Lysine - Dietary Sources

Dietary Sources

The nutritional requirement per day, in milligrams of lysine per kilogram of body weight, is: infants (3–4 months) 103, children (2 years) 64, older children (10–12 years) 60 to 44, adults 12. For a 70 kg adult, 12 milligrams of lysine per kilogram of body weight is 0.84 grams of lysine. Note that recommendations were subsequently revised upwards, e.g. 30mg/kg for adults.

Good sources of lysine are high-protein foods such as eggs, meat (specifically red meat, lamb, pork, and poultry), soy, cheese (particularly Parmesan), and certain fish (such as cod and sardines).

Lysine is the limiting amino acid (the essential amino acid found in the smallest quantity in the particular foodstuff) in most cereal grains, but is plentiful in most pulses (legumes). Consequently, meals that combine cereal grains and legumes, such as the Indian dal with rice, Middle Eastern hummus, ful medames, falafel with pita bread, the Mexican beans with rice or tortilla have arisen to provide complete protein in diets that are, by choice or by necessity, vegetarian. A food is considered to have sufficient lysine if it has at least 51 mg of lysine per gram of protein (so that the protein is 5.1% lysine).

Foods containing significant amounts of lysine include:

• Catfish, channel, farmed, raw: 9.19% of the protein is lysine.
• Chicken, roasting, meat and skin, cooked, roasted: 8.11% of the protein is lysine.
• Beef, ground, 90% lean/10% fat, cooked: 8.31% of the protein is lysine.
• Soybean, mature seeds, raw: 7.42% of the protein is lysine.
• Soybean, mature seeds, sprouts: 5.74% of the protein is lysine (sprouting decreases the lysine content).
• Winged Bean (aka Goa Bean or Asparagus Pea), mature seeds, raw: 7.20% of the protein is lysine.
• Lentil, pink, raw: 6.97% of the protein is lysine.
• Lentil, sprouts, raw: 7.95% of the protein is lysine (sprouting increases the lysine content).
• Parmesan cheese, grated: 7.75% of the protein is lysine.
• Azuki bean (adzuki beans), mature seeds, raw: 7.53% of the protein is lysine.
• Milk, non-fat: 7.48% of the protein is lysine.
• Egg (food), whole, raw: 7.27% of the protein is lysine.
• Pea, split, mature seeds, raw: 7.22% of the protein is lysine.
• Kidney Bean, mature seeds, raw: 6.87% of the protein is lysine.
• Chickpea, (garbanzo beans, Bengal gram), mature seeds, raw: 6.69% of the protein is lysine.
• Navy Bean, mature seeds, raw: 5.73% of the protein is lysine.
• Amaranth, grain, uncooked: 5.17% of the protein is lysine.
• Quinoa: 5% of the protein is lysine.