Taurine Foods and Products
What Is Taurine In? Taurine Foods and Products
According to the FDA, healthy adults are able to synthesize taurine from sulfur-containing amino acids, such as cysteine and methionine. This makes taurine a conditionally essential nutrient, but newborns and those who may be in certain disease states may require dietary supplementation.
Taurine is naturally found in meat and dairy products, which means if you eat a balanced diet, you probably get all you need. It’s found in cow’s milk-based infant formula and may be added as a supplement to non-dairy-based infant formula.
For those who eat both plants and meat, diets have been estimated to provide nine to 400 milligrams of taurine per day. For those on a lacto-avo-vegetarian diet, it’s estimated to be about 17 milligrams per day, while vegan diets indicate zero levels of taurine. The FDA states that individuals with low dietary taurine intake may conserve taurine. So basically, the excretion of taurine through urine is low when taurine is restricted, as in the case of a vegetarian or vegan diet.
What is taurine content in certain foods? Here are a few approximations:
- Meat and poultry — 11 to 306 milligram/100 grams wet weight
- Seafood — 11 to 827 milligrams/100 grams wet weight
- Dairy products — two to eight milligrams/100 milliliters
- Breast milk and infant formula — four to seven milligrams/100 milliliters
Up to 3,000 milligrams per day of taurine in supplement form is considered safe. However, more studies are needed to confirm this. Additionally, your body will excrete excess taurine through the kidneys, but that could put a lot more work on the kidneys than necessary, especially for anyone dealing with kidney failure, something to discuss with your doctor.