proteins are the source of nitrogen and indispensable amino acids, which the body requires for tissue growth and maintenance, therefore MyoMax Hardcore contributes to the growth and maintenance of muscle mass, and also to the maintenance of normal bones. 

MyoMax Hardcore is not full of sugar and it’s devoid of unnecessarily high amounts of carbohydrates altogether! MyoMax Hardcore will not overload you with carbs, the ratio of carbs to protein and other non-caloric ingredients in our opinion is great! Also, we made the formula with a special carbohydrate blend that includes the branded Waxy maize and Palatinose carbohydrate sources (the first has a high glycemic index, the latter has a low one). That’s not all! MyoMax Hardcore has a number of additional scientifically proven active ingredients! MyoMax provides 5.5 grams of the most studied Creatine, Creatine Monohydrate (and other Creatines in our proprietary matrix). At least a 3 g daily dose of Creatine is scientifically proven to increase performance in successive bursts of short-term, high intensity exercise like weight training and interval cardio. 

Nutritional Information

Amount per serving			Amount per serving
Calories	447 kcal		"MyoMax Hardcore" Proprietary Matrix	20077 mg
Calories from Fat	27 kcal		Amino Select Matrix (10000 mg)
Total Fat	3 g		L-Leucine, L-Glutamine, Taurine, L-Threonine, L-Arginine, L-Alanine, L-Valine, L-Phenylalanine, L-Tyrosine, L-Isoleucine
Saturated Fat	1.3 g		Multi-Component Creatine Matrix (5500 mg)
Cholesterol	50 mg		Creatine Monohydrate, MicronTec Micronized Creatine Monohydrate, Creatine Citrate, Creatine Phosphate, Kre-Alkalyn® pH-buffered Creatine Monohydrate, Creatine Pyruvate
Total Carbohydrate	63 g		Proprietary "BETA" Matrix (4210 mg)
Sugars	5 g		Beta-Alanine, HMB-Ca, Avena sativa extract, Coleus forskohlii extract (10% Forskolin), Calcium Pyruvate, Alpha-Ketoglutarate Calcium (AKG)
Dietary Fiber	2.5 g		Proprietary Support Matrix (367 mg)
Protein	42 g		Bitter Melon extract, L-Carnitine L-Tartrate, Magnesium Oxide, Bromelain, Papain, Alpha Lipoic Acid, BioPerine®, Zinc Sulfate Monohydrate, Nicotinamide, Folic Acid, Chromium Picolinate
Sodium	409 mg
Potassium	445 mg
Vitamin B3 (Niacinamide)	2.5 mg
Magnesium	57 mcg
Folic Acid	30 mcg
Chromium	12 mcg
Zinc	1.5 mg

Clearly aiming to be a mass gainer for the more calorie conscious MyoMax provides 42g of protein but only 63g of Carbs. The majority of these carbs aren’t super quick absorbing sugars so it’s not ideal for postworkout but great for any other time of day.

You get a excellent support matrix of creatine, Glutamine and one of my favourite supplements HMB. You get good looking doses of all the extras and it looks like Scitec have covered all the bases and not missed anything important.

Taste

I had the Max Chocolate flavour and I found it very sweet and a little sickly. It wasn’t that it wasn’t nice but there was a lot to drink (about 600mls after mixing) and towards the bottom it became a little bit too sweet for me. It did mix well in a standard shaker which some gainers struggle with.

Side Effects

None

Price

£31.19 for 1.4kg tub with 10 servings in.

Results

MyoMax is for people looking to gain size without losing control of their calories. It contains everything you need to kickstart growth and strength gains, although its not designed as a post workout shake it absolutely helped with recovery. There is nothing important missed out from the nutritional profile at all, this is a complete gainer.

Due to the lower calorie count and lower level of carbs to other gainers I would place this with the “lean bulk” category, its ideal for people looking to add size quickly whilst keeping their body fat under control.

It quite pricey but unfortunately all gainers are, keep your fingers crossed for a special offer.

This is a solid choice for someone who is looking to bulk but a bit hesitant to go for a super high calorie shake. 7/10

You can buy MyoMax here