Protein is a necessary part of a balanced diet, for good reason: protein is the key “building block” in virtually every part of your body, from skin, hair and nails, to bones, muscles, teeth, and beyond. It’s important to eat adequate amounts of protein each day because your body does not store it anywhere, so has no reserves if the supply runs out.

Exactly how much protein you need daily depends on your age and body weight. The U.S. RDA (recommended daily allowance) for protein is 0.8 grams of protein for every kilogram of body weight (2.2 pounds) for adults. So if you weigh 175 pounds, that is approximately 79 kilograms, multiplied by 0.8 grams of protein, and your daily minimum should be 63 grams of protein.

The younger you are, the more protein you need per kilogram of body weight. Children, for example, should be getting between 1.0 and 2.2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight.

The good news is that it’s incredibly easy to get enough protein each day, even if you don’t consider yourself to be a meat lover.

Here are three easy ways to eat more protein:

1) Breakfast

For breakfast, an obvious high protein food is egg. Each large egg contains approximately 6 grams of protein. Have two eggs and you’ve just doubled your intake to 12 grams. If you don’t like plain eggs, you could make an omelet, or mix up some egg salad and spread it on whole grain toast.

Eggless breakfast protein meals could include yogurt (usually 8+ grams of protein per cup), cottage cheese with fruit (14+ grams), or peanut butter on whole grain toast (8+ grams).

2) Lunch

Lean chicken breast contains up to 30 grams of protein for a 3.5 ounce serving, and a 6-ounce can of tuna contains about 40 grams of protein.

Other good choices would be cheddar cheese (7 grams per oz.), a turkey burger (22 grams for a 4 oz. patty), or egg salad (if you didn’t already have it for breakfast).

3) Dinner

For dinner, you could have a 6 ounce steak (40 grams of protein), salmon (a 3 oz. serving contains 19 grams of protein) or beans (most common varieties have 10-20 grams of protein per 1 cup serving).

* High Protein Snacks

If you don’t eat a lot of protein during meals, try some of these snack options:

- Sliced turkey (2 oz., 10 grams protein)

- Almonds (1 oz., 5g)

- String cheese (1 oz., 8g)

- Beef jerky (1 oz., 10g)

- Broccoli (1 cup, 4g)

- Brown rice (1 cup, 5g)

If all else fails, you could drink a protein shake or eat a protein bar – but those would be secondary to getting your protein from real, nutritient-packed food.