What is Gelatin?
Gelatin is a translucent, powdery substance, resembling the texture and appearance of white sand, and is full of amino acids.
As our bodies age, we sometimes experience higher levels of inflammation, sickness, compromised digestion, aches and pains.
While our bodies can make some of the amino acids on their own, the average person tends to have less gelatin as they age, resulting in depleted essential amino acid levels that the human body requires to function optimally.
Gelatin’s amino acid profile
- 4% Lysine
- 6% Aspartic acid
- 8% Arginine
- 9% Alanine
- 10% Glutamic acid
- 12% Hydroxyproline
- 12% Proline
- 21% Glycine
One of the most valuable amino acids found in gelatin is glycine, which helps to lower inflammation, improve mental alertness, joints and digestive health as well as helping to prevent and heal leaky gut.Â
In addition to this, gelatin has a number of other key benefits:
11 health benefits of gelatin
1. Skin health
Consuming more gelatin in our diets is a smart natural skin care approach. The reason for this is that gelatin has skin healing properties due to its rich source of collagen. Collagen is considered one of the building blocks for skin, it helps with skin elasticity, reduces skin roughness, aging, wrinkles, stretch marks and helps protect you from free radical damage.
2. Teeth, nails and hair
Gelatin provides abundant amounts of calcium, magnesium and phosphorous which helps to build and maintain strong teeth, nails and hair.
3. Cellulite and stretch marks
Cellulite is caused by a breakdown or loss of collagen. Gelatin also helps prevent stretch marks by improving the skins strength, elasticity, tone and firmness.
4. Hormone balance
The glycine in gelatin helps the body to make glutathione which is crucial for helping to remove excess estrogen from the body.
5. Adrenals
Under stressful situations the body requires more minerals, nutrients and amino acids which can be provided to the body from gelatin. Gelatin has been found to help rejuvenate organs such as the adrenals as it helps the body to deal with stress easier.
6. Mood booster
Many people take amino acid supplements to naturally boost mental focus and clarity, ‘happy’ hormones and reduce nor-epinephrine (stress hormones). However, what they don’t know is that gelatin can aid in all of this as it contains many amino acids, one being glycine which acts similarly to an anti-anxiety and an anti-depressant, but without the negative side effects.
7. Boosts metabolism
Glycine also helps to boost metabolism and also helps to regulate insulin sensitivity keeping people from storing abdominal fat.
8. Digestion
Gelatin is incredibly easy to digest. Some of the amino acids founds in gelatin helps to increase hydrochloric acid in the stomach which is essential for digestion and nutrient assimilation.
9. Keeps you satiated
Taking gelatin increases satiety hormones and helps to control and lower hunger hormones.
10. Improves sleep
Gelatin has been found to not only aid sleep, but also improves sleep quality and reduces day time sleepiness.
11. Aids liver detoxification
Often in today’s toxic world the body can’t make enough glycine needed to keep up with the body’s detoxification needs. Taking gelatin provides additional glycine which supports the neutralisation of toxins in the liver and aids the body to naturally detox from heavy metals along with toxins and chemicals from our diet and environment.
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How to add more gelatin to your diet
The best way to consume gelatin is to honour the whole animal and eat from ‘Head to Toe’, meaning you use the bones and connective tissues from healthy animals to make foods like stock or bone broth.
You can then use this stock or bone broth as the base of curries, soups, stews and to cook vegetables in. While eating bone broth is one of the best ways to get gelatin, collagen, nutrients, minerals and other important nutritional components, we do understand that this isn’t always easy or possible for some people.
Another alternative is to add gelatin powder to your diet, which can allow you to make it an easy and simple addition to many foods like smoothies, coffee, hot chocolates, gravies, panna cottas, cheesecakes, jelly and much more.
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How much gelatin do I need?
Most people can start off with ½ – 1 Tbsp of gelatin (or 1 cup of bone broth) per day without any side effects and are able to slowly increase the amount every week or so as you body becomes used to the volume. As everyone is unique and has different requirements, the key here is to listen to your body and its needs.
It’s important not to get too carried away with consuming gelatin, especially if you are new to it. Taking too much gelatin too quickly can lead to some digestive distress, so start slowly and listen to your body’s signs and symptoms.
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Here are 10 of our favourite recipes that use gelatin:
- Mango, Macadamia and Cultured Coconut Custard
- Choc, Cinnamon, Coconut Gummies
- Dairy Free Chocolate Panna Cotta
- Raspberry and Mango Jelly Squares
- Apple and Passion Fruit Jelly
- Summer Chia Pudding
- Anti-Inflammatory Turmeric and Mango Panna Cotta
- Supercharged Bulletproof Coffee
- Lemon and Ginger Jelly
- Gelatin Hair Mask
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Changing Habits Gelatin
Gelatin is a product that Cyndi uses regularly because of its wonderful healing properties and natural source of amino acids which aids skin and bone health, hair and nail growth, recovery after exercise, immune function, digestion aid and weight regulation.
Unable to source certified organic gelatin within Australia, our organic gelatin is supplied by a 5th generation family owned business in Europe, recognised for their high quality standards.
So add some gelatin into your diet so you too can reap the health benefits.
Happy changing habits.
Jordan Pie
Changing Habits Nutritionist
Can I buy this in UK, really miss being able to buy your products. Very limited health products here mostly in the hands of one large chain ?
Hi Vanessa, We ship to the UK so you can order directly from the website to get the gelatin. We don’t have any stores stocking it in the UK at the moment.
Great information and very informative. I am getting a lot out of these articles.It has changed my way of cooking.
Can I please have all 10 links for the gelatin recipes they sound awesome.
Hi Linda, thank you for your feedback and glad you’re gaining so much from the blog! It looks like the links were broken, but I’ve fixed them up now—enjoy!
If your gelatin is sourced from Europe and is animal based, is it guaranteed to be free from the bovine diseases eg: Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) or Mad Cow disease or Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease?
Hi Anne, our gelatin is actually porcine so no worry there 🙂
Which is better, gelatine made from bones or seaweed?
Just letting you know the link to supercharged coffee doesn’t work. It just re-opens the Gelatin page! 🙂
Thanks Gabrielle, that link is now working correctly!
cannot open any of the recipes?
Just bought your gelatin from health food store – was excited to get started 🙂
Also the Raspberry and mango Jelly Squares recipe doesn’t work ? is that the one in the picture above ?
Hi Robyn, here is the link to the recipe you’re after. Enjoy: https://changinghabits.com.au/recipes/raspberry-and-mango-jelly-squares/
Hello, I’ve been reading about collagen hydrolysate and that hydrolysing makes the collagen of the gelatin available in hot or cold uses. Here is some of what I read:
“As a food, hydrolyzed collagen is very similar to gelatin, but there are critical differences.
This is because the manufacturing of hydrolyzed collagen is more intensive than the processing of gelatin. Hydrolyzed collagen manufacturing breaks up the amino acid chains (protein) into smaller units than the processing of gelatin.
Thus, while the amino acid profiles and health benefits between hydrolyzed collagen and gelatin are similar, the chemical properties such as the ability to set liquid, are quite different. In addition, the digestibility of hydrolyzed collagen appears to be superior for some people due to the less complex structure.”
I couldn’t find collagen hydrolysate amongst your products. I was looking at smoothie recipes that included it, and obviously, gelatin would not be dissolved in cold smoothies.
What are your thoughts on what may or may not be true around this subject. Many thanks.
Hi Vanessa. Can you use Gelatin when you are in P2 of the HCG protocol if you incorporate the extra calories in the 500 calorie limit? I assume the calories would be minimal and no fat?
Hi Jaimee,
Gelatin is a free food in Phase 2 of the 4 Phase Fat Loss protocol and can be used to make delicious recipes like this: https://4phasefatloss.com/apple-ginger-cider-jelly/ Please refer to the 4 Phase online program for more details 🙂
Hi. I was taking a tblspn of Gelatin in the morning and also one at night. This was just added to water and the consumed. Can you do this with your Gelatin? Or do I need to consume this differently? Can you advise? Thank you
I was previously using a brand called Great Lakes
Thank you.
Hi Cheryl. The recommended serving size is 1 tbsp per day so you could split that between your morning and evening doses if you wanted to. You can consume our gelatin simply by mixing with water. I hope this helps 🙂