Although, I don't love using anything that isn't naturally occurring, when you're in a pinch, protein powders can really come in handy.

You can make an awesome smoothie with protein packed foods like nut butters, coconut milk, greek yogurt and gelatin, but sometimes people want to use a tried and true protein powder.

So, I have set off to find the best ones out there for you. My search had three requirements:

First, the source. I wanted to be sure to find organic products that were concentrates (NOT isolates as they are too acidic and harmful to your health) and whey products from grass-fed cows.

Secondly, I wanted to find products that were created with temperature control in mind. You see, any protein source (I only looked at whey or rice based ones), when it's being made into a nutritionally dense powder version of itself needs to be protected from too high of a temperature. You don't want anything that was exposed to high heats during its production as these high temperatures cause proteins and enzymes to denature and render them useless and toxic.

And, thirdly, I didn't want anything with noxious artificial sweeteners in it.

These are the winners:

Vital Whey Pure Protein Powder

Mercola's Miracel Whey Protein (check out the video on this link too, very informative on the different types of whey protein out there… even though Mercola comes off as too “salesy” to me, he does have great information… and this is a good product.)

Epic Protein Rice Protein Powder