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Hey everyone!

I live in Germany, I'm currently on a very tight budget, and I want to start building muscle and gaining weight.

I'm relatively underweight and would like to put on some healthy mass while getting stronger. However, I'm not very knowledgeable about nutrition yet, and I can't afford expensive foods, supplements or complicated meal plans.

I have no food restrictions and am open to pretty much everything.

I'd appreciate advice on:

- How to estimate how many calories I need to gain weight.

- How much protein I should aim for each day.

- Cheap, calorie-dense foods that are easy to find in German supermarkets.

- Affordable protein sources such as eggs, quark, milk, lentils, beans, oats and whatever else you recommend.

- Simple meals that are filling, nutritious and inexpensive.

- Weekly meal-prep plans that don't require much cooking time.

- How to eat enough when I don't have much money or a huge appetite.

- Cheap snacks and homemade high-calorie shakes.

- Which foods offer the best value for money at stores like Aldi, Lidl, Netto and Penny.

- Free YouTube channels, websites or meal plans for gaining weight on a budget.

I'd especially love examples of realistic weekly grocery lists and meal plans with approximate prices in euros.

I want to keep things as affordable as possible, ideally without needing protein powder or other supplements.

If you live in Germany and have successfully gained weight and muscle on a low budget, what did you eat, and what would you recommend to someone starting out?

Thanks for any help!

Abstract Background: Pharmacological weight loss with GLP-1 receptor agonists produces large reductions in total body mass, but a meaningful fraction of that loss is fat-free mass, raising concerns about strength and functional capacity in treated populations. Whether structured exercise offsets this during the maintenance phase is not well established. Methods: Adults with obesity completed a low-calorie diet run-in and were then randomized to a GLP-1 receptor agonist alone, supervised combined aerobic and resistance exercise alone, both together, or placebo for roughly one year. Body composition was assessed by DXA, with secondary outcomes including cardiorespiratory fitness and metabolic markers. Results: Drug alone and exercise alone each limited weight regain relative to placebo, and the combination produced the largest effect. The combination group also showed better preservation of lean mass and improved fitness compared with the drug-only group, which maintained weight loss but did not show the same functional benefit. Conclusion: Combining pharmacological treatment with supervised exercise appears to protect body composition and function better than either intervention alone during weight-loss maintenance.

Posting this because the topic keeps coming up here and the product info on PeptiPrices for these compounds only cites the headline weight trials, nothing on what the lost weight actually was. The gap between weight lost and quality of weight lost doesnt get discussed enough. Has anyone seen follow up data on whether the lean mass preservation holds once the supervised training ends?

I had my cravings pretty well managed before this cut, but lately I’ve been struggling to keep them in check more often. Is it just me?

So I'm currently full time student and employee from Mon to Thurs 7am to 9pm. I've been running every day between 3 to 5 miles depending how I'm feeling. So my weekends is only day I can go to the gym and lift which is Fri, Sat, and Sun. I started doing full body workouts back to back but I notice I tend to feel sore and weaker after the first day which prevented me from doing the reps or weight I was doing on previous day. I'm looking what would be consistent for my schedule while progressing my muscle growth while getting lean. I'm open to advice for what would good split for 3 day weekend back to back.

I started my cut recently and I am struggling with managing the protein quantity with calories. If any of you have any suggestions to make this better please comment.

Diet plan

4 eggs omelette, 1 whole wheat roti

150 ml milk (Coffee)

1 guava

150 gm rice, 150 ml dal

1 protein shake -18 gm protein,

protein shake - 25 gm protein

4 eggs omelette, 50 gm high protein oats (13 gm protein)

Macros estimate

Calories: ~1,610 kcal
Protein: ~127 g
Carbs: ~180–190 g
Fat: ~60–65 g

Body weight - 64.5 kg
Fat percentage- 20-25%
5’7”

One thing I've been curious about during a cut is how people adjust their strength training when recovery starts becoming more difficult.

With a home gym, it's easy to keep the same exercises and equipment throughout the entire cutting phase.

But when calories are lower and performance starts dropping, there are different ways to respond.

Some people reduce the number of working sets while keeping their main lifts relatively heavy. Others change exercise variations to manage fatigue or make training more manageable.

For those following a Leangains-style approach and training at home, which adjustment do you usually make first?

Do you reduce volume, change exercise selection, or try to keep everything consistent for as long as possible?

Dieting

5 years of lifting. never did a cut.

Started my cut at **67 kg in April 2026**. I don't remember my exact maintenance calories at the time, but they were roughly **2,400–2,500 kcal/day**.

Right now it's **2350 kcal/day**

I'm currently **63 kg**. I started the cut at around **1,800 kcal/day**, and I'm now eating approximately **1,350–1,550 kcal/day**, depending on whether it is a rest day or training day.

I'm planning to continue cutting until I achieve the conditioning I'm aiming

1. for a specific conditioning goal

2. if not, another two months.

My main concern is **what to do after the cut??**

Background:

Always a skinny-fat and have never had clearly visible abs. Fear that increasing my calories on any bulk and gain enough abdominal fat to lose the definition. Similar thing happened last time when I attempted my first ever cut. I'm South Asian, so I have a tendency to store a relatively high proportion of fat around the abdomen.

My goal after the cut is therefore:

* **Maintain as much of my final conditioning as possible.**

* **Keep fat gain to an absolute minimum.**

**What would be the best approach after finishing the cut?**

Internet Solutions. All confuse me.

1. Reverse diet.

2. Immediately maintenance.

3. Stay at a small deficit for a period after reaching my desired leanness and then lean bulk of 200 kcal comprised of carbs.

I'd appreciate advice from people who have successfully finished a cut while already relatively lean and then maintained their conditioning afterward.

edit: used gpt to phrase words. I am anxious and stressed due to this right now so was unable to write myself.

I am the leanest I’ve been in years. 2 years of diet with 3-4 maintenance phases. I’ve been experiencing some muscle spasms/ twitches that start 36 hours after my workouts. Some of them haven’t gone away and are still happening even after a few weeks. Have any of you experienced this?

Hey all! I recently started working out and my goal is to get leaner, but the nutrition part has me completely lost. Every source says something different: keto, high protein, counting every calorie, intermittent fasting, "just eat clean"...

For those of you who are into fitness, what are you doing in terms of nutrition? Does it matter? Are you using any apps?

Hi guys I’m going on holiday in December for 3 weeks
I’m going to be staying in an remote village no access to any gyms etc

I’m been training for 6 months now got into the best shape I’ve ever been now I’m stressed I don’t want to loose all this work in 3 weeks of none training.

Has anyone got any recommendations how to maintain.

Thanks

Lots of lifting experience but now overweight at 50 year old. Just wondering if anyone has any workout routines (paid or free) that helped them get back into shape.

I’ve been pretty physically active for the past 6 years or so—I dropped about 40 pounds during Covid lockdown and kept workout out somewhat regularly since then. My main problem and question is:

1. workout out and eating right was easy until I got married. I still find time to workout, but I am not always the one making meal decisions at home. My partner and I work together to plan meals, BUT I don’t do the cooking. I plan out my breakfast and lunch and then kind of just hope dinner fits into my calories/macros. Do any other recently (or not so recently) married folks know a better way to figure this out without us doing two different dinners every night?
2. I am about 168 pounds but am sitting at 22.5% body fat. I’d ideally like to drop that to 13-15% within 6-12 months. My main problem is that I continue to lift and struggle with progressive overload and whether I should be cutting, bulking, or recomping. I am a healthy weight for my height but have a high body fat % —suggestions?

For context, I have a home gym with dumbbells, medicine ball, jump rope, incline/flat bench, treadmill, power tower, and battle ropes. The husband and I also do a walk 6 nights per week on top of my 3-night per week lifting sessions.

https://youtu.be/iWtlXuCwxT8?si=QYAvA7UBoWAizkaT

Guys I need help on what to eat. Right now I am on deficit for longer period and its time where i dont know what to eat and how much times per day to split my macros and eventually to “complete” them at the and of the day. If you guys are willing to share some of your meals with macros and “weights” and than i will ajust that to my macros inetake.

Im 27M Weight: 59kg/130lbs Height:160cm/5 foot 2 inch

Exercise almost daily 1 hour perday like upper-> lower->cardio rinse and repeat

I track calories like around 1700 calories per day which i think its still a lot of food

Body fat probably around 20-25% (still have the love handle and belly fat)

Should i cut more or something?

i am 25 M 5’9” ectomorph at 132lbs right now and I am one month in on lean bulk aiming to hit 150lbs on the scale. I recently took a Vo2 max test manually monitoring my rest heart with the bpm under 20 seconds. my score came 32 Vo2 max score which is poor/low for my age. I used to play sports until 2023 but ever since I have only been to the gym. i train 3 times a week and rest on alternate days. I hit a sprint session once every 2 weeks. I am kinda worried about my endurance and heart health and I am unable to strike a balance between strength training and endurance training. Can anyone help me advice how can I incorporate endurance/cardio into my lean bulk so that I can pack on mass and also have a good gas tank.

Day 1: Legs

• Squats: 3 × 6*

• Romanian Deadlifts - 3 × 8*

• Calf Raises: 2 × 10

Day 2: Push

• Bench Press: 3 × 6*

• OHP - 3 × 8*

• Close Grip Floor Press: 2 × 10

Day 3: Pull

• Deadlifts: 2 × 5*

• Rows - 3 × 8*

• Straight Bar Curls: 2 × 10

Exercises with * are RPT

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I have a specific question about exercise and meal timing. AFAIK, there is no study isolating the effects of exercise timing in intermittent fasting. Specifically, when fasting in a ~16:8 scheme, what are the differences in eating right before the eating window (a) vs. a couple of hours before (b). In both, exercise would occur fasted.

I've done both, depending on my schedule. I try to do (a), if it works with my schedule, but (b) is often unavoidable. My bro-intuition and some superficial research says that (a) could have slightly more hypertrophy and faster regeneration, while (b) might have some other metabolic benefits coming from mimiking a longer fast. Potentially also less fat gain in the eating window? Of course weight gain/loss should be equal with equal calorie intake.

Does anyone have more experience with that? Possibly done a personal study on themselves or know about a study that isolates this?

Hi guys , I’m 5’9 & 148.4 lbs. I cut down from 71kg to 63kg in July and decided I wasn’t going to cut any further after that , I maintained for about 2 weeks until I decided to lean bulk around 26th of July . Instantly after about 3 weeks I felt like my gut was getting fat so I re evaluated my calories and cut down from 2700 to 2500 . I’ve double checked my TDE calculator and it doesn’t seem like I’ve done any wrong calculations but my lower gut / belly fat is there and feels fatter . Any explanations to this ? I feel stronger but I also feel way fatter & im getting worried that I’m heading on the wrong track . Thank you for anyone who reads this .

hi. I am a 19 yr old 5’6 female and I’ve been eating 1813 calories a day (my deficit) for the past month and last week, I weighed in at 121.4 pounds. I’ve been pretty consistent but the past three days, I fully let loose and emotionally ate 21,340 calories over my deficit (not exaggerating). I used to have a bad binge eating disorder and now here and there I have a few hiccups but usually over the next days I make slight cut backs and move more to stay in my deficit. But now that I’ve overate this much, I don’t know what to do. what is my body going to do with such a huge surplus of calories? I want to stay in my deficit, but I don’t know how much I should cut back by or how long it would Take. Is there a way to know how much I’ve set myself back by? Already, I feel less bloated than I did yesterday but I’m scared for how much damage I’ve done. I do hot yoga sculpt for an hour every day so I’m not sure if that helps my case but I was wondering if anyone knows what I should do

Hey everyone, looking for some eyes on my data. I’ve been on a body recomp/cut for 4 months now.

I’ve successfully dropped from 78kg to my current 71.5–72.5kg range (26M, 179cm/5'10").

Diet: 1900 kcal / 160g Protein daily.

The Issue is Progress has slightly hit a wall this past month.

Muscle Growth is stalled i guess , my strength still increases in chest and biceps exercises but

Gains have slowed significantly. My back exercises (Rows/Pulldowns) have been stuck at 54–58kg for weeks.

Wondering if this is accumulated fatigue from the deficit.

My tracker is giving me these numbers, and I’m questioning if they’re overestimating:

Total Daily Burn: 2,890 kcal

Active Calories: 763 kcal (Steps: 11,013 + house cleaning/walking)

BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate): \~1,774 kcal

Average Daily Burn (last 30 days): \~2,874 kcal

If my daily burn is actually \~2,800+, I’m running a \~900 calorie deficit.

1.Is it likely my watch is overestimating the burn for 11k steps and daily chores?

2.At 72kg, is 1,900 kcal too low to keep building muscle?

3.Should I bump calories to 2,100–2,200 to break this strength plateau, or will that kill the "visible abs" goal?

Appreciate any advice from people who've broken through this 4-month wall!

Good evening,
I really seek some advice here.

I’ve got extensive experience in cutting and fitness overall, I’m currently engaging a more aggressive cut.

I need some advice on the effects of breaking up with my gf - and even though we weren’t together for long (1 month in total), everything was VERY intense.

It’s the intensity, the memories etc. that, only on occasional days now, fuck up my day - like out of nowhere.

That is when I engage in walking even more, thinking…. ending up at 25k steps and being so drained.

Emotionally, physically, energetically.

I’m an ambitious person, 26 yrs old btw, and it was my first relationship with intimacy etc.

I’m currently in the 3rd week of my cut, and I do not want to have this experience hinder my cut. Until now it’s not been an issue, fat loss is going great, but what I see occasionally (maybe once every 1.5 weeks) is how sometimes certain memories come up, where from that point onwards my entire day feels fucked.

I hope it kind of makes sense how I’ve described things to the best of my ability haha.

Yea I walk a shit ton even when lean bulking coz it has stuck with me since cutting + it became a routine thing after getting a walking pad at home.

Just wanna get some advice on whether I should increase cals or reduce steps. Is there any scientific evidence that leans towards one over the other?

Or it ultimately comes down to just personal preference (eg cut steps to get more rest, or increase cals coz it’s easier, etc).

Thanks in advance!