Looking to use Huel as a path to weight loss based on sound nutrition. I do the math and find 1550 calories a day is what I’m after … less than the 2000 daily that has Huel delivering all my daily vitamin/mineral needs.
I have taken a multi-vitamin, a single potassium (99mg) and recently a single magnesium (new doc suggestion). Do I continue this with Huel to cover any gap because of the lowered calorie intake?
Hi @ClemsonDad!
I’m certainly no expert. I’ll let the others with more knowledge weigh in.
Personally, I’m also using it for weight loss. I’m consuming less than the 2000 calories daily also. I’ve been taking a multi vitamin and 2 other supplements.
Good luck 
The short answer is: unless you have a specific condition that reduces your absorption of nutrients in your gut, you will be completely fine on vitamins by only consuming 3/4 of the 2000 calorie Huel dosage that contains 100% or more the RDA of vitamins. No need to take an extra multivitamin. And here is why:
In pharmacy school we learned about the RDA = Recommended Daily Allowance. It’s not an exact science and it’s really a fudged number. In essence, the Food and Drug Administration looked at studies and scientific research on the minimum amount of vitamins that a person would need to prevent the various vitamin-deficient diseases (Rickets, Scurvy, Beriberi, Pernicious Anemia, etc). You know, diseases that you’ve never heard of, or are in old literature or part of a joke. (I’ve been practicing pharmacy for 18 years in a large hospital and have never seen anyone with Scurvy. Yarrrrg.)
So they take the minimal amount needed and then multiply by, like, 4 or 5, just to “be safe”. At least on the water soluble vitamins. They may not jack up the fat soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K) as much. But the bottom line is that the RDA is overkill for 99% of the general population and most of us pee out the excess water soluble vitamins anyway. Only people with impaired absorption would actually need the full RDA, and that’s probably part of why they factored in this safety net. And even then, you can go a day or two without any vitamins and you body’s stores will not deplete.
(As a side note, there may be some good reasons to vitamin supplement people who take Proton Pump Inhibitors since those drugs can decrease Vit B12 and Magnesium absorption. The degree of mal-absorption is not exactly known and most patients on these PPIs still get enough in their diet anyway.)
99 mg of potassium chloride is almost nothing. For comparison sake, the lowest dose of prescription Potassium Chloride tablets available on the market is 10 miliEquivalents, which calculates out to 750 miligrams of potassium chloride. Patients on diuretics are often prescribed potassium supplements and will be on doses of like 20 to 40 miliEquivalents per day total, which is 1500 - 3000 mg of potassium chloride. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with taking an over the counter potassium 99 mg ( 1.2 miliEquivalents) supplement if you want, so long as it’s not expensive. But in reality, a sip of orange juice or licking a banana 3 times will give you about the same amount of potassium.
Hmmm… I take that back. Looks like 1 out of 20 Americans have “Scurvy”.
Still, consuming 1500 calories of Huel daily will give you about 250% of the RDA for Vitamin C (2000 Huel calories has 330% RDA of Vit C), and as I said above the RDA is likely overkill.
Huel is stamping out Scurvy. Yarrrg. Tis a fine day to drink some Huel, me matees.
@Deron
Shiver me timbers! 
️
Thanks, for the info! You’re always super helpful!
Unfortunately, at the moment I take a very small dose of a statin so I take Co-Q10 because I was told the statin depletes it.
I have a small issue with a fatty liver 
, so I take Krill oil to help me get added Omegas…A Dr over the past few years told me to do this. Apparently I just follow instructions blindly. 
When I got my hysterectomy /oopherectomy, the head Dr at the hospital told me to take an over 50 senior multivitamin from then on (even though I wasn’t over 50). I have no idea why now. I was hopped up on morphine at the time of the conversation. 
My eye doctor also told me to include Lutein. My old lady multivitamin has that in it too. 
I’ve just always assumed, as you said, that I’d pee out anything my body didn’t absorb. I try to buy quality vitamins and I’d save alot of moolah if I didn’t have to buy all these dang pills! Yarrrg 
We are getting on a tangent in this thread, but I will add something here. A few vitamins can actually accumulate in large doses over time. These fat soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K) can do this. And this can sometimes lead to liver problems. However, this is a rare occurrence and people have to intentionally do something to get to this level of accumulation.
You’ll notice that in many multivitamins, they manufacturer has no problem giving 300% of any of the B vitamins or Vitamin C. But if you look close, you’ll see that they really temper their dosing of the A, D, E, or K vitamins. In fact, many won’t include vitamin K since there are so many people of Warfarin.
In recent years, there is debate over recommended doses of Vitamin D, one of the fat solubles. It has been suggested that higher doses than the RDA may be healthy. Many patients are now being put on doses in the 1000 to 5000 units per day range, while 400 units remains the official RDA. (It’s also complicated by the fact that there are a few forms of Vitamin D available for vitamins.) This may be due to the fact that many people don’t spend as much time outside these days. Remember that our body can make some Vitamin D from sunshine exposure.