Purines, Gout and Huel

New article

Purines, Gout and Huel

Any queries, please discuss them here.

6 Likes

No way …

I just had gout really badly in my right foot big toe, I can’t begin to tell you how annoyed I was to find out that it was generally men who get it.
I assume my doctor thought that was interesting titbit of information to share, it just pi**ed me off.

Great…

James, I see you mentioned vanilla was this original vanilla tested as that’s what I was using when I got the gout with a flavour booster mint choc did you test the flavour boosters as well

We have just tested one type of Huel, however, as the oats and flaxseed are the main contributors to the purines, other flavours will be similar. The Flavour Boosts are such a low inclusion, that even if they do contain purines (doubtful), the intake would be so low.

Consuming 1-2 servings of Huel per day, total purine intake is still reasonably low if you’re not consuming other high purine foods.

2 Likes

I am having 1.5 to 2 scoops for breakfast James, then for midday meal I tend to have two scoops.

For my evening meal I have a normal meal since starting huel I’ve switched over to vegetarian/vegan as it seems unnecessarily cruel to be eating one meal of an animal just because.
And if I’m totally honest with you I’ve got to say a lot of the vegan vegetarian stuff that we’ve had is really really nice in fact a lot nicer than what we were eating.

Anyway I got sidetracked so for example for the evening meal I would have boiled potatoes ,garden peas and carrots with for example a quorn lattice bake.

Or I will make a meal for example a chilli or a spag bol made with oomph which I have to say taste bloody lovely.

My two huel meals always contain mint choc flavour boost because mint choc is life lol

See if I take this source as an example.

It seems to me reading that that if anything huel should be reducing my risk of getting gout.
I mean I’ve completely cut out obviously red meats seafood all that kind of stuff.

I guess I’m just going to have to see if I get it again :frowning: I hope not it was really really painful I honestly thought I’d broken my toe lol

Interesting and surprising. Thank you for the article.

Hello James

I had been loving my HUEL 2 times a day at 3 scoops of Vanilla. Really worked well for me until i came down with Gout which i had never had ever before.
So painful had to go to Urgent care, the whole deal swollen toe and foot with massive pain.
Dr asked me about diet gave him the snapshot of HUEL contents. He said this is a very moderate Purine issue that may be causing the Gout and URIC ACID. Uric acid was way up, only one meal at dinner most of the time a chicken salad.
Dr put me on a couple things to get swelling calmed down and a cortisone shot and after a week and a half all is normal. But i had stopped all HUEL consumption which bothers me a bunch cause i love the product.
Now no issues with Gout and i am scared to try the Huel again. Have you heard of any other people experience this issue- Many thanks

@JamesCollier - I have a friend who gets some pretty bad gout attacks and seems to have various food triggers - I’d thought about recommending he try Huel but it seemed that the standard formulation could actually make it worse. Would you say that the Black Edition would be a fairly good option for him because of the removal of oats and introduction of Acerola Cherries? Id heard that cherries can really help keep uric acid levels under control.

1 Like

Wow just learnt a lot about gout ! Thanks

1 Like

Hi @Phil_C

If someone has gout, having one serving of Huel per day, shouldn’t be an issue. Black may be lower but we’re waiting on the results from our lab (due any day now), and I don’t want to commit until the results are in. RTD, however, has undetectable levels of purines so will be fine. You’ve also prompted me to get Bar v3.1 tested too.

I’ve not heard the cherry - uric acid connection before; have you any info on this?

Hi James there’s lots of various studies around over the past few years with various success rates however all seem to conclude that cherries can reduce the risk of recurrent gout attacks and reduce inflammation when one occurs by varying degrees - many seem to settle on a 30-35% reduction.

see here

This study is about cherries (prunus), like tart cherries, not acerola (malpighia). Totally different plants.

1 Like

I don’t know if this applies to acerola as they’re different. Don’t cherry-pick studies :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

3 Likes

Botany is not my strong point :slight_smile: still interested to know about the purine content in black as its more feasible to ship larger quantities of powder than RTD to here.

Had a quick squizz around the net and it seems that acerola cherries have the same anti inflammatory properties as tart cherries but there has been less research done on this species to verify the efficacy with joint and gout sufferers.

1 Like

I’ve had issues with Gout over the last few years but can’t say I’ve ever had a flare up while I’ve been Hueling.

I did have somebody on this forum warn me that the product wasn’t great for gout sufferers some time ago, but given that I was about 3 months into a 100% Huel stage of my life and hadn’t had any problems, I took it with a pinch of salt.

Having spoken to fellow gout sufferers in the past, certain common triggers don’t seem to trigger everybody. For example, doctors recommend to steer clear of seafood if you struggle with gout. That’s never caused me any issues. In fact, it’s when I eat too much red meat or just generally pile on the pounds that I have problems, but none of the other triggers seem to affect me and I’m sure I’m not entirely unique in this.

1 Like

Hi Dan - good to hear your feedback - my friend has similar issues to you, red meat causes a very rapid reaction and he even has had some less immediate reactions to some veggies - spinach, green peas and mushrooms. Chicken is OK - fish isn’t.

1 Like

Hi James,
Did you get the results for the Purine levels and the Black Huel? I switched from white to black about a year ago. I have just had a Gout Flare-up and want to evaluate what has changed in my life. I love using Huel products but would switch to whichever had the lowest impact on my Purines. I only have 1 meal a day with the Black Huel.

What has reduced my flare-ups for 4 years (only 2)
Cherries fresh and frozen per day
3 litres of water (every flare-up seems to be falling out of this habit)
Celery
ACV
No Alcohol

Thanks,

Andy

Hey Andy, James is away for a couple of days so I hope you don’t mind me stepping in. The Huel powders are low in purines and we have an article that covers this in more detail here.

You shouldn’t have any problem with one Huel meal a day but you could monitor this with the help of your GP/dietitian to narrow down the causes of your flare-ups.

Does anyone know the relative purine content of BE and v3.0?

Assuming BE is much lower but would really like the numbers, if available.

Thanks. and apologies if this question’s been asked elsewhere, I’ve checked all the gout threads but can’t find it anywhere.

1 Like